2013-14 NBA Season Thread

[Arles]

Originally Posted by Brian Swartz

This. LeBron averaged 25.3 ppg last year, 27.5 this year in the finals going into today(after which it's going up). He shot 44.7%, 35.3% from 3, 79.5% FT last year. This year? 60% fg, 61.% 3pt fg, 75% Ft. Assists and rebounds are down, and I'll blame him for the rebounds(assists not so much, given what his teammates aren't doing with his passes). He's scored more and far, far more efficiently this year. Overall, I think he's been better but it sure hasn't been a bad finals for him.

Everywhere else on the Heat roster you see guys with big drop-offs, Ginobili hasn't been the human train wreck he was most of last year, etc. I've actually felt sorry for LeBron today much like I did when he was in Cleveland, because very little of this are things he can change. The other team is better than his, and not by a small margin.

Great post. Lebron was statistically better than last year in all areas but reb (7.1-8.4) and assists (4.8-6.6). Against the Spurs, here are the numbers:
13-14: 38 MPG, 28.2 PPG, 7.8 RPG, 4 APG, 2 SPG, 3.8 TOPG, 57%FG, 52%3, 80% FT
12-13: 43.1 MPG, 25.3 PPG, 10.4 RPG, 7 APG, 2.2 SPG, 2.6 TOPG, 44%FG, 35%3, 79% FT

Given the Spurs shot historic numbers, it makes sense his Def Rebounding numbers are a little lower. The additional turnover is from the end of games 2 and 3 when he got 7 combined turnovers in the 2nd half of blowouts when he was trying to do too much. Everything else is almost historic for an NBA performance.

Wade was much worse (6 PPG less at 43% FG), Bosh was basically a 3-point shooter (down from 9 to 5 RPG, down 2 on OREB), Allen shot 15% lower from 3, Chalmers scored 6 fewer PPG on horrendous shooting (32%, 14% from 3). In 13-14, Miller/Allen/Chalmers/Battier made 61/55/41/44 %s from 3. This year, only Lebron (52%) and Rashard Lewis (45%) made more than 41% from 3. Chalmers was 14% and Battier didn't hit a 3 all series. Last year, 7 players shot a higher FG % than Lebron - this year no one did. It's clear that the supporting cast fell off a cliff - led by Wade, Allen, Chalmers and Battier playing significantly worse, Bosh never going in the paint and not having Mike Miller.

Outside of Lebron being better than Parker, the Heat lost every other production comparison. Kawhi >>>> Wade, Duncan >> Bosh, Diaw >>> Lewis, Manu >>> Allen, Green >>>> Cole, Splitter >> Birdman and Mills >>>>>> Chalmers. IMO, you could argue the production of this year's Heat team in the finals was worse than even his Cavs team (who atleast had a handful of guys over 45% FG).

But, I don't want to take anything away from the Spurs - they were awesome. Seeing the level of team basketball and unselfishness was refreshing. Here's hoping the NBA tries to copy their model for next season.

[RainMaker]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Hard to believe that Spoelstra didn't at least attempt to do something until things got completely out of hand. Allowing Ray Allen to play 27 minutes tonight alone ought to constitute a fireable offense.

At this point if LeBron doesn't opt out I'm going to be tempted to think he's lost his mind.

Who else was he going to play? Chalmers was in a tailspin. Allen at least allowed them to try and score at a higher pace.

And where does Lebron opt out and go to? Not many top teams have enough cap space for him. I know there is a buzz about Cleveland but that team was shit last year and has a lot of question marks. I'd rather ride out another season in Miami as they have a better GM, better coach, and better owner in place.

[nol]

Originally Posted by bob

Pistons over Lakers in 5 maybe?

Yeah, this is the most similar in how quickly it went from "still interesting if the Heat/Lakers have enough players regain form" to a total ass-kicking.

If the Spurs had beaten the Mavericks in 4 or 5 games, I seriously think people would be discussing them as one of the top teams of all time. That series, by the way, is yet another indicator of why having Chalmers and Cole is so dumb from a team-building perspective for Miami. The Spurs were definitely rusty from resting so often at the end of the season, but putting Shawn Marion on Tony Parker made things much tougher for them at first.

