Orlando as a model?

[Rastapopoulos]

Last year, when everyone hopped on the Orlando bandwagon, I was agin it. Their style of play seemed too simplistic to me - like the Magic of the Penny/Shaq/Brian Hill days: a big man in the middle ringed by shooters at every position camped outside ready for kickouts.

I still think it's ugly, and it still hasn't produced a champion. But the Magic are looking like an unstoppable juggernaut right now. And in general, hitting threes seems to be very important. And finally, it's not like it's fun to watch the Blazers' current offense.

Of course, for us to model the Magic, Oden has to be able to stay healthy. If he does, I believe he can approximate Dwight Howard, both on defense (good) and offense (not so good) as well as any other player in the league. And we already have shooters at 3 of the other 4 positions. But Miller doesn't really fit the mold, which is why a lot of people were very lukewarm about his signing.

If we were to try to mimic the Magic, what would that mean for personnel moves? I think it would argue in favor of re-signing Outlaw as a "stretch 4" (because his three-shooting has become Rashard Lewis-esque). But who's our Jameer Nelson? Nelson has looked much better than I thought he could and has been a big part of their success (and perhaps could be the factor that pushes them over the top, because I think the Magic would have to be favorites if they make the Finals, particularly as they would have homecourt).

 

[BrianFromWA]

If you're going to that model, I'd almost look at trading LMA out for Dirk. He's a pretty good Stretch 4, and his skillset isn't one that'll go away as he leaves his prime in the next couple of years.

 

[HailBlazers]

If J-Bay could get his ball control down, his three point shot, and his dishing skills I believe he can be our Jameer. Allot to ask I know, but he's a hard worker and I think he can.

Throw in a healthy Oden as our Dwight and I'd say we got a model similar to Orlando's

 

[RR7]

Orlando's style is very similar, IMO, to many small college basketball teams. Have one good big guy in the middle and a whole bunch of good shooters. And they live by the 3, die by the three. If shots are falling, they can run you out of the building(shoot you out, maybe), but if not, they really have nowhere else to turn. Especially since Dwight's offensive game is rather limited. I'd prefer the triangle as a model, personally.

 

[Minstrel]

Orlando's style is very similar, IMO, to many small college basketball teams. Have one good big guy in the middle and a whole bunch of good shooters. And they live by the 3, die by the three. If shots are falling, they can run you out of the building(shoot you out, maybe), but if not, they really have nowhere else to turn.

Duke basketball.

 

[Hank The Dwarf]

Duke basketball.

Not really.

Duke does shoot a ton of 3's.. but they get those out of a Motion offense, drive and kicks or in transition.

Orlando seems to be the old school style inside out game. Same results but much different way of getting there.

 

[Hank The Dwarf]

And we already have shooters at 3 of the other 4 positions. .

I would not say that Roy, Batum and LMA are pure shooters at all. LMA has no range outside of 15-18 feet and that wont work in that kind of offense.. and while Roy can shoot - that is certainly not the thing he does best. Batum has good % on a very small amount of attempts.

If you are going to design and offense to get you jumpers off kick outs... you better have some premier shooters on your roster.

 

[Minstrel]

Not really.

Duke does shoot a ton of 3's.. but they get those out of a Motion offense, drive and kicks or in transition.

I disagree. At least, though the '90s and first half of '00s, when I was watching more college basketball. They generally relied on having an inside force (force, at least, at the college level) like Elton Brand, Carlos Boozer or Sheldon Williams and spaced the floor around with three-point shooters. Athletic slashers like Corey Maggette were rarities and there wasn't a lot of motion to the offense, in my opinion.

 

[Hank The Dwarf]

I disagree. At least, though the '90s and first half of '00s, when I was watching more college basketball. They generally relied on having an inside force (force, at least, at the college level) like Elton Brand, Carlos Boozer or Sheldon Williams and spaced the floor around with three-point shooters. Athletic slashers like Corey Maggette were rarities and there wasn't a lot of motion to the offense, in my opinion.

Coach K ran a 3 out 2 in motion offense for almost all of the 90s and early 2000's. He recently went to a 5 out spread motion offense that utilizes drive and kicks or quick shots off of screens.

They never were a power inside out team like Orlando is right now.

 

[BGrantFan]

Orlando's "model" begins with a dominant rebounding and defensive center who has a limited offensive skillset.

Hmmm ... if only we could get one of those...

