It would be great to look at Portland game 2 and show the defense working against these same plays.
Wiseman definitely played much better on the pick and roll, including a couple of blocks. And of course Steph blew up but did we see Oubre fighting over the top and making the right reads or did Portland just miss shots they made the first game?
My memory says they had fewer open shots but they missed some as well.
"Explain 1 Play" has been a bit of a misnomer for a long time, but this format really stretches that name to the breaking point, huh?
I like the idea of reacting to bunch of plays and analyzing the defense, but a highlight reel is a very unrepresentative sample, so it doesn't give you a reliable picture of what does or doesn't work most of the time. There are always going to be a few plays in there where it's like, "Well, damn, they made a tough shot." If a coverage leads to difficult shots and a team misses 4 out of 5 of them, the 1 they made is going to be the one in the highlight reel. I think a better thing to analyze this way would be a stretch of continuous play, like a run that more or less decided the game, or the several basketball minutes of a particular lineup, something like that.
You can call it "Apricot Inspects" or something. "APRICOT INSPECTS: Paschall and Draymond playing together" or "APRICOT INSPECTS: Portland's opening run" something like that. I dunno, maybe there's a catchier name. I'm not a marketing guy.
In fact, “Explain One Play” came about in 2015 to lower my own expectations for releasing stuff. In 2014-15 I was writing these occasional megatomes about Kerr’s schemes which were good quality but bless anyone who read the whole thing. Also, Vox Media wanted more pieces for more advertising hahaha. So I said, I’ll cover ONE possession each game win. That will be about 50ish spread across the season. Then the bastards reeled off 24 straight to start and won 73+15 that year.
I will surely comment on critical stretches of play in the future... it’s basically what I did on the Looney screens video last week. But we may not have so many close games this season... :(
Honestly, a large portion of E1Ps cover lots of plays, I just am too lazy to rebrand and like to set the expectations low... “wow he covered TWO possessions, that’s 100% bonus”, instead of “damn this guy is lazy he made a video and it only talked about ten seconds of the game”.
I’m having a lot of fun with the voiceover/annotation/reactions thing... still trying to trim the workflow to make it easier to produce more of these faster.
One thing that is puzzling is Wiggins on defense. It seems like he makes some great plays at times and at other times gets beaten really badly, with smaller players blowing by him in the paint..
Does my perception match your coach POV?
Is he just vulnerable to that quick first step or are these lapses in concentration?
It's not just him. A lot of the guys are getting blown by really easily. That's gotta be part of why the team's 3pt D is so bad, because someone has to leave their man to cover, or else they give up a humiliatingly easy layup/dunk.
Thanks for breaking down the defense in E1P. Sadly, our defense broke down quite bit against Portland.
My initial take after the game was that Draymond didn't do much if anything to improve the team but at least you showed how the rotations actually work and Dray in the right place all of the time.
On another note - does anybody use Android phone and case to TV using Chromecast? If yes, do you see the chrome-casting icon when playing the video from within the page?
Just curious to know if it is my browser having problem or Substack pages have inherent limitation in this regards. It used to work on GSOM.
I rarely use my laptop. Hence casting these videos to TV used to be awesome.
Mr E - When I click LGW icon in top-left corner of video, it takes me to youtube as expected. But sometimes it opens the video and sometimes (like the first video) it opens to LGW youtube homepage. Any idea why?
Is it possible to embed the YouTube link in the article? That would obviate above mentioned casting issue since I cast from YouTube
Looks like Oubre's natural (and may be the only) inclination on D is to be an on-ball defender. Seems like even if another player has rotated, he keeps going after the ball. Once he realizes that he is out of reach, he stands around.
Can you really teach this kind of stuff to a person who has been in league for 4 years already? Also lack of full length training camp and longer preseason as well as Dray missing during both may be one of many things that may doom this season.
I wonder if Oubre is in his head not only on O but also miscues on D carryover on O.
I think you can teach it. I'm not sure any teaching occurred in Phoenix, and I feel like in many ways Oubre is still a first or second-year player from a knowledge standpoint. Time in the league is not as important as who you spend it with. I absolutely agree the short season and lack of pre-season is particularly harsh for what is really now a very young team that is trying to integrate three new starters (I count Wiggins, as he never really got to play with Steph/Dray last year.
