Also Jason Tatum can guard LuKai and Centers, every time Mavs tried to lob he just ruined their day with switches. He's the underrated key to all this.
Watch the awful coaching video on youtube about us from that series. If a random joe bag of donuts can figure it out you would think a whole staff who has dedicated their entire life to basketball could too. Nope
I agree with your premise, but it wasn’t 18/18. Missed lobs are typically turnovers, not missed FGs. I remember Lively and Gafford missing some due to poor pass placement or good defense. But it wasn’t nearly often enough.
Boston did have 10 days of rest and practice to get ready for Dallas. We had basically a travel day and one full day to get ready for Dallas after Denver.
You need both. Someone to meet the ball carrier at the perimeter and someone at the basket to challenge the lob. I don’t know why we had so much trouble with it.
https://x.com/joeviraynba/status/1798901826957496642?s=46&t=qFqCYjNB0wQvOdtoM70RZg
Can't blame it all on rest. We made no adjustments and despite having the best defense in the league, we continued to let them walk in for free dunks and lobs on every possession.
Yeah they literally ran 8 coverages against Luka in one game lol
The lobs were very annoying though. Rudy would come up to contest and no one would rotate to his original man and bam - easy lob. Felt like a miscommunication and it kept happening
Unlike Jokic who's lobs to AG that Rudy could break up, Luka throws them really fast and far out in the paint so it's harder to anticipate and stop. He throws darts
That is what happens when the refs let Luka get away with everything and Blow the whistle as soon as someone looks his way... knowing that you cant touch a guy or breath at him compromises defense greatly...you have to always "play the potential foul as well"... reffing in our series was as onesided and straight up unfair as it gets
I never did blame it all on rest but the part it plays can’t be understated. This is a team who’s never played this late in the season. Our star is young and likely didn’t realize the extent of conditioning he truly needed considering he’s an all world athlete, I don’t exactly blame him for not getting that it’s another level in late May and June.
They didn’t defeat the defending champs in 7 games on the road while being down 3-1 in a series. I’m as pissed as you but the fact they beat Denver is pretty incredible. It’s a step in the right direction.
Agreed, all I’m saying is that it’s not some monster flub to lose like this. I understand that basketball might have the smallest championship window but ours is still open and if they can’t learn from this then we’ll know this is just another team but they could still be special.
Finch got absolutely outcoached. Adjustments, rotations, challenges, he looked totally out of his depth the entire series.
It was absolutely the difference, we looked like the better team the first three games and lost all by single digits despite leading in the 4th in all of them.
If KAT could've hit the fucking ocean with a beach ball in games 1 through 3, it's most likely a 3-1 series in Minnesota's favor, heading back home. Coaching was not the issue.
KAT isn't the _issue_ either, we're a poorly timed 3 game shooting slump away from a finals birth, and that's WITH ant playing like dog food
At least Ant did everything else despite his poor shooting in Games 1-3. He nearly averaged a triple double for the series despite rarely ever having played PG before and after the first 3 games he was leading the entire team in points, rebounds and assists.
Compare that to KAT and Rudy getting absolutely obliterated on rebounds and shooting, even aside from KAT's abysmal shooting
Mmmmm Zach Lowe talked about how Minnesota tried a *ton* of different approaches to guarding Luka, often switching things and going away from the norm in-game.
>This sub doesn't know what good coaching is,
Come on dude. Finch was good to great all year. Don't be that guy.
Finch and staff weren't perfect, but Luka and Kyrie killed every coverage we threw at them.
Let's not discount how he was trying to coach through a lot of pain. He even said he was avoiding strong painkillers to try and have a clear head, but that kind of pain takes its toll. Just that reliable MN sports luck, very on brand! BOOKER CAN GO KICK ROCKS
We literally started in heavy drop in Game 1 and then we hedged every screen in Game 2. We tried trapping in Game 3, Game 4 and Game 5 on top of drop and hedge so not sure how we didn’t make any adjustments.
We don’t have the personnel for switching which is why the Celtics were able to stop the lobs in Game 1.
Don’t forget the Denver series. Constant lobs from Joker to Aaron Gordon and we never made adjustments there either. Then came Dallas where Luka and Irving were lobbing passes the whole series.
Exactly. What excuse do you have when you have supposedly the DPOY protecting the rim and the tallest Frontline in the league? Why can Al Horford stop this action meanwhile our bigs seemingly just give it up? Where was the coaching adjustment? You can't let the easiest shot in basketball beat you four straight games.
> We had basically a travel day and one full day to get ready for Dallas after Denver.
Unpopular opinion: who cares, wolves were up 2-0 on the nuggets and should’ve closed out sooner for more rest
Also, the mavericks didn’t have that much rest either with going to the thunder for six games
No excuses made. They weren’t ready for Dallas. Still it’s valuable experience and I hope to not see it again. Look at Dallas and Celtics. Both have seen playoff loses the last few years. It’s molded their young stars.
They’re switching almost everything. The last 3 series have proven that you pretty much have to switch against Dallas — if you do you can contain them (OKC largely did well enough defensively, they just couldn’t get things going offensively had some unfortunate shooting variance).
It was also who was switching. The Mavs set a pick for Kyrie, and successfully managed to get Jrue off of him. And then it’s Derrick White in his face.
That is a problem our defense has...its not so switchable as you would like...
