Played the #3 team in Pro Am yesterday... (PS4)

[ajd2t]

We matched up with the #3 team in Pro am on the PS4 yesterday (Highlight Zoo 376-10) and I just wanted to share a few observations to let people know what to expect if you get matched with one of the top ranked teams.At the time we were 34-0 and #315.

Their team setup was:

2- PG's

1- SF/SG

2- Outside centers

They played an extended trapping 3-2 on Defense. They tried to steal almost every pass so that opened up quite a few holes if they didn't steal the ball.

The 2 centers would start in the paint and extend out to the corners. If someone tried to cut through the middle of the floor they would hold the take charge button and if you were using turbo they would draw the offensive foul. They managed to draw 6 offensive fouls this way. First time we had encountered that tactic in Pro AM.

The majority of the points they scored were in transition. As soon as we put a shot up the 2 PG's were out and both of the big men had the Break Starter badge. It was the first game i have played where every full court pass a team made was completed.

They weren't particularly impressive with their half court offense.They usually setup in a 4 out 1 in set.Most of the time the PG would try to isolate up top and have a center set a screen around the top of the key. The PG would try to penetrate and either take the layup or kick to an open man if someone tried to help out. If that wasn't there their offense usually broke down and led to a turnover or contested shot.

I don't think the SF scored more than a couple points. Most of the scoring was done by the two PG's or one of the Centers that took advantage of being left open on the perimeter.

The biggest problem we had was rebounding. I believe they ended up out rebounding us 36-21 which led to quite a few easy second chance points in the paint.

We got behind 10 or so points before we made a run to bring it within four towards the end of the 3rd quarter. They answered with a 3 at the end of the 3rd to take a 7 point lead and we never recovered. We ended up losing by around 15.

I just wanted to give some insight on what to expect if anybody here gets matched up with a high ranking team that way hopefully you can be more prepared for what they are trying to do than we were lol.

[barond57]

Re: Played the #3 team in Pro Am yesterday... (PS4)

Yup sounds about right. The top 100 teams don't really win by basketball tactics. We usually play tops teams pretty tough. The main thing is to play smart and slow. Keep TOs to a minimum and the guards need to run back after every shot to stop fast breaks. As you mention before teams like that don't do well if you force them to play halfcourt offense

[Pokes404]

Re: Played the #3 team in Pro Am yesterday... (PS4)

We've played some high ranking teams before (I think the highest ranked team we've played was in the 60s), and we were pretty heavily overmatched from a physical standpoint. A lot of my teammate's MyPlayers are still in the low-mid 80s and I have an 89 OVR stretch PF.

These games are all about controlling the pace and keeping their extra possessions down. That means limiting turnovers as much as possible and controlling the defensive glass. And of course, you have to play good defense and force them to take contested shots.

The team we played liked to play a 3-2 zone and deny the pass back to the PG at the top of the arc. That didn't last long though because my PF has a killer midrange and all I had to do was work elbow to elbow. Even when the backside wing tried to come over and contest my jumper, it left me an easy pass to the opposite wing for an open 3. They played man-to-man the rest of the game.

BTW, we lost by 2 in the end. It was a fun game though.

[Rockie_Fresh88]

Re: Played the #3 team in Pro Am yesterday... (PS4)

Being a top 100 team I've faced quite a few of them . I can tell you the worst are the top 20 guys. It's always 2 really short great ball handling guards with speed. Then it's usually 2 really big guys who can rebound and one who can shoot. The next guy is always a SF/SG who usually is a non factor in the game . They play zone first and foremost . The bigs always have break starter . The guards cherry pick their butts off all game.

Scoring against these teams is never the problem . Defending them at half court is never the problem. They live off of fastbreaks and dribble moves. You really have to be patient . Use your fake pass button . They gamble a lot. They double and over play a lot . If you aren't patience you've already lost. Also you pretty much need at least 1 7'3 big man with maxed rebounding and the badges for this game . Limit bad shots . I've lost to some of these teams and beaten some.

I've only faced one legit top 100 team and those guys played through the high post and backdoor feeds . Other than that all these guys play the same .

