How Top Point Guards In The Pick And Roll Are Defended…And Why
NBA Playbook.com
When I did my post on Rajon Rondo for Basketball Prospectus a few weeks ago, HoopSpeak‘s Beckley Mason
(seriously, go follow him now) mentioned that he thought it would be
interesting to look at how other top point guards were played in the
pick and roll. Considering that I agree with Beckley, I decided to look
at five of the league’s top point guards and see how defenses play
them.
Why is this important? With the influx of a lot of great point
guards, the pick and roll has been featured more and more in the NBA.
The reason why the pick and roll is so effective with a good point
guard is that it forces the defense to react and puts them on the
backfoot. That’s why you see defenses trying to stop the pick and roll
in a lot of different ways. One of the things that I did notice when
focusing on the defense is that they tend to try and force the ball
handler coming off of the pick away from his strength and towards his
weakness.
Rajon Rondo
How Teams Defend Him
Teams defended Rajon Rondo by going under screens. Out of all the
ball screens that Rondo received, the defense went under the screen 50%
of the time. In addition, Rondo was rarely trapped coming off of the
screen, as defenses trapped Rondo 0.8% of the time, or 12 total traps.
Why?
When playing Rajon Rondo, you want to turn him into a shooter and a
scorer. Rondo is such a great passer and there are so many other great
scorers on his team, that you don’t want to dedicate extra defenders to Rondo as he comes off of the ballscreen:
Rondo is a really heady point guard and when he sees a trap when
coming off of the ball screen, he is immediately looking to stretch the
defense, find the open man, and hit them. With the kind of success he
has being trapped, it is no wonder why you see so few traps of him.
One of Rajon Rondo’s weaknesses, and perhaps his biggest, is that he
is not a good shooter off of the dribble. Not only does his struggle
with his shot, but he also lacks the confidence to take a jumper off of
the dribble consistently to make himself a threat. As a response teams
go under the screen, pack it in, and force Rondo to beat them. The
result is a higher amount of turnovers you would expect as Rondo tries
to force things instead of taking the shot:
When watching Rondo come off of a ballscreen, you really see his
unwillingness to even look at the rim, let alone attempt a jump shot.
With Rondo not being a threat to shoot the basketball, it invites teams
to go under the screen because they know that he won’t hurt them with
the shot. It allows defenses to focus on defending the four other
Celtics while keeping Rajon Rondo from getting into the paint and
breaking the defense down.
That’s the goal.
Derrick Rose
How Teams Defend Him
Teams defended Derrick Rose by trying to get the basketball out of
his hands. When coming off of a ball screen Rose was single covered,
meaning there wasn’t an extra defender sent his way, just 34.8% of the
time.
Why?
Rose’s situation with his Bulls is almost the exact opposite
situation that Rajon Rondo has with the Celtics. Rose is so good with
the basketball in his hands that defenses would much rather let Rose’s
teammates try to beat them. To do so, they throw extra defenders at him
and make Rose pass the basketball. When defenses committed to Derrick
Rose, they were able to force him to pass it 91.3% of the time and on
those passes, his teammates scored only 0.946 points per possession on
just 43.6% shooting:
As Rose comes off of a ballscreen, he more often than not sees a
second defender looking him right in the face as teams overload in his
direction, leaving teammates open and willing to deal with the
consequences.
Rose is a smart player and he doesn’t force the issue a
whole lot, so teams were able to get the ball out of his hands more
often that not as Rose made the right direction, hitting the open man.
Unfortunately for Rose and the Bulls, his teammates couldn’t knock down
the open shot consistently. That end result is a much more attractive
option than the end result when Rose is single covered, usually coming
off of a switch with a big trying to defend Rose:
Derrick Rose is so quick and so explosive that if he sees an opening,
which usually happens when he is single covered coming off of a ball
screen, he attacks it before the defense even knows that it is
happening. Once Rose gets to the rim he is almost impossible to stop
and when watching him attack the pick and roll so successfully, it is no
wonder why he is getting double on most ball screens.
Steph Curry
How Teams Defend Him
Teams defended Steph Curry by going over screens in an effort to
force Curry to attack the rim instead of taking the jump shot. Teams
have gone over Steph Curry ball screens 62% of the time, 9th most in the
NBA among all ball handlers with at least 60 pick and roll possessions.
Why?
Steph Curry is probably one of the best, if not the best, shooter at
the point guard position. Because of that, teams want to try and keep
him from getting open looks coming off of ball screens. To do that,
defenses went over ball screens forcing Curry to put the ball on the
floor and attack the rim instead of stopping, pulling up, and knocking
down jumpers. Something that happens when the defense goes under
ballscreens:
With the threat of that happening, teams want to try and stay
attached to Curry. The only way to do that is by going over
ballscreens:
When the defense goes over a ballscreen against Steph Curry, they are
keeping pressure on him, not allowing him to get an open look, and
forcing him to keep his dribble going. The result is usually either a
turnover or an uncomfortable/contested lay-up or shot in the paint.
Those are shots that Curry struggles with, especially when compared
with his jumpers when his feet are set.
Steve Nash & Chris Paul
How Teams Defend Them
When looking at pick and roll point guards, Steve Nash and Chris Paul
are probably the two most complete point guards in the NBA. That
becomes obvious when looking at how teams try to defend them. Unlike
the three previous point guards, where there was a noticeable trend when
looking at how they are defended, there is no one way Nash and Paul are
defended. When it comes to Chris Paul, defenses went over screens
36.3% of the time and went under screens 35% of the time. With Nash,
the numbers were a little more skewed towards going over the screen, but
even still, defenses were attempting to mix it up against him as
defenses went over the screen 42% of the time and under the screen 22%
of the time. If there is one trend in regards to how they are defended
it is how often they force the defense to run into the screen. Both
Nash and Paul were able to get the defender to run into the screen close
to 50% of the time, as Nash did it 49.9% of the time (9th among PGs)
and Paul did it 54.7% of the time (3rd among PGs).
Why?
Because both Steve Nash and Chris Paul can pretty much do everything
required of a point guard in pick and roll situations, they can shoot
the ball, attack the rim, and hit the open teammate, defenses are forced
to try a lot of different things and they tend to not have much success
trying to stop them (both PGs are among the top 12% in terms of pick
and roll PPP). In addition to this, both point guards simply know how
to set up screens, as shown by the percent of time they are able to get
defenses to run into screens:
When watching through these clips, it is pretty easy to see why both
Steve Nash and Chris Paul are so dangerous when using ball screens.
They just know how to set up and use ball screens, putting a lot of
pressure on the defense. Their respective shooting ability forces the
defense to try and go over the screen, but they are able to get their
defenders to run into screens and free them up. Both Nash and Paul are
nearly impossible to defend in the pick and roll.
—
Looking at the 5 point guards chosen for this post, you should notice
that each point guard is probably the best in their respective
category. Rondo is a great pass-first point guard, Rose is that super
athletic point guard who wants to get to the rim, Steph Curry is a great
shooter, and Paul/Nash are complete point guards (at least
offensively). Within each category, you can see how the defense tries
to play the pick and roll, trying to play each point guard away from
their strength and towards their weakness. The only exception is with
Nash and Paul, who don’t really have much of a weakness in the pick and
roll, the uncertainty leads to defenders getting run into screens more
often than not.
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