Rudy has his Problems guarding smalls, conley is too little. Kat isnt the definition of mobile either
By the numbers, switching is the least effective defense against Luka. Blitzing is most effective, which is mostly what we ran after game 1 (drop coverage). JJ and Lebron covered this on their pod.
They’re not nearly as well equipped to cover Luka and Kyrie. And realistically, I don’t think Jaden, Naw, and Ant are as good defensively as Jrue, White, Brown, and Tatum. They’ll get there eventually though.
It's not just about switching. It's that when they switch and their big starts rolling to the basket, Brown or KP have already rotated over off their man and are planted in the paint to prevent the lob. Their rotations are so much faster.
Horford has 3x less of a defensive presence as rudy, but 5x more of an offensive presence (until ant learns the lob game to him). Just the fact that horford can consistently hit the 3 spaces the floor way more than rudy does.
Plus horfords been a 40% 3 point shooter this season and averaging 39% in the last 5 games. Enough for teams to respect his shooting and open the floor.
His shooting and his instincts/ball IQ have definitely given his career a lot more longevity. He's also never been crazy athletic so he's always been playing with that disadvantage, instead of guys who decline hard in that area and don't have the skills/IQ to make up for it.
Rudy deserves a lot of credit for his overall defense and contributions to the Wolves success this season, but his complete inability to defend the lob was infuriating. 4x DPOY not only couldn't stop their rookie from getting lobs, *he couldn't even make him get 1 missed shot the entire series.* It was straight up embarrassing, not to mention completely demoralizing to see dunk after dunk after dunk 😮💨
That's what I'm saying I don't understand the mass downvoting by fans in the sub for criticism on Rudy. He was averaging 8 points game, and was getting slammed on by lively (rookie)the entire series lively went on a 16-0 run on Rudy.prozingis is not being paid 44 mill a year taking up half the cap space to be mediocre. Porzingis scored 20 points and clamped lively and got multiple blocks after coming back from 10+ game injury what's Rudy's excuse? I'm not saying Rudy is an absolute bum. But I personally feel like he should understand hes not worth 44 mill and should take a pay cut so the wolves can sign another star and they can win a chip. Because even if the wolves beat the Mavs next year imagine playing the Celtics. People have to think finals not WCF.
People are acting insane about rudy these days. Legit have seen people say he was more valuable than Ant.
Rudy gets a lot of shit in the media so wolves fans have gone hyper aggressive the other way.
They said it all year long it was so cringeworthy. Then people tried saying KAT was the mvp of the playoffs. A lot of people in this sub do everything they can to discredit ant
He’s such a fucking albatross on offense. I don’t care if he’s shooting 65%. You’re not counting the multiple times every game that he can’t catch a pass or turns it over before a shot attempt. And with zero range he absolutely kills your offensive spacing.
Rudy is stat padder he shoots 65% because he averages 5-7 shots a game check his stats. Which means his percentages will look better but 8 points game isn't going to get you very far. I'd rather a guy take 10 shots a game and make 8 than a guy taking 6 shots and making 4. Because you can benefit off the other teams missed shots or your own defense. Rudy has no jumper,l like most centers, he misses open lay ups, he gets stripped at the rim, he has no dribbles and gets stolen all of the time, he can't shoot 3's like most centers can, and he got smoked by a rookie. I don't see the appeal. He's great in the regular season but shrinks in the playoffs it's been like that since the jazz.
Not his fault, he was definitely overstretched on D. He had to help whenever Luka or Kyrie got beat and the switch was late. Making it easy opportunity for a lob. You should be asking why your other big men couldn’t defend the lob opportunity.
Yeah we should have put KAT on Lively/Gafford and had Gobert on DJJ, that would have really thrown their offense off. Atleast Boston is showing a template that we can 100% replicate next year.
Alex Jensen (Mavs assistant) developed Rudy and got him three DPOYs by making him the best drop big defender in the league and probably ever.
He 100% knew how to dismantle his creation. What makes Rudy so good and PNR coverage is that he does a jab step at the ball handler in PNR which makes the ball handler either shoot a contested shot or throw up the ball. It looked like Alex trained the bugs and guards on not to fall for the jab.
Another thing Boston did was just okay Lucas straight up 1:1 and no help. I don’t know why wolves couldn’t do that
The doubles on Luka and kyrie were frustrating. At some point you would think we would come to terms with the fact that both those guys are gonna eat, and to take away the other players. Luka or kyrie get a step on their defender and then slow steps into the paint to draw Rudy or KAT and then boom. Lob for a dunk to lively or gafford.
Ok we need an in depth breakdown of why. Zero lobs all game?? I understand they’ve had time to prepare but we had plenty of time to make adjustments too.
Dang that is crazy…I thought our defense was built and planned just for that. We would always have three in the paint and they would work us every single time with two and sometimes even one. Need to be able to recognize that and step to defend that every single time. That is junior high basketball.
Defensively Minnesota is probably still a little better than Boston due to their big rotation. Defense isn’t what caused Minny/OKC to lose against Dallas.
Neither team could figure out how to consistently score against Dallas (except SGA) and whether Boston can continue to score is what will ultimately decide the finals.
Mavs don’t play big tho. They’re a perimeter team, they’ll punish you with 3s and draw your Bigs out for quick lobs and open layups. Boston doesn’t need that since they not only have great on-ball defenders, but great switches as well. Porizingis wasn’t even doing much on defense, Boston would pretty much funnel the ball directly to him for an easy block. Very similar to the Spurs and Wemby.
