Originally posted by 49ersMyLife:
...and that's too few touches in the post for Dwight and Howard. If Kobe was playing on the perimeter - that can be excused...but he's out and by far the best two players on the court are Gasol and Dwight. I'm not even putting the full blame on the players, it's the offense. Even when they get the ball in the post, the spacing is so poor...it's easy to double or get help.
Also, when Dwight and Gasol haven't been gettin' enough quality touches in the post all year, it's hard to ask them to be efficient all of a sudden. I thought the ball was moving well at times in the first half, but once Lakers got behind...guys started chucking ball from outside.
Dwight and Gasol have been much better in the post in previous years. This offense is set up for perimeter players, and hurts the Centers and PFs who are primarily paint players. I feel that's one of the reasons why Gasol and Dwight don't demand the ball OR are as aggressive with it...as they once did, because they just don't feel comfortable in this offense.
4ML...there is so much objective evidence to dispute this that it's not even funny. The 2nd least efficient play for the Lakers this year was the post up. We don't score when Pau & Dwight get post touches. This is over the course of thousands of possessions. It's as simple as that. Pau was a stud in the post in the championship years, but hasn't been in quite some time. Dwight was no more efficient in the post in previous years than he was this year.
Look at Memphis...two of the best post up players in the league with Randolph & Gasol, and an offense that's built around them. Only team in the league that posts up more than the Lakers do. Bottom 10 offense in the league,
Look at San Antonio...one of the best post players in NBA history who has had a tremendous season. They post up half as often as the Lakers do. The Spurs have cut back significantly on their post ups over the years. They're very efficient with it, and that's because they rarely do it. It's not the offense. The Laker's spacing is excellent. The rest of the league has copied D'Antoni's 4-out, 1-in sets with an emphasis on the deep corners because of it. Posting up...both the Lakers and leaguewide...is one of the most inefficient plays in the sport in 2013. "Pound the post" is one of those dogmas that are simply antiquated.
Too few post touches for Pau & Dwight? We generated 0.54 PPP out of post possessions. That's AWFUL. Over the course of 48 minute game, that's about 60 points. Our non-post plays generated far more points. Steve Nash ran 16 pick & rolls today, looked rusty as hell, missed a ton of open shots (as did Pau off of the PnR), and he STILL generated 16 points off of it. 1 point per possession, which is almost twice what the post touches got. But we should post them up more?!?