It's an inside-out offense, and it isn't terribly complicated.

 

[Rastapopoulos]

If J-Bay could get his ball control down, his three point shot, and his dishing skills I believe he can be our Jameer.

As the great Sabas once said: "if my grandmother had a beard she'd be my grandfather". (I believe he was sanitizing the original slightly.)

 

[Rastapopoulos]

I'd prefer the triangle as a model, personally.

I'm with you there. But name one team not coached by Phil Jackson that has successfully implemented it. It's not like his acolytes haven't tried - Cleamons in Dallas, Rambis in Minnesota - but it's always been a disaster.

 

[Eastoff]

You would also need guys who are very diligent about getting the wild rebounds (the ones that don't stay right by the rim for the center to pick up) You know, the more I think about it, Dwight Howard's 20-20s are just a product of that system: grab close board and dunk it. GO can do that.

As of last season, we were a similar team. Nate used a lot of three point shooting. He would gets the guys to swing the ball a lot to find the open man. It is seriously the change from Blake and Outlaw to Dre and Batum/Webster. BUT! I think we are better not trying to live by the 3 die by the 3.

So in conclusion, you would need a PG who can hit 3's (maybe Bayless but not very consistent) Roy can shoot the long ball, but likes to drive. Batum and Webster can hit, but they are streaky (which is okay in that system). And LMA can hit a 3 once in a while. Honestly Frye at the 4 would be good in that system, especially if he helps dig out some rebounds once in a while.

 

[Rastapopoulos]

The Orlando system has a player who is the main creator. Last year that was probably Hedo. This year it seems to be more Nelson. For us it can be Roy. That means you do need to pair him with a PG who's a shooter. Maybe that's why we were more Orlando-esque last year with Blake. (I thought at the time that Blake would be perfect for Orlando after Nelson went down.)

 

[BGrantFan]

The Orlando system has a player who is the main creator. Last year that was probably Hedo. This year it seems to be more Nelson. For us it can be Roy. That means you do need to pair him with a PG who's a shooter. Maybe that's why we were more Orlando-esque last year with Blake. (I thought at the time that Blake would be perfect for Orlando after Nelson went down.)

It all depends on having an uber-garbage player in the post who doesn't need a lot of post-ups to be effective. Oden can be that guy. The problem is, after reading another thread, some people seem to think Oden is a much better offensive player than I think he is at this stage of his career.

 

[Rastapopoulos]

An article about the Magic's offense.

 

[Rastapopoulos]

It all depends on having an uber-garbage player in the post who doesn't need a lot of post-ups to be effective. Oden can be that guy. The problem is, after reading another thread, some people seem to think Oden is a much better offensive player than I think he is at this stage of his career.

Here's a statistical comparison between Oden and Howard.

 

[BrianFromWA]

both those guys suck. Though some people seem to think they're busted-ly horrid, or horridly busted, or just busts. Though I'm sure there are some people who think that that D. Howard guy has some hope of being good--at some later stage of his career.

 

[BGrantFan]

Here's a statistical comparison between Oden and Howard.

That article basically is in line with my thoughts about Oden and how he is most effective. Thanks for posting it.

The problem is, there is a sizable faction of rabid fans who think that Oden not being the primary focus on offense is some sort of misuse of him. I happen to think the opposite. I think that making Oden the primary focus of an NBA offense is misusing him. Let him play to his strengths, which are offensive rebounding and taking up other rebounders. If he every stays out of foul trouble and gets 34 mpg, he's a 16/12 guy right now while being in foul trouble, and he'll block 2.5 shots a game. Those numbers, especially rebounding and blocks, would only go up if he wasn't wary of fouls.

 

[Minstrel]

That article basically is in line with my thoughts about Oden and how he is most effective. Thanks for posting it.

The problem is, there is a sizable faction of rabid fans who think that Oden not being the primary focus on offense is some sort of misuse of him. I happen to think the opposite.

You may be right, but the numbers presented definitely provide some evidence that the "give Oden a big offensive role" people (I'm one of them, though I wouldn't characterize myself as "rabid" about it) may be right. The numbers can't prove what offensive role a player should have, but there are some interesting things: his TS% is remarkable...his Offensive Rating is also incredible.

I think at the very least, he's under-utilized. If he's leading the NBA in scoring efficiency, he could certainly stand to shoot more. Would his TS% drop with more shots? That usually happens...but when he's starting at #1, it can drop and he can still be hugely efficient.

