re: Zach Lowe splashes a little cold water on Pels

I agree with a lot of what you're saying, but you ARE talking about ways to cover up sub-par natural shooting and help it improve.

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If no one can shoot, teams can easily double up and clog the paint.

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I think that's going to happen anyway though. If you had to choose between stopping Zion getting to the basket and shooting 74.4% or 34.4% 3 point shooter and board favorite Myles Turner taking a 3, the math says stop Zion. A Zion shot within 3 feet is worth 1.49 points, that Turner 3 is worth 1.03.

You'd have to be a 49.6% 3 point shooter to be as big of a threat as Zion in the paint. Likewise, you'd need a really good 3 point shooter out there to not want Zion taking that shot.

Zion can’t take 90 shots a game though.

And like any player, Zion’s efficiency drops when he has defenders surrounding him. Dropping down to 54% when he has tight coverage. His efficiency drops down to 48% if he is holding the ball for more than 2 to 6 seconds.

The idea with spacing is that you have efficient outlets if penetration is stopped, and you have players that through motion, screens, and other actions and their gravity allow guys like Zion to better get into that ideal low post position or create the conditions for Zion to operate as close to his maximum efficiency as possible. To efficiently score on possessions Zion can’t operate under optimal conditions. When you lack those conditions you allow defenders to tighten up and chip away at your star players efficiency, and you lack the counterweights to make them pay for doing so.

That’s a start. A further start would be other guys with multi level scoring so if your other star is getting doubled or having an off night, you are not having a completely shrunk floor that is harming your best players efficiency(not to mention creating additional wear and tear on their bodies by allowing so much defensive focus on them).

It’s like some of you all are actually trying to talk yourself into the idea that this team would be no better off if we replaced Bledsoe’s abysmal 26% catch and shooting with a guard like Chris Paul or replaced Lonzo with a more dynamic scorer/facilitator like Brogdon, or instead of Adams we had a big with the spacing capability of Kat or Al Horford.

By some of your all’s reflexively defensive talk you would think this is a dynastic championship contender we are about to field this season.

Nope. Not at all. We’re talking regular season. Anything in the playoffs should they make it there is a bonus.

I don’t expect Bledsoe to be trigger happy at the 3, I expect him to dribble penetrate to score or force defenses to become off balance creating chaos.

If Ball’s shot picks up from last season, it’s all moot point as a lot of “worry” is stemming from the belief that Ball’s shot is a mirage.

I am under no delusions that the team to shoot anywhere near the volume of 3s they did last season but the balance here will be more quality shots from deep. Denver, OKC, and even Milwaukee were not explosive from deep but they took a lot of quality shots from deep and made enough of them to be in the middle of the pack where I expect this team to be this season.

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Zion can’t take 90 shots a game though.

And like any player, Zion’s efficiency drops when he has defenders surrounding him. Dropping down to 54% when he has tight coverage. His efficiency drops down to 48% if he is holding the ball for more than 2 to 6 seconds.

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the point he's making is that the lane will be clogged regardless as long as Zion is out there, and these numbers you posted prove that even more. Every team understands that he has to be stopped at all costs. You leave him one on one with the ball or don't show help when he cuts, he's going to kill you.

Bledsoe's shooting is near what Jrue's was, but one thing he's actually better at than Jrue is driving to the goal. He has a higher FG% as well as a higher foul rate on drives than Jrue did.
Lonzo and BI are both capable of hitting wide open 3's at 40% rates, and everyone knows what JJ is capable of.


SOmethign that is underrated in todays game is the ability to set a good pick, and Adams is one of the best at that. Setting a pick for Bledsoe/BI and creating a mismatch immediately, or making the rest of the defense sag to help off the pick creates wide open guys on the perimeter. Just b/c you kick it out to the perimeter doesn't mean you have to shoot it. That's somethign NAW learned in the bubble, and you saw him driving to the goal b/c it was easy to get around your defender when he's running to close out on you b/c the defense is imbalanced. You keep the defense imbalanced and running around after that initial pick and you're going to have open lanes to the goal with the correct ball movement and penetration.

