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How Good Can Walker/Hendricks Be Defensively?

Saint Cy of JFC

Saint Cy of JFC

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Is there any chance the Jazz's projected starting lineup is an average or better defensive lineup? It's been acknowledged that defense wasn't really a emphasis point last year. I think that probably had something to do with wanting Collins to shine offensively as much as possible. Collins also made it a bit easier for Keyonte/Sexton to operate in the PNR with a more dynamic center. But from what Tony Jones has said Utah is going to start Walker Kessler, so one would think that would shift an emphasis back to defense

Projected starters:

Sexton
George
Hendricks
Lauri
Kessler

The front court has fantastic size. I view Lauri as mostly a neutral defender. I think he could potentially raise his game on that end being sandwiched next to two potentially positive defenders in Hendricks/Kessler.

Sexton/Keyonte are obviously big defensive weak links, but both players have believable room for improvement. Sexton has gotten slightly better on D from my eye test and 2nd year players usually make some sort of improvement defensively. I don't see any reason why Keyonte should be one of the worst defensive guards in the NBA.

Hendricks posted a fantastic -0.4 DBPM. That's really good for a rookie, especially one as raw as Hendricks who wasn't on a good defensive team.

Walker should be less of a wet blanket this year and should hopefully stop trying to be something he isn't with shooting 3s and get back to the basics
 
Saint Cy of JFC said:
Is there any chance the Jazz's projected starting lineup is an average or better defensive lineup? It's been acknowledged that defense wasn't really a emphasis point last year. I think that probably had something to do with wanting Collins to shine offensively as much as possible. Collins also made it a bit easier for Keyonte/Sexton to operate in the PNR with a more dynamic center. But from what Tony Jones has said Utah is going to start Walker Kessler, so one would think that would shift an emphasis back to defense

Projected starters:

Sexton
George
Hendricks
Lauri
Kessler

The front court has fantastic size. I view Lauri as mostly a neutral defender. I think he could potentially raise his game on that end being sandwiched next to two potentially positive defenders in Hendricks/Kessler.

Sexton/Keyonte are obviously big defensive weak links, but both players have believable room for improvement. Sexton has gotten slightly better on D from my eye test and 2nd year players usually make some sort of improvement defensively. I don't see any reason why Keyonte should be one of the worst defensive guards in the NBA.

Hendricks posted a fantastic -0.4 DBPM. That's really good for a rookie, especially one as raw as Hendricks who wasn't on a good defensive team.

Walker should be less of a wet blanket this year and should hopefully stop trying to be something he isn't with shooting 3s and get back to the basics
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I think they’ll be better. They (overall) were pretty bad last year. Still probably a lot of mistakes. If the Jazz are committed to playing Markkanen and Hendricks together at the forward spots, I’d really like to see Cody Williams at the 2 and 3 this year. I like his upside as a defender also.
 
That's still a very porous defense from the guard position, and we know how much that can screw up a defense from the Rudy years. That being said, those teams were much better defensively during the regular season when teams did less game planning.
 
Walker is pretty much a proven commodity on the defensive end, I agree that Lauri is neutral to slightly positive, so the real question is how good can Hendricks be.

Hendricks obviously has the physical tools to be a great defender. The question mark is how quickly he can process the game/instincts/etc and I would say effort/confidence as well. He also needs to be a good enough shooter to allow for the offense to run while he is on the court. I'm hopeful, but there are still a lot of concerns. He's shown flashes, but not consistently, and one of the hallmarks to great defenders is consistency.
 
Walker is fairly proven. He's one of the best, if not the best, rim protector in the league. He doesn't have the physical ability to be something beyond a drop big, so I don't see much expansion there. He's really good at the most important thing for a big, but he won't be ideal for every situation. Where he can improve is with his general toughness. Generally, I think Kessler is a fairly smart defender who doesn't get caught out of place or over pursue. He will age well because he doesn't jump much.

I think TH's defensive strength will be his versatility. He will be able to do a lot of things well, but I don't think he will necessarily be elite at any facet of defense. But a guy who is a B+ or A- at everything might be considered one of the better defenders in the league because the versatility is so valuable. Depending on how his body develops, I could see him shifting more towards a 4/5. Right now I think he's best on the perimeter, but if he bulks up it could allow him to do more big man things. I wish his effort was more consistent. Sometimes he's an energizer bunny and making plays/deflections all over the court. Other times he seems zoned out and he'll let loose balls drift past his face. I don't think he's ever going to be a high IQ type of defender so he will have to be effective with his physical tools (which are great) and effort level.
 
None of those presumed starting 5 can play good on ball defense against better NBA guards on the perimeter. Lauri and Hendricks will likely provide solid help but they cant go 1on1 against them so its more about Key and Sexton not being traffic cones.

I think creating advantages against us on the perimeter will be pretty easy for most NBA starting 1s and 2s, and creating advantages means giving up good looks and points. Kessler evens things a bit as driving inside will be tough... but most guards can operate around that.

Its been the same story for the past 2 seasons. Guards have career nights against us, and that will likely continue.
 