Whether he should be the offensive focus, I'm not sure. Brandon Roy is awfully good and awfully polished. It's also easier to allow a perimeter player to control and dictate the offensive flow. On the other hand, a big man who can draw double-teams in the middle is a huge boon to an offense, as it creates a lot of space for other players to exploit.

 

[BrianFromWA]

And in general, my rabid feelings about Greg's role are that he's a pretty phenomenal passer out of the post to go along with that otherworldly TS%. If all we did was take half of the LMA pick-and-pops that we start the game with and turn them into Oden on the low block with cutter-after-cutter going through the lane, that's a pretty good start to an offense right there.

He averaged less than 2 TO's a game--even in his "foul-plagued or whatever" 24 minutes.

 

[hasoos]

I pretty much figured that is how it would be with Oden healthy. The one guy who doesn't match that model is Miller, who isn't a good outside shooter.

 

[BGrantFan]

And in general, my rabid feelings about Greg's role are that he's a pretty phenomenal passer out of the post to go along with that otherworldly TS%. If all we did was take half of the LMA pick-and-pops that we start the game with and turn them into Oden on the low block with cutter-after-cutter going through the lane, that's a pretty good start to an offense right there.

He averaged less than 2 TO's a game--even in his "foul-plagued or whatever" 24 minutes.

Could it possibly be that Oden is so efficient on offense because of how he's been used? You mention his passing, yet he averages less assists/36 than Dwight Howard. You mention TS%, yet Howard is in the same range. Nate was funning post-ups through Oden early in games. The problem was, Greg couldn't stay on the court, usually because of fouls. I'd just like to see Greg get some minutes where fouls aren't an issue. My problem is blaming Nate for Oden's offense, when Oden's PER this year was just below Dwight Howard's. I don't see how that can be considered a failure on the coaching staff.

 

[BrianFromWA]

There are two ways of looking at it, though I only subscribe to one.

The first is that Nate had no intention of using Greg in the offense. He didn't work that in the offseason planning, in the training camp offenses (See: Juwan Howard screaming at people to throw Greg the ball) in the preseason offenses, and after his speech on Oct 25 where he said that Greg just needed to focus on D, b/c Nate's offense scored last year and it would score this year. He didn't work it when Blake was starting, when Miller was starting, when both were starting, etc. That's the problem I have...I think (Minstrel said it better than I) that Oden is a force down low, and is under-utilized. Yes, I think he should work on his fouling. But he fouled out of one game, so any minutes he didn't stay on the floor were a product of the coach pulling him out. Maybe that was a great decision, to keep him from having 6 silly fouls in a row and being gone. I think it's a poor one, since he didn't even give his player the opportunity to learn to play through them.

The second is that it's the coach's job to prepare the players. If he doesn't like that Oden looks like a handicapped kangaroo on the offensive end, he needs to train him up--seeing as how he's a franchise cornerstone and all. I don't like this theory, b/c for all we have heard Nate's given him assistant coaches that are supposed to develop bigs and still his footwork looks a big fugly.

 

[BGrantFan]

There are two ways of looking at it, though I only subscribe to one.

The first is that Nate had no intention of using Greg in the offense. He didn't work that in the offseason planning, in the training camp offenses (See: Juwan Howard screaming at people to throw Greg the ball) in the preseason offenses, and after his speech on Oct 25 where he said that Greg just needed to focus on D, b/c Nate's offense scored last year and it would score this year. He didn't work it when Blake was starting, when Miller was starting, when both were starting, etc. That's the problem I have...I think (Minstrel said it better than I) that Oden is a force down low, and is under-utilized. Yes, I think he should work on his fouling. But he fouled out of one game, so any minutes he didn't stay on the floor were a product of the coach pulling him out. Maybe that was a great decision, to keep him from having 6 silly fouls in a row and being gone. I think it's a poor one, since he didn't even give his player the opportunity to learn to play through them.

The second is that it's the coach's job to prepare the players. If he doesn't like that Oden looks like a handicapped kangaroo on the offensive end, he needs to train him up--seeing as how he's a franchise cornerstone and all. I don't like this theory, b/c for all we have heard Nate's given him assistant coaches that are supposed to develop bigs and still his footwork looks a big fugly.

Fair enough. I'm sure we'll both agree that Oden needs to be healthy for any of our hypotheticals to come into fruition. I'll also add that the coach's primary job is to win games.