There's a pretty good four-year track record showing that LeBron's the only player in the league who can shut down these scoring PGs (Parker, Rose) with any regularity, and if you don't have him, your next best bet is using a decently long and athletic 6'6"+ guy. Unless a team's relying on its own point guard to score 20 points and dish out 8 assists, there's no point in putting in a shorter guy who will be exploited on switches defensively.

[Groundhog]

The change Spo should have made following game 3 was giving Beasley some minutes IMO. Yeah he's a bit erratic, but the Heat could have used another guy capable of putting the ball in the basket to open up some scoring opportunities.

The key for the Spurs is that they were able to play LeBron straight up with Leonard 1-on-1 in those last 3 games, with only weakside help most of the time. The Heat roster is, Big 3 aside, a bunch of old dudes who space the floor with their shooting ability. Playing LeBron straight up negated a lot of what they do, and that, more than any shots or rebounds Leonard made, is what made him MVP.

LeBron played well overall, especially the first quarter. It's far from his fault that Bosh vanished into his shell again and Wade was subpar, but LeBron really had to try and force the issue a little bit on offense after that first Q. He was too reluctant to attack the basket when being defended - even when it was someone like Parker.

[nol]

Originally Posted by Groundhog

The key for the Spurs is that they were able to play LeBron straight up with Leonard 1-on-1 in those last 3 games, with only weakside help most of the time. The Heat roster is, Big 3 aside, a bunch of old dudes who space the floor with their shooting ability. Playing LeBron straight up negated a lot of what they do, and that, more than any shots or rebounds Leonard made, is what made him MVP.

This is literally as close as you can legally get to playing a box-and-one defense in the NBA.

[Groundhog]

Originally Posted by nol

This is literally as close as you can legally get to playing a box-and-one defense in the NBA.

Absolutely. This is the scenario that LeBron has to attack against, and when I say attack I don't mean score always. You have every Spurs defender flirting with the 3 second D rule and waiting to crash in on LeBron. You have all other Heat players behind the 3 point line waiting for a kick out. LeBron has to attack and find the open man here, if he can't just finish himself. Otherwise there is no point having all those shooters who, Wade aside, are not shot creators. I'm not one of those who is going to criticize LeBron for making the pass rather than the shot, but he has to be the one that initiates the play and then makes the right decision with the ball - pass or shoot.

Is it fair that that's all on him for the Heat to win? Maybe not. But with the roster as it was, that's the only chance they had against a team like the Spurs.

[Groundhog]

dola

And I stand by the Leonard straight up comment - when LeBron has Manu or Green guarding him, and to a lesser extent Diaw, he does look to attack that much more often than with Leonard.

[nol]

OK, that's just Kawhi being the primary defender - I took "straight up" defense to mean that the Spurs were playing with normal help defensive principles rather than having all four guys ready to jump off their guy to help Leonard.

Those three guys aren't really ready for a kickout - two of the three are Wade and Chalmers, and the Spurs wouldn't have cared if the ball got to them (can't tell who the other guy is, but probably the same for him because it doesn't look like Ray Allen). When the most likely positive outcome is going to come from going 1-on-5 (hitting the open guy becomes borderline meaningless when the open guy is shooting 14% from three), that's just not going to work for anybody over the course of 48 minutes against a good team.

[RainMaker]

Originally Posted by Groundhog

The change Spo should have made following game 3 was giving Beasley some minutes IMO. Yeah he's a bit erratic, but the Heat could have used another guy capable of putting the ball in the basket to open up some scoring opportunities.

Beasley is terrible at basketball and would have done nothing but hurt them.

[nol]

Originally Posted by RainMaker

Beasley is terrible at basketball and would have done nothing but hurt them.

Yeah, whatever kept him from getting playing time is obviously coming from the defensive end, and if he's apparently worse there than James Jones, who came in and got 3 fouls in like 3 minutes one game, it wasn't going to help.

