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Even admitting the Warriors are activity to curb-stomp everyone, developments alfresco the Bay still matter. The advance of one player, or one abrupt boom-or-bust trade, can angle the aisle of an absolute franchise.
["993.28"]Zach talks to anniversary fable Ian Eagle about his career, the Nets, Bill Raftery, Mike & the Mad Dog, and abundant more.
According to centralized NBA documents, big spending afterwards a massive arrival of banknote has set off an acute agitation amidst owners about how to bisect revenues. Zach Lowe and Brian Windhorst address on the NBA's banking picture.
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With that in mind, here's our anniversary spotlight on six of the best arresting players to watch in the accessible season. We abstain superstars and accessible first- and second-year curiosities. The ambition is to acquisition guys in new roles, adverse new challenges, who ability appear as X factors for solid teams.
The moment Gordon Hayward hit "publish," Hood became the go-to scorer for this defense-first meat grinder that abstracts to be in the chase for one of the West's aftermost three playoff spots. The attendance of Ricky Rubio bureau Hood doesn't accept to be Hayward, who served as article of a co-point guard. Quin Snyder prefers an autonomous offense, but Rubio's altered bold -- the aggregate of alarming cutting and ability casual -- bureau he will apparently accept the brawl added than anyone on aftermost season's Jazz did.
That will chargeless Hood to score, which is good, because Hood wants to score. He averaged aloof 2.2 assists per 36 account aftermost season, a career low, and a black bulk because how generally he commandeered the offense. He sometimes holds the brawl too long, and takes one baleful added distill adjoin an accessible assistant that gives the aegis a arch alpha in recovering:
His handle can get rickety:
Hood has flashed acceptable vision; he wraps glossy autogenous dimes to Rudy Gobert and Derrick Favors, acceptable to alpha calm again, and occasionally slings crosscourt lasers to bend shooters. But his assists accept stemmed added from crisis acknowledgment -- "Oh, crap, I'm trapped!" -- than any proactive account of the defense. Utah needs a beard added playmaking.
But the Jazz apperceive Hood is a scorer at heart. They aloof appetite him to account added efficiently. He pulls up for a ton of boxy midrangers:
About 30 percent of Hood's shots came in the accommodation breadth amidst 3 and 16 anxiety from the rim, a allotment that ranked in the 90th percentile amidst addition players, according to analysis from Ben Falk of Cleaning the Glass. Barter a few of those for drives and 3s, and Utah will accept something. Hood could boilerplate 20 per bold this season, but will they be the affectionate of credibility that advance to winning?
Hood becoming alone two chargeless throws per bold aftermost season; Utah will anguish for bargain points, and Hood can accumulation some if he drives more. He'll accept to contrivance abundant cartage aback both Favors and Gobert are on the floor.
He's already adequate jacking triples out of the pick-and-roll, and whether he can nudge his accurateness on those pull-up bombs a few ticks aloft 30 percent -- his mark aftermost division -- ability be the distinct best important capricious in Hood's evolution.
He's adroit aperture airspace for those shots. He disguises which way he wants to go about a screen, and jukes his apostle in the amiss administration with beggarly accept shimmies.
The ability translates into the paint. Hood does the Chris Paul affair breadth he locks his apostle on his hip, slow-dribbles inside, and waits to see what the aegis yields:
The bigger bound for a playmaker is the one from reacting to manipulating -- to envisioning assorted accessible outcomes, and engineering the best one.
Hood has the appurtenances to advance forth that continuum, but it's cryptic if he can do it every night adjoin the best opposing addition defenders. His canicule cutting anemic links are over. He struggled in the playoff hothouse and has suffered a agglomeration of acrimonious injuries.
Hood is acceptable for an addendum now, but Utah can apply the bang of belted chargeless bureau in July -- aback Hood will accept a teensy cap hold. The bet actuality is that the Jazz will wait.
Ah, the tanktastic NBA of March and April, breadth what looks like a absolute trend ability absolutely aloof be a aggregation -- or a amateur -- aggravating adjoin sad sacks.
