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What is wrong with the Jazz Defense

O

oldtimer

Well-Known Member
Last year people said our defense was bad because Boozer and Memo couldn't guard the pick and roll. Jazz fans have also complained that we don't guard the three point line. Lately I've seen lots of talk about missing defensive rotations (helping the helper) type problems. I do not know why our guards are having so much trouble guarding the high screen and roll. Opposing point guards seems to drive uncontested to the hole all game long.

I'm starting to wonder if the problem is not the players, but the coaches. I've read that Jerry Sloan liked to force base-line, while other teams like to force middle. I have no idea what Corbin's defensive strategies are, but they look bad. I think coaches matter and I point to the coach of the Bulls, Tom Tibadeau (spelling bad). He benched Boozer early in the year for his defensive rotations and now says Boozer is playing much better defense. Chicago is playing very good defense at the moment.

Celtics, Bulls, Thunder all play real good team defense and they switch like crazy. Whatever they are doing I think we need to employ that type of system. I think if the Jazz fixed their defense they would be winning some of these close ball games instead of finding ways to lose.
 
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oldtimer said:
So you believe its the players and not the system the jazz are using.
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I believe it's the coach most of all. I said for the last 18 months to fire Sloan and hire Thibodeau and we missed the boat. Chicago does not have elite defenders yet they're buying into his philosophy and kicking *** on that side of the ball.
 
What is wrong with the Jazz Defense? Their is none. I am amazed the Jazz can never stop the three. Boler said that during the month of Feb, Jazz opponents shot 44% from three. That is a staggering stat. Our wings just can not stop anyone. In my opinion, the perimeter is hurting us the most. The second part that hurts is our rebounding. We have little chance of winning when we get out rebounded.
 
KrazeeEyeKilla you were absolutely right. Thibodeau is a stud coach and I love his defensive philosophy. Why can't we employ the same system?

I try to read about the jazz every day, but since Corbin was hired I have not seen anything reported about his defensive system. Does anybody know if Corbin's defensive system is the same as Sloan's (ie force baseline)? I would love to know what they are supposed to be doing, because it looks like every man for himself out there.
 
The team has been weak on D for several years at least. Some could be players, some must be coaching. They seem totally intent on doubling almost anyone in or near the paint, at the cost of leaving folks open at the 3 pt line. We seem to have a habit of giving wide open 3s at the end of games.

And Jerry Junior seems to be employing all he "learned" from 7 years under Sloan. I agree with the poster above about Tibadeau. Couldn't they at least steal someone for assistant who know Tibs defense?
 
Um, Jazz philosophy is to force to the middle, and most other teams try to force baseline.

Jazz decide to show on the pick and roll, forcing the defender being picked to go between the two bigs to get back to his man. The other defending big not in the pick and roll generally zones out, trying to guard both the big rolling and his own man in the second it takes the wing/PG to recover to his man. If the rolling big cuts hard, the big in the pick and roll will switch while the zoning big takes on the pick and roll big.

Two things happen that cause problems. First, the small can't recover to his man, forcing the zoning big to go one on one, leaving essentially a two on one with the guard and the zoning big's man. Second, a defending wing is forced to collapse to cover this two on one, leaving a wing open. Third, one or both of the offensive bigs have long range shooting ability, stretching the zoning big way too much, and eventually leaving one of them open. Fourth, the showing big does a poor job delaying the guard, and the whole defense breaks down trying to cover that deficiency.

It all starts with problem number 4. A bad, slow, inept show by the big causes problem one to happen. Problem one can happen even with a good show, and a number of our guards often fail to recover on their own accord.

Maybe the Jazz could go under screens more, but it's kind of a lazy philosophy to generally go under screens instead of fighting through them. You should go under screens to adapt to the player, not as a general strategy.