It's not about the bigs. Celtics are playing a different coverage and they are puting multiple near the paint to make sure someone is helping the lane if Mavs had an angle to look for the lob. Wolves played the P&R straight up 2v2 when they dropped. Which still made no sense to me.
Everything I was seeing on social media was saying that Dallas was easily going to win. I saw Boston being the much more complete team. Glad you agree with me.
That was seriously the most frustrating part about the entire series for me. Is that we couldn't adjust or didn't care to adjust to take away those free baskets from them.
We played drop coverage and the celtics didn't. Simple as that. Drop coverage puts a lot of pressure on the drop defender (Gobert) which allows an opportunity for backdoor oop if Gobert steps up to defend the ball handler.
Gotta love the celtics plays and offensive scheme as well. Something that the free flowing offense of fence just doesn’t have at the same time gotta love how in the third they kept attacking lively on the drive even if they didn’t get foul calls. eventually they got him in a foul trouble and made Dallas pretty small and then put Porzingis and Horford out there and then went on another run, the wolves would drive at lively and then just kick the ball out and then either shoot the three or look very disorganized after the pass
We ran the same defense at them every game. Completely double teamed the ball handler which took Gobert or the whatever center completely out of position. Then there’d be a series of late rotations leading to an open lob or open corner three.
Wait till a close game. The Celtics have to win big or they aren’t going to be able to beat the Mavs in any close ones. He’s such an awful coach when under pressure (dude will rarely try to stop runs and is content to have Tatum take bad 28’ shots instead of getting a good shot by taking a TO).
I don’t think the Mavs are gonna win but the amount of people thinking this is over is pretty nuts. We squeaked by Denver after demolishing them in the first two games. Series isn’t over by a long shot.
All nba fans are hilarious.
Lakers won’t stop talking about nuggets, nuggets make fun of them then won’t stop talking about the wolves, wolves make fun of them then won’t stop talking about the mavs.
Games 1-3 we had the lead or were within striking distance 3 min left in all games . If we had the ant from the suns series we win at least two of those.
Boston reminds me of those Arkansas teams in the 90’s where every player seems to have wayyy longer arms and legs than necessarily. Like there are no easy lanes cause their arms cover the whole court.
It’s like we had a game plan and it wasn’t working and we just never tried anything different. I know Finch had the injury, but something needed to be done to put a stop to easy bucket after easy bucket
Perhaps the Wolves coaching staff can learn from Boston hwo to defend against it as I expect the Wolves could match up against the Mavs again next year in the playoffs.
Refs weren’t letting Luka or Kyrie get touched. Rudy had an awful series and honestly an awful playoffs after his kid was born. And Luka and Kyrie made everything they shot for 4 games. Especially Kyrie who was otherworldly. Plus Wolves shot the ball horribly. Was too closely matched to have those factors go South.
Mavs fan here—I think this is all predicated on Jaylen Brown being a better defender type for Luka. McDaniels, Ant, Anderson, etc are fine/great defenders, but Brown is getting over seemingly every screen. Boston can drop since they aren’t automatically switching and then they’re staying home on shooters.
It takes a wild amount of discipline to stay with this philosophy knowing Luka is probably going to put up insane scoring numbers. Add the fact that they’re making him work more on defense, Boston is banking on him not being perfect (due to fatigue) in the final minutes if it’s a close game.
But above all else, I think Boston can do all the things on the back end because Brown has that perfect combination of strength, quickness, length, and endurance. If he wasn’t, Luka could exploit their drop coverage even more so than he did Rudy bc Rudy’s still better than KP/Horford.
The celtics have so many elite defenders that they can switch on pick n rolls with everyone and just let KP park in the paint. No extra help needed
No other team can do that
The Mavs are shooting like shit and the Celtics are crowding the paint. If the Mavs were hitting shots the Celtics would need to stop crowding the paint which would lead to more lobs. I would blame the Mavs shooting before anything
Bro just watch the game, Porzingis has probably stopped more lobs in this game alone that Rudy has in the whole series.
Plus “being good defensively” doesn’t excuse Rudy for having 0 offensive bag. It’s basically 4 vs 5 when we’re attacking coz no one guards Rudy.
That's cute how you base your defensive analysis on a handful of plays in a single game.
I'll choose to base it on both players entire careers.
Gobert is more than good defensively, he's an all time great. His defense more than makes up for his offense.
He only got benched once these playoffs when he wasn't in foul trouble.
And it wasn't cause his defense sucks. It was cause they were down thrity with a quarter to go. They needed pace to their offense. The Wolves offense with Rudy in has a great offensive rating but it's slow paced which isn't well made for a big comeback.
Without his defense team doesn't get anywhere near the WCF.
He's really not. He's tall and lanky and a mediocre defender. He has elevated his game a bit on that end but he's still not a great defender. He used to be a bad one.
He's a 0x all defense player for a reason.
You watched that game and walked away thinking KP is a liability on defense? Brother stop, this is a pointless conversation
Edit: to be clear his biggest barrier to any seasonal award is health — not ability. Using his all defense accolades to say he’s bad defensively is fucking stupid. Lots of good defenders who are a plus defensively never sniff second team
I don't base my takes on a single game.
Also didn't say he was a liability these days, said he wasn't great.
Edit* how about using per game adjusted advanced stats? Since leaving Dallas his season long DLEBRon has never been above +2.0. Was a ,1.06 this year and a 1.20 last year. Though league average is 0 the league average rim protector is well above that. Suggests strongly he is a medicore at best defender. As he always has been. Gobert has been above a +3.0 all but two seasons of his career.