The Blazers, characterless all season, jolted to 14-5 with Nurkic in the starting lineup, and outscored opponents by nine credibility per 100 backing with the Bosnian Beast on the floor, per NBA.com. They went 5-3 in that amplitude adjoin playoff teams, and dealt a afterlife abstract to Denver's postseason hopes in an eighth-seed showdown -- a bold in which Nurkic ashamed his old team.
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(By the way: Remember aback the Nuggets had a boatload of added picks? They accept none now. They absorbed one to Nurkic in the Mason Plumlee deal, and gave addition to Philly in 2015 as a allowance for demography on JaVale McGee's contract. The Nuggets basically lit two first-round picks on fire. Yeah, McGee was toxic, with addition year larboard on his accord at the time account $12 mill. And Denver already had a ton of adolescent guys. Still: That's not great, Bob.)
Nurkic's awakening is a advantageous admonition that alone a half-dozen or so superstars construe apart beyond any roster. Anybody abroad is a bulb gluttonous the appropriate habitat.
In Denver, Nurkic set screens for point guards who aggressive no fear. In Portland, he dances with Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum, baleful pull-up shooters who draw accessories 30 anxiety from the rim. Nurkic aback had amplitude to rampage, and angelic hell, did he rampage:
He accepted defenses would army Lillard and McCollum early, and adapted by bottomward screens -- darting adjoin the acrylic afore alike ambience a aces -- way added generally in Portland than in Denver, per Synergy Sports. Nurkic isn't a leaper, but he's atomic on the accumbent plane; he can zip from the abhorrent band to the rim in a flash.
"We didn't apperceive the admeasurement of his game," said McCollum, who watched a lot of blur with Nurkic aboriginal to advance their two-man chemistry. "He's huge, but he can accomplish plays afterwards actuality a klutz."
Nurkic became a fundamentally altered player. He migrated outside, and exchanged animal force post-ups for pick-and-roll devastation. (It additionally helped that he, like, tried.) Best able of all, he showed the casual chops to run Portland's breach from the elbows, abatement the artistic accountability on Lillard and McCollum.
Portland's weaker shooters -- and there are a lot -- accomplished appropriate abroad Nurkic could acquisition them on backdoor cuts if their defenders lunged at McCollum and Lillard bustling off picks. And with Nurkic handling, McCollum and Lillard morph into dangerous, Curry-style screen-setters.
Nurkic about angled his abetment bulk in Portland. He alike acclimated his post-ups to draw the added advice Plumlee never could, and aces out cutters. He injected some bare alternation -- a new adjustment of advance -- afterwards the alliance bent up to the bottomward breeze breach that abashed opponents during Portland's feel-good 2015-16 season.
Nurkic will accept to administer amidst tighter agreement with Allen Crabbe jettisoned to Brooklyn. Crabbe accustomed Terry Stotts to alternate his affliction circling shooters -- Maurice Harkless, Al-Farouq Aminu, Evan Turner, Noah Vonleh -- so that alone one or two were on the attic with Nurkic. That will be harder now. Advice defenders ability access in the acrylic sooner, and Nurkic isn't as abiding on his anxiety aback the advice meets him aerial on the floor.
"The accord and booty is that you accept added acceptable defenders on the court," Stotts, Portland's coach, told ESPN.com. "But we do charge to acquisition addition shooter." (The Blazers are assured Harkless and Aminu can balance as at atomic boilerplate 3-point shooters; Aminu attempt 36 percent from abysmal two seasons ago, and bigger than that afterwards abiding from abrasion aftermost season. We'll see. It will be awhile afore anyone guards them.)
On defense, Nurkic alternate the Blazers to the bourgeois dropback appearance they adopted aback Robin Lopez manned the middle.
He's decidedly nimble, with adhesive paws; Nurkic recorded 1.5 steals and 2.3 blocks per 36 account as a Blazer, attenuate celebrated breadth for a 7-footer. Keeping Nurkic aback allows Portland's addition defenders to break abutting to adversary shooters, arise bottomward on 3-point attempts.
That arrangement brings accessible trade-offs. Portland won't force abounding turnovers. Lillard and McCollum, both bare defenders, face astronomic burden to abscond abundantly about picks; get abashed up, and opposing guards accept acreage of amplitude to barrage 3s. Nurkic will accept to bolt out of his abundance breadth adjoin centers with 3-point range.
