Why can't we solve Dame traps

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SharpesTriumph

SharpesTriumph

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Looking like it'll be 5 years of playoffs in a row we struggle to solve Dame traps.

Clippers then Warriors
Warriors
Pelicans
Warriors
Lakers

It seems like it should be easy to solve a trap, pass to teammate and have them run 4 on 3.

Why can't we solve the trap?
 
We did, when Gary and Melo were on the wings with Jusuf as the outlet.

But tonight they started bringing their bigs up even higher and more aggressively on the traps. Need to work some action to get Dame off the ball a bit. The Whiteside-Nurkic lineups have to go. That was obvious in the first quarter, but Terry doesn't make changes on the fly, ever.
 
SharpesTriumph said:
Looking like it'll be 5 years of playoffs in a row we struggle to solve Dame traps.

Clippers then Warriors
Warriors
Pelicans
Warriors
Lakers

It seems like it should be easy to solve a trap, pass to teammate and have them run 4 on 3.

Why can't we solve the trap?
Click to expand...

Because Aminu.
 
What we really need is a 2nd playmaker. We gotta get a real back up PG that can run a offense.
 
SharpesTriumph said:
Looking like it'll be 5 years of playoffs in a row we struggle to solve Dame traps.

Clippers then Warriors
Warriors
Pelicans
Warriors
Lakers

It seems like it should be easy to solve a trap, pass to teammate and have them run 4 on 3.

Why can't we solve the trap?
Click to expand...
We did it well in Game 1. We'll do better in Game 3.
 
Time for Gary Trent to break out. He starts hitting and they will have to make changes.

id even throw a surprise at LA and start

Nurkic
Whiteside
Treat
CJ
Melo

pretend Dame is hurt a bit

then bring in Dame for CJ and Gabriel for either Whiteside or CJ and run them hard

This would mess them up and they’d have to react to us
 
The issue is Melo will not be able to keep javale/howard or AD off the glass on defense. And Bron is also a huge issue if he takes Trent in the post.

We don’t have the horses we need to matchup without Ariza and Collins.

We are also playing way too slow offensively because we have to take it out of bounds and they are picking up full court with token defense. By the time we get in our sets, if the initial action doesn’t work, we are being forced into hero ball. More possessions actually benefits us because we are the better shooting team but we need to pickup the tempo so we are not playing the entire game in the half court.
 
too bad Dame doesn't have this Lebron guy....he seems like a trap breaker
 
I told ya MFers here this team ain’t done shit since that 1st quarter. Lakers figured us out FAST
 
You need other players who are competent moving the basketball and being aggressive in a 4-on-3 situation. Truly, other than Nurk, if Dame is out of the equation, who moves the basketball on our team?

You need to attack the rim for dunks or fouls or kick it out and make 3s. Who do we have that does that? Trent made 3s for the first five games in the bubble, but he's come back down to earth since.

You have to have offensive threats that make the opponent pay for covering one guy with two guys 35 feet from the basket. Sadly, we don't have guys that can do that consistently. We have several more-than-adequate one-on-one offensive players, but this is a situation where you need to move the ball around quickly and decisively, not settle for low-percentage midrange shots and you hit open 3s, you dunk, or you get to the line.
 
PCmor7 said:
You need other players who are competent moving the basketball and being aggressive in a 4-on-3 situation. Truly, other than Nurk, if Dame is out of the equation, who moves the basketball on our team?

You need to attack the rim for dunks or fouls or kick it out and make 3s. Who do we have that does that? Trent made 3s for the first five games in the bubble, but he's come back down to earth since.

You have to have offensive threats that make the opponent pay for covering one guy with two guys 35 feet from the basket. Sadly, we don't have guys that can do that consistently. We have several more-than-adequate one-on-one offensive players, but this is a situation where you need to move the ball around quickly and decisively, not settle for low-percentage midrange shots and you hit open 3s, you dunk, or you get to the line.
Click to expand...
You brought up a lot of good points. I like to add that teams has figured out that Trent basically stand in the corner, he doesn’t go running around bunch of Screens like Klay Thompson and Redick. So all they have to do is make sure their man doesn’t leave him. I feel strongly this is on Coach Stotts, he need to call
plays that will allow Trent to move around in the offense.
And secondly, this whole thing about needing a second playmaker is understandable but also nonsense at the same time. When dame passes out of the trap all his teammates need to do is keep passing to the open man, is it really that hard for someone who has played basketball so long to do that simple task? This is also on coach Stotts for not emphasizing that.
Third, why are guys like melo and our guards trying to crowd the paint. With their lack of height or athleticism they won’t make a difference to a bunch of seven footers. They need to stick with their man on the 3 point line. Other teams get way too many open looks, we were really lucky that the Lakers had a really bad shooting night in game one cause otherwise it would’ve been a lost. This is also on coach Stotts
And lastly, what is coach Stotts even doing anyway. His offense is “free flow” so he doesn’t really call plays anyway. His free flow offense should also be known as no discipline offense. Just go out there and see what you can do. And his defense has never been good either. He also seem like a guy who can’t fired up his team. We’ve never heard him doing that. It’s always been one of the players, mostly Dame and Nurkic. So if he can’t even motivate his team, especially coming out of halftime, what’s the hell is he even doing?
And I’ve hated coach Stotts for a very long time
 
SharpesTriumph said:
Looking like it'll be 5 years of playoffs in a row we struggle to solve Dame traps.