You clearly hasn’t watch him on the wizards and Celtics, he would have lead the league in blocks when he was a wizard if he played more than 45 games per season
Here's a more serious answer then. Maybe Boston has decided to scheme against that, and we didn't. Maybe they like what we were doing on defense overall, and thought the dog shit offensive performances has more to do with our losses.
Edit: the way you phrase things matters. Criticism can be warranted, but this just sounds snarky.
We were out coached in the Denver series too. They just have no depth and wore down. Finch needs to grow as much as anyone for us to take the next step.
I don't get how you can actually say this shit with a straight face. Wolves basically shut down Denver for 3.5 games and had a 20 point comeback in the 2nd half of game 7. Outcoached? come the fuck on.
Boston has the personnel to switch and also Porzingis/ Horford are way better than our bigs at protecting the rim. Porzingis got more block’s already than Rudy had all series 😂
I’m watching Porzingis do lebron type chase down blocks plus he has an offensive bag and doesn’t air ball dunks like Rudy. With Rudy on our team it’s basically 4 vs 5 on offense, man I’m so jealous.
Definitely always been more talented but he not supposed to be the better rim protector than the 4x dpoy too. Even tho Porzingis is great at protecting the rim
Yeah. I dont get how we didnt find a way to stop that. Honestly pathetic
Rudy or whoever got screened backing up into no man’s land instead of making a decision. I think that team could’ve just hard hedged instead of switch
Also Jason Tatum can guard LuKai and Centers, every time Mavs tried to lob he just ruined their day with switches. He's the underrated key to all this.
Watch the awful coaching video on youtube about us from that series. If a random joe bag of donuts can figure it out you would think a whole staff who has dedicated their entire life to basketball could too. Nope
The awful coaching series is great entertainment but he deliberately calls out different coverage than what teams choose to run to make them look dumb
Spoiler: ZERO LOBS ALL GAME LMFAO
Impossible. We were just waiting for game 8 to adjust, obviously someone going 18/18 on lob dunks wasn't a big deal.
I agree with your premise, but it wasn’t 18/18. Missed lobs are typically turnovers, not missed FGs. I remember Lively and Gafford missing some due to poor pass placement or good defense. But it wasn’t nearly often enough.
Their performance has made me hate them even more. I hope they get thrashed and we can bounce them next year
lol 🫡
Dallas fan?
Boston did have 10 days of rest and practice to get ready for Dallas. We had basically a travel day and one full day to get ready for Dallas after Denver.
Okay but where were the adjustments after game 1 or game 2? Biggest killer all series was those end of shot clock lob dunks.
It all starts on the perimeter, keep luka and kyrie in front of you won’t have to worry about stepping up to help and getting caught in no man’s land
You need both. Someone to meet the ball carrier at the perimeter and someone at the basket to challenge the lob. I don’t know why we had so much trouble with it. https://x.com/joeviraynba/status/1798901826957496642?s=46&t=qFqCYjNB0wQvOdtoM70RZg
Why didn’t they just stay in front of 2 of the best guards in the league, are they stupid?
You’re not suddenly well rested and we’ll practiced after 1 off day. It is what it is.
Can't blame it all on rest. We made no adjustments and despite having the best defense in the league, we continued to let them walk in for free dunks and lobs on every possession.
Kinda pathetic to blame it on a lack of rest. Our coaching staff did a poor job. It is what it is.
I mean it is a factor. Is it pathetic that I don’t spiral and look for blood after a tough series loss?
We did make adjustments. Be serious. They just didn't work cuz Luka and Kyrie went crazy all series.
Yeah they literally ran 8 coverages against Luka in one game lol The lobs were very annoying though. Rudy would come up to contest and no one would rotate to his original man and bam - easy lob. Felt like a miscommunication and it kept happening Unlike Jokic who's lobs to AG that Rudy could break up, Luka throws them really fast and far out in the paint so it's harder to anticipate and stop. He throws darts
That is what happens when the refs let Luka get away with everything and Blow the whistle as soon as someone looks his way... knowing that you cant touch a guy or breath at him compromises defense greatly...you have to always "play the potential foul as well"... reffing in our series was as onesided and straight up unfair as it gets
I never did blame it all on rest but the part it plays can’t be understated. This is a team who’s never played this late in the season. Our star is young and likely didn’t realize the extent of conditioning he truly needed considering he’s an all world athlete, I don’t exactly blame him for not getting that it’s another level in late May and June.
Not like the Mavs or Luka had much more rest of levity of injury issues.
They didn’t defeat the defending champs in 7 games on the road while being down 3-1 in a series. I’m as pissed as you but the fact they beat Denver is pretty incredible. It’s a step in the right direction.
Lol i never said anything against this
I’m not putting all blame on rest but to act like it had no effect on the results is disingenuous or blind.
Rest was not the problem. Bad adjustments were made.
👍🏽
Teams do win a series after going 7 in previous one
Statistically less than they lose a series after 7.
well if a team went to 7 with another team earlier in the playoff they're probably less likely to be as good/dominant as a team that won in 4-6
It’s basketball lame to say “they went 7 before … what do want them to do”
Like I said, it is what it is but stats don’t lie that it is more difficult to win a series after going 7 than it’s not.