[Groundhog]

Originally Posted by nol

Those three guys aren't really ready for a kickout - two of the three are Wade and Chalmers, and the Spurs wouldn't have cared if the ball got to them (can't tell who the other guy is, but probably the same for him because it doesn't look like Ray Allen). When the most likely positive outcome is going to come from going 1-on-5, that's just not going to work for anybody over the course of 48 minutes against a good team.

They wouldn't have cared as much as they cared about LeBron reaching the basket, but in that situation LeBron would find the open guy and they'd either hit or miss the open J. An open shot by Wade or Charmers or whoever is a damn site better than a vast majority of possession they had yesterday.

Regardless - Spurs were favourites coming into this and I don't think there's anything the Heat could have done to win this. Even the horrid start by San Antonio in the first quarter of game 5 was more due to them missing easy/open shots that they normally make while LeBron hustled and created his own chances.

[Groundhog]

Originally Posted by RainMaker

Beasley is terrible at basketball and would have done nothing but hurt them.

He's careless and has a low basketball IQ, but he's the closest thing to a "scorer" they have behind LeBron. I'm not saying he's ideal or anything, but he might have been an option to insert in that 2nd quarter and see if he can pick up a few quick baskets. Not like the Heat have any one else on that bench creating scoring opportunities.

[Groundhog]

Originally Posted by nol

OK, that's just Kawhi being the primary defender - I took "straight up" defense to mean that the Spurs were playing with normal help defensive principles rather than having all four guys ready to jump off their guy to help Leonard.

To clarify here too - yes, the Spurs are keyed on LeBron obviously, and this is indeed an NBA-esque box-and-1, but if LeBron does not attack here, then Kawhi is straight up defending him, as each of the defenders, despite being keyed on LeBron are in positions to recover to their man on the pass. The only thing LeBron can do from this position is shoot a J or drive and draw the D.

The real issue of course is that the Heat are even running a clearout for LeBron against this D...

[Young Drachma]

Originally Posted by chadritt

Ughhh, Im not even a big fan but Lebron deserves better than this. At least he won 2 in a row. I didnt want the Heat to win but this is just sad to watch happen to an all time great.

Barkley never won one and everyone slurps at him, so I figure history will be better to LeBron, the first star of the social media era. Can't imagine what this world would've done to Jordan if he'd come along later. I doubt he's the transcendent figure he is. Timing is everything.

As much as I wanted the Heat to threepeat, this outcome is more fun because I feel like it'll lead to a lot of upheaval in Miami and maybe all three of them deciding to part ways.

[Groundhog]

Heat won 2 of 4 titles. Even if LeBron never wins another title, I doubt the result of this last series will come up in the future when discussing his legacy.

[Fidatelo]

And 4 straight trips to the finals. That's pretty impressive.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by RainMaker

Beasley is terrible at basketball and would have done nothing but hurt them.

Couldn't have been more useless than Ray Allen in Game 5. Nor Chalmers in much of the series.

[Neon_Chaos]

Best player of his generation. Arguably the best physical specimen in basketball history (who comes close? Karl Malone?).

I still hate LeBron. So happy he didn't win it this year.

Not that I hate him personally, no, I don't know the man.

I sports-hate him. Schadenfreude, I guess.

[Arles]

Originally Posted by Groundhog

The key for the Spurs is that they were able to play LeBron straight up with Leonard 1-on-1 in those last 3 games, with only weakside help most of the time. The Heat roster is, Big 3 aside, a bunch of old dudes who space the floor with their shooting ability. Playing LeBron straight up negated a lot of what they do, and that, more than any shots or rebounds Leonard made, is what made him MVP.

What killed Miami was that no one outside of the two old men (Ray and Lewis) could hit a deep 2/3. Wade was awful, Chalmers was awful, Cole stunk, Battier didn't hit one all series, Haslem wasn't a threat, nor Birdman. Bosh was inconsistent, but shrunk as the series went on. So, in order to space the floor, the Heat had to play the all-crap defensive team of a broken down Wade, Ancient Ray Allen, grandpa Rashard Lewis along with Bosh and Lebron. Whenever Cole/Chalmers/Battier/Haslem/Birdman were teamed with Wade, there was no spacing on offense so scoring was tough. They were playing about as far from "straight up" as possible. The first 2 games they played him straight up and then they saw that no one could shoot so they (smartly) adjusted. Last season when Miller, Allen, Chalmers (who could shoot then) and Cole (same) were on the floor - they couldn't help as much and Lebron had a ton of assists.