Super loved that first video, equally as I have all E1Ps. Differencs is that usual E1Ps go deep into a complicated Dubs play (depth). This one is quick but multiple plays (breadth) and also like you are talking to another you instead of us.
Another great vid. I'm digging all formats old and new.
Kerr mentioned this but it really just seems like the breakdown at the point of attack is too easy and it just snowballs from there. Any ideas what we could do differently? Immediately trap and get the ball out of Damian's hands and force another playmaker to make plays?
Certainly the playoff standard is to just trap Dame and make the rest of the team beat you. The alternative I guess is switching (I like) or try to rotate help on drives and be on a string to recover to open men (GSW tried this and seemed to get diced up)
I think the theory behind Oubre consistently going under screens is that due to his length he can cover a lot of ground in a short amount of time. I don't know if that's by design from the coaches or it's just a normal habit of his that he gets away with more often than he doesn't. But going over the screen and trailing behind the ballhandler would actually be more beneficial since he can use that length to bother the shot from behind (assuming he stays disciplined and prevents being "put in jail" by the ballhandler).
This was great, love hearing you "react" as opposed to show a selected set of plays but definitely still gonna need the E1Ps that pick a specific type of play and deep dive. Someone called head tap last night and my wife was amazed as I calmly predicted exactly where who would run where and where the pass would lead!
I love your usual style of video, but this one was great too. It was nice getting to see a half dozen or more plays rather than just one, which presumably is an advantage to doing it in real time. Thanks so much!
It would be great to look at Portland game 2 and show the defense working against these same plays.
Wiseman definitely played much better on the pick and roll, including a couple of blocks. And of course Steph blew up but did we see Oubre fighting over the top and making the right reads or did Portland just miss shots they made the first game?
My memory says they had fewer open shots but they missed some as well.
This format definitely works. I'm getting a lot out of the videos.
The "Explain 1 Play" name is fine by me. It's like "Scoop of Ice Cream". If you give me two or three scoops, who am I to complain?
"I expect exactly THIRTY ONE FLAVORS, Mister Baskin-Robbins"
"Explain 1 Play" has been a bit of a misnomer for a long time, but this format really stretches that name to the breaking point, huh?
I like the idea of reacting to bunch of plays and analyzing the defense, but a highlight reel is a very unrepresentative sample, so it doesn't give you a reliable picture of what does or doesn't work most of the time. There are always going to be a few plays in there where it's like, "Well, damn, they made a tough shot." If a coverage leads to difficult shots and a team misses 4 out of 5 of them, the 1 they made is going to be the one in the highlight reel. I think a better thing to analyze this way would be a stretch of continuous play, like a run that more or less decided the game, or the several basketball minutes of a particular lineup, something like that.
You can call it "Apricot Inspects" or something. "APRICOT INSPECTS: Paschall and Draymond playing together" or "APRICOT INSPECTS: Portland's opening run" something like that. I dunno, maybe there's a catchier name. I'm not a marketing guy.
In fact, “Explain One Play” came about in 2015 to lower my own expectations for releasing stuff. In 2014-15 I was writing these occasional megatomes about Kerr’s schemes which were good quality but bless anyone who read the whole thing. Also, Vox Media wanted more pieces for more advertising hahaha. So I said, I’ll cover ONE possession each game win. That will be about 50ish spread across the season. Then the bastards reeled off 24 straight to start and won 73+15 that year.
*includes GIF of apricot insects*
I will surely comment on critical stretches of play in the future... it’s basically what I did on the Looney screens video last week. But we may not have so many close games this season... :(
Honestly, a large portion of E1Ps cover lots of plays, I just am too lazy to rebrand and like to set the expectations low... “wow he covered TWO possessions, that’s 100% bonus”, instead of “damn this guy is lazy he made a video and it only talked about ten seconds of the game”.
I’m having a lot of fun with the voiceover/annotation/reactions thing... still trying to trim the workflow to make it easier to produce more of these faster.
One thing that is puzzling is Wiggins on defense. It seems like he makes some great plays at times and at other times gets beaten really badly, with smaller players blowing by him in the paint..
Does my perception match your coach POV?
Is he just vulnerable to that quick first step or are these lapses in concentration?
I don’t have an opinion yet of Wiggins’s D. It seems about average with an occasional spectacular play.
