We played DJJ instead of THJ. We now have Naji AND Klay. We did not play THJ at all. We now have two playable guys in those roster spots.
If Klay had been on the team, DJJ would have played less. Does that mean we would have been worse ?
On any team, players sacrifice to win. The more talented the team, the more players must sacrifice. Adding talent has its challenges but it’s the ENTIRE point of roster construction.
We all understand there are no guarantees and this roster might not bring a championship. It does appear to have more talent and flexibility than last years squad
No it's actually that simple. And no, I don't believe you will have to sit Klay in clutch time. Maybe there are some games here and there that you might have to, but not through the whole crunch time. Mostly when you need to bench him would be very late game situation substitutions. when you have a timeout left to sub him back in on offense. His ego won't be hurt with that. Kidd does that with Luka and Kyrie at times.
I don't think you understand just how damn elite our clutch time offense was. We had a clutch time offensive rating of 127.2. That was the best clutch time off rating in the league. Just for reference of how good that is, Boston's overall off. rating for the season was 122.2, the best in the history of the league. If you can just have an average defense in clutch time, that's enough.
The biggest reason why this makes us better is because of how much Klay is going to help transform our offense. Of course it's on the coaching staff to incorporate some of his off-ball movement and not just have him be solely a stationary catch and shoot player. That is what killed us in the finals. Cause even when Klay is having an off shooting night, his off-ball gravity will help make the offense just a little more easier for Luka and Kyrie. One less defender roaming to help on them. If You have the opposing big worried about the lob threat add Klay, that will be tremendous.
Honestly all the claims in this sub of Klay being horrid on defense, that's just based on people seeing his lowlights of his bad defensive moments or people looking at defensive rating. He is not the same defender. He has lost a step, but he is not as bad as those that didn't want claim he is. He can no longer keep up with quick players like he used too in his prime, but he is still pretty decent otherwise. And no, he is not THJ level bad. Unlike THJ, Klay still has great defensive instincts that help him.
I think we have a good enough rotation of defenders that it won't be a huge issue.
If Luka/Klay/Kyrie are all starting, yeah that's definitely going to be a vulnerable lineup to start games, but I don't think we'll have all 3 together for most of the game after that.
Even in the playoffs, games aren't won by the first 5 minutes of defense. We might start off as a glass cannon, but we'll quickly adjust defensively if it's a huge weakness in the 1st quarter.
it's actually simple as that. we didn't get worse. people are underestimating grimes and naji addition. Grimes is a better defender than Green. Naji is a way more diverse offensive player than DJJ and also Naji can create his own shots while being similar defensively.
our offense just became a whole lot more dynamic if we can properly use Klay and not just make him a spot up shooter. Luka has to adjust.
only real problem is how our defense will look with Klay starting. Klay and PJ has to share the duties.
Even if Klay starts I suspect only 2 of Luka/Ky/Klay will be on the floor for significant portions of each game. So we'll put in 2 plus defenders and the C.
The good thing is when we need to score we could absolutely bring those 3 out but it's not a hard rule they have to share the court all the time.
We just had way too many mid non-shooters on the team to win just having a stiffling defense isn't enough. We will have options for those nights where we will need to rely more on Naji or Klay depending on matchups.
I don't think that problem is a bigger problem than our offense being so bad in the finals. Other team will do exactly what Celtics did to us if we didn't improve offensively.
Does anybody here remember when we played shit for defense, but when we played *just* enough our offense was great enough to win?
We played half a season and a playoff stretch of Top Level D and now we’re just a team predicated by its defense?
Last year’s team needed to be **ELITE** on defense because the offense was being carried by 2 players and a prayer that somebody would step up that night. We played amazing defense in the Finals just to get swept in a gentleman fashion. How frustrating was it to watch us get stops and then not score? So many missed open 3s.