I will say that a lot of it has to do with Jefferson. At the beginning of the year, I was actually pleased with how he showed on the pick and roll. He made sure the guard had to back off a bit, or take longer to go around him without fouling. However, teams picked up on his inability to recover to his man (or his fellow big's man) in a timely manner, so they started to take advantage of that. I think Jefferson has recently started to turn back to his man a bit more quickly in the last ten games or so, and that has opened the lane up for the guard to get into.
 
We've been doubling down in the paint since I began following the Jazz more than 15 years ago. I remember once during those first years I was watching them that Hubie Brown explained that it was Jerry's philosophy to give up the three ball because the percentages were in our favor that they'd miss. Well, guys shoot the three a lot more confidently today and Jerry simply refused to acknowledge this and was too stubborn to change. To make matters worse, with poor defenders i we've had in the paint, we were forced to continue to do this in any case.
 
Does everyone realize that when guys are shooting a lot of three's it doesn't mean that we need better wing defenders. It also relates to interior defense as well. If you let them far enough into the paint than the defense sucks in and it allows open 3 point shots.

It is absolutely the defensive scheme. Greg Popovich is very stricts on never allowing 3 point shots. He says if you are guarding somebody in the corner don't leave your man. When the entire team knows which guy is staying home it allows the other players to know there role of helping. It creates structure on defense.
We haven't had structure on defense for a long time. And its chaos and that is why we all can remember guys chasing 3 point shooters for over 10 years. We have never been good at stoping the 3 point shot.
Back in the 90's when the 3 point shot was rarely taken and the mid range shot was king the Jazz defense was great. The game has changed! We need to worry about the 3 point ball more and that is why Popovich has had one of the best defenses over the past decade. The rest of the league changed while we got stuck in Sloan's ways.
 
I think this has been Corbin's biggest fault thus far. Offense is surprisingly good, but rotations have been far worse since Sloan left. Guys are losing their man almost constantly. I have noticed Corbin rarely uses the zone where Sloan was able to use it effectively against the right lineups. Of course I also have to throw out the arbitrary "Al is not a true center", because on D he is not much of a help defender.
 
Darkwing

I don't mean to be contrary, but that is opposite of what Deron Williams said when he was traded. Deron said the Nets defense was weird because Sloan was always trying to force baseline and Avery was forcing middle. You may be right, but I thought it was exactly backwards. Either way I don't think it completely the power forwards fault. Favors shows hard and gets back to his man quickly and we were still getting beat by New York. Maybe the help defense needs to come from another player on the pick and roll.
 
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It's a combination of lack of talent, the way the team is built, and coaching. I'm with Zman and Krazeeye. Whatever
Thibodeau is doing is working and if there is an assistant that knows his system, that's the guy the Jazz need to get.
 
Personal effort.

/thread
 
oldtimer said:
Darkwing

I don't mean to be contrary, but that is opposite of what Deron Williams said when he was traded. Deron said the Nets defense was weird because Sloan was always trying to force baseline and Avery was forcing middle. You may be right, but I thought it was exactly backwards. Either way I don't think it completely the power forwards fault. Favors shows hard and gets back to his man quickly and we were still getting beat by New York. Maybe the help defense needs to come from another player on the pick and roll.
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Link?

Maybe on the wing pick and rolls, but as a general philosophy, the Jazz want to funnel the man with the ball into the center of the court. Harpring mentioned this against the Knicks. He mentioned Kirilenko forced Anthony on a play to go to the middle, something he's been taught, but was harping on the fact that it didn't matter since there wasn't any help coming anyway.
 
Twin Towers said:
Back in the 90's when the 3 point shot was rarely taken and the mid range shot was king the Jazz defense was great. The game has changed! We need to worry about the 3 point ball more and that is why Popovich has had one of the best defenses over the past decade. The rest of the league changed while we got stuck in Sloan's ways.
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Steve Kerr several years back when he was commentator said that "shooters eyes light up when they head to Salt Lake" because they know they are going to get a lot of great looks.
 
