UPIA1968
PhD Student
Posts: 1062
Loc: Cornwall, PA
Reg: 11-20-06
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06-13-23 08:53 PM - Post#356772
Check out the comments in the Inky article regarding James Harden.
There were similarities between Harden's and Dingle's play last year. Doc Rivers talks about the need for such scorers to keep moving so the defense can't set up defenses agains them.
https://www.inquirer.com/sixers/doc-rivers-jam es-h...
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palestra38
Professor
Posts: 32118
Reg: 11-21-04
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Re: Penn's Ball movement
06-14-23 06:53 AM - Post#356775
In response to UPIA1968
That might explain Penn's late game woes. Opponents simply doubled Dingle wherever he was and the rest of the team couldn't pick him up.
Dingle made far more of an attempt to get his teammates involved than does Harden.
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SomeGuy
Professor
Posts: 6302
Reg: 11-22-04
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Re: Penn's Ball movement
06-14-23 08:29 AM - Post#356777
In response to palestra38
That’s complicated. Harden certainly gets others involved in a sense — he led the league in assists per game. In some ways, he does much, much more to enable other guys to score than Dingle, just in terms of getting them the ball in position to score. I think what Rivers is talking about is Harden’s inability or unwillingness to move the ball outside of that context — to give it up to someone who is not in position to score in order to come back and get the ball in a more advantageous position/situation. Essentially working to find ways to get the ball in situations where they can’t double rather than just finding the open guy and taking the rest of the play off.
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palestra38
Professor
Posts: 32118
Reg: 11-21-04
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Re: Penn's Ball movement
06-14-23 09:18 AM - Post#356779
In response to SomeGuy
Correct---but you have to look at his assist numbers in terms of usage. If he controls the ball for 20 seconds and makes a pass, sure, he gets an assist if the ball goes it. But no one else will get an assist---so if you want to judge that style, it's a question of whether Harden's assists are greater in number than the team would get if they moved the ball around, not whether they are greater in number than anyone else. To me, making Maxey a catch and shoot player is a terrible mistake.
Jordan did not control the ball for 24 seconds and then look to make a pass. He can be criticized a bit for not looking to pass when he had the ball towards the end of the shot clock, but his efficiency given the number of times he had the ball in that situation was incredible. I think the offensive game plan was deficient last year and we didn't get others involved as we should have, resulting in the break down of the offensive and the need for Dingle to play hero ball. It was much the same as the Zack or Foreman hero ball offenses, except those teams played much better defense so you could get away with it.
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SomeGuy
Professor
Posts: 6302
Reg: 11-22-04
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Re: Penn's Ball movement
06-14-23 09:38 AM - Post#356781
In response to palestra38
Yes, Jordan is much better at what Rivers is talking about. He actually does give the ball up and come back to it. And they did lots of stuff to get Dingle the ball in different spots to try to find the best angle to attack. Sometimes that still got predictable, but it was different from how the sixers set up harden (or how harden sets up himself). I think once Harden had the ball and attacked, he was far more likely to find someone else than Dingle. Harden shoots it less and passes more than Dingle — he’s much more of a play maker. But he’s a playmaker at the exclusion of everything else. The rate numbers on assists are astoundingly different—harden assisted 43% of his teammates made baskets while he was on the floor this year. Jordan assisted 15% of his teammates’ baskets. Yes, that shows that nobody else gets assists when harden is on the floor, and we agree that is part of what rivers views as the problem.
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