Clippers then Warriors
Warriors
Pelicans
Warriors
Lakers

It seems like it should be easy to solve a trap, pass to teammate and have them run 4 on 3.

Why can't we solve the trap?
Click to expand...
Some would say personnel.

As if we don't have a completely different personnel now than we did in some of those other series...

The one major constant? The coach.
 
AldoTrapani said:
I told ya MFers here this team ain’t done shit since that 1st quarter. Lakers figured us out FAST
Click to expand...
That's so weird because we outscored them in the third and fourth quarter in game one... but you are right in a way, I guess. We haven't totally kicked there asses since that first quarter but we'll bring it to them again... I don't know how the series or season will end for our team (assuming you consider in your own negative way that the Blazers are your team) but I know we will show up again and will win at least another game if not this series. Like Dame said after the game, the Lakers don't get two wins for kicking our asses tonight, they just get one. You do understand that right now the series is tied at one game a piece right. Oh and I hope you remember that you said we wouldn't even win one game and we one the very first game. So how the fuck am I supposed to believe you when you say we won't win again?
 
Good posts and reasoning everyone.

Lack of passing ability on team, iso ball

Poor preparation and coaching

Last point I might add is Dame himself, seems hes not directing people, passing or not passing quick enough
 
People have to hit shots to break the traps.

People don't hit shots, we don't punish the team for trapping Dame, and we lose.

When we were hitting shots we were destroying people on offense. Dame was going off. Well...... last night was a glimpse back at the Aminu/Harkless days.
 
Natebishop3 said:
People have to hit shots to break the traps.

People don't hit shots, we don't punish the team for trapping Dame, and we lose.

When we were hitting shots we were destroying people on offense. Dame was going off. Well...... last night was a glimpse back at the Aminu/Harkless days.
Click to expand...

I strongly disagree that is why we are struggling with Dame traps right now. When teams trap we are not generating good quality shots. There should be a steady result of wide open shots for somebody when the defense puts 2 defenders on 1 player. That is not the case for our offense.

Step 1 is we need to beat the trap to generate wide open shots
Step 2 is make enough of your wide open shots, should be easy with better shooting personnel we have this year.

We can't seem to complete step 1.
 
Interesting wrinkle in how Houston is countering traps on Harden, who also is shooting like shit, but they're winning because they're jacking so many open threes. They were talking about this on the Windhorst pod today.

They had Jeff Green initiate P&R with Harden being the screen guy. Prevents a trap on Harden, or forces a switch of a guy who Harden can take off the dribble. Wonder if we can do some of this with maybe Melo and Dame. Key still is spacing. Houston puts the other three guys on wings/baseline completely spread out. I wonder if we need Ant to just be the third wing shooter in this series.
 
The middle of the floor is wide open. We need to either A) trust Nurkic to be a decision-maker with the ball in the middle of the floor or B) send a cutter to the open area, which allows for a look at the rim, or if the Lakers rotate, an open perimeter shot.

Portland right now isn't taking advantage of the 4-on-3, 3-on-2 areas of the floor when the Lakers are sending 2-3 defenders at Dame. The openings are there, we just have to move on offense. Way too much standing around and watching last night.
 
HolyBackboard said:
The middle of the floor is wide open. We need to either A) trust Nurkic to be a decision-maker with the ball in the middle of the floor or B) send a cutter to the open area, which allows for a look at the rim, or if the Lakers rotate, an open perimeter shot.

Portland right now isn't taking advantage of the 4-on-3, 3-on-2 areas of the floor when the Lakers are sending 2-3 defenders at Dame. The openings are there, we just have to move on offense. Way too much standing around and watching last night.
Click to expand...
To be fair, Dame didn't get rid of the ball fast enough last night, and having Whiteside in along with Nurk killed any and all spacing in the middle of the floor.
 
illmatic99 said:
To be fair, Dame didn't get rid of the ball fast enough last night, and having Whiteside in along with Nurk killed any and all spacing in the middle of the floor.
Click to expand...
Having Nurk and Hassan in at the same time is going to be tough on the pick and roll. If we're going to go jumbo lineup, we need to run some post ups and punish the Lakers in the paint. It's also difficult, because Nurk sets the better screens of the two and also has the better range so figuring out what to do with Hassan or where to put him on the floor will be a key adjustment the rest of the series.
 
I'm starting to think that Dame himself, his style of play, is the problem.
 
Traps on a team's primary creator are actually difficult for most teams. The Warriors have broken traps on Curry most successfully because they had Draymond Green, a creator with almost point guard like vision and ability to pass. If you can counter a trap with another primary-level distributor to lead the 4-on-3, the traps become much less effective. McCollum needs to be that guy, like he is when Lillard is out with injury. But he rarely seems to be able to tap into that game when Lillard is around. The team needs to empower him to be their point guard whenever Lillard is trapped and Lillard needs to do what Curry does in those cases--become Reggie Miller and run people ragged off screens to become an off-ball threat. They do this sporadically, but they don't, IMO, have a commitment to playing this way when a defense goes trap-heavy.
 
SharpesTriumph said:
Looking like it'll be 5 years of playoffs in a row we struggle to solve Dame traps.

Clippers then Warriors
Warriors
Pelicans
Warriors
Lakers

It seems like it should be easy to solve a trap, pass to teammate and have them run 4 on 3.

Why can't we solve the trap?
Click to expand...

you forgot Memphis...they were the first and set the template

the answer to the question is simple: because Portland doesn't have another elite talent
 
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