No doubt about it; Popovich is hands down the best coach in the NBA. When the Spurs stay healthy, they are generally NBA champs...
I'm suspecting a big part of our defensive woes this year are the sheer number of new guys on the team. I'll bet they are spending most of their time on the practice court with running the Jazz offense, with little time on learning the Jazz defensive schemes. There's only so many hours in the day.
At the pro level of competition, guys are generally playing against smart players running a "system" designed and coached by smart coaches, and the old addage "there's a defense to beat any offense, and an offense to beat any defense" is as true in the NBA as in the NFL. The ideal situation is for a coach to vary both his offensive game AND defensive game to at least momentarily confuse the opponent and create turnovers or easy baskets. With new players, this is very difficult to do due to the coordination with teammates required, resulting in teams knowing what the Jazz are doing beforehand and being able to counter it much more successfully.
 
KrazeeEyezKilla said:
I believe it's the coach most of all. I said for the last 18 months to fire Sloan and hire Thibodeau and we missed the boat. Chicago does not have elite defenders yet they're buying into his philosophy and kicking *** on that side of the ball.
Click to expand...

Yes back when we were having the discussion I thought I was the first to bring up Thibodeau (sp.). As usual the Jazz are a day late and a dollar short, as the saying goes. If Corbin is to survive, he needs to find a assistant defensive minded coach like coach T. was for the Celtics.
 
oldtimer said:
I've read that Jerry Sloan liked to force base-line, while other teams like to force middle.
Click to expand...

The Jazz have always tried to funnel players to the middle.

oldtimer said:
Celtics, Bulls, Thunder all play real good team defense and they switch like crazy. Whatever they are doing I think we need to employ that type of system. I think if the Jazz fixed their defense they would be winning some of these close ball games instead of finding ways to lose.
Click to expand...

I don't think the problem is the defensive schemes.
 
Twin Towers said:
Does everyone realize that when guys are shooting a lot of three's it doesn't mean that we need better wing defenders. It also relates to interior defense as well. If you let them far enough into the paint than the defense sucks in and it allows open 3 point shots.

It is absolutely the defensive scheme. Greg Popovich is very stricts on never allowing 3 point shots. He says if you are guarding somebody in the corner don't leave your man. When the entire team knows which guy is staying home it allows the other players to know there role of helping. It creates structure on defense.
We haven't had structure on defense for a long time. And its chaos and that is why we all can remember guys chasing 3 point shooters for over 10 years. We have never been good at stoping the 3 point shot.
Back in the 90's when the 3 point shot was rarely taken and the mid range shot was king the Jazz defense was great. The game has changed! We need to worry about the 3 point ball more and that is why Popovich has had one of the best defenses over the past decade. The rest of the league changed while we got stuck in Sloan's ways.
Click to expand...

Two notes
1. The Spurs have a center named Tim, who you can structure your defensive plans around.

2. The "problem" is actually opposite what you say and that is that the Jazz have a significant structrure on D. As many have noted Jerry doubles the big guy (on any team) and the team is supposed to rotate accordingly as soon as the offense does the pick and roll (all teams run pick and roll except 1ish 2ish)

When the Jazz were running this effectively late last year they were on a 21-3 run - then AK gets hurt (different topic...) and it falls apart. Durning that 21-3 run last year David Locke pointed out that the Jazz offensive efficiency did not change, but the defense. They were ranked in the top 3ish.

So the problem today is that BECUASE the Jazz rely on a structure, when it breaks down it is horrid. Thus right now with the new players, with the new coach and the attitude issues, there is simply a mess on defense. At this point they'd be better off just playing a less structured no-doubling model. And offensively strong team (like the Knicks) exposes this notably.

And that brings to the final point and that is Jerry played the 'double down' model against all teams to essentially practice the defensive plays so that the team would have it down by playoff time. (And it is also for this reason that Jerry would play the veterans 'too long.' It was to give them - the best players - the best opportunity to play together to get the offensive AND defensive system down.)
 
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