The Denver Nuggets' 2008-09 Defense and Michael Jackson: Gone Too Soon

A Championship team needs to have a tough paint defense unless it happens to be one of the best two or three offenses in the history of basketball and even then you would not want the paint defense to be poor but close to average at the least. For one thing, easy scores in the paint tend to demoralize players (and coaches and fans) on the receiving end.

George Karl and the Nuggets are violating this clear and enduring principal this year by in effect saying they can challenge for a Ring without caring much about a leaky paint defense.

But any team serious about the Quest for the Ring needs to do everything possible to keep the points it allows in the paint at 40 or less per game. A fast paced team can maybe get away with exactly 40 paint points per game whereas a slow paced team needs to keep it below 38 or so. All teams regardless of pace that are trying to win the Ring more so with defense than offense must keep points in the paint allowed to 37.5 or less per game. All teams serious about trying to win the Quest more so with defense are going to be medium or slow paced teams; it is basically impossible to run a fast pace on offense and have a serious chance of winning a Ring more with defense than with offense. The faster the pace you run on offense, the less opportunity you have to succeed with a tough defense.

The gold standard for paint defense is 36 points given up in the paint per game (or even less). The abysmal standard is 45 points or more points given up in the paint per game. Face it: if you give up more than 45 points in the paint per game, you are not even trying to defend the paint.

Here is how the teams currently rank:

POINTS GIVEN UP IN THE PAINT PER GAME
2009-10 REGULAR SEASON
As of March 2 2010
1 Cleveland Cavaliers 35.8
2 Orlando Magic 36.1
3 Detroit Pistons 36.8
4 Milwaukee Bucks 37.6
5 Boston Celtics 37.8
6 Miami Heat 37.9
7 Indiana Pacers 38.3
8 Chicago Bulls 39.5
9 Charlotte Bobcats 39.6
10 Utah Jazz 39.8
11 Washington Wizards 40.5
12 Los Angeles Lakers 40.7
13 Dallas Mavericks 41.3
14 San Antonio Spurs 41.6
15 Portland Trail Blazers 41.6
16 Los Angeles Clippers 42.1
17 Toronto Raptors 42.3
18 Philadelphia 76ers 42.7
19 Oklahoma City Thunder 43.1
20 Denver Nuggets 43.5
21 Phoenix Suns 43.7
22 Minnesota Timberwolves 43.8
23 Atlanta Hawks 44.1
24 Houston Rockets 44.3
25 New Orleans Hornets 44.5
26 New Jersey Nets 44.7
27 Sacramento Kings 45.6
28 New York Knicks 46.4
29 Golden State Warriors 46.6
30 Memphis Grizzlies 48.4

The Nuggets, who have been victimized in the paint more and more as this season has progressed, as the other teams realize that Denver is not defending the paint well like they did last year, are now averaging 43.5 points given up in the paint per game versus 38.4 points last year. Remember, what may seem like a small difference like this means big changes in whether a team can really win the NBA Championship or not.

The Nuggets have flipped from being a tough in the paint team last year to a soft in the paint team, something which they could largely avoid if they played expert paint defender Renaldo Balkman for at least as many minutes as they did last year, which was 780 minutes in the regular season but, however, virtually zero minutes in the playoffs. Playing without Balkman’s tough paint defending and great defensive rebounding against Dallas in the West semifinal was not enough to sink Denver but it was enough to help ruin Denver in the West final, and the same thing or worse is destined to happen this year.

Defending the paint means, to name the most important things:

--You deny offensive rebounds by very good or better defensive rebounding. Your team boxes out and fights for all rebounds continuously and aggressively.

--You have very good or better man to man defending close to the hoop.

--You are not doing so much switching due to screens and pick and rolls that the big men who can defend the paint end up out of the paint guarding guards while a small forward or a guard is left with the near impossible task of preventing a score in the paint by a center or power forward. Instead of over switching all the time, your big men need to often fight through screens and fight to stay with the opponent’s big men.

--Guards almost by definition are just minor factors with respect to paint defense. Even small forwards are often relatively minor factors. Defending the paint is primarily a job for power forwards and centers. So to defend well in the paint, you can not make the big mistake of playing guards for too many minutes and centers and power forwards for too few minutes. Size is crucial in basketball; every inch counts.

For most teams, you want to have the total minutes played by centers and power forwards add up to more than 96 (the length of a game, 48 minutes, times two positions). The optimal number of minutes depends on how good the players at the different positions are, but almost always you will need to have power forwards and centers play at a rock bottom minimum a combined 101 minutes per game and, in many, many cases they should play 106-116 minutes a game. Any coach who thinks he is going to win a lot of playoff games while having always exactly two power forwards and centers in the game and never three of them is very unlikely to be successful.