Lebron needs to play with 3 shooters and a good PnR bigman. No one could shoot (outside of him) this series and that's why everyone sagged off their man to help. I think Wade, Cole and Chalmers were literally left wide open outside of 15 feet from game 3 on. Allen and Lewis hit some shots, but were traffic cones on defense. Honestly, I would rather play with Bosh than Wade if I was Lebron. If Wade isn't creating havok on D or getting to the basket, his game is useless for Lebron (who thrives on creating space for open shooters).

[RainMaker]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Couldn't have been more useless than Ray Allen in Game 5. Nor Chalmers in much of the series.

Allen at least spaces the floor as you need a guy on him in the corner. He also at least tries on defense.

[Alf]

Arles just nailed it in. I'm in full agreement there.

[whomario]

Definitely the main issue for Miami, Arles.

some random musings on the spurs from me:

- The problem for Miami of course gets magnified when the other team has a guy like Diaw to play the 4 spot and nullify any advantage the Heat might gain by going small. There can´t be many players who averaged 6 ppg yet were such an important factor in a finals series.

- Overall, the Spurs just had no fringe player or question mark in their top8/9, which is pretty remarkable. It definitely helped that they gave that 2nd unit so many meaningfull minutes in the regular season. Duncan played 55% of the possible minutes this season and yet they won 62 games. Shocking, right ? It gets better: He still played the most minutes on the team. Parker just 51%, Leonard 49%, Ginobili 39%. Marco Belinelli actually played the 2nd most minutes on the spurs.

- Ginobili has been such an amazing player all season. Of course he did not do it in a heavy-duty role (to be honest, he never really could), but when he is on the court, he is one of the 10 or 15 best players in the league in my eyes and has been for much of his career. Basically all season the Spurs went from a very good team to an out-of-this-world good team when he stepped on the court. He led the Spurs in +- in the Reg Season, the whole playoffs and in the finals.

- Diaw and Ginobili allowing guys like Parker and Duncan to act as decoys and giving a guy like Leonard miles of space was a huge luxury.

- The fact that Patty Mills could do his best Steph Curry (Davidson Version) impersonation without anybody ever even questioning his shot selection shows you how balanced the team really was

[ColtCrazy]

That's an excellent analysis, Arles. When you think about SA, they have a number of guys that can hit the long 2/3. They aren't restricted if one is off (like Green was in game 5).

[Groundhog]

Originally Posted by Arles

Lebron needs to play with 3 shooters and a good PnR bigman. No one could shoot (outside of him) this series and that's why everyone sagged off their man to help.

I agree with your points overall, but the Heat played 3 or 4 shooters at all times with LBJ. Wade is a big exception, but most everyone else the Heat have signed the last couple of years have been 3pt shooters.
How many wide open shots did the Heat's shooters clank? Based on my memory of the series it wasn't that many really - they didn't shoot lights out, but they also weren't getting the same kind of open looks they are used to getting with LeBron drawing attention. The offense wasn't generating anything.

[RainMaker]

Originally Posted by Arles

Lebron needs to play with 3 shooters and a good PnR bigman.

So basically his old Cavs team.

[nol]

Originally Posted by Groundhog

How many wide open shots did the Heat's shooters clank? Based on my memory of the series it wasn't that many really - they didn't shoot lights out, but they also weren't getting the same kind of open looks they are used to getting with LeBron drawing attention. The offense wasn't generating anything.

Quite a few. Here you see Ray Allen and Rashard Lewis ranking lower in catch and shoot field goal percentage (and those numbers were definitely boosted by earlier rounds) compared to other specialists. http://stats.nba.com/playerTrackingC...&sortOrder=DES

[Young Drachma]

Makes me wanna play FBPB with a hard cap in a Big 4 type scenario and see what happens...