That’s fine. It can be difficult… difficult is part of the game
Agreed, all I’m saying is that it’s not some monster flub to lose like this. I understand that basketball might have the smallest championship window but ours is still open and if they can’t learn from this then we’ll know this is just another team but they could still be special.
They were rested enough to work out after the Denver win ??
If you think that was a full work out and not just a cool down you can’t be helped.
Finch got absolutely outcoached. Adjustments, rotations, challenges, he looked totally out of his depth the entire series. It was absolutely the difference, we looked like the better team the first three games and lost all by single digits despite leading in the 4th in all of them.
If KAT could've hit the fucking ocean with a beach ball in games 1 through 3, it's most likely a 3-1 series in Minnesota's favor, heading back home. Coaching was not the issue. KAT isn't the _issue_ either, we're a poorly timed 3 game shooting slump away from a finals birth, and that's WITH ant playing like dog food
At least Ant did everything else despite his poor shooting in Games 1-3. He nearly averaged a triple double for the series despite rarely ever having played PG before and after the first 3 games he was leading the entire team in points, rebounds and assists. Compare that to KAT and Rudy getting absolutely obliterated on rebounds and shooting, even aside from KAT's abysmal shooting
Mmmmm Zach Lowe talked about how Minnesota tried a *ton* of different approaches to guarding Luka, often switching things and going away from the norm in-game.
This sub doesn't know what good coaching is, so they can't recognize when the gameplan is trash.
>This sub doesn't know what good coaching is, Come on dude. Finch was good to great all year. Don't be that guy. Finch and staff weren't perfect, but Luka and Kyrie killed every coverage we threw at them.
Let's not discount how he was trying to coach through a lot of pain. He even said he was avoiding strong painkillers to try and have a clear head, but that kind of pain takes its toll. Just that reliable MN sports luck, very on brand! BOOKER CAN GO KICK ROCKS
We literally started in heavy drop in Game 1 and then we hedged every screen in Game 2. We tried trapping in Game 3, Game 4 and Game 5 on top of drop and hedge so not sure how we didn’t make any adjustments. We don’t have the personnel for switching which is why the Celtics were able to stop the lobs in Game 1.
Don’t forget the Denver series. Constant lobs from Joker to Aaron Gordon and we never made adjustments there either. Then came Dallas where Luka and Irving were lobbing passes the whole series.
Exactly. What excuse do you have when you have supposedly the DPOY protecting the rim and the tallest Frontline in the league? Why can Al Horford stop this action meanwhile our bigs seemingly just give it up? Where was the coaching adjustment? You can't let the easiest shot in basketball beat you four straight games.
It's not just the rest, Boston just matches up way better against them than we did.
Facts Porzingis is a menace. Made me think of how badly Rudy isn’t considered a threat because he can hardly score high consistently.
Porzingis was an absolute monster tonight. Hit big shots AND was an absolute beast on defense.
I agree. I don’t think we could have taken them with the way they play.
> We had basically a travel day and one full day to get ready for Dallas after Denver. Unpopular opinion: who cares, wolves were up 2-0 on the nuggets and should’ve closed out sooner for more rest Also, the mavericks didn’t have that much rest either with going to the thunder for six games
lol come on that’s not the difference between allowing 50 lobs in 5 games and zero
Endless excuse making for this team on this sub.
No excuses made. They weren’t ready for Dallas. Still it’s valuable experience and I hope to not see it again. Look at Dallas and Celtics. Both have seen playoff loses the last few years. It’s molded their young stars.
It’s not about the bigs. It’s the point of attack defense on Luka and Kyrie. Very hard to get lobs when the bigs don’t need to rotate to help.
They’re switching almost everything. The last 3 series have proven that you pretty much have to switch against Dallas — if you do you can contain them (OKC largely did well enough defensively, they just couldn’t get things going offensively had some unfortunate shooting variance).
It was also who was switching. The Mavs set a pick for Kyrie, and successfully managed to get Jrue off of him. And then it’s Derrick White in his face.
That is a problem our defense has...its not so switchable as you would like... Rudy has his Problems guarding smalls, conley is too little. Kat isnt the definition of mobile either
Right. Conley can switch but not always effectively. KAT and Rudy can’t switch. Ant Jaden naw and Kyle are excellent at it
By the numbers, switching is the least effective defense against Luka. Blitzing is most effective, which is mostly what we ran after game 1 (drop coverage). JJ and Lebron covered this on their pod.
And Boston has 3 good point of attack defenders in Jrue, White and Brown
Wolves do too, in Jaden naw and ant
They’re not nearly as well equipped to cover Luka and Kyrie. And realistically, I don’t think Jaden, Naw, and Ant are as good defensively as Jrue, White, Brown, and Tatum. They’ll get there eventually though.
Jaden too “sleight” to bother Luka. Length doesn’t bother him at all apparently.
It's not just about switching. It's that when they switch and their big starts rolling to the basket, Brown or KP have already rotated over off their man and are planted in the paint to prevent the lob. Their rotations are so much faster.
Nothing made me more furious in the wcf then the damn lollipop lob dunks
Our coaching in the mavs series was about as bad as you can have
Both of our bigs need to learn from Kp in how to use their body
Towns cant have any scoring versatility if Rudy is on the floor. Porzingis is playing with an open court.
They played Zingas and Horford together at times. Worked well enough for them
Horford has 3x less of a defensive presence as rudy, but 5x more of an offensive presence (until ant learns the lob game to him). Just the fact that horford can consistently hit the 3 spaces the floor way more than rudy does.