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the point he's making is that the lane will be clogged regardless as long as Zion is out there, and these numbers you posted prove that even more. Every team understands that he has to be stopped at all costs. You leave him one on one with the ball or don't show help when he cuts, he's going to kill you.

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And the point I’m making is that when you contextualize the numbers, spacing does matter. Because a good spacer is in fact the better option than a draped Zion or a draped Zion holding the ball more than 2 or more seconds in a half court.

And I wish people would stop this nonsense about Jrue and Bledsoe being similar shooters. Bledsoe shot an abysmal 26% on catch and shoot threes, 38% on pull ups, but he takes them infrequently and connects with them less than one a game. Meanwhile Jrue is a 36% catch and shoot player and 34% on pull ups. Of which he connects on both over twice a game to Bledsoe’s barely one.

And setting great picks is great, but you need guys that can hit those shots reliably. Not sure why it’s controversial to say we would be better off with great picks and good shooters on units with great spacing vs great picks and below average spacing units.

To be clear I wasn’t even arguing Center, that’s Bronc. Adams and Zion can work together fine.

I’ve long held that Ball and Jrue were not good fits and they needed to trade one to find a better fit, aka a guy that could shoot or pull up off the dribble consistently.

And we are in the same boat with Bledsoe/Ball. One of our starting Guards has to be that guy and in my opinion neither are.

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With regard to a Turner style stretch 5 though, I don't believe teams are going to bite and think you can be just as effective with a mobile center than can flash to the right spot to give Zion a dump off target and hit a 10 foot jumper.

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Agree here. Just because a guy shoots 39% instead of 35%, doesnt mean they provide any more spacing. E'Twaun Moore had great 3P%, but did not provide much in terms of spacing because he was relatively static and his wind up meant teams could sag off and still close out enough to affect the shot.

I don't want to add "shooters" who do not provide gravity just because of %'s. The difference between a 35% shooter and 40% shooter is .15 pts per shot. That is a 1.5 pts per game advantage if they take 10 per game (which they don't). A guy like Tony Snell shoots ~40% of his 3's, plays average defense at 6'7", and gets paid a bit over MLE money, but is on his 3rd team in 3 years and teams pay to get rid of his contract because he doesn't add much else and like Moore is a somewhat slow and reluctant shooter.

Bledsoe's C&S % will hurt, but his pull up % may help and he can replace a better % of Jrue's production than anyone we could have gotten in FA. He's also not a long term piece of this team. This roster will evolve as Zion and BI grow. We have the assets and clean enough books to add multi-dimensional shooters later.

People seem to be getting upset, but this year is a mini-reset. Pels want to win and a shot at the play-in is probably realistic, but the FO used the offseason to acquire assets and signaled they will take their time constructing the team. The Adams move was questionable (I still don't love it), but I am willing to give Griff the benefit of the doubt until we have at least a half season to evaluate whether the "little things" he does to impact games leads to meaningful benefits for the Pels.

I think this is a very tough argument. Your argument is kinda based off Lonzo, BI, and Zion taking minimal steps forward. You are claiming their success will depend a lot on Adams/ Bledsoe + their shooting/ spacing abilities. If all these players have solid chemistry then I can easily see Bledsoe/ Adams getting better in this system, which in return helps our core.

Favors couldn't make a contested layup last year and Jrue wasn't exactly a sharpshooter. Having Adams spacing and size should automatically add more points and open up the court. Bledsoe can shoot more efficiently on our team with a better role than the Bucks and hopefully a fresh start.

No one can argue with you because you are kinda saying that Bledsoe and Adams aren't the best guys we can get for spacing, shooting, etc. But they are actually pretty good at those things and your argument then is that even if they are good at those things Lonzo, Zion, etc will still struggle.