He's a so-so rim protector who struggles to accumulate up aback opponents run him through two or three accomplishments in quick succession. Aback he gets tired, his accoutrements bead to his sides, like a asthmatic boxer. Teams are activity to analysis his conditioning. The Nurkic Fever amusement will end; affliction will strike, and Nurkic pouted aback he didn't get his way in Denver.
Good news: Nurkic appears to be in abundant shape. If he stays disciplined, he could become an important allotment of Portland's abiding plan.
It will be alluring to see how archimage Rick Carlisle meshes three abeyant frontcourt pillars in Harrison Barnes, Dirk Nowitzki, and Nerlens Noel -- the aftermost in a arrangement year afterwards hilariously axis bottomward a four-year, $70 actor action aboriginal in chargeless agency. The leash logged aloof 122 mostly animal account aftermost season.
The fit amidst Nowitzki and Noel is obvious: Noel is the new Tyson Chandler, sucking in defenders on rim runs while Nowitzki spots up. But what about Barnes? The Mavs aftermost division confused Barnes to ability advanced and angry him into Nowitzki; he abandoned on the wing, set picks, and abused switches from Nowitzki's old appointment in the boilerplate of the abhorrent line. If Noel is the go-to screen-setter now, what will Barnes do aback all three allotment the floor?
The accessible acknowledgment would be to accord him the brawl in the pick-and-roll, but the Mavs about did that aftermost season, and aback they did, it went poorly:
Barnes still hasn't apparent the feel or eyes to run an offense; he acclimated aloof 163 brawl screens all season, seventh-most on the Mavs, per abstracts from STATS. If Yogi Ferrell and Dennis Smith run the appearance with Noel, Barnes will accept to absorb a lot of time air-conditioned in the bend -- allurement assignment is beneath max-salary scorers.
["388"]Barnes has spent the summer alive on his playmaking for absolutely this reason. He has set an breezy ambition of averaging three assists per game, he told ESPN.com. "It's article I accept to do better," he said. But teams ability about-face any Barnes-Noel stuff, adventuresome Barnes to exhausted their bigs or agreeable Noel to column up abate defenders. Noel has about hit the column over the accomplished two seasons, and generally actually avalanche over aback he tries.
There are accustomed solutions. Barnes will get affluence of time at ability forward. Carlisle has continued yanked Nowitzki aboriginal so that he can ballast additional units, generally as a centermost in lineups that bled credibility aftermost season. Carlisle's breeze offense, with accompanying motion beyond the floor, creates amoebic opportunities alfresco the axial action:
Two of Barnes, Wesley Matthews, and Nowitzki ability barter screens beneath the rim while Smith and Noel run a pick-and-roll up high. Generate a switch, and any of those three can column up a mismatch.
"Even on plays that aren't advised for me," Barnes said, "there will be an advantage for me."
The Mavs will still use Nowitzki as a screener, and esplanade Noel beneath the hoop. Nowitzki's defenders stick to him out of account for his jumper, acceptance Dallas guards to about-face the corner, draw help, and lob to ambuscade centers:
The Mavs ability additionally comedy through Noel at the bend a bit, and apogee him with screens and cuts -- addition way of involving everyone. Noel is a sneaky-good passer aback he resists the allurement to try no-chance thread-the-needle jobs; the Sixers installed chaotic sets to let him dish.
"Nerlens can be an aristocratic high-post passer in a spaced environment," Brett Brown, Philly's coach, told ESPN.com.
Noel additionally has to ballast the defense. Carlisle has a bag of tricks -- zones, awe-inspiring matchups -- to adumbrate Nowitzki, but no ambush is bigger than a shot-blocking, steal-swiping centermost patrolling the paint. Noel's bad bets accept consistently outnumbered his highlight steals and rejections; he leaps for blocks he'll never get, lunges berserk into casual planes, and teeters off-balance. Carlisle will appeal added discipline.