Strutter said:
That's still a very porous defense from the guard position, and we know how much that can screw up a defense from the Rudy years. That being said, those teams were much better defensively during the regular season when teams did less game planning.
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Sure, but there are a number of top 15 defenses that have bad to average defensive guards.
 
I'm guessing we'll still be pretty bad. Jumping to 20th best in the league would a huge (and, for me, highly encouraging) jump.

I'm saying this in large part because I think a lot of great defense (except for the true defensive freaks) depends on both individual experience and collective experience together. We'll still be at a huge deficit in both. Last year we had Dunn and THT (who was as least competent) playing real minutes at times in the backcourt, but we still had basically no chance defensively, aside from that one midseason run where everything seemed to coalesce and we were playing mostly bad/diminished teams.

If we make a defensive jump with this group, I'm expecting it to be 2025-6.

Individually, I think Hendricks is still a bit too raw to really produce great defense consistently, though hopefully by the end of the year, that's beginning to change.
 
Coach Ellis said:
I think they’ll be better. They (overall) were pretty bad last year.
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Am I remembering correctly that they were literally the worst defense in the entire NBA?

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HermanG said:
None of those presumed starting 5 can play good on ball defense against better NBA guards on the perimeter. Lauri and Hendricks will likely provide solid help but they cant go 1on1 against them so its more about Key and Sexton not being traffic cones.

I think creating advantages against us on the perimeter will be pretty easy for most NBA starting 1s and 2s, and creating advantages means giving up good looks and points. Kessler evens things a bit as driving inside will be tough... but most guards can operate around that.

Its been the same story for the past 2 seasons. Guards have career nights against us, and that will likely continue.
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Key/Sexton/Clarkson (and likely Collier/Mills) are a truly abysmal defensive backcourt. There are levels to being "bad" and our guys are amongst the worst.
 
KqWIN said:
Key/Sexton/Clarkson (and likely Collier/Mills) are a truly abysmal defensive backcourt. There are levels to being "bad" and our guys are amongst the worst.
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I wonder how much time Williams will get at the 2?

I'm not expecting all world perimeter defense out of him, but he should definitely be our best perimeter defender.
 
SoberasHotRod said:
I wonder how much time Williams will get at the 2?

I'm not expecting all world perimeter defense out of him, but he should definitely be our best perimeter defender.
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I'm not sure, though I believe Williams is a candidate to be force fed minutes in the same way that Key was. There's not a lot of depth behind Key/Sexton, so he could see minutes there. I'm uncertain about his defense. I think his best attribute as a defender is his on ball defense, but I also think that's just one part of defense and often one of the more "overrated" parts of defense because it's the only thing that captures our eye. I'd agree that he's probably one of our better on ball defenders right away...but I worry about his inactivity elsewhere. I'm not much of a stickler over positions....but if he doesn't improve his rebounding/defensive activity, he kinda has to be the "2" because otherwise you're behind the curve in terms of rebounding/other stuff related to size.

His defensive numbers were really poor in college, not just box score stuff but also his +/- related stuff IIRC.
 
idiot said:
I'm guessing we'll still be pretty bad. Jumping to 20th best in the league would a huge (and, for me, highly encouraging) jump.

I'm saying this in large part because I think a lot of great defense (except for the true defensive freaks) depends on both individual experience and collective experience together. We'll still be at a huge deficit in both. Last year we had Dunn and THT (who was as least competent) playing real minutes at times in the backcourt, but we still had basically no chance defensively, aside from that one midseason run where everything seemed to coalesce and we were playing mostly bad/diminished teams.

If we make a defensive jump with this group, I'm expecting it to be 2025-6.

Individually, I think Hendricks is still a bit too raw to really produce great defense consistently, though hopefully by the end of the year, that's beginning to change.
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The defense will have to improve as a team, not individuals.
 
I think the best argument as to why we will improve on defense is that it's simply hard to be that bad two years in a row. Whoever is 30th was likely bad, but also intentionally bad and "unlucky". I think we'll probably be like 25th.
 
HermanG said:
One of the worst defenses in the history of the NBA.

That is unfair though, as average points scored has gone up past 5 years to so high that new bests/worsts are set quite often on those metrics.
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Ya I'm not talking about history since a team from the 80's vs today is apples to oranges

Were they the worst defensive team in the NBA last season though?

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KqWIN said:
Saw this tool twitter, found it kind of interesting. It's a quick model that predict's a lineup's defensive rating percentile in comparison to every lineup over the last 5 seasons.

Methodology is also on the site. I found it interesting that forwards appear to be the most important.


View attachment 17103
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Pretty fun. If we're really going to be a middle of the road defensive team next year, we won't be a bottom 5 team. Of course this doesn't have rookies so we can't see what our bench units might look like.

I put my starting lineup for my team from the draft and got a 91%.
 
SoberasHotRod said:
Pretty fun. If we're really going to be a middle of the road defensive team next year, we won't be a bottom 5 team. Of course this doesn't have rookies so we can't see what our bench units might look like.

I put my starting lineup for my team from the draft and got a 91%.
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The Celtics starting lineup last year was at 72% for comparison.
 
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