honestly couldn’t remember, so went to Cleaning the Glass to check and it looks like we really are missing klay. In the aggregate the lineup iterations with him at PG wound up with a positive net rating (although the 3 most used and 4 of the 5 most used had negative net ratings), but if you look further into the numbers it was due to their defense, not their offense, which sounds about right. You can see the lineups here. Based on his post practice interviews the last 3 days (ie not including today) during which he said they specifically did not practice those days using specific lineups/groups because he wanted to evaluate who played well together and who didn’t. So, with this being the first time they’ve scrimmaged with designated lineups, I think it’s safe to conclude these lineups were chosen purposefully. Sam Gordon with further info on the lineup combos that are being run at the scrimmage: 1000%. Bob was the first domino, then Klay. My money is on Dray next (which I’m all but certain he knows too because if you’ve paid attention to what Dray has said about Dunleavy and the FO strategy all summer it sounds like he’s reading off Lacob’s talking points; he’s carrying the hell out of Lacob’s water as if it’ll keep Lacob from running the same playbook on him, even if/when it contradicts Steph – like when Steph has made it pretty clear he wants signings to be made and Dray turns around and talks about how brilliant it is that the FO didn’t make moves 🙄). Naji Marshall yesterday during Mavs’ media day on what he’s going to bring to the floor: “Standing on business. Aggressive, energy, defense, just being a dawg on both sides of the floor. If you don’t know my game, I’m just a dawg. Plain and simple.”
Outside losing Klay, not getting this guy (no idea if the Warriors were even interested, but they’re even bigger idiots if they weren’t so I’m telling myself they were lol) this off season hurts the most. I wanted him so badly and he was actually attainable financially speaking. 😭💔
Shoutout to Panda Hank for pulling these.
Klay has been labeled a “defensive liability” these days and while that’s always been greatly exaggerated, he looks to be on a mission this year to prove just how exaggerated that was. I think what we’ll see with his defense this season will show just how much his dip defensively had more to do with the Warriors’ roster construction the last couple of years on both sides of the ball – he’ll now be playing with two bigs that are legit rim protectors which is an underrated factor when it comes to perimeter defense, ie they can put a lot more pressure on the ball and close out tighter than they would otherwise be able to, & he also won’t have to worry about needing to put up 2nd option-like numbers on the offensive end. He’ll be in a more Steph/KD/Klay type Warriors role, which I think will help him and the Mavs out a lot. In his post-game media session last night he said the following, which alluded to that:
“It’s really nice when you have such great offensive players like Luka and Kai, because you don’t feel like you have to shoulder the load as much on that side of the ball, so you can focus on guarding guys…I’m just challenging the ball handler and switching on to whoever. I take great pride in guarding.”
A few reasons why we should have kept Klay especially in lieu of some of our young players like kuminga and Podz :
• There was mention of him having back tightness after the last game and it sounded like he only did a walkthrough of practice the next day and didn’t participate in the live action portion. I bring this up because every single one of his shots tonight were incredibly stiff and/or short with no lift – even his floaters were flat. He didn’t look like he was activating his base at all on his shots so I have a feeling his back wasn’t 100% this game. • He’s a biiiiig rhythm guy. He does not gel offensively in games where the flow is very herky jerky and erratic, and the Clippers game was very much this. Is it less than ideal that he can’t catch a feel for his shot under these circumstances?
No doubt, but that’s just always been how he is. It’s why pace with ball movement is the environment he excels in so much. Tonight had plenty of pace but the ball movement and flow just wasn’t there. • The most important point I advise Mavs fans to continuously remind themselves of: Klay Thompson starts every single season slowly. Again, it’s just how it and always has been. Case in point: his career average 3P% is 41.3%…his career average 3P% in the month of October? 34.6%. A couple more examples: • In 2016-17, he averaged 31.3% from 3 through the first 11 games of the season, which included games where he went 0/6 and 0/7 from 3. He ended the season with his highest scoring season of his career averaging 22.3 ppg on 47% overall and 41.4% from 3. • In 2015-16, his second highest scoring season in his career in which he averaged 22.1 ppg on 47% overall and 42.5% from 3, he started the season shooting 29% from 3 and in the spring of that year, had games where he shot 0/7 and 0/8 from 3.Obviously those are season in his prime, and he’s no longer in his prime, but point is he also looked abysmal for stretches to start seasons that ended up being some of the statistical best of his career.