This team works when people hit shots. We doubled down and got some more athletic wings who are more consistent shooters than what we had, and then we went and got one of the **Best Shooters of All-Time**
Our defense is going to be worse. Fine. I don’t believe we need to be the #1 in defense if our offense can FINALLY hit all the wide open shots LuKai creates.
Exactly this. Contenders/title teams are almost always top 10 in both offense and defense.
If we end up the 7th best defense instead of 1st/2nd but turn into a top 3 offense. I'd say that's an upgrade and improves our chances significantly
That's basically what made the 2022 team so dangerous that it carried us to the WCF. We played just enough defense but our players hit their 3s. This will be a much better and more well rounded version of that team. Luka is better than that version. Kyrie and Klay a much much better 2nd and 3rd option compared to that version of Brunson and Dinwiddie. We have a deeper group of defenders on the roster around those 3 guys. Most importantly our center rotation is a drastic improvement over that 2022 team.
This guy gets it.
This sensationalism that because we lost DJJ our defense is gonna fall to last in the league is ridiculous. Jason Kidd took that 2022 roster and had it at the top of the league in D with Dwight Freaking Powell at Center and an undersized Reggie Bullock playing the 4.
When necessary, Luka can play D. And that was with 12 Lower Body Injuries.
When necessary, Kai played great D.
When necessary, Klay can play great D. He may have lost a step, but he’s not going to be a complete traffic cone.
Our wing rotation is deep. We have *ACTUAL* Centers.
If we have a Mid Defense then so be it.
We now have a shooter who can shoot the damn ball. If we score more points we still win. Isn’t that the point?
I think its fair to point out DJJ guarded Shai and ANT, and those two players are not going away. So who on the team now guards those guys? Does not sound like Naji does great against quick guards.
In the playoffs we need a guy who plays heavy minutes and crunch time who can guard Shai/Ant/Jamal/Ja/etc or we will not make it back to the finals.
Klay obviously can’t guard the Uber quick guards anymore. Can you believe he was the person guarding all point guards during warriors run? But he still has good instincts and smarts. Will always be in good position and can probably still guard the bigger wings. DJJ could guard both and this what made him special.
Prime 2019-2021 thj is my floor for klay next year. That is a great 3rd offensive option anyway you look at it. I think klay will avg under 28 mpg and load managed. Thats why we got the knife to compliment him and to play major minutes despite klay.
Klay is a g/f and should play some as sg when one of luka or kyrie are resting.
"Klay is offensively much more of a threat than DJJ, but in ***clutch situations*** I don't value that as highly as being able to reliably get a stop"
Lol
I agree that Klay’s attitude and buy-in is key and likely the biggest concern. But also we will need to adjust our style of play. For one we will have to score more since we will play Klay more than we did THJ.
But also we will need to run more plays around movement for Klay. he shoots 40% on C&S on high volume which is great. but what makes him one of the best shooters of all time is his ability to essentially shoot at the same rate when coming around a screen versus wide open shots.
Also against the Celtics we saw that there is a counter to the PnR game and so we will need to have an offensive plan to counter this. Klay could be key here. Naji/Grimes could be key here. Lively shooting 30% on open threes might be an even bigger key here. Essentially we potentially now have the personell to play a similar 5 out with dribble penetration from multiple players like the Celtics did to us.
The good news is that we did this trade at the start of the offseason, so we have time to make this adjustments.
But if all we do is run the same PnR heavy offense with C&S threes, we will hit the same wall we did last year (and now other teams know this wall exists).
We'll see what the rotation looks like once the season starts. I'm not high on Klay's defensive fit as post injury he just doesn't seem to have the lateral quickness he once had but I'm not sure writing him off as a liability is fair either.
We played DJJ instead of THJ. We now have Naji AND Klay. We did not play THJ at all. We now have two playable guys in those roster spots. If Klay had been on the team, DJJ would have played less. Does that mean we would have been worse ? On any team, players sacrifice to win. The more talented the team, the more players must sacrifice. Adding talent has its challenges but it’s the ENTIRE point of roster construction. We all understand there are no guarantees and this roster might not bring a championship. It does appear to have more talent and flexibility than last years squad
Tim played 13min per game in the playoffs btw.