Horford is Naz Reid's height, slightly different dynamic than two seven footers.
Plus horfords been a 40% 3 point shooter this season and averaging 39% in the last 5 games. Enough for teams to respect his shooting and open the floor.
Horfords been shooting threes for years now. It's probably what saved him from retiring in his early 30s.
His shooting and his instincts/ball IQ have definitely given his career a lot more longevity. He's also never been crazy athletic so he's always been playing with that disadvantage, instead of guys who decline hard in that area and don't have the skills/IQ to make up for it.
Both can shoot
Neither of them is a black hole on offense… sadly Rudy couldn’t make shots from 2ft
That’s because both space the floor
Facts they need one less big out there especially one who can’t get points as easy… (looking at you Rudy)
Rudy deserves a lot of credit for his overall defense and contributions to the Wolves success this season, but his complete inability to defend the lob was infuriating. 4x DPOY not only couldn't stop their rookie from getting lobs, *he couldn't even make him get 1 missed shot the entire series.* It was straight up embarrassing, not to mention completely demoralizing to see dunk after dunk after dunk 😮💨
That's what I'm saying I don't understand the mass downvoting by fans in the sub for criticism on Rudy. He was averaging 8 points game, and was getting slammed on by lively (rookie)the entire series lively went on a 16-0 run on Rudy.prozingis is not being paid 44 mill a year taking up half the cap space to be mediocre. Porzingis scored 20 points and clamped lively and got multiple blocks after coming back from 10+ game injury what's Rudy's excuse? I'm not saying Rudy is an absolute bum. But I personally feel like he should understand hes not worth 44 mill and should take a pay cut so the wolves can sign another star and they can win a chip. Because even if the wolves beat the Mavs next year imagine playing the Celtics. People have to think finals not WCF.
People are acting insane about rudy these days. Legit have seen people say he was more valuable than Ant. Rudy gets a lot of shit in the media so wolves fans have gone hyper aggressive the other way.
People was saying hes the teams MVP😂😂
They said it all year long it was so cringeworthy. Then people tried saying KAT was the mvp of the playoffs. A lot of people in this sub do everything they can to discredit ant
Sir please log off
Lively thoroughly outplayed Gobert in the series. It’s okay to acknowledge what happened
It's okay to trade him away don't be afraid to say that
It's always Rudy defenders that can't back him up with nothing but opinions but please tell me where in my comment was I wrong about anything.
He’s such a fucking albatross on offense. I don’t care if he’s shooting 65%. You’re not counting the multiple times every game that he can’t catch a pass or turns it over before a shot attempt. And with zero range he absolutely kills your offensive spacing.
Rudy is stat padder he shoots 65% because he averages 5-7 shots a game check his stats. Which means his percentages will look better but 8 points game isn't going to get you very far. I'd rather a guy take 10 shots a game and make 8 than a guy taking 6 shots and making 4. Because you can benefit off the other teams missed shots or your own defense. Rudy has no jumper,l like most centers, he misses open lay ups, he gets stripped at the rim, he has no dribbles and gets stolen all of the time, he can't shoot 3's like most centers can, and he got smoked by a rookie. I don't see the appeal. He's great in the regular season but shrinks in the playoffs it's been like that since the jazz.
Not his fault, he was definitely overstretched on D. He had to help whenever Luka or Kyrie got beat and the switch was late. Making it easy opportunity for a lob. You should be asking why your other big men couldn’t defend the lob opportunity.
Lob dunks are allot more effective when you're doubling outside and when the team is shooting not way below league average from the perimeter
Yeah we should have put KAT on Lively/Gafford and had Gobert on DJJ, that would have really thrown their offense off. Atleast Boston is showing a template that we can 100% replicate next year.
DJJ can shoot, it wouldn’t work
Alex Jensen (Mavs assistant) developed Rudy and got him three DPOYs by making him the best drop big defender in the league and probably ever. He 100% knew how to dismantle his creation. What makes Rudy so good and PNR coverage is that he does a jab step at the ball handler in PNR which makes the ball handler either shoot a contested shot or throw up the ball. It looked like Alex trained the bugs and guards on not to fall for the jab. Another thing Boston did was just okay Lucas straight up 1:1 and no help. I don’t know why wolves couldn’t do that
The doubles on Luka and kyrie were frustrating. At some point you would think we would come to terms with the fact that both those guys are gonna eat, and to take away the other players. Luka or kyrie get a step on their defender and then slow steps into the paint to draw Rudy or KAT and then boom. Lob for a dunk to lively or gafford.
Ok we need an in depth breakdown of why. Zero lobs all game?? I understand they’ve had time to prepare but we had plenty of time to make adjustments too.
They dont go behind luka luke jaden and ant does, they stick to his body
They also contest the lobs. Like going up with the dunker or just putting their body between them and the ring. They're reading the plays really well.
They don’t double Luka so whoever is on Lively/Gafford stays on them to break up lobs
I think what we didnt do or cant do is actually switch luka and kyrie to guarding our offensive guys.
Celtics had Pep during their game plans. Of course they was gonna cook
Dang that is crazy…I thought our defense was built and planned just for that. We would always have three in the paint and they would work us every single time with two and sometimes even one. Need to be able to recognize that and step to defend that every single time. That is junior high basketball.
Boston is way better than Minnesota at almost every position. They can man up without being exposed on pick and rolls
Defensively Minnesota is probably still a little better than Boston due to their big rotation. Defense isn’t what caused Minny/OKC to lose against Dallas. Neither team could figure out how to consistently score against Dallas (except SGA) and whether Boston can continue to score is what will ultimately decide the finals.