[Groundhog]

Originally Posted by whomario

- The fact that Patty Mills could do his best Steph Curry (Davidson Version) impersonation without anybody ever even questioning his shot selection shows you how balanced the team really was

I think the Eddie House comparison was pretty good in that regard - Patty is a guy you can bring in and give the greenlight to. Best case, knocks down a couple of threes, worst case he goes 0-3 and you sit him down.

I was more impressed with his defense to be honest. A lot better than I expected from him. Gets wiped out on screens, but works hard to get back into position, and he really got into Ray Allen's head too.

[Groundhog]

Originally Posted by nol

Quite a few. Here you see Ray Allen and Rashard Lewis ranking lower in catch and shoot field goal percentage (and those numbers were definitely boosted by earlier rounds) compared to other specialists. NBA Stats - Player Tracking Catch and Shoot

Again though, in the Finals, how many of those shots were wide open, as opposed to with a defender coming at them? In the Pacers series both Allen and Lewis were getting and converting wide open chances. Against the Spurs the catch and shoot opportunities were contested more often than not - not clean looks. Nearly any time a Heat shooter got an open jumper, Pop called a timeout or made a substitution.

[nol]

Originally Posted by Groundhog

Again though, in the Finals, how many of those shots were wide open, as opposed to with a defender coming at them? In the Pacers series both Allen and Lewis were getting and converting wide open chances. Against the Spurs the catch and shoot opportunities were contested more often than not - not clean looks. Nearly any time a Heat shooter got an open jumper, Pop called a timeout or made a substitution.

It's the NBA - the majority of shots are contested. Between 10-20% of regular season mid-range and three-point shots are considered to be open looks (http://blog.cacvantage.com/2014/02/t...t-defense.html and it's not a giant leap to assume that players on a team with LeBron James will shoot proportionally more open jumpers.

Ray Allen and Rashard Lewis have made hundreds of millions over the course of their career by shooting a higher percentage on much more highly-contested shots. They shot 44 combined threes in the series, so if 8-10 of them were open, that's more open looks than you'd expect them to get (even before factoring in that it's one of the best defenses in the league playing at playoff rather than regular season intensity). edit - and those guys' percentages didn't even fall off as much as did everyone else's.

For players like that, "not shooting lights out" is pretty bad considering the quality of looks and the fact they're not contributing anything in other areas to justify staying on the court. Look at someone like Boobie Gibson who only had a place in the league as long as he was knocking down 40 percent of the looks he was getting from playing with LeBron.

[Groundhog]

Originally Posted by nol

It's the NBA - the majority of shots are contested. Between 10-20% of regular season mid-range and three-point shots are considered to be open looks (Vantage Sports: The Intersection of Shot Defense, Location, and Clock (DLC) and it's not a giant leap to assume that players on a team with LeBron James will shoot proportionally more open jumpers.

No assumption needed, it happened on a regular basis in the Pacers series. My point is, Spurs series, that wasn't the case. Those shots weren't there, because LeBron wasn't drawing the D. Again, not putting all the blame on him, but

All those (very interesting) graphs do is highlight that open shots fall at a much higher % than guarded. That's no different for Allen and Lewis. My eyes tell me that the Heat got very few good, open looks agains the Spurs. The Spurs got open looks on an insane amount of possessions.

[nol]

Originally Posted by Groundhog

No assumption needed, it happened on a regular basis in the Pacers series. My point is, Spurs series, that wasn't the case. Those shots weren't there, because LeBron wasn't drawing the D. Again, not putting all the blame on him, but

All those (very interesting) graphs do is highlight that open shots fall at a much higher % than guarded. That's no different for Allen and Lewis. My eyes tell me that the Heat got very few good, open looks agains the Spurs. The Spurs got open looks on an insane amount of possessions.

It just seems low compared to the really high baseline of open shots Miami usually gets; the shots were still much better looks than just about any team or player could expect to get against the Spurs. Popovich specifically mentioned it after Game 1:

"We made a good number of mistakes," he said. "They missed some wide, wide open shots that they had, that scare you to death once you watch the film.

