When I played basketball in high school, I was a match nightmare … for my trainer.
At 6 feet 2 inches, I had a good size for a leader. At 6.2 in the 40, I had a decent speed for a center.
I couldn’t shoot, so the trainer put me on the leader.
In attack. Certainly not in defense.
My father had the coach’s ear and insisted that I play, so I did it, with the instructions: break your buttocks in defense. And shoot only layups.
I was good in layups. Could make at least three out of four.
And it turns out that I was good in defense too. As long as I have associated myself with guys who were not a vagueness.
I could keep the best attackers in the league and the shooting guards. Even certain centers. It is not difficult to motivate yourself when the bench is the alternative.
That’s why I think I could keep Nikola Jokic. I’m shocked more guys can’t.
OK, not at 6-2 and 185 pounds as if I were in high school. My son is 6-7, 230-Give me this size and I know I could do it.
I mean, look at Jokic.
He is one of the slowest players on the ground, and that includes WNBA. And he’s not a 3 -point super shooter.
These two things are combined to make it guardible.
The key to Jokic’s success is his leg game … and the stupidity of most of his defenders. The first is not exactly the level of “dancing with the stars”, so everyone has a chance.
Even me.
At 6-7? Of course. Have you looked at Draymond Green accumulating with him? He has 6-6.
Draymond knows the defense. And he knows Jokic. Put both together and you understand why the otherwise unstoppable force has drawn 33% or less three times in his career against the Warriors, less than 50% 14 times and below his average career in 25 of the 36 games.
What Draymond taught me was the following:
When Jokic has his back on the basket, give him a little space. It was then that he likes to shoot, which is problematic for any defender. But with one step ahead in a step due to the spacing, it can turn like a top – it is not going.
Keep him hard when he faces the hoop. The rotation does not help him when he is already looking forward to, and he is not going to be dribble around you. If you are attached to him, when he takes a step back to shoot his patented facade, you walk with him. A bit like dancing.
And to cry aloud: no double teams. My message to any teammate leaving his man to help me: if they wanted you to keep Jokic, you keep Jokic. You focus on preventing it from Michael Porter Jr. or Christian Braun from obtaining open looks. As thunder has done. And if you keep Russell Westbrook … guy, you must be a bad defender, because this guy cannot shoot.
Jokic is at his worst when he can’t go. In the Oklahoma City series, he has an average of 5.2 assists per game – about half of his average season. And it pulls 45%, which explains why the nuggets are in a hole.
What is the popular complaint among the football coaches for bad high school teams? We are small, but we are slow.
Jokic is slow, but he can’t jump. I can be a defender of the whole world against guys like that. The same goes for most people with my talent 10 times.
He lifts the ball to shoot, does not move.
You see the ball starting to leave his hand, jump.
Remember that he does not jump, so the release point may be 9 feet from the ground. Without jumping, I touch 8 feet.
Then, when the ball is at a foot of his hand, I quickly jumped the 2 feet required to slap the shot laterally.
Did you know that Tim Duncan had the most shots blocked in the history of the NBA? That Pau Gasol was not far behind? And that Zion Williamson closes the ground like Silky Sullivan?
If you can’t jump over the defenders, they are lucky. And Jokic has a sion disease.
The key is: do not jump before seeing the ball prepare for takeoff. This prevents being fooled in a disadvantageous position, allowing Jokic to do the two things that mostly fill his rating totals – exceed or draw a fault.
Lester Hayes could have kept Jokic. He had the right approach: leave me alone and the rest of you play 10-sur 10. No tackle. No Blitz. No zone coverage. Just me, my conquest and an island.
Of course, the selection is part of the mission, but it is another area where the lack of speed and jump capacity of Jokic helps me. He has a direction on his leaflet of rebound, and if I am on this path, he will not risk a fault.
Not on me.
And that leads to the funny part: when we get the rebound, it becomes me and the big galot in a lazy race at 94 feet at the front of the other side. I can win this race – especially when the fact is my name enough in the newspaper.
I learned that in high school.
Final score planned for a given night: Jokic 24 points, I eight.
I would be the hero, which leads to a more important problem:
What am I saying to Doris in the post-match interview?
“I would like to thank my father, because if he did not know the coach …”
