I took Denver +4 yesterday early by having the conviction that with or without Dwight Howard, the Nuggets would be competitive against the current team of the Lakers, excluding in nights where they shot 17-33 3pts like they did in their first game of the season having Denver. Dwight Howard played, the Lakers went to -6, but they eventually lost the game. It's not clear the current style of the Lakers doesn't suit them. Mike D'Antoni will never be able to make his team win the title with this uptempo style and the truth is that I heavily doubt that any coach would be able to win a title with this roster that has too many fatal flaws in both ends of the floor.
Yesterday on my writeup for the Nuggets play, I wrote the following: “The Lakers have been heavily struggling in stopping the dribble penetrations from the opposing guards and also transition plays from their opponents. Their guards are slow and even Dwight Hoard seems to have lost half a step this season.”
This was exactly what happened, as Ty Lawson was able to get into the paint easily with JaVale McGee and Kenneth Faried being able to also get uncontested looks at the rim through pick and roll sets. Lawson had a big game with 9-18 FG and 10 assists and it's important to note that it was only the fourth time Lawson had +10 assists this season, but two of them were against the Lakers. Denver isn't a top offensive team in terms of pick and roll ball handler plays (#18) or pick and roll roll man plays (#21), but they shot 7-14 FG and 5-6 FG respectively on this kind of plays yesterday! And what about the Lakers's transition defense? Well, Denver scored 25 fast break points, while shooting 10-14 FG on transition plays!
The Lakers aren't playing much better on offense neither, as they are taking too many long range shots and according to Hoopdata, they took 17 shots from 16-23 feet and 30 shots from behind the 3pts line, for an absurd volume of 57% of their shots being from 16 feet or even longer from the basket! On a game against Denver, you have to rebound well to avoid the Nuggets to score second chance points or committing turnovers that can originate transition points and this was what the Lakers let the Nuggets do last night by allowing 17 offensive rebounds and committing 18 turnovers. Now the Lakers will have to bounce back on their following game against Houston, a team like Denver who loves to play run and gun basketball. Good luck with that!
DAL vs NOH Quick Recap:
I decided to take the Hornets in that since I read that Dirk Nowitzki would start with Chris Kaman in the frontcourt. This duo doesn't work defensively and the Hornets easily proved that by having an excellent efficiency in running pick and rolls, while pounding the bad rotations from the Mavericks frontcourt. New Orleans ended the game with 11-20 FG on pick and roll ball handler plays and 9-12 FG on pick and roll roll man plays! Greivis Vasquez has been struggling a bit this season when he is pressured, but against Dallas's passive defense, he just torched the Mavericks with 11-18 FG, 25 points and 9 assists! On the other hand, Dallas's offense played good enough to win. Dirk Nowitzki played well and the Mavericks were able to take advantage of the Hornets's poor transition defense in the second half by scoring 19 fast break points. In overtime, Dallas missed several wide open shots, while the Hornets converted their easy look shots and won the game because of that.
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