Unlike Oubre who consistently pops off the screen as being out of position, though he has endearing hyper-effort on some on-ball plays.
It's not just him. A lot of the guys are getting blown by really easily. That's gotta be part of why the team's 3pt D is so bad, because someone has to leave their man to cover, or else they give up a humiliatingly easy layup/dunk.
Thanks for breaking down the defense in E1P. Sadly, our defense broke down quite bit against Portland.
My initial take after the game was that Draymond didn't do much if anything to improve the team but at least you showed how the rotations actually work and Dray in the right place all of the time.
Looking forward to Dray being able to stay on the court longer
On another note - does anybody use Android phone and case to TV using Chromecast? If yes, do you see the chrome-casting icon when playing the video from within the page?
Just curious to know if it is my browser having problem or Substack pages have inherent limitation in this regards. It used to work on GSOM.
I rarely use my laptop. Hence casting these videos to TV used to be awesome.
*case = cast
Mr E - When I click LGW icon in top-left corner of video, it takes me to youtube as expected. But sometimes it opens the video and sometimes (like the first video) it opens to LGW youtube homepage. Any idea why?
Is it possible to embed the YouTube link in the article? That would obviate above mentioned casting issue since I cast from YouTube
I put a direct YT link under the video
Yay! Thanks.
Looks like Oubre's natural (and may be the only) inclination on D is to be an on-ball defender. Seems like even if another player has rotated, he keeps going after the ball. Once he realizes that he is out of reach, he stands around.
Can you really teach this kind of stuff to a person who has been in league for 4 years already? Also lack of full length training camp and longer preseason as well as Dray missing during both may be one of many things that may doom this season.
I wonder if Oubre is in his head not only on O but also miscues on D carryover on O.
I think you can teach it. I'm not sure any teaching occurred in Phoenix, and I feel like in many ways Oubre is still a first or second-year player from a knowledge standpoint. Time in the league is not as important as who you spend it with. I absolutely agree the short season and lack of pre-season is particularly harsh for what is really now a very young team that is trying to integrate three new starters (I count Wiggins, as he never really got to play with Steph/Dray last year.
I stand by my opinion that he should move to second unit for now.
Super loved that first video, equally as I have all E1Ps. Differencs is that usual E1Ps go deep into a complicated Dubs play (depth). This one is quick but multiple plays (breadth) and also like you are talking to another you instead of us.
Another great vid. I'm digging all formats old and new.
Kerr mentioned this but it really just seems like the breakdown at the point of attack is too easy and it just snowballs from there. Any ideas what we could do differently? Immediately trap and get the ball out of Damian's hands and force another playmaker to make plays?
Certainly the playoff standard is to just trap Dame and make the rest of the team beat you. The alternative I guess is switching (I like) or try to rotate help on drives and be on a string to recover to open men (GSW tried this and seemed to get diced up)
That's what everyone does to Steph. But it looks like the Blazers have plenty of guys who can bury you from outside...
You're the greatest! Thanks for the explanations.
I think the theory behind Oubre consistently going under screens is that due to his length he can cover a lot of ground in a short amount of time. I don't know if that's by design from the coaches or it's just a normal habit of his that he gets away with more often than he doesn't. But going over the screen and trailing behind the ballhandler would actually be more beneficial since he can use that length to bother the shot from behind (assuming he stays disciplined and prevents being "put in jail" by the ballhandler).
Makes sense. I’d be surprised if GSW had a scheme that says everyone but Kelly go over the screen...
Enjoyed the multi-play format very much Mr. A, the play results not so much. Hoping Monday brings a cleansing vid showing good defensive rotations!
This was great, love hearing you "react" as opposed to show a selected set of plays but definitely still gonna need the E1Ps that pick a specific type of play and deep dive. Someone called head tap last night and my wife was amazed as I calmly predicted exactly where who would run where and where the pass would lead!
The ultimate purpose of E1P is to help us impress mates
Apricot, getting fans laid since 2018
2014 tbh. I started writing pieces to figure out Kerr’s brand new system.
Sorry, I just grabbed a year out of my ass for the bit
I love your usual style of video, but this one was great too. It was nice getting to see a half dozen or more plays rather than just one, which presumably is an advantage to doing it in real time. Thanks so much!
Electronic hug has been delivered
Zap!!⚡⚡
My hug does electrical damage no more than 5% of the time