[jyoung]

Re: Played the #3 team in Pro Am yesterday... (PS4)

2K really needs to go into the sliders for this mode and downgrade pass accuracy/pass reception on long outlet passes.

The constant cherry picking and 80-foot outlet passes being caught in stride over the shoulder is the biggest gameplay flaw in Pro Am.

These passes should be flying out of bounds, or if they're caught at all, the receiver should go into the bobble animation that incapacitates him for a few steps while he regains control of the ball.

[de5m0n]

Re: Played the #3 team in Pro Am yesterday... (PS4)

Played against #6 at the time team The Contract Killaz led by Kiing Doomz.

My team had 1 friend, 2 randoms that I never played with and computer at PF.

We lost by 16 points because they took advantage of the computer (it finished with 1 rebound at pf slot) and our offense wasn't the sharpest since i never played with those 2 randoms and computer is useless.

i feel like we could of beat them or made them sweat if we had a semi experienced team. their offense was butt ugly (my matchup ended with 7 turnovers) but their defense did give us some problems but they would of been corrected by 2nd quarter if played with familiar teammates.

[HowDareI]

Re: Played the #3 team in Pro Am yesterday... (PS4)

Yep, see the same thing almost 100% on Xbox.

Used to be a top 100 team until we got too many losses (I don't play games were ANY one of us lags out) I play to play with my friends irl and if we win it's cool but it's not that serious...but I digress lol

Them teams really aren't good at basketball, they're "good" at 2K; at finding the exploits and nuances and once you learn how to counter one team doing it you can gameplan for probably all the top 50 teams lol.

We played probably I'd say 10 games from the top 100 teams and a couple of the top 15 the best being number 9.

Honestly without lying we won all but the first one. Like I said, we couldn't figure out how to counter the things they were doing.

We got me as a 7'3 center and my friend's a 7' center. I put it on my son I refuse to get outplayed at the center position lol, I go for 20 and 20+ in them games because just like in real life there's nothing you can do to counter a dominant center on offense or defense.

If you don't got two REALLY GOOD big men on your team you're going to lose 99.9% of the team. And they both gotta know how to board and rotate, and limit turnovers. No scoring in the paint, no post ups. All your opportunities gotta be off the glass or in transition or off a good cut.
The second you post up it's getting ripped by someone doubling.
You also gotta have a couple sharpshooters that'll make the D pay for gambling.
And your point has to be smart at setting up the offense and getting back on defense. The pg should almost never drive against these teams, because regardless his matchup is gonna leak either off a make or miss it don't matter.

[hengk23]

Re: Played the #3 team in Pro Am yesterday... (PS4)

good to see another philly native in here (south philly) over here

anyway yea me and my team play the same way if one of us lag out we all quit . Like you said we get on to play as a team not get on and have someone wait 40mins till next game.


just dont know how they are gonna go about this eSports mode if the servers are working correctly. It happens way to many times a night with someone lagging out before game even starts. Its really annoying

[Rockie_Fresh88]

Re: Played the #3 team in Pro Am yesterday... (PS4)

Yep, see the same thing almost 100% on Xbox.

Used to be a top 100 team until we got too many losses (I don't play games were ANY one of us lags out) I play to play with my friends irl and if we win it's cool but it's not that serious...but I digress lol

Them teams really aren't good at basketball, they're "good" at 2K; at finding the exploits and nuances and once you learn how to counter one team doing it you can gameplan for probably all the top 50 teams lol.

We played probably I'd say 10 games from the top 100 teams and a couple of the top 15 the best being number 9.

Honestly without lying we won all but the first one. Like I said, we couldn't figure out how to counter the things they were doing.

We got me as a 7'3 center and my friend's a 7' center. I put it on my son I refuse to get outplayed at the center position lol, I go for 20 and 20+ in them games because just like in real life there's nothing you can do to counter a dominant center on offense or defense.

