but it's relative.
offenses-are-"
better" = defenses-are-"
worse" does not mean that the importance of defense has lessened. It might actually be the opposite. That uneven equation was working last season when the 3rd ranked defense won the championship by beating the 11th ranked defense. The year before, the 5th ranked defense beat the 13th ranked defense for the championship
look at the defensive rankings for the top-4 seeds in in each conference:
1 Los Angeles Lakers 106.0
2 Philadelphia 76ers 107.6
3 New York Knicks 108.6
4 Phoenix Suns 108.9
5 Utah Jazz 109.1
8 Milwaukee Bucks 110.3
14 Los Angeles Clippers 111.7
26 Brooklyn Nets 114.3
the obvious outlier is Brooklyn. The Clippers are interesting seeing as how they are 14th after ranking 5th last year. But the Clips lead the league in load management and their 3 best defenders have missed an average of 13 games each. I'd expect their defense to ramp up over the remaining 25 games, especially after replacing Williams with Rondo
and here's the thing: when I have seen this discussion engaged around here, almost always it's a debate about defense based upon Portland's prospects. About where the Blazers need to improve to shed the '
pretender-not-contender' status. About what template Portland can realistically use to upgrade their upside.
so, if the Nets do manage to win it all having a bottom-10 offense, is there any usable template there for Portland? of for any small-market team? How realistic would any template be that says: "
first, add three players with the offensive caliber of Durant, Harden, and Irving"....?
it would be interesting if somebody would go back 20-30 years and see how many times in the finals the lower ranked defense has beaten the higher ranked defense. I know that happened 20 years ago when the Lakers beat the 76ers. I'd bet it has rarely happened since, and if it has, it would have still been two top-10 defenses battling for the title