(The original text was published on december 8. The author is Andrew Lopez, a pelican accompanying reporter. The content of the article does not represent the translator’s point of view.)
In the 2022-23 season, the new orleans pelicans with brandon ingram, CJ mccolum and zion williamson trio are considered to be one of the best attacking teams in the league.
Ingram scored nearly 24 points in the first two seasons of new orleans, while last season he averaged 22.7 points. Mccolum has scored more than 20 points in seven consecutive seasons and has averaged 24.3 points in 26 matches since pelican got him with a whistle-pressing trade. Williamson is also among the top attacking players in the league when he is in good health.
But if pelicans want to jump from a play-off team to an elite team in the league, they must improve their defense.
Last season, pelican’s defensive efficiency ranked 18th in the league, losing 112.0 points per hundred rounds on average-but williamson was not there at that time, and he missed the entire 2021-22 season because of a fracture in his right foot.
Due to his strong offensive dominance, Williamson has always been regarded as a weak link at the defensive end. In the 2020-21 season, pelican’s defensive efficiency ranked 23rd in the league (113.3); When zion was present, their defensive efficiency was 111.7.
But so far this season, williamson’s aura and defense are different from before, and pelican also has the hope of finally achieving good results.
“You know I have seen something different from before, that is his defensive consciousness, especially for the ball holder.” Ingram once told ESPN before a preseason match against the heat, “it seems that he always remembers trying to do it in his mind. This is of great significance to our team.”
“We know we can score. But if everyone participates in the defense and sets an example for other members of the team, it will be difficult for the opponent to beat us.”
Ingram’s words proved to be predictable. Pelican’s defensive efficiency is already the third in the league, helping them rise to the first in the west. Williamson is one of the main reasons for this improvement.
When you ask Pelican coach Willie Green about Williamson’s defense, he will choose to talk about the team’s overall defense strategy rather than the defensive performance of individual players. When williamson was asked about his own defense, he would choose to avoid answering.
Even after williamson made several key defences against the raptors on november 30, the two still did not answer this question directly.
But at least one Pelican player is willing to give Williamson the praise he deserves.
“Obviously, I have not seen every game of his career. But since I came here, that (he in this competition) is the best he I have ever seen. “Pelican forward larry nance told ESPN one day after defeating the raptors,” everyone can see the offensive performance. But in my opinion, when our team urgently needs someone to stand up and defend, he also sent out four steals and two cap in a very timely manner.”
Nance was obtained from portland trail blazers in the transaction of new orleans in mccolum in February this year. Last season, he only played nine regular season matches after recovering from knee surgery, but he has become an important member of pelican defense system this season.
According to data from the Glass Cleaning, the 2022-23 season nance was playing center for 91 percent of the time, it included 234 minutes of appearance with the top star williamson-the relieve a garrison strategy they implemented at the same time made the latter like a duck to water.
Second Spectrum data tracking shows that this season, when williamson was a defender in the defensive block removal, he gave his opponent an average of 0.85 points after each block removal. This is the sixth place among the 68 players who have defended at least 200 defenders this season.
In the 2020-21 season, as a defender of defense, Williamson gave his opponent an average of 0.96 points after each break, which was closer to the league’s average of 0.99 points.
When Williamson tried his best to block the opponent from shooting, his hit rate against attacking players was. This ranks fifth among the players who have completed at least 10 times of this kind of defense in this season.
“Most of the time, he is the one who will be attracted to arch top by his opponent and targeted by a single beater, because they want to exhaust him, he was forced not to play his own level on the offensive side.” Nance said, “so if we can get him to play some rounds in front of the camera, it’s like saying to the opponent, ‘hey, watch, I’m not that kind of person. You can find anyone you want. Don’t come to me. I’m not that kind of person. ‘, then he will be liberated in the future and release more power when attacking.”