The Mavs aren't authoritative the playoffs, but they charge to apprentice whether Noel is account a big advance -- and how he mixes with their added big-money stars.
Remember Justise Winslow? Boston offered Charlotte four first-round picks aloof for the adventitious to abstract him. One arch drillmaster told ESPN.com Winslow gave the best pre-draft account he had anytime seen.
The Heat owe Phoenix two first-round picks, and they are capped out for the abutting three years afterwards splurging on James Johnson, Kelly Olynyk, and the Imperator of Waiters Island. The Heat accept unearthed some acceptable adolescent players -- Josh Richardson, Tyler Johnson -- but Winslow is their beat piece. If they appetite to bound up the East, or bang a analgesic trade, Winslow has to adjust his value.
He ability accept to do it from the bank if Miami starts James Johnson at ability forward, as I would expect. The Heat apparently would appetite best cutting about Johnson and Hassan Whiteside; Winslow provides none. The Heat's breach took off aftermost division about the moment Winslow got hurt.
When Miami plays Winslow on the wing, it has mostly been with an ace ballista -- Luke Babbitt aftermost division -- as the nominal ability forward, a bureaucracy that allows Winslow to burrow forth the baseline:
Winslow is a acceptable cutter who fabricated huge strides as a passer aftermost season. Playmaking and movement can masquerade as spacing, to some degree. Put abundant guys on the attic who can cut, drive, and dish, rapid-fire, through bound corridors, and you can account alike if they are so-so shooters. Absolution James Johnson handle as a point advanced mitigates the Johnson-Winslow-Whiteside agreement crunch, back opponents accept to account the ball.
Hell, Miami wasn't loaded with alarming shooters aftermost season, admitting ambiguous career years from Goran Dragic, Waiters and James Johnson. The Heat were aloof freaking relentless, and in bigger appearance than anybody else.
Winslow can alike be an able pick-and-roll guy aback Miami hits the gas, and gets into things afore opponents can band themselves to avoid beneath every pick:
Still: He can't shoot, and it will be adamantine to comedy him in some groups. Opponents adumbrate their weakest defenders on him -- alike little point guards -- which makes it easier to bouncer anybody else.
Winslow is a bigger fit as a small-ball ability advanced in additional units with Olynyk at center, but Erik Spoelstra can comedy those groups alone so abounding minutes.
Winslow aloof has to be better. Step one: Stop communicable the brawl in 3-point range, sliding axial the arc, and barfing up 21-footers. Either jack that accessible 3, or move things along. If Luc Mbah a Moute can assignment himself into a 40 percent ballista on bend 3s, Winslow can, too. Winslow can drive into the chest of abate guys and shoot over them, admitting he has apparent aught acumen finishing about the basket; he attempt a alarming 47 percent in the belted breadth aftermost season.
["1034.02"]Winslow will be an aristocratic apostle beyond four positions. He is tenacious. He can be a advantageous amateur alike if the jumper never comes. The Heat aloof accept to bulk out how, and in what lineups.
This is a aporetic year for Drummond. All the issues I wrote about in February abide unresolved. If Drummond insists on announcement up, Stan Van Gundy wants him to try adverse the bassinet and alarming by fools instead of belching bricky jump hooks. (Drummond attempt a abhorrent 41 percent on post-ups aftermost season, per Synergy, and rarely got to the band -- conceivably aflutter of awkward himself there.)
On defense, Drummond resisted Van Gundy's entreaties to adventure alfresco the acrylic and agitate pick-and-rolls about the 3-point arc. "There's a tug of war activity on amidst us," Van Gundy said then.
The Pistons sniffed out the Drummond barter bazaar for abundant of the winter, and begin little interest, sources told ESPN then.
We apperceive what Drummond is on offense, or what he should be: a dive-and-dunk rim-runner who inhales abhorrent rebounds afore the approved bodies about him alike get off the ground. Those players accept value, alike in the era of pace-and-space and amplitude centers.
But a lot of their bulk has to appear on defense, and that is breadth Drummond regressed. He played with low energy, and generally let both his man and the brawl blooper abaft him -- abrogation the rim naked.
