SUMMARY
This is AI generated summarization, which may have errors. For context, always refer to the full article.
Out of all the maxims pertaining to basketball – and the NBA in particular – that are evergreen, there is one that you’ve probably heard the most when it comes to reaching the mountaintop.
Defense wins championships.
That statement has rung true for time immemorial.
Every NBA championship winning team – from Bill Russell’s Boston Celtics of basketball antiquity up till the recent Golden State Warriors’ dynastic run – possessed the kind of defense that chokes the proverbial life out of opponents and saps their will to the utmost extreme.
Offense is sexy; defense isn’t, more often than it is. It is rugged by nature, and it demands a workhorse approach for it to be effective. It requires more buy-in from everyone on your team, especially from your best players; when they do, everything else falls into place.
From day one of the 2019-2020 NBA season, LeBron James bought into the defensive philosophy Frank Vogel wanted to instill.
Anthony Davis bought in the moment he was traded to the Lakers, and when someone of James’ stature places the full weight of his support behind the system, you’d be unwise not to buy in as well.
The result: The Los Angeles Lakers being crowned the 2019-2020 NBA champions, their 17th title in franchise history.
And perhaps unlike their previous championships – won mostly on the offensive exploits of past greats such as Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Shaquille O’Neal, and Kobe Bryant – this conquest came with defense at the forefront.
106.1: The Lakers’ regular season defensive rating
Defensive rating/efficiency is a metric widely used to measure a team’s ability to be effective at preventing the other team from scoring. It is often the be-all-end-all standard in terms of assessing how good a team’s defense is.
The Lakers put up a 106.1 defensive rating – the third-best mark, behind the Milwaukee Bucks and the Toronto Raptors – during the regular season, meaning that they allowed an average of 106.1 points per 100 possessions during the year.
To put this number into perspective, it is extremely rare for a team to not be among the top 10 in terms of defensive efficiency and still win the NBA championship.
Since the 1999-2000 season, only 3 teams have won a title without being considered a top 10 defense in the regular season: the 2000-2001 Lakers (22nd), the 2005-2006 Miami Heat (17th), and the 2017-2018 Golden State Warriors (11th).
The last time the Lakers were a top 10 defense seemed like an eternity ago: during the 2010-2011 season, when they finished as the No. 2 seed in the Western Conference but were eliminated in the conference semifinals by the Dallas Mavericks.
It went downhill for them defensively thereafter, and rock bottom was reached during 2015-2017, when the Lakers were considered the worst defense in the league for two consecutive seasons by virtue of having the worst defensive efficiency out of all 30 teams.
But in just 3 seasons after posting their league-worst mark, the Lakers turned around their situation. From being one of the more mediocre defenses of the past decade, the Lakers are now one of the preeminent defensive squads in the NBA.
“I’m really proud of our whole team, beginning with our captains, but really top to bottom our whole roster’s commitment to the defensive end,” Vogel said after the Lakers’ Game 5 victory over the Houston Rockets back in the Western Conference semifinals.
“From the beginning of the season our group has really committed to that end of the floor and it’s paying dividends now.”
6.6: The Lakers’ blocks per game in the regular season
One thing that immediately stands out in the Lakers roster is that they are an extremely huge team. They are filled to the brim with players who are tall and/or lengthy, or have the athleticism to play like they are taller and lengthier than they actually are.
This translates into what should have been an obvious conclusion to make at the beginning of this season: The Lakers are the best rim-protecting unit in the NBA, with their 6.6 blocks per game leading the league during the regular season.
Furthermore, they ranked fourth in the regular season in terms of field goal percentage allowed from less than 5 feet away from the rim (opponents shot 58.9% from that range against them), per NBA Advanced Stats.
When you have players like Dwight Howard – a former Defensive Player of the Year and shot-blocking menace – and JaVale McGee, who is a rare combination of extreme height and extreme length, you’re bound to make things difficult for any offense within the paint.