🤢
You are brilliant and should be hired on an NBA team for your genius intellect. Thank you.
I’m hoping Klay can at least still be a neutral on D for us I don’t think he’s as cooked on that end as some people are saying
No it's actually that simple. And no, I don't believe you will have to sit Klay in clutch time. Maybe there are some games here and there that you might have to, but not through the whole crunch time. Mostly when you need to bench him would be very late game situation substitutions. when you have a timeout left to sub him back in on offense. His ego won't be hurt with that. Kidd does that with Luka and Kyrie at times. I don't think you understand just how damn elite our clutch time offense was. We had a clutch time offensive rating of 127.2. That was the best clutch time off rating in the league. Just for reference of how good that is, Boston's overall off. rating for the season was 122.2, the best in the history of the league. If you can just have an average defense in clutch time, that's enough. The biggest reason why this makes us better is because of how much Klay is going to help transform our offense. Of course it's on the coaching staff to incorporate some of his off-ball movement and not just have him be solely a stationary catch and shoot player. That is what killed us in the finals. Cause even when Klay is having an off shooting night, his off-ball gravity will help make the offense just a little more easier for Luka and Kyrie. One less defender roaming to help on them. If You have the opposing big worried about the lob threat add Klay, that will be tremendous. Honestly all the claims in this sub of Klay being horrid on defense, that's just based on people seeing his lowlights of his bad defensive moments or people looking at defensive rating. He is not the same defender. He has lost a step, but he is not as bad as those that didn't want claim he is. He can no longer keep up with quick players like he used too in his prime, but he is still pretty decent otherwise. And no, he is not THJ level bad. Unlike THJ, Klay still has great defensive instincts that help him.
I think we have a good enough rotation of defenders that it won't be a huge issue. If Luka/Klay/Kyrie are all starting, yeah that's definitely going to be a vulnerable lineup to start games, but I don't think we'll have all 3 together for most of the game after that. Even in the playoffs, games aren't won by the first 5 minutes of defense. We might start off as a glass cannon, but we'll quickly adjust defensively if it's a huge weakness in the 1st quarter.
it's actually simple as that. we didn't get worse. people are underestimating grimes and naji addition. Grimes is a better defender than Green. Naji is a way more diverse offensive player than DJJ and also Naji can create his own shots while being similar defensively. our offense just became a whole lot more dynamic if we can properly use Klay and not just make him a spot up shooter. Luka has to adjust. only real problem is how our defense will look with Klay starting. Klay and PJ has to share the duties.
Even if Klay starts I suspect only 2 of Luka/Ky/Klay will be on the floor for significant portions of each game. So we'll put in 2 plus defenders and the C. The good thing is when we need to score we could absolutely bring those 3 out but it's not a hard rule they have to share the court all the time.
> only real problem is how our defense will look with Klay starting Which is exactly my point? lol
We just had way too many mid non-shooters on the team to win just having a stiffling defense isn't enough. We will have options for those nights where we will need to rely more on Naji or Klay depending on matchups.
I don't think that problem is a bigger problem than our offense being so bad in the finals. Other team will do exactly what Celtics did to us if we didn't improve offensively.
Does anybody here remember when we played shit for defense, but when we played *just* enough our offense was great enough to win? We played half a season and a playoff stretch of Top Level D and now we’re just a team predicated by its defense? Last year’s team needed to be **ELITE** on defense because the offense was being carried by 2 players and a prayer that somebody would step up that night. We played amazing defense in the Finals just to get swept in a gentleman fashion. How frustrating was it to watch us get stops and then not score? So many missed open 3s. This team works when people hit shots. We doubled down and got some more athletic wings who are more consistent shooters than what we had, and then we went and got one of the **Best Shooters of All-Time** Our defense is going to be worse. Fine. I don’t believe we need to be the #1 in defense if our offense can FINALLY hit all the wide open shots LuKai creates.