2 years ago but just 6 months after being away for 2.5 years. There’s also the part where sports med experts (see here and here) say it takes 2-3 years to fully return to their new physical baseline (aka their physical best post-injuries), and by year 3 will have stabilized to what he’ll be going forward (this upcoming season will be year 3), after the injuries he sustained. That “one dude” is the Bay Area media’s sports med expert (aka keeps up with Bay Area athletes’ injury history and performance) and a pediatric orthopedic surgeon, sports medicine specialist, and Vice-Chair of Pediatric Operations and Section Chief of the Division of Pediatric Orthopaedics at UCSF.
Hence why I linked his assessment; he’s not some twitter doc.Because again, that’s Klay lol it just comes with the territory. In the same way that he needs to find a flow and rhythm in game, he needs to settle into the rhythm of the season. When you throw in a completely new environment and system, you end up with awkward growing pains on top of a completely normal for Klay build up to start the season. But as the above shows, even beyond his completely normal for Klay slow starts,
he has had a number of games even at the peak of his prime where he went 0/6 or 7 or 8 from 3 because he’s a shooter and it happens, even to one of the best to ever lace ‘em up. All of this is to say that him going 0fer is not a sign that he’s washed or doesn’t have it anymore,
I promise. He started slow even in his prime. Lastly, the Warriors’ first preseason game was against this Clippers team (who is annoyingly long and obnoxious on defense for being such a wildly mediocre team, and I say that as a fan of an even more mediocre team lol) and Steph, who like Klay in tonight’s game didn’t have any other spacers on the floor with him, was in a very similar hell that Klay was in tonight.
• Nothing but contested or awkward chuck it up out of rhythm because they finally got a hint of space shots. He also couldn’t create space to save his life and his final stat line ended up being 9 pts on 2/8 overall, 0/4 from 3, and 5/5 FTs with 3 TOs and 2 assists.
*This Clippers team is just seemingly a shit matchup for over 30 shooters who command doubles and being face guarded and who are without other offensive Shoutout to Panda Hank for pulling these.
Klay has been labeled a “defensive liability” these days and while that’s always been greatly exaggerated, he looks to be on a mission this year to prove just how exaggerated that was. I think what we’ll see with his defense this season will show just how much his dip defensively had more to do with the Warriors’ roster construction the last couple of years on both sides of the ball – he’ll now be playing with two bigs that are legit rim protectors which is an underrated factor when it comes to perimeter defense, ie they can put a lot more pressure on the ball and close out tighter than they would otherwise be able to, & he also won’t have to worry about needing to put up 2nd option-like numbers on the offensive end. He’ll be in a more Steph/KD/Klay type Warriors role, which I think will help him and the Mavs out a lot. In his post-game media session last night he said the following, which alluded to that:
“It’s really nice when you have such great offensive players like Luka and Kai, because you don’t feel like you have to shoulder the load as much on that side of the ball, so you can focus on guarding guys…I’m just challenging the ball handler and switching on to whoever. I take great pride in guarding.”weapons on the court to take away some of that attention. Honestly, I genuinely just didn’t think nor expect other fanbases to be familiar with his in-seasonal (or pre-seasonal as it were) patterns, which is what my main point was with my post.
*My bad if that’s a miscalculation on my part and kudos to those of you guys who were already familiar with them, seriously. Klay Thompson’s defensive highlights in the 18 first half minutes he played in his Dallas Mavs debut.
Keep JK at the starting SF!! He’s been consistent the past 3 games scoring wise and he’s shown improvements on shooting, rebounding, and defense. You don’t reward him by putting him at the bench.
