Define “switchable wing defender” — because of the four or five I can think of during the Bennett era (Brogdon, Anderson, Hunter, Key and to a lesser extent Hall) we switched on screens rather than hedged with only two of them. But we had elite defenses when, essentially, all we did was hedge (2014-16).
EDIT — Murphy, too. But the defense in 2020-21 was a mess.
Isaac looked good on ball too. The off ball problems are to be expected from a freshman in his first game
Yea man. He really gets in a stance and locks in and moves really well
I’d say Key, Hunter, Isaiah, Darion, Akil all fall into the mold I’m referring to. Although Malcolm and Anderson obviously were very versatile as well. And Diakite for that matter, although obviously more a big.
On this team right now, are we playing anybody who can reliably guard 2-4? I’d say no. And that’s the problem. When there’s breakdowns and players get switched, we can’t just overcome it. We use to have Swiss Army knife defenders that made the whole thing work, and right now we’re much less flexible. Most of our guys can only guard one or two positions.
Eh, not the “accidentally throw it out of bounds” at least (not sure when you’d throw it out of bounds necessarily). They had 6 steals, which isn’t great, but it also means we had 2 TOs that weren’t steals. Our “accidental” TO rate was actually really good.
@Hooandtrue posted the vibe check in the other thread:
I was in the majority voting “okay.” I feel okay about last night. Not great. Not bad. Okay. I think this thread has generally reflected that vote.
My biggest takeaway is w/r/t the rotation. The “Tony won’t change” folks were right. So far. I wasn’t necessarily one of those folks, so kudos to them.
Darion and Akil weren’t wing defenders. Akil could guard a wing from time-to-time (Jabari Parker, for one) but he was guarding bigs 99% of the time. And Darion was guarding bigs 100% of the time.
I see what you’re saying with “switchable.” Not necessarily switching screens (which is still relatively new for our packline) but guys who can guard multiple positions.
Beekman is probably the only player on the team who can guard three different positions. (Clark can do two, if the SG is smaller, Franklin can do two, Shedrick two, Gardner one or two, Caffaro one.). None of the new guys has any experience to suggest they could, either.
I think it’s possible the rotation shifts around. 2016-17 was the last time TB had this much quality depth (in my opinion), and Jarred Reuter was averaging over 15 mins a game all the way until conference play before getting relegated to spot minutes, and it took Ty until 6-7 games into conference play to average more than 10 mins a game.
Totally - I probably shouldn’t have used “wing”. Switchable and versatile are probably much better terms.
But yeah, basically, in the past we’ve had a number of guys who could guard 2-4, or 3-5, and be fairly comfortable doing so. We don’t really have that with this current roster (maybe some of the first years, but that’ll take time). I think that inherently limits how good this team can be defensively.
Just look at last night when BVP and Jayden got switched onto guards. There were like three or four possessions where they got cooked. I’m sure they’ll get better, but I think it’s going to be a year or two before we’re back to the levels of defense we used to play. I mean, we used to role out lines up with terrifying size, length, and agility (Hunter+Key+Mamadi, or Malcolm+Justin+Darion). That’s just not this current roster.
In regards to no Traudt, I was message @unknown about it and he brought up a good point: Kadin and Papi were playing well. Jayden was rebounding good at the 4 spot and BVP was stretching the floor. Outside his own development, which I am all for, would it have helped us to put in Traudt when we were struggling on the defensive end?
This is getting to be a larger sample size than just a couple of games. He even lit it up in the scrimmage too. Awesome development
I’m curious as to what you thought he would change specifically around the rotation once we knew that Bond was a likely RS? I mean the only real thing I can think of is play Taine more (I don’t know that that is anywhere near an upgrade on O or D) or play Dunn more (probably doubly true). What other things were you looking for?
We can’t really play Reece and KC all that much less together because that means IMK is playing 38 minutes a game (unrealistic) or BVP/Gardner are playing some 3 (scary).
Had the same thought the front court actually felt crowded last night with the four guys you mentioned playing well, I could see how it would be difficult for Traudt to get on the floor. I also wondered, if CTB wanted to get Papi his pt knowing he will be out Friday and that Traudt could get some minutes then.
Another point - is it possible to have travelling called? Refs missed one that was excusable on a drive by NCC but really blew two that I saw (one on a drive that ended up with Reece getting a foul and the other when they were running the weave - guy took about 4 steps without a dribble).
Also @BDragon is probably right on the Papi/Traudt situation for Friday.
Papi gets kudos - he looked so much better last night than last year.
Great point on Papi PT also means I was wrong on writing on the wall for Papi this season. He responded.
Also that and 1 punch it dunk maul was nice nice
For all the hand wringing about Reece maybe not taking a leap or multiple freshmen maybe not being contributors, I don’t think that stuff is so important. The offense looked genuinely good last night. We have shot makers. I’m not worried about us being a top 30 offense, which is where we need to be.
The issue is the defense. That’s the only huge issue right now. We’ll need to be a top 10 defense to really compete. That has always been the formula. From what I saw last night, we were good on defense with lineups of Reece, Kadin, and no Kihei, ok with Reece, Kadin, and Kihei, and bad when one of Reece or Kadin wasn’t on the floor (Kihei can’t switch which is a massive deal when Deandre Hunter and Mamadi Diakite aren’t on the court). We’ll need to figure out how to be better defensively for the 15-20 minutes that one of Reece and Kadin can’t play, and we may need to sacrifice offense for defense at some point (hello Ryan Dunn).
I was wrong as well. Thought Papi may be headed to a smaller role this year, and he may still be, but he looked very good last night. He played with aggression and was in control. The yam was perfect got me off the sofa.
I could see there being minutes for Dunn to support the Jayden-BVP pairing defensively. Reece-Armaan-Dunn-BVP-Jayden is a lineup that I think survives defensively.
I think that’s the right idea, especially since it’s the minutes that Kadin sits in particular which will be the biggest issue. We can play Reece 35+ but maybe 25 for Kadin.