It’s the final Friday of 2017, so let’s roll:
1. Jordan Bell and the Steph-less Warriors
So … Cash Considerations might be good already — at least when surrounded by Golden State’s elite talent. The Warriors have blitzed opponents by 16 points per 100 possessions with both Bell and Kevin Durant on the floor, and Bell’s all-around game has helped the Dubs thrive without Stephen Curry.
Bell brings a speed and switchability on defense no one else in Golden State’s misfit crew of centers can approach. He fits on offense as another cagey ball-mover. Trap Durant on the pick-and-roll, and Bell slips into a 4-on-3 — and (usually) whips the ball to the right place. Watch him eyeball Omri Casspi cutting through the lane, fake a pass there, and wait for the waves to recede — leaving his real target open in their wake:
When defenses gird for the pass, Bell lays out bait and springs a surprise handoff — the ol’ Nick Collison:
Bembry has dished 26 assists and barfed away 36 turnovers. He has coughed it up on (gulp) 37.9 percent of the pick-and-rolls he has finished with a shot, drawn foul, or turnover —
the very worst mark in the league.
Bembry is either overestimating the speed and dexterity of his handle, or underestimating the speed and dexterity of NBA athletes. When he slides the ball too far out in front of his chest, presumably to kick-start some sort of evasive maneuver, defenders snatch it. He tries to slither through corridors only the canniest ball handlers navigate unscathed.
Bembry also throws some of the saddest wayward crosscourt lobs you will see in the NBA — lollipops so soft, multiple defenders have time to debate which of them should steal the ball.
Maybe it doesn’t matter. Bembry hasn’t even cracked 700 NBA minutes; injuries derailed the start of his second season. Atlanta is in full developmental mode, and Bembry needs NBA reps.
But his early misadventures in ballhandling have surely raised alarms.
It took two dozen games (not that long, really), but the Thunder have discovered some fundamental truths about themselves — mostly that Carmelo Anthony has to be a 3-point-gunning third option. Oklahoma City is 12-3 since Dec. 1, and Melo’s stutter-stepping, ball-stopping isolations have dropped from about 7.5 per game before then to 3.5 since, according to Second Spectrum data. His post-ups are down, too.
Anthony is jogging into trail 3s at the rear of Russell Westbrook’s manic fast breaks, and he still gets to cook if he gets the ball late in the shot clock. (Note to Melo: any number higher than seven or eight does not constitute “late.”)
Westbrook has absorbed most of the load, and he’s finishing at the rim with MVP explosion again. A Westbrook spread pick-and-roll barrage, peppered with pindowns for Paul George, was always the road map. It’s hard to find much “spread” with both Andre Roberson and Steven Adams on the floor, but Westbrook doesn’t need much.
Billy Donovan is smartly mitigating the Roberson effect by having him set more screens for Westbrook — about seven per game since Dec. 1, up from 4.5 before, per Second Spectrum.
There is so much work left. The Thunder haven’t landed on a fifth crunch-time player; right now, it’s Roberson by default. Donovan is figuring out how to stagger his three stars. The lineup data on that is mostly discouraging, but still noisy — and hard to parse — at this stage. The bench is thin.
Patrick Patterson hasn’t looked the same since offseason knee surgery; he has barely played alongside Adams. Jerami Grant has been solid as a backup center, but Raymond Felton is Raymond Felton, and Alex Abrines is fading to the edges of Donovan’s rotations. Are they really riding with Josh Huestis when it matters? You know Sam Presti is going to find one more guy around the trade deadline.
Also a problem: Oklahoma City still has only one crunch-time set — a wing “Hawk” pick-and-roll in which Anthony screens for George before flipping around and screening for Westbrook as George curls around the opposite side. Opponents are, umm, onto that one. Westbrook remains statuesque, hands on knees, whenever someone else has the ball.
This isn’t a 60-win juggernaut waiting to bust out. But they could play the rest of the season at a 50-win pace, and be an absolute pain in the ass in the playoffs.
I know everyone has to shoot 3s now, but can Acy maybe chill on contested above-the-break triples early in the shot clock?
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