"That's not just blowing smoke or an exaggeration. There were about seven or eight wide‑open threes they had that just didn't go down."

So even if he was slightly off, 7 open threes out of 29 is 24 percent, and that's excluding the open looks that went in.

[Groundhog]

Originally Posted by nol

It just seems low compared to the really high baseline of open shots Miami usually gets; the shots were still much better looks than just about any team or player could expect to get against the Spurs. Popovich specifically mentioned it after Game 1:

I'm talking specifically about the spankings in games 3-5, but I don't believe that's true either re: the Heat getting better looks than any team or player could get against the Spurs. They had more difficulty against the Western conference playoff opponents than the Heat gave them.

[nol]

Not defensively. They were rusty against the Mavericks, and the two games the Thunder won were due to having two players that could attack and get to the line - Durant and Westbrook were 37-39 on free throws in the two wins. None of the Western teams they played were particularly successful from the three-point line.

[Brian Swartz]

Those shots weren't there, because LeBron wasn't drawing the D.

I don't think it's the case that LeBron wasn't drawing the D, it's a matter of who the D was being drawn from. The Spurs were fine with helping off Wade and others like Haslem. They were very specific about who they helped off and when.

I thought this was a huge difference in the series and was really obvious in Game 5. By that point Miami had been hit so many times they had no idea where the next punch was coming from and did some really silly things. The one-play microcosm of this was when, of all people, Tiago freaking Splitter gets the ball in the right corner, they rush at him(why??), he dribbles by, James comes in to try to steal it, so you're now doubling Tiago Splitter 15 feet away from the basket, he hits Mills for like his fourth 3-pointer of the quarter. I mean, if I'm Miami I take Tiago Splitter shooting anything that isn't an uncontested dunk over Mills with an open three. The difference wasn't always that dramatic or obvious but the Spurs knew who they were going to help off of and when: Miami was frenetic, and not in a good way, and really didn't seem to have a good disciplined idea of how they wanted to defend.

[Brian Swartz]

Dola, I've never agreed so completely with Arles, I think pretty much everything he's said on this series has been on the money.

[Arles]

Originally Posted by Brian Swartz

I don't think it's the case that LeBron wasn't drawing the D, it's a matter of who the D was being drawn from. The Spurs were fine with helping off Wade and others like Haslem. They were very specific about who they helped off and when.

This is exactly right. In games 1 and 2, they helped off everyone and Allen/Lewis had a ton of open looks (so did Battier/Wade/Cole, but they weren't effective). Allen and Lewis took 14 3s in Game 1 and hit 5 of them. If you rewatch, nearly all were open looks, many created by Lebron. In Game 2, Lewis/Allen had 10 mostly open 3s and hit 4 of them. So, in games 1+2, they took 18 3s and hit 8 (44%). In games 4 and 5, they only had a combined 11 3s (hitting 4) - and that's being down a lot and scrambling to shoot 3s late. In game 3, Lewis or Allen didn't make a 3 until 5 min left in the first half down 24 points.

The Spurs were just magnificent on defense from game 3 on. They would sag/help against everyone not named Ray or Rashard. Look at game 3, Allen and Lewis combined for 61 terrible defensive minutes and only took a combined 9 3s (most after they were down 24+). In game 4, they played almost 50 minutes and shot 6 3s (making 2) to offset their terrible defense. They were a combined -65 in those two games (compared to game two where they shot 16 times and were +15). The strategy was genius - they forced Lebron to pass to Cole/Wade/Battier/Chalmers who were open - knowing his basketball DNA would look to the open guy. Game 4 is a perfect example - Wade+Cole+Chalmers+Battier shot 22 times (many were open) and made 6 (27%). Lewis and Allen shot just 6 3s (most contested) and made 2. It was really a coaching clinic by Pop to take away the two shooters and force Lebron with help to pass to non-threats. Spoelstra was forced to keep Lewis/Allen on the court because they were the only threat, but that killed their defense.