As you might suspect, George Karl is doing this: he is refusing to play three power forwards and centers at once for even a tiny number of minutes a game. He did play three of them at once for a few minutes a game last year, which was quite surprising and unusual. But this year, as a result of inadequate center and power forward minutes, not only is George Karl not defending the paint well, he is also not taking advantage of a good opportunity to add some extra disruption and confusion for the opponent’s offense. Playing three power forwards and centers at once is a little bit like a power play in hockey.

Phil Jackson is typically playing three power forwards / centers at once for 6-12 minutes per game.

NOTES ABOUT CERTAIN OTHER TEAMS
First, notice an obvious but important generality: roughly speaking, the worst teams in the League give up the most points in the paint and vice versa. There are a small number of exceptions from time to time.

Notice that even though the Lakers overall this year are outstanding on defense (they have just about the best defensive efficiency) they are slightly over the recommended points in the paint maximum. But this is illusory, because Pau Gasol, the most important Lakers paint defender, has missed just about 18 games this season. The Lakers are definitely under 40 points per game surrendered in the paint as long as Pau Gasol is in there and as long as Coach Phil Jackson keeps reminding them to defend the paint well. Having said that, the Lakers, like the Nuggets, do seem to be emphasizing perimeter defense more and paint defense less. But they are doing both at a higher level than are the Nuggets.

What about Nuggets’ injuries? Kenyon Martin and Chris Andersen have missed a very small number of games. Small forward Carmelo Anthony has missed some games but he is definitely not a great or even a good paint defender which by the way is another indirect reason for why Balkman absolutely must play or the Nuggets are toast.

Notice that the Celtics, who won the Quest in 2008 with, you guessed it, a fierce in the paint and overall defense, have not, unlike the Nuggets, abandoned tough paint defending. However, the Celtics have their hands full to say the least in the East Conference, because both the Cleveland Cavaliers and the Orlando Magic (the two teams which are Boston’s main rivals to win the East this year) have extremely good paint defending this year, substantially better than that of the Celtics. Always remember that small differences in numbers translate into big differences on the court in terms of win potential in the playoffs.

We can also look at a related view: the percentage of all points given up that are given up in the paint. This indirectly corrects for pace, whereas the straight up points per game in the paint is slightly biased against fast paced teams such as the Nuggets. Could it be that the Nuggets have been getting a bum rap from Quest for the Ring on this subject?

Let’s compare the teams in percentage of all points given up that are given up in the paint. In other words, we are looking at, in effect, how important a team thinks paint defending is, and/or we are looking at how strong the paint defense is relative to the defense as a whole.

POINTS GIVEN UP IN THE PAINT AS A PERCENTAGE OF ALL POINTS GIVEN UP
2009-10 REGULAR SEASON
As of March 2 2010
1 Indiana Pacers 0.3683
2 Cleveland Cavaliers 0.3757
3 Orlando Magic 0.3772
4 Detroit Pistons 0.3802
5 Milwaukee Bucks 0.3868
6 Miami Heat 0.3989
7 Washington Wizards 0.3990
8 Boston Celtics 0.4008
9 Chicago Bulls 0.4010
10 Toronto Raptors 0.4013
11 Utah Jazz 0.4078
12 Phoenix Suns 0.4123
13 Minnesota Timberwolves 0.4124
14 Dallas Mavericks 0.4189
15 Charlotte Bobcats 0.4199
16 Los Angeles Clippers 0.4202
17 Golden State Warriors 0.4213
18 Los Angeles Lakers 0.4235
19 Philadelphia 76ers 0.4236
20 Denver Nuggets 0.4240
21 San Antonio Spurs 0.4302
22 Sacramento Kings 0.4326
23 Houston Rockets 0.4365
24 Portland Trail Blazers 0.4370
25 New Orleans Hornets 0.4393
26 New York Knicks 0.4419
27 New Jersey Nets 0.4430
28 Oklahoma City Thunder 0.4490
29 Atlanta Hawks 0.4537
30 Memphis Grizzlies 0.4699

OK, now we have proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that Denver is, whether they know it or not, packing it in with regard to paint defense, because they rank exactly the same (20th) in percentage of points given up that are given up in the paint as they do in straight up points given up in the paint per game.

With respect to winning the Quest, on a scale of 1 to 10 where 1 is the least important thing to do and 10 is the most important thing to do, paint defense is somewhere between an 8 and a 10. You most definitely do not want to be below average on anything that is extremely important for winning the Quest.

So the Nuggets are cruising for a bruising, yet all they have to do to shore up the paint defense is increase Chris Andersen and Renaldo Balkman minutes by a combined 24-30 minutes per game. If they did this, they would most likely improve to where they could really challenge the Lakers this year. But right now, the Nuggets have guard overkill going. They have two truly outstanding young guards in Ty Lawson and Arron Afflalo and of course they have superstar Chauncey Billups at the point.