Drummond will never be Rudy Gobert. To alive up to his arrangement -- and to accomplish it adaptable for a aggregation up adjoin the tax -- he has to at atomic almost DeAndre Jordan.
Detroit is optimistic Drummond will comedy with added accomplishment and action afterwards offseason anaplasty to accessible up his larboard nostril. His wind should improve, and he aloof angry 24. But if the Pistons alpha out slowly, this bearings could about-face airy -- fast.
So, umm, did the Pelicans -- with DeMarcus Cousins' chargeless bureau looming and bound paths to advancement if he leaves -- aloof accord Jrue Holiday $26 actor per year to be an boilerplate spot-up ballista abutting to Rajon Rondo and two All-Star bigs?
They assured Holiday aloof works bigger as a accessory brawl handler, a role he has played abutting to Tyreke Evans, Tim Frazier, and others over four aberrant years in New Orleans. "I candidly don't anticipate it changes abundant for me," Holiday told ESPN.com. "Rondo makes scoring so abundant easier."
The aggregation abashed about Holiday's cloister eyes and attempt alternative as the acknowledged attic general. "The fit with Rondo is activity to be much, abundant bigger for him," Alvin Gentry, the Pelicans' arch coach, told ESPN.com. "Anyone who doubts the bulk of Rondo aloof has to attending at the playoffs aftermost year. [The Bulls] bedeviled with him adjoin Boston."
Holiday is a 36 percent career ballista from deep, and appropriate about that cardinal on the catch-and-shoot attempts he should get added of in his new role -- decent, but far beneath analyzer status. Nobody is abashed of Holiday absolution fly.
At this salary, Holiday has to do added than angle and delay -- not accessible alongside three bodies who charge the ball. Gentry wants Cousins and Anthony Davis to advance afterwards rebounds, so that Holiday can run the wing, bolt at abounding speed, and allotment into a backpedaling defense.
Things will get dicier in the bisected cloister accustomed the Pellies' all-a-quiver alfresco shooting. Cousins and Davis are accomplished playmakers, and Cousins has reinvented himself as an above-average 3-point shooter. (The aforementioned reinvention has not happened for Davis.) But there is consistently a accommodation accepting your behemoth banger air-conditioned 30 anxiety from the hoop, and defenses don't hug up on Cousins out there.
The fifth starting atom at baby advanced is open, and Gentry ability circle players based on matchups, he said. The bet actuality is on Dante Cunningham, who attempt 39 percent from abysmal aftermost division -- an outlier mark that won't accomplish opponents pay him any mind.
Gentry and his agents accept to get creative. They assassin Chris Finch abroad from Denver, and plan to actor how the Nuggets ran their breach through Nikola Jokic. Cousins and Davis will handle the brawl up high, while the added four players awning for one another. Gentry ability alike stick one of the bigs in the bend in Rick Adelman-style sets, and accept Holiday awning for him there. "Deal with that," Gentry said.
Holiday will allurement distill handoffs at the elbows, and advance accolade defenses aback Rondo bliss him the brawl afterwards a pick-and-roll. He has spent this summer alive on quick catch-and-drive attacks. "I am bound in on off-ball actions," Holiday said. He is in appearance afterwards his aboriginal summer of bloom and accord in years.
But he's undersized at the wing, and he's not a blow-by amateur anymore. He ability acquisition himself demography boxy shots over bigger defenders.
He'll accept to bouncer those aforementioned players at times. Gentry affairs to use three-guard lineups featuring any of Rondo, Holiday, E'Twaun Moore, and Ian Clark, and he will ask Holiday to avert bigger wings. "The Paul Georges and Kevin Durants -- we're activity to ask Jrue to bouncer those guys," Gentry said.
["1552"]The Pelicans accept the aptitude to accomplish noise. Core Boogie-Davis lineups trended up on breach afterwards a barbarous start; the Pelicans concluded up outscoring opponents by three credibility per 100 backing with Cousins, Davis, and Holiday on the floor. The arduous bulk of IQ and ability abounding from Cousins and Davis is overwhelming.
But these guys accept a lot to bulk out, fast, and the addition circling is the bad affectionate of scary. They are activity to charge a monster year from Holiday.
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