knicks1248 wrote:

fishmike wrote:

franco12 wrote:

Finestrg wrote:

EwingsGlass wrote:

franco12 wrote:

nixluva wrote:Gallo isn't a stopper but he's not a matador either. How soon we forget. What Gallo often does is back off smaller quicker players and uses his length to get a hand in their face. We're gonna use zones a lot too so who cares about man 2 man? With all the length we'd have on the floor it would be hard for teams to get all the way to the basket. Felton, Gallo, AR, Amar'e n Turiaf would be a nightmare on D cuz all of our guys can move well and block shots. The MDA Zone could work real well for long stretches.

To me- this is the thing I'm most worried about.

We're going to play zone a lot- and plan on everyone switching on defense. That is the philosphy of MDA, I guess. And something about that just made players last year, I think, lazy about defense because guys switched when there was no reason to.

And I'm sorry, good defensive teams don't use gimmicks and don't switch at every instance.

I agree we have better defenders- but the question is can we maybe have a better game plan for playing defense?

Can't be argued that the best defensive teams in the NBA play man coverage and have great help defense. That said, there are a lot of non-NBA teams that play excellent zone defense. I don't know enough to say that one form of defense is far superior to another, but I think it is clear that playing good man-to-man coverage requires skilled defenders at every position, otherwise use picks to switch the assignments until they have a favorable matchup. It seems like zone defense is the easiest to coach (and if players are lazy--- whether in zone defense or man coverage) the defense fails. The switch off of picks concept is not exactly a zone defense, it is just man-coverage without specified defensive assignments. In that sense, Gallo has to guard the SG at various points-- the question is still whether it is worth starting him there so you can put arguably your best 5 on the court at the same time or whether either Randolph or Gallo have to come off the bench.

Maybe this is a better question-- is it better to have Gallo initiating defense at the SG with a lineup of

Felton
Gallo
Randolph
Amare
Turiaf

or

have Randolph (or Gallo--but I am opposed to Gallo and his back) playing Center? I think both Randolph and Gallo are too young and fragile to have banging in the paint.

or

just have Randolph be the first big off the bench?

To be perfectly honest, I'm concerned with Gallo guarding the bigger true 4s down low just as much as I am about him guarding quicker players out on the perimeter. I don't see him succeeding defensively at either spot over long stretches..To me Gallo's best position on the floor is SF on both ends..The best lineup might have Gallo off the bench as the 6th man coming in for Randolph...We'll have to see. We do have a ton of versatility and interchangability now so that's good..

There is now way MDA starts Randolph who just got here over Gallo

Randolph & Douglas might be the only two who get off the bench- would not be surprised to see MDA try to go with just 7.

I'm all in favor of a 7 man rotation... Especially the way this team is build with interchangable parts no reason that 7 guys wouldnt play close to the same amount of minute (7 guys = 34 minutes each). The 8th guy would most likely be an extra bigman for size, but I would think his minutes would be much less.

PG Felton
SG Chandler
SF Gallo
PF Amare
C Turiaf
bench: Douglas, AR, Drago

Azu may not be ready to play. I'm under the impression that Turiaf will be. Walker showed nice things last year but will need to clearly earn his minutes. Same with the other guys.

On the ZONE DEFENSE:

Its just like any defense. Its as good as the guys who play it. Look at the starting lineup I have up there. One tough PG and 4 long athletic bigs. Especially when AR comes in we will be an ultra long team. The zone defense will force teams to beat you with the jumper and there are a lot of teams that just dont shoot that well.

Never in a million years would a seven man rotation work, players would be completely dead by the 8 min mark in the 4th qtr, on top of that, your going to be run doown and beat up, by late feb.

Thats just all around not a good idea

Eruzione!!!!!!!!!