Is Josh Smith the Defensive Equivalent of Joe Johnson on Offense?

[MrMeltdown]

This is a down-time thread. Things have really flattened out around here since your unrealistic fantasy-dream went up in smoke and you now realize Dwight Howard will not be a Hawk.So, I will try to contribute something other than how I am not a fan of Ferry and how I don't think he will be able to acquire the level of talent that he gave away in the Joe deal through free agency or trades.Is Josh Smith just as bad for the Hawks defensively as some thought that Joe Johnson was offensively. Joe was the bailout guy offensively and Josh is the same defensively. We have went through gimmicky stages defensively and if you really think Zaza should be the starting C then Josh is going to have to be even better protecting the rim because Zaza is a walking layup drill with his bad foot speed.Futhermore, people claim we can't move him back to SF because he is the only guy that protects the rim. Even if it is for his betterment, we can't do it because we are too dependent on him in one area.My biggest problem with having guys as your bailout plan is that you may never see what the problem is if every man is not asked to uphold his end of the bargain. That is a bad thing because you re-sign players you should not and so forth.What is your opinion? Do you think Josh is just as much poison defensively as Joe was offensively. Do we depend on him too much? Look at this stuff Ferry has put together, who is the defensive guy other than Josh, Stevenson? Who was the other offensive guy other than Joe, Jamal.

Edited August 17, 2012 by MrMeltdown

[macdaddy]

I see what you're saying but i don't think its unusual. Most teams don't start 5 good defenders. I look at Josh as bailing out the guards more than bailing out Zaza. But that's not unlike most teams but usually your center does that. I feel like we have 3 good defenders in Josh, Al, and Teague who also happen to be our 3 best offensive players at this point. So that's pretty good. If stevenson is still any good i'd be interested in a teague/stevenson/?/josh/al lineup. either plug in williams or korver. Anyway, i feel like what you're saying is kind of LD's philosophy last year. Every guy has to check his own man. You can't count on a switch or someone ot bail you out. Still I don't think Josh is a problem defensively. I think he's an asset.

[ruhiel]

If the Hawks stop playing gimmicky defense then the center doesn't have to protect the rim.If you have Josh Smith at the 3 and Horford at the 4 AND Zaza also helping clogging the lane then penetration pretty much stops.Even Derrick Rose had problems with Josh flanked by Al and Zaza.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvRdVujM2I0The gimmicky defense comes fromA) replacing Josh at SF with Mo Evans or Josh Childress or Damien Wilkins. They get blown by and can't block shots like Josh, so all the pressure is now on our undersized pf or C to stop penetration. With Josh at the 3, on the offchance that the penetrator sees a lane to the rim:A) you have a big man, someone who doesn't have to jump to stop penertation, only stand in the wayB) Josh can still alter the shot from behindWe've gone with Josh and Joe as crutches for a long time. Instead of just extra options the Hawks make sure they only have 1 option in certain situations. IE Josh is the only rim protector, yet you put Hinrich or Joe on Paul Pierce ensuring blow bys.If you switchup the gimmicky undersized lineups on a by game basis... The 3-guard gimmicks have been basically a self-fulfilling prophecy. And its the coaches fault, but unfortunately in the end the fans suffer too from unrealized potential.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvyD9sABGCY

[GST]

Just found this, may have been posted before:http://www.sportingcharts.com/articles/nba/the-nbas-best-defensive-players-%282011-2012%29.aspx

[thecampster]

Just found this, may have been posted before: http://www.sportingc...2011-2012).aspx

Although this stat has merit, team defense plays a role in opposing PER. For example, shot blockers like Smith, Howard have to leave their own man often to clean up someone else's mess. Conversely, players like Johnson can funnel their man to the shot blocker. So teams with a quality shot blocker or 2 can get improved PER's. Take also into account having a very poor defensive player on your team like we did when we had Bibby. He has a greater negative effect on your shot blocker because he has to leave his opponent often. Where as a team mate like Johnson will have to work less hard when his own opponent gets less shot opportunities because the opposing PG or SF is torching your team. Deeper than that is how hard a player has to work on their own defensive end. In the case of Johnson, players work extremely hard to guard him and so work less hard on the offensive end, lowering their PER and taking them out of rebound position. Opponent PER has real merit in this case but not as a defensive metric but as an impact metric. I like what they did there but it is definitely not perfect.

[TheNorthCydeRises]

Although this stat has merit, team defense plays a role in opposing PER. For example, shot blockers like Smith, Howard have to leave their own man often to clean up someone else's mess. Conversely, players like Johnson can funnel their man to the shot blocker. So teams with a quality shot blocker or 2 can get improved PER's. Take also into account having a very poor defensive player on your team like we did when we had Bibby. He has a greater negative effect on your shot blocker because he has to leave his opponent often. Where as a team mate like Johnson will have to work less hard when his own opponent gets less shot opportunities because the opposing PG or SF is torching your team. Deeper than that is how hard a player has to work on their own defensive end. In the case of Johnson, players work extremely hard to guard him and so work less hard on the offensive end, lowering their PER and taking them out of rebound position. Opponent PER has real merit in this case but not as a defensive metric but as an impact metric. I like what they did there but it is definitely not perfect.

This is funny. Because if you were to say this in reverse, and attribute JJ's "lower than superstar" PER to the fact that works hard on defense, and it takes him out of rebound position, you'd get ripped. Heck, the only high usage guys on that list are JJ and Wade. And when it comes to JJ, his shot attempts and usage actually went DOWN. So I don't know how much I can attribute the fact that people had to "work hard to guard him", so they can accumulate rebounds and steals, as a reason why their overall PER was down. If anything, ( as you alluded to ) team defensive scheme would lower the opponent PER, along with how well the individual man is defending. The person that JJ guarded last year, shot 37.7% FG in the regular season + playoffs . . . according to Synergy Sports. If you were to re-stack that top 5 in defensive PER at SG ( Meeks - Wade - Johnson - Allen - Brewer ), and arrange it according yo FG%, this is how they would stack up: - Allen: 34.2% - Wade: 35.8% - Brewer: 37.2% - Johnson: 37.7% - Meeks: 40.4% All 5 of those guys are holding their man down to extremely low shooting percentages. And each guy excels in different areas of defense. A guy like Meeks ( 48.5% ) was an extremely poor defender in Isolation, while guys like JJ ( 24.2% ) and Wade ( 26.4% ) were elite defenders in isolation. But guys like Allen and Meeks are good with fighting off and through screens to get to their man, and closing out on spot up shooters, something that Ray Allen was excellent at. And a guy like Ronnie Brewer is just an all around above average defender in just about every situation, but not elite in any particular one. JJ's weakness on defense was closing out on spot up shooters and defending the pick and roll, mainly fighting through the screen. So you can look at a lot of regular and advanced stats when it comes to determining who are the better defenders at SG. It's better to subscribe to Synergy, view clips of these guys of how they play defense, and see if that correlates with the numbers. Edited August 19, 2012 by northcyde