If you don't got two REALLY GOOD big men on your team you're going to lose 99.9% of the team. And they both gotta know how to board and rotate, and limit turnovers. No scoring in the paint, no post ups. All your opportunities gotta be off the glass or in transition or off a good cut.
The second you post up it's getting ripped by someone doubling.
You also gotta have a couple sharpshooters that'll make the D pay for gambling.
And your point has to be smart at setting up the offense and getting back on defense. The pg should almost never drive against these teams, because regardless his matchup is gonna leak either off a make or miss it don't matter.

Exactly Fam !!! I hate sometimes not being able to post up in games like this . You hit the nail on the head with this post

[Man2ManD]

Re: Played the #3 team in Pro Am yesterday... (PS4)

Like someone said before in 2k, the best player/squad is those who know how to exploit the game not because their skill/knowledge of basketball.

Until 2k doesnt add a stamina system this turbo fest wont stop. With a proper system half of the crap will be gone. You can run from the right side of the court to the left side in less than 2 seconds, making the court so small that is easy to double the big man and run back in time to contest the shot. Or just run to the handballer and try to get a steal. But the best one is being able to sprint at the same speed in a fastbreak in the 1st quarter as in the 4th.

In FIFA if you keep running until your stamina drops to zero you'll get injured and be out of the game lol.

[jfsolo]

Re: Played the #3 team in Pro Am yesterday... (PS4)

I don't play online, but it's sad to me that H2H teams that have the best success are constructed by having the best "builds", in a take down a raid boss in a MMO like Guild Wars 2 kind of way. "Looking for cherry-picking PG, with great stealing skills."

[SirGaryColeman]

Re: Played the #3 team in Pro Am yesterday... (PS4)

I don't think the top teams will ever use real basketball tactics.

At the end of the day, this is a video game and video games will be exploited for what works.

[HowDareI]

Re: Played the #3 team in Pro Am yesterday... (PS4)

Exactly Fam !!! I hate sometimes not being able to post up in games like this . You hit the nail on the head with this post

Yea us bigs usually get how the game works the best.

Most bigs are actually better passers than guards, because we get forced to playmake from the post cuz of all the hands on us lol

It gets to a point sometimes where I just wanna give up, even if I'm having a monster game. It's cool getting 20 points but when they're all off dunks it's like I'm no better than them. I wanna show them how to actually play big, most centers have no idea how to do basic hooks lol.

[jyoung]

Re: Played the #3 team in Pro Am yesterday... (PS4)

I don't think the top teams will ever use real basketball tactics.

At the end of the day, this is a video game and video games will be exploited for what works.

If 2K:

1) Lowered the outlet pass accuracy/reception ease

2) Increased the rate of fatigue, especially for heavy turbo users

3) Globally reduced every player's speed/acceleration

4) Increased the size of the court

5) Increased the likelihood of the ball coming loose when spamming size ups and dribble moves into a defender's body

Then real basketball tactics would be a lot more effective in Pro Am.

Until then, I expect to get cheesed to death every single game in Pro Am, especially against teams in the top 1000 rankings.

If nothing changes between now and the Road to the Finals tournament, then I expect the championship game to be an ugly game of 2K with no resemblance to real basketball, just like the final game was in last year's head to head tournament where it was nothing but trapping zones and alley oop spam.

[HowDareI]

Re: Played the #3 team in Pro Am yesterday... (PS4)

If 2K:

1) Lowered the outlet pass accuracy/reception ease

2) Increased the rate of fatigue, especially for heavy turbo users

3) Globally reduced every player's speed/acceleration

4) Increased the size of the court

5) Increased the likelihood of the ball coming loose when spamming size ups and dribble moves into a defender's body

Then real basketball tactics would be a lot more effective in Pro Am.

Until then, I expect to get cheesed to death every single game in Pro Am, especially against teams in the top 1000 rankings.

If nothing changes between now and the Road to the Finals tournament, then I expect the championship game to be an ugly game of 2K with no resemblance to real basketball, just like the final game was in last year's head to head tournament where it was nothing but trapping zones and alley oop spam.

^^^Because of all that I scoff/chuckle at every mention of "esports" coming to 2K.

The "top" players who'll be showcased are going to really look bad if they broadcast or have highlights on youtube, and I don't see how that'll make the game look good or entice less cheesy players into playing the game.