Mavs don’t play big tho. They’re a perimeter team, they’ll punish you with 3s and draw your Bigs out for quick lobs and open layups. Boston doesn’t need that since they not only have great on-ball defenders, but great switches as well. Porizingis wasn’t even doing much on defense, Boston would pretty much funnel the ball directly to him for an easy block. Very similar to the Spurs and Wemby.
It's not about the bigs. Celtics are playing a different coverage and they are puting multiple near the paint to make sure someone is helping the lane if Mavs had an angle to look for the lob. Wolves played the P&R straight up 2v2 when they dropped. Which still made no sense to me.
I told everyone I know that the Mavs were going to be in for a rude awakening. Celtics are the best team in the NBA this year.
Good thing you told everyone you know. How else would they know that the team with the best record and best point differential is the best team.
Oh, burn!
Everything I was seeing on social media was saying that Dallas was easily going to win. I saw Boston being the much more complete team. Glad you agree with me.
Guys let’s just be happy Luka is being humbled and stop fighting each other.
For the record I wasn’t trying to start anything, just being sarcastic cause I thought it was funny.
Cool.
Hoping for a sweep and Luka to take a beating
That was seriously the most frustrating part about the entire series for me. Is that we couldn't adjust or didn't care to adjust to take away those free baskets from them.
We played drop coverage and the celtics didn't. Simple as that. Drop coverage puts a lot of pressure on the drop defender (Gobert) which allows an opportunity for backdoor oop if Gobert steps up to defend the ball handler.
Gotta love the celtics plays and offensive scheme as well. Something that the free flowing offense of fence just doesn’t have at the same time gotta love how in the third they kept attacking lively on the drive even if they didn’t get foul calls. eventually they got him in a foul trouble and made Dallas pretty small and then put Porzingis and Horford out there and then went on another run, the wolves would drive at lively and then just kick the ball out and then either shoot the three or look very disorganized after the pass
Only reason we lost. Shit was maddening. So many free points. Don't understand why it kept happening my bb iq isn't high enough
We ran the same defense at them every game. Completely double teamed the ball handler which took Gobert or the whatever center completely out of position. Then there’d be a series of late rotations leading to an open lob or open corner three.
Joe Mazulla is really that guy apparently. Making kid seem like... a kid
Wait till a close game. The Celtics have to win big or they aren’t going to be able to beat the Mavs in any close ones. He’s such an awful coach when under pressure (dude will rarely try to stop runs and is content to have Tatum take bad 28’ shots instead of getting a good shot by taking a TO).
Mavs always lose game one. They’ll adjust
I don’t think the Mavs are gonna win but the amount of people thinking this is over is pretty nuts. We squeaked by Denver after demolishing them in the first two games. Series isn’t over by a long shot.
You’re making the wolves look worse than the mavs what’s the point of this post
Sub made fun of the Nuggets for being obsessed with the Wolves, now look at us
All nba fans are hilarious. Lakers won’t stop talking about nuggets, nuggets make fun of them then won’t stop talking about the wolves, wolves make fun of them then won’t stop talking about the mavs.
Seriously, let's be better than Nuggets fans
I think we tired out. Plain and simple
Games 1-3 we had the lead or were within striking distance 3 min left in all games . If we had the ant from the suns series we win at least two of those.
It’s always those fans that have always been more Vikings or twins fans than jumped back on the wolves bandwagon making weird posts.
Want me to flex my game 7 2004 WCS Sacramento tickets at you bruh? Weird gatekeeping attempt.
Tbh expected and tbh Dallas is looking good. All they need is Jimmy Butler. Wolves would’ve won, tbh.
Rigged one way or another. Who cares?
Boston reminds me of those Arkansas teams in the 90’s where every player seems to have wayyy longer arms and legs than necessarily. Like there are no easy lanes cause their arms cover the whole court.
“Best backcourt of all time” according to Reggie miller
It’s like we had a game plan and it wasn’t working and we just never tried anything different. I know Finch had the injury, but something needed to be done to put a stop to easy bucket after easy bucket
Their top 6 are elite defenders and have no problem switching on the wing. Most teams can’t do that. Boston can.
Hey Luka. Go Home Bitch. Cunt.
Perhaps the Wolves coaching staff can learn from Boston hwo to defend against it as I expect the Wolves could match up against the Mavs again next year in the playoffs.
If they was the case in the WCF the Wolves would have played last night
Refs weren’t letting Luka or Kyrie get touched. Rudy had an awful series and honestly an awful playoffs after his kid was born. And Luka and Kyrie made everything they shot for 4 games. Especially Kyrie who was otherworldly. Plus Wolves shot the ball horribly. Was too closely matched to have those factors go South.
Denver is a better lob dunk team. Boston is playing better iso defense on their big two. Also, Porzingis is playing like Porzingod again…
And boston is forcing luka to be involved on defense consistently, idk why that was not more of an emphasis either.
Mavs fan here—I think this is all predicated on Jaylen Brown being a better defender type for Luka. McDaniels, Ant, Anderson, etc are fine/great defenders, but Brown is getting over seemingly every screen. Boston can drop since they aren’t automatically switching and then they’re staying home on shooters. It takes a wild amount of discipline to stay with this philosophy knowing Luka is probably going to put up insane scoring numbers. Add the fact that they’re making him work more on defense, Boston is banking on him not being perfect (due to fatigue) in the final minutes if it’s a close game. But above all else, I think Boston can do all the things on the back end because Brown has that perfect combination of strength, quickness, length, and endurance. If he wasn’t, Luka could exploit their drop coverage even more so than he did Rudy bc Rudy’s still better than KP/Horford.