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honestly couldn’t remember, so went to Cleaning the Glass to check and it looks like we really are missing klay. In the aggregate the lineup iterations with him at PG wound up with a positive net rating (although the 3 most used and 4 of the 5 most used had negative net ratings), but if you look further into the numbers it was due to their defense, not their offense, which sounds about right. You can see the lineups here. Based on his post practice interviews the last 3 days (ie not including today) during which he said they specifically did not practice those days using specific lineups/groups because he wanted to evaluate who played well together and who didn’t. So, with this being the first time they’ve scrimmaged with designated lineups, I think it’s safe to conclude these lineups were chosen purposefully. Sam Gordon with further info on the lineup combos that are being run at the scrimmage: 1000%. Bob was the first domino, then Klay. My money is on Dray next (which I’m all but certain he knows too because if you’ve paid attention to what Dray has said about Dunleavy and the FO strategy all summer it sounds like he’s reading off Lacob’s talking points; he’s carrying the hell out of Lacob’s water as if it’ll keep Lacob from running the same playbook on him, even if/when it contradicts Steph – like when Steph has made it pretty clear he wants signings to be made and Dray turns around and talks about how brilliant it is that the FO didn’t make moves 🙄). Naji Marshall yesterday during Mavs’ media day on what he’s going to bring to the floor: “Standing on business. Aggressive, energy, defense, just being a dawg on both sides of the floor. If you don’t know my game, I’m just a dawg. Plain and simple.”
Outside losing Klay, not getting this guy (no idea if the Warriors were even interested, but they’re even bigger idiots if they weren’t so I’m telling myself they were lol) this off season hurts the most. I wanted him so badly and he was actually attainable financially speaking. 😭💔
Shoutout to Panda Hank for pulling these.
Klay has been labeled a “defensive liability” these days and while that’s always been greatly exaggerated, he looks to be on a mission this year to prove just how exaggerated that was. I think what we’ll see with his defense this season will show just how much his dip defensively had more to do with the Warriors’ roster construction the last couple of years on both sides of the ball – he’ll now be playing with two bigs that are legit rim protectors which is an underrated factor when it comes to perimeter defense, ie they can put a lot more pressure on the ball and close out tighter than they would otherwise be able to, & he also won’t have to worry about needing to put up 2nd option-like numbers on the offensive end. He’ll be in a more Steph/KD/Klay type Warriors role, which I think will help him and the Mavs out a lot. In his post-game media session last night he said the following, which alluded to that:
“It’s really nice when you have such great offensive players like Luka and Kai, because you don’t feel like you have to shoulder the load as much on that side of the ball, so you can focus on guarding guys…I’m just challenging the ball handler and switching on to whoever. I take great pride in guarding.”
A few reasons why we should have kept Klay especially in lieu of some of our young players like kuminga and Podz :
• There was mention of him having back tightness after the last game and it sounded like he only did a walkthrough of practice the next day and didn’t participate in the live action portion. I bring this up because every single one of his shots tonight were incredibly stiff and/or short with no lift – even his floaters were flat. He didn’t look like he was activating his base at all on his shots so I have a feeling his back wasn’t 100% this game. • He’s a biiiiig rhythm guy. He does not gel offensively in games where the flow is very herky jerky and erratic, and the Clippers game was very much this. Is it less than ideal that he can’t catch a feel for his shot under these circumstances?
No doubt, but that’s just always been how he is. It’s why pace with ball movement is the environment he excels in so much. Tonight had plenty of pace but the ball movement and flow just wasn’t there. • The most important point I advise Mavs fans to continuously remind themselves of: Klay Thompson starts every single season slowly. Again, it’s just how it and always has been. Case in point: his career average 3P% is 41.3%…his career average 3P% in the month of October? 34.6%. A couple more examples: • In 2016-17, he averaged 31.3% from 3 through the first 11 games of the season, which included games where he went 0/6 and 0/7 from 3. He ended the season with his highest scoring season of his career averaging 22.3 ppg on 47% overall and 41.4% from 3. • In 2015-16, his second highest scoring season in his career in which he averaged 22.1 ppg on 47% overall and 42.5% from 3, he started the season shooting 29% from 3 and in the spring of that year, had games where he shot 0/7 and 0/8 from 3.Obviously those are season in his prime, and he’s no longer in his prime, but point is he also looked abysmal for stretches to start seasons that ended up being some of the statistical best of his career.