Nance is a center with relieve a garrison capability, and Pelican also makes good use of this. In general, pelicans now use 29.6 percent of relieve a garrison (ranked 10th in the league) when facing the removal of the ball, which is higher than 19.5 percent (ranked 22th in the league) last season.
When Pelican’s starting center Volan chunas was present, they had 18.4 percent of the time at relieve a garrison. When Nance was present, the number would soar to 39.5 percent.
“(Relieve a garrison) added a new level to the game, making both the opponent coach and the player have to consider it.” Nance said, “some teams with the highest level of relieve a garrison are also the teams with the highest defensive level in the past few years-Boston, Jinzhou.”
“They all have the kind of players who can really go from the number one defense to the number five. There are also me, Zion and an uncertain number of defenders in our squad, because we have to relieve a garrison with these defenders.”
In the past quarter of the season, only milwaukee bucks and cleveland cavaliers have better defensive efficiency than new orleans (losing 107.6 points per hundred rounds on average).
This weekend, the western top Pelicans and their defense will be tested twice by the visiting Phoenix Sun. Phoenix has the second most offensive efficiency in the league, and he scored more than 120 points in four of the five games before his big defeat to Celtics on Wednesday.
Sun was also the team that ended pelican’s fun playoff trip last season. At that time, pelican quietly entered the additional competition area as the ninth place in the west, then defeated the san antonio Homa thorn and the los angeles clippers, and got the qualification of no. 8 seed. They and the sun were eliminated after six battles in the first round.
Now, since pelicans are on the rise, the next two matches against the sun can test how much progress they have made, especially on defense.
Second-grade forward Herbert Jones plays against the best outside player in the opponent’s array every night. Last season, the average number of times he changed the course of the ball, the number of offensive fouls and the number of times he tried his best to block the opponent’s shooting were the highest in the team, he was almost selected as the NBA’s best defensive team as a rookie.
Nance and jose alvarado are both examples of pelican the replacements. They all played an important role in the two teams with the highest net efficiency this season (at least 20 minutes). The net efficiency of any two of them and other teammates (at least 100 minutes) can be ranked in the top eight in the team; And when the two of them are together, net efficiency is the third (21.1) in the team.
The diversity of the lineup-you can choose to play a small lineup or a large lineup, relieve a garrison or not relieve a garrison-is essential to the goals pelican wants to achieve this year.
“I think our growth, understanding of tactical concepts and focus on details are attributed to our coaching team.” Mccolum said, “After that, all we have to do is to go on the court and display what we have learned, help each other while working hard, and communicate with each other effectively.”
But Pelican’s defensive luck is also good. The number of times they let their opponents throw three-point goals is the sixth in the league, but the third-point shooting rate of their opponents is the worst 32.7 percent in the league.
Judging from the shot probability measure (gSP) calculated by Second Spectrum, pelican’s opponents expect a three-point hit rate of 35.5 percent, which is nearly three percentage points higher than the actual hit rate. This difference is the second largest in the league this season.
Despite this, Pelicans still think that their defensive progress is not an illusion.
“I think we are all excited about the current position of the team.” Green said, “we have done a lot of useful things on the defensive side. There are several points we can continue to improve; But in most aspects, I think we are doing well.”
The pelican team will continue to defend in unity. As for attack, they already have a balanced approach. They have six players with double-digit scores on average, and two other players close to this standard-alvarado (9.6 points on average) and nance (8.9 points on average).
However, the Pelican three giants-Williamson, Ingram and mccolum-all scored lower than their career average. Nance said that this was because they were more involved in defense on the court.
“Sacrifice has many ways of expression.” He said, “for example, there are players in our team who cannot play, and there are also players who undertake different roles. For CJ, Brandon and even Zion, sacrifice may be to invest a little less energy on the offensive side and increase concentration on the defensive side. At this point, they did a great job.”
“I think the more we combine all these and look at them from an overall perspective, the more terrible we will become in the future.”
Original: Andrew Lopez
Compilation: asteroid falling
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