Bibby's and Webber's defense

[bozzwell]

You are the one who manufactured this little topic in order to take shots at a player, not me. Peja generally takes care of his own man. However he is next to worthless as a help defender. What has changed for us is that post injuries Webber has descended to that level himself. He is no longer an interior defensive presence (and he was never Deke to begin with), and he can no longer cover for all of our pasty groundbound slugs the way he once did. So where is the extra help going to come from? Brad? He might as well be 6'6" on defense. Darius? Ditto. Peja? Of course not. We used to be unathletic and groundbound at two of the three frontcourt postions, now its all three. If ANY one of our frontcourt types had hops and the desire to use them, he could cover for everyone else. But Webb was it. And he just can't anymore. And that's a problem. And its not one that can be solved with or current personnel.

You picked a wrong game to make a stand on defensive issues, too. Kings really played D in the first quarter and in a number of very brief bursts (mainly when Suns would take a lead or threaten to increase it) and on each occasion Pedja was very prominent in help defense and even Bibby had a key stop (block on Q I believe). Webber gave what looked like stupid foul (it wasn't) just so he can call a huddle and (I guess) point out blown defensive plays. All of that leads me to believe that Kings players know what it takes to play D, however it is either of their choosing or some other reason that is not obvious to me that some/most of the time they just don't D up.

Myth of defense as currently promulgated by the talking heads on ESPN/TNT and on most basketball forums (including those outside NBA/USA) is balony. Any player who is good/athletic enough to make NBA roster can be thought how to play good defense. You can't be thought size, lenght and blocking but pretty much everything else is doable. Schemes and special tasks can be devised to cpmpensate for the lack of speed, athleticism or other areas where team is at a distinct disatvantage. i've seen Kings and Rick do all of the above. Never on a consistent basis though. Not our game. However, unlike Dallas and Suns we can crank it up when really, really necessary.

No need to dump on Chris, Mike, Pedja or Brad.

(BTW, how come nobody is revisiting claims that Cat is an underrated defender?)

 

[KP]

You picked a wrong game to make a stand on defensive issues, too. Kings really played D in the first quarter and in a number of very brief bursts (mainly when Suns would take a lead or threaten to increase it) and on each occasion Pedja was very prominent in help defense and even Bibby had a key stop (block on Q I believe). Webber gave what looked like stupid foul (it wasn't) just so he can call a huddle and (I guess) point out blown defensive plays. All of that leads me to believe that Kings players know what it takes to play D, however it is either of their choosing or some other reason that is not obvious to me that some/most of the time they just don't D up.

Myth of defense as currently promulgated by the talking heads on ESPN/TNT and on most basketball forums (including those outside NBA/USA) is balony. Any player who is good/athletic enough to make NBA roster can be thought how to play good defense. You can't be thought size, lenght and blocking but pretty much everything else is doable. Schemes and special tasks can be devised to cpmpensate for the lack of speed, athleticism or other areas where team is at a distinct disatvantage. i've seen Kings and Rick do all of the above. Never on a consistent basis though. Not our game. However, unlike Dallas and Suns we can crank it up when really, really necessary.

No need to dump on Chris, Mike, Pedja or Brad.

(BTW, how come nobody is revisiting claims that Cat is an underrated defender?)

Yeah, Peja had some good steals that lead to transition baskets for us. I think the suns have the most potent offense in the league though, it's kinda hard to get to down on the Kings defensively when they are playing against those guys. We knew we would give up a lot of transition/fast break pts. They are just way faster in Transition than we are, or any other team is for that matter.