2 years ago but just 6 months after being away for 2.5 years. There’s also the part where sports med experts (see here and here) say it takes 2-3 years to fully return to their new physical baseline (aka their physical best post-injuries), and by year 3 will have stabilized to what he’ll be going forward (this upcoming season will be year 3), after the injuries he sustained. That “one dude” is the Bay Area media’s sports med expert (aka keeps up with Bay Area athletes’ injury history and performance) and a pediatric orthopedic surgeon, sports medicine specialist, and Vice-Chair of Pediatric Operations and Section Chief of the Division of Pediatric Orthopaedics at UCSF.
Hence why I linked his assessment; he’s not some twitter doc.Because again, that’s Klay lol it just comes with the territory. In the same way that he needs to find a flow and rhythm in game, he needs to settle into the rhythm of the season. When you throw in a completely new environment and system, you end up with awkward growing pains on top of a completely normal for Klay build up to start the season. But as the above shows, even beyond his completely normal for Klay slow starts,
he has had a number of games even at the peak of his prime where he went 0/6 or 7 or 8 from 3 because he’s a shooter and it happens, even to one of the best to ever lace ‘em up. All of this is to say that him going 0fer is not a sign that he’s washed or doesn’t have it anymore,
I promise. He started slow even in his prime. Lastly, the Warriors’ first preseason game was against this Clippers team (who is annoyingly long and obnoxious on defense for being such a wildly mediocre team, and I say that as a fan of an even more mediocre team lol) and Steph, who like Klay in tonight’s game didn’t have any other spacers on the floor with him, was in a very similar hell that Klay was in tonight.
• Nothing but contested or awkward chuck it up out of rhythm because they finally got a hint of space shots. He also couldn’t create space to save his life and his final stat line ended up being 9 pts on 2/8 overall, 0/4 from 3, and 5/5 FTs with 3 TOs and 2 assists.
*This Clippers team is just seemingly a shit matchup for over 30 shooters who command doubles and being face guarded and who are without other offensive Shoutout to Panda Hank for pulling these.
Klay has been labeled a “defensive liability” these days and while that’s always been greatly exaggerated, he looks to be on a mission this year to prove just how exaggerated that was. I think what we’ll see with his defense this season will show just how much his dip defensively had more to do with the Warriors’ roster construction the last couple of years on both sides of the ball – he’ll now be playing with two bigs that are legit rim protectors which is an underrated factor when it comes to perimeter defense, ie they can put a lot more pressure on the ball and close out tighter than they would otherwise be able to, & he also won’t have to worry about needing to put up 2nd option-like numbers on the offensive end. He’ll be in a more Steph/KD/Klay type Warriors role, which I think will help him and the Mavs out a lot. In his post-game media session last night he said the following, which alluded to that:
“It’s really nice when you have such great offensive players like Luka and Kai, because you don’t feel like you have to shoulder the load as much on that side of the ball, so you can focus on guarding guys…I’m just challenging the ball handler and switching on to whoever. I take great pride in guarding.”weapons on the court to take away some of that attention. Honestly, I genuinely just didn’t think nor expect other fanbases to be familiar with his in-seasonal (or pre-seasonal as it were) patterns, which is what my main point was with my post.
*My bad if that’s a miscalculation on my part and kudos to those of you guys who were already familiar with them, seriously. Klay Thompson’s defensive highlights in the 18 first half minutes he played in his Dallas Mavs debut.
Keep JK at the starting SF!! He’s been consistent the past 3 games scoring wise and he’s shown improvements on shooting, rebounding, and defense. You don’t reward him by putting him at the bench.