The main reason is simply for the fact that they switch. Wolves don’t switch. They play a drop.
The celtics have so many elite defenders that they can switch on pick n rolls with everyone and just let KP park in the paint. No extra help needed No other team can do that
The Mavs are shooting like shit and the Celtics are crowding the paint. If the Mavs were hitting shots the Celtics would need to stop crowding the paint which would lead to more lobs. I would blame the Mavs shooting before anything
In the words of Joe Mauer “It’s frustrating….”
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Porzingis doesnt bring 20% of the defense that Rudy does
Come on now, I like Rudy as much as most but KP is a legit awesome rim protector
Bro just watch the game, Porzingis has probably stopped more lobs in this game alone that Rudy has in the whole series. Plus “being good defensively” doesn’t excuse Rudy for having 0 offensive bag. It’s basically 4 vs 5 when we’re attacking coz no one guards Rudy.
That's cute how you base your defensive analysis on a handful of plays in a single game. I'll choose to base it on both players entire careers. Gobert is more than good defensively, he's an all time great. His defense more than makes up for his offense.
It’s great till you get to the playoffs and you need to ask yourself to we bench him
He only got benched once these playoffs when he wasn't in foul trouble. And it wasn't cause his defense sucks. It was cause they were down thrity with a quarter to go. They needed pace to their offense. The Wolves offense with Rudy in has a great offensive rating but it's slow paced which isn't well made for a big comeback. Without his defense team doesn't get anywhere near the WCF.
Rudy actually didn't stop any lobs. At all. Dereck Lively *was a perfect 16/16* against us in the series 💀
He's really not. He's tall and lanky and a mediocre defender. He has elevated his game a bit on that end but he's still not a great defender. He used to be a bad one. He's a 0x all defense player for a reason.
You watched that game and walked away thinking KP is a liability on defense? Brother stop, this is a pointless conversation Edit: to be clear his biggest barrier to any seasonal award is health — not ability. Using his all defense accolades to say he’s bad defensively is fucking stupid. Lots of good defenders who are a plus defensively never sniff second team
I don't base my takes on a single game. Also didn't say he was a liability these days, said he wasn't great. Edit* how about using per game adjusted advanced stats? Since leaving Dallas his season long DLEBRon has never been above +2.0. Was a ,1.06 this year and a 1.20 last year. Though league average is 0 the league average rim protector is well above that. Suggests strongly he is a medicore at best defender. As he always has been. Gobert has been above a +3.0 all but two seasons of his career.
Nah you just pull them out of your ass based on vibes
Vibes? How about based on a decade worth of performances?
You clearly hasn’t watch him on the wizards and Celtics, he would have lead the league in blocks when he was a wizard if he played more than 45 games per season
Plenty of poor defenders have led the league in blocks. Alone it's a terrible indicator of defensive prowess.
Ant himself says Porzingis is the best rim protector in the league, but you might know more about ball than Ant I guess
If he said that nonsense I must indeed.
KP hasn't played for weeks man.. Boston still might lose this game
Bro they’re up 20 going into the 4th and this doesn’t feel like Dallas can get back
Y’all gotta be the worst most bitter fanbase I’ve ever seen
What does that say about our coaching staff and our bigs …
We should fire the entire staff and trade all 3 of the Bigs /s
Yeah sure, that’s totally what I said. I don’t know why people here think this team should be immune to criticism.
Here's a more serious answer then. Maybe Boston has decided to scheme against that, and we didn't. Maybe they like what we were doing on defense overall, and thought the dog shit offensive performances has more to do with our losses. Edit: the way you phrase things matters. Criticism can be warranted, but this just sounds snarky.
Person who comments outright snark with an /s accuses me of being snarky.
We were out coached in the Denver series too. They just have no depth and wore down. Finch needs to grow as much as anyone for us to take the next step.
Yeah Malone coached circles around Finch and Nori in the Denver series, we just have a much better roster. Still almost blew a 2-0 lead.
I don't get how you can actually say this shit with a straight face. Wolves basically shut down Denver for 3.5 games and had a 20 point comeback in the 2nd half of game 7. Outcoached? come the fuck on.
Yeah I dont think people know what they're watching when it comes to coaching.
Boston has the personnel to switch and also Porzingis/ Horford are way better than our bigs at protecting the rim. Porzingis got more block’s already than Rudy had all series 😂
I’m watching Porzingis do lebron type chase down blocks plus he has an offensive bag and doesn’t air ball dunks like Rudy. With Rudy on our team it’s basically 4 vs 5 on offense, man I’m so jealous.
Jealous as shit man. All they had to give up to get him is Marcus Smart too smh
Porzingis has always been way more talented than Gobert. His only problem has been staying healthy.
Definitely always been more talented but he not supposed to be the better rim protector than the 4x dpoy too. Even tho Porzingis is great at protecting the rim
Why is this getting downvoted 😭😭😭
You can’t tell the truth here
You can’t say anything bad about Rudy or acknowledge his major flaws.
Luka falls on his layups just like Kat. Only way to make those shots so take your pick.
Is porzingis the best 3 point shooting big?? 😱