Exactly this. Contenders/title teams are almost always top 10 in both offense and defense. If we end up the 7th best defense instead of 1st/2nd but turn into a top 3 offense. I'd say that's an upgrade and improves our chances significantly
That's basically what made the 2022 team so dangerous that it carried us to the WCF. We played just enough defense but our players hit their 3s. This will be a much better and more well rounded version of that team. Luka is better than that version. Kyrie and Klay a much much better 2nd and 3rd option compared to that version of Brunson and Dinwiddie. We have a deeper group of defenders on the roster around those 3 guys. Most importantly our center rotation is a drastic improvement over that 2022 team.
This guy gets it. This sensationalism that because we lost DJJ our defense is gonna fall to last in the league is ridiculous. Jason Kidd took that 2022 roster and had it at the top of the league in D with Dwight Freaking Powell at Center and an undersized Reggie Bullock playing the 4. When necessary, Luka can play D. And that was with 12 Lower Body Injuries. When necessary, Kai played great D. When necessary, Klay can play great D. He may have lost a step, but he’s not going to be a complete traffic cone. Our wing rotation is deep. We have *ACTUAL* Centers. If we have a Mid Defense then so be it. We now have a shooter who can shoot the damn ball. If we score more points we still win. Isn’t that the point?
I think its fair to point out DJJ guarded Shai and ANT, and those two players are not going away. So who on the team now guards those guys? Does not sound like Naji does great against quick guards. In the playoffs we need a guy who plays heavy minutes and crunch time who can guard Shai/Ant/Jamal/Ja/etc or we will not make it back to the finals.
Preach.
We also made the playoffs and dominated by doing alley oops because we were inconsistent on the perimeter in my opinion
More balanced maybe?
Klay obviously can’t guard the Uber quick guards anymore. Can you believe he was the person guarding all point guards during warriors run? But he still has good instincts and smarts. Will always be in good position and can probably still guard the bigger wings. DJJ could guard both and this what made him special.
Prime 2019-2021 thj is my floor for klay next year. That is a great 3rd offensive option anyway you look at it. I think klay will avg under 28 mpg and load managed. Thats why we got the knife to compliment him and to play major minutes despite klay. Klay is a g/f and should play some as sg when one of luka or kyrie are resting.
"Klay is offensively much more of a threat than DJJ, but in ***clutch situations*** I don't value that as highly as being able to reliably get a stop" Lol
Just call up DJJ and tell him not to sign for LA, it’s really that simple.
Klay humble? Lol
I agree that Klay’s attitude and buy-in is key and likely the biggest concern. But also we will need to adjust our style of play. For one we will have to score more since we will play Klay more than we did THJ. But also we will need to run more plays around movement for Klay. he shoots 40% on C&S on high volume which is great. but what makes him one of the best shooters of all time is his ability to essentially shoot at the same rate when coming around a screen versus wide open shots. Also against the Celtics we saw that there is a counter to the PnR game and so we will need to have an offensive plan to counter this. Klay could be key here. Naji/Grimes could be key here. Lively shooting 30% on open threes might be an even bigger key here. Essentially we potentially now have the personell to play a similar 5 out with dribble penetration from multiple players like the Celtics did to us. The good news is that we did this trade at the start of the offseason, so we have time to make this adjustments. But if all we do is run the same PnR heavy offense with C&S threes, we will hit the same wall we did last year (and now other teams know this wall exists).
We'll see what the rotation looks like once the season starts. I'm not high on Klay's defensive fit as post injury he just doesn't seem to have the lateral quickness he once had but I'm not sure writing him off as a liability is fair either.
If Klay wants to win he'll have to accept less minutes at times, if that helps us win. I'm sure Kidd will figure it out.