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martin
Posts: 76269 Alba Posts: 108 Joined: 7/24/2001 Member: #2 USA |
12/17/2010 3:06 PM
So do Knicks!
   http://offthedribble.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/17/nuggets-need-more-nene/ Last night’s instant classic between the Spurs and Nuggets had it all: intrigue that naturally surrounds the league’s best team, great individual performances by the biggest names, a hotly contested result, a game-winner, would-be game-winner, controversial foul calls, and a finale that could propel this contest to Game of the Year status. And buried beneath it all was a 19-point performance from Nene, another quietly efficient outing from a center often unfairly overlooked in the grand N.B.A. scheme. Nene is actually one of the league’s most effective post players, though you’d never know it from his role in Denver’s offense. Some nights, he seems resigned to clean up after misses by Carmelo Anthony and Chauncey Billups. But on the rare occasion when the Nuggets actually look to feature him in their attack (as they did last night, when Nene posted a season-high 14 field goal attempts), Nene does crazy things like victimize a living legend. Tim Duncan may have had quite the evening, but he had no way to counter Nene’s quickness, nor his ability to execute from either block. It wasn’t a standout performance, either. Nineteen points on 50 percent shooting? That’s what Nene does. He leads the league in both effective field goal percentage and true shooting percentage. According to Synergy Sports Technology, he scores in some capacity (either with a made bucket or a trip to the foul line) on 75 percent of his post-ups, and currently averages 1.5 points per possession down on the block. Those are monstrous numbers that trump Nene’s competition. For that matter, Nene’s efficiency trumps nearly all of his Nuggets teammates, too, and yet he ranks seventh on the team in usage rate. J.R. Smith, Al Harrington, and Gary Forbes all use a greater percentage of the Nuggets’ possessions than Nene. That’s criminal. It’s already bothersome that the inefficient Anthony puts up more than twice as many shot attempts as Nene, but at least that is somewhat explainable, even if not defensible; like it or not, Anthony is considered a star, and players of that stature tend to get their shots, efficiency be damned. Still, the distribution of shots in the Nuggets offense is stilted, and too often Nene -– perhaps the most likely to defer of all of Denver’s primaries –- ends up on the low end of the usage totem pole. It may seem petty to gripe about shots in the league’s fifth-best offense, but the way to improve team performance is rectify weaknesses. Redirecting the offense to get more quality looks for its most efficient scorer certainly qualifies. Plus, balance isn’t a prerequisite for N.B.A. success. While most champions tend to boast both top-10 offenses and defenses, Mike D’Antoni’s Suns had only a passable defense while demolishing the idea of rank-induced offensive glass ceiling. It wasn’t enough for Phoenix to merely be the best offensive team in the league. They had to be the best by as wide a margin as possible. The statistical blueprint is there, and all the Nuggets have to do is build on their strengths while hedging their weaknesses. Having a good offense doesn’t relieve any team from the perpetual responsibility for improvement, and getting Nene more looks down low is the most obvious way toward offensive progress without external additions. There’s no valid excuse for Drew Gooden, J.J. Hickson, Darko Milicic, and Taj Gibson to be averaging more field goal attempts per game than the hyper-efficient Nene. His effectiveness from the post begs for a bigger role, even if that request is never granted. In all likelihood, Anthony will continue to clank long two-pointers, Chauncey Billups will pull up when he pleases, and the Nuggets, competent but perpetually mortal, will shine a few shades dimmer than they should. Official sponsor of the PURE KNICKS LOVE Program
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Moonangie
Posts: 24766 Alba Posts: 5 Joined: 7/9/2009 Member: #2788 |
12/17/2010 3:19 PM
I wish it would only take AR to trade for Nene. Dude got game and size.
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