Details and Odds and Ends

First off, take 15 minutes out of your day and watch the above video. I’ve been watching LeBron James obsessively for literally half of my life, and there’s stuff there I’ve never noticed. The attention to how finishing is more than just athleticism is enough to recommend it, but there’s a breakdown of his post moves with comparison to footage of other players and his training with Hakeem, a look at what makes his first step so successful, and even subtle things he does on the court to avoid injury. I would never have been able to tell you about the quality of LeBron James’ shin angles before watching that video.

Some other stuff from the early goings-on in the league:

— We have to think about James Harden putting up absolute video-game numbers while scoring efficiently. It’s a ridiculous thing. Harden has always been discounted because of his defense, and it’s true that the Rockets don’t play any defense. The question is how much of the blame for the latter should be placed in Harden’s lap.

Here’s what I’d say: Isiah Thomas is one of the great point guards of all time, but when looking at his efficiency numbers, he doesn’t come close to matching his legend. However, when you consider that his Pistons teams were built around defense, and all of their resources were allocated to defense. (Example: they replaced Adrian Dantley, who combined scoring and scoring efficiently as well as just about anybody, with Dennis Rodman, who didn’t play offense, in the starting lineup, and eventually traded the former.) This meant that Isiah had to create more than he would have liked to in an ideal situation, and his efficiency suffered as a result. Harden’s Rockets, on the other hand, have all of their resources allocated towards offense, and their offense is completely built around putting Harden in the best position to succeed as possible.

In short, I don’t hold the Rockets’ poor defense against Harden as much as most do, because most good teams should be able to hide a wing player on defense, even a Vine star like Harden. (Heck, LeBron has spent a good portion of the last few regular seasons cantering for most of the game on defense.) However, I do think that Harden is the beneficiary of a system that allows him to be incredibly successful at the expense of a strategy that would ultimately make his team an actual contender.

— Holy Christ, how do you stop Kevin Durant right now? He’s averaging 28 a game, and his True Shooting is right up at 70%. 70%! With that spacing, in that offense, you either have to leave him alone, where he’ll drain an open jumper, close out on him, where he’ll blow by you, or switch at him, where he’ll take a smaller guy down to the post and drain an easy fadeaway over him or cross up a big man. Do you let him get his free 28 a game, or do you throw doubles and traps at him and risk opening up Steph, Klay, and the rest of the bunch, especially when Durant starts to learn when to pass in that triangle? It’s a question the Cavs are going to have to consider at some point.

— Speaking of the Triangle “Are the Knicks running the triangle?” is the stupidest running story in the NBA. After the season opener, the Inside the NBA crew was talking about how the Knicks shouldn’t be running the triangle, and saying that it had only been effective with the Bulls and Lakers, ignoring that the Warriors have been running a form of the triangle and being the best offense in basketball for the past few years and, more importantly, that the Knicks aren’t running everything. They look like five guys in one of those movies where everyone wakes up in the same room together with no memory of how they got there and only know that they will have to work together somehow. Basically, if the movie Cube was an offense, that’s what the Knicks are running.

Yes, there is a story about how Phil Jackson thinks that running the triangle and finding players who will be successful in the triangle will give him advantage against the rest of the league when that is clearly not the case. It’s like Moneyball, only the opposite.

— Speaking of the Knicks, sometimes I think about the 76ers with Embiid, Kristaps, Noel and Saric coming off the bench, their pick and the Lakers’ top-3 protected pick coming in the next draft, Simmons (who is right-handed) in the pipeline, and free-agency money, and I cry inside. Kristaps and Embiid together would be so glorious.

— Speaking of the Lakers, it’s hilarious to see “maybe Kobe was holding the Lakers back” headlines. Let’s see. Kobe took 17 shots a game, make 36% of them, played no defense, didn’t pass, had the league’s biggest contract, and the Lakers, who were terrible, were an astonishing 9.6 points per 100 possessions worse with him on the floor. There is no possible human way, knowing what we know about basketball and math, that Kobe did not make the Lakers worse last season. He had a great career, he didn’t give himself that contract, and he wasn’t Byron Scott, but come on.

— Speaking of Byron Scott, after LeBron left there were people on this site saying “if only Byron Scott was the coach when LeBron was here.” You know who you are. (I don’t, I forget. But I remember people saying that.)

— Get the good big men in the league on good teams. Please.

— DeMar DeRozan can’t keep doing this, right? Everything I know about long twos says this has to end. He’s like the John Henry of the mid-range jumper right now, swinging that hammer as the steam engine that is the 3-point shot churns behind him.

— Okay, that’s a quick 1,000 words for you. Enjoy your Friday and your weekend, and a win against the Wizards would be nice. I’ve never forgiven that team/fanbase for how they acted during the Cavs/Wizards “rivalry” the first time LeBron was here.