But the addition of Anthony Davis makes going to the rim an almost futile endeavor.
Davis averaged 2.3 blocks per game in the regular season and was placed on the All-NBA Defensive First Team doing things a man of his size shouldn’t be able to do.
Davis’ defense was arguably the difference maker in their series against the Heat. In Game 6, Vogel elected to place Davis at the 5 in lieu of starting Howard in order to minimize mismatches, allowing Davis to guard Bam Adebayo – a non-shooting threat – which in turn allowed Davis to roam freely in the paint as a rim protector without having to worry about stretching out to the perimeter.
Put yourself in the shoes of a ballhandler like Kendrick Nunn. You’ve worked hard to bypass the Lakers’ hounding perimeter defense, and LeBron James – a hulking defensive presence himself – allows you the rare privilege of a driving lane. At first glance, it seems like James let you off too easily.
But you find out that it was by design, because a 7-footer with the wingspan of a pterodactyl is waiting to render your layup moot:
Nunn is the very definition of insanity – doing things over and over again and expecting different results – when he tries it again against Davis:
Even the threat of Davis blocking your shot as you get closer to the rim can force you to make mistakes. Tyler Herro, a rookie with seemingly endless amounts of bravado, makes a head-scratching pass with Davis suddenly occupying his peripheral vision:
Having Davis as your anchor on defense is unfair – but then again, being unfair is often what wins you NBA titles.
14.2: The Lakers’ deflections per game in the playoffs
You may be surprised to hear deflections are a measured stat, but NBA’s Advanced Stats page considers it among its “hustle” metrics, alongside other concepts such as loose balls recovered, charges drawn, box outs, etc.
Deflections may not immediately lead to a steal or turnover, but they can disrupt an offense’s rhythm. Passes that should have been clean are instead thrown off their projected course because a defender stuck to the basic defensive principle of keeping your arms and hands up. This makes the offense have to create on the fly, resort to plan B or beyond, or to try something that’s way outside their comfort zone.
The Lakers, with their playoff-leading 14.2 deflections per game and 284 total deflections, have made it difficult for teams to navigate passing lanes all season long.
Forcing your opponents to make mistakes in the form of wayward passes and turnovers is a skill not many NBA teams possess, but the Lakers have made it their trademark. It forces even the most disciplined of offenses to rush and do things they aren’t accustomed to.
Duncan Robinson – who is unquestionably a better shooter than he is a passer – is less of a threat when he tries to get the ball to a teammate instead of putting it through the hoop:
The Lakers were second in the league in fastbreak points per game in the regular season (18.4), just behind the Toronto Raptors. They were second in the playoffs with 15.1 per game, behind the Brooklyn Nets.
Additionally, the Lakers ranked third in terms of points off turnovers both in the regular season (19.0 per game) and the playoffs (17.6 per game), per NBA Advanced Stats.
Turning the ball over against the Lakers is akin to jumping off a cliff and landing on the rocks below. Give the Lakers an opportunity to run in transition and it might as well be a death sentence, especially against the likes of LeBron James, perhaps the deadliest transition force in NBA history.
James’ job on offense was made much easier when the defense behind him was willing to bunker down and do the nitty-gritty work. The Lakers – a mediocre half-court offense during the regular season – dominated when they forced offenses to turn the ball over and controlled the pace.
As the Lakers – and everyone else, for that matter – learned in the playoffs, the halfcourt offense would solve itself, but only after they stuck to what got them there in the first place: a defense that grinds opponents to a pulverized powder, fueled by effort and near-telepathic cohesion the likes of which have been seen in only a few other championship-winning teams.
Once again, that maxim – defense wins championships – turned out to be true. But for the 2019-2020 Los Angeles Lakers, it wasn’t just a bit player or complementary piece on their way to the title.
It was the very identity they espoused – and the league had no choice but to kneel and submit. – Rappler.com
Add a comment
How does this make you feel?
There are no comments yet. Add your comment to start the conversation.