Given the fact that 2-guard J.R. Smith has fallen off pretty badly this year, as by the way Quest thought would probably happen sooner or later if he was treated as a black sheep instead of as a valuable starter, the Nuggets could easily take away some playing time from Smith and not lose anything on the guard front. Further, there is essentially zero reason for reserve point guard Anthony Carter to be playing at all since the Nuggets have three truly outstanding guards along with the potentially outstanding J.R. Smith. Whenever Carter plays, who simply due to age alone can not compete with Afflalo, Lawson, or even Smith, the Nuggets are shooting themselves in the foot. Steven Graham isn't even worth discussing.

A FEW NOTES ABOUT CERTAIN OTHER TEAMS
So far this year (it won’t change much between now and the end of the season) the Indiana Pacers are most dedicated to and/or most able to defend the paint whereas the Memphis Grizzlies are the least. You know those Grizzlies, always screwing up somehow, laugh out loud.

The Cavaliers and the Magic are just behind the Pacers at the top of the paint defending heap. The Celtics are just far enough behind those two teams to have a problem that they had better deal with in some way, since despite superstar point guard Rajon Rondo the Celtics are going to be depending at least as much on defense as on offense in this year’s playoffs. In other words, the Celtics are doing very well at defending the paint, but they probably have to do even better if they want to be in the NBA Final this year.

Notice that if you look closely you can often see evidence of major injuries when you break something like this down. For example, the Portland Trailblazers are 15th in points given up per game and 24th in percentage of points given up that are in the paint. This tells you that although the Trailblazers play at a very slow pace and keep their points per game given up fairly low as a result, they are actually getting killed in the paint, which is obviously due to several major injuries to some of their best forwards and centers. Portland, like Denver, has flipped from being a fairly good paint defense team to a poor one, but in Portland’s case this is due to injuries whereas in Denver’s case this is due to poor player minutes allocation.

Another interesting thing to observe is that the Atlanta Hawks, because they have a really bad paint defense, even worse than Denver’s, seem destined this year to be defeated fairly easily no later than the East semifinal round (2nd round of the playoffs). This is especially true given that Boston and especially Cleveland and Orlando all have outstanding paint defenses.

For more details of this whopper of a Nuggets mistake that we have been understandably focused on since early December, see any or all of these Reports:

--Shocking but True: the Denver Nuggets are Better than the Lakers but can they beat the Lakers in the 2010 Playoffs?

--George Karl is Losing Home Court Advantage due to not Defending the Paint

--The Denver Nuggets have Defensive Problems and the Solution is Sitting on the Bench

DENVER NUGGETS HANDLED IN THE PAINT THE LAST 2 GAMES
The Nuggets just dropped two straight important games. On Sunday February 28 against the Lakers themselves in Los Angeles, Phil Jackson figured this paint defense thing (and more) out at halftime and, after a shaky first half, the Lakers dominated in the second half and defeated the Nuggets 95-89. The Lakers scored 50 points in the paint! That’s five-oh, brother man! This means the Lakers owned the Nuggets in the paint and it also means that the Lakers were intentionally running extra plays into the paint because they knew for a certainty that the Nuggets’ paint defense is not what it was last year and is simply not good enough.

We like to say that LA Coach Phil Jackson is one of the few basketball people who does not need to check out Quest for the Ring because he knows everything we know and more. So it is doubtful Jackson figured out how to beat the Nuggets by reading the Quest. Still, Quest is hot like fire and, after last year’s horrible wild ride that might have ended up in total destruction (see the Darth Vader Series) this year is going along quite well indeed so far.

Although the next night the Nuggets were back to back road in Phoenix, the Suns were also back to back, having played on Sunday themselves in San Antonio (where they lost by a little bit). So both teams were back to back. Once again, the Nuggets got off to a strong start early. But it took the Suns just one quarter to learn how to turn things around big time against the Nuggets, and by halftime the Suns were leading the Nuggets 57-44. In the second half, the Nuggets, and this was surprising even to me, never mounted a serious challenge and lost the game 101-85. The Suns scored 44 points against the Nuggets in the paint although in fairness the explosive Suns average 44.6 points in the paint offensively.

The Lakers offensively average 45.1 points per game in the paint, so if you think you are going to beat them or even just compete closely with them in a series with a lame paint defense (with for example too many guard minutes and not enough power forward / center minutes) you have another thing coming.

Oh well, we can cry the blues for those wayward Nuggets, laugh out loud….

THE NUGGETS 2008-09 DEFENSE: GONE TOO SOON