Hollinger: Thunder's changes boost chances

[Daddy]

can anyone open this: http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/playoffs/2012/story?page=PERDiem-120601&_slug_=nba-playoffs-oklahoma-city-thunder-key-adjustments&action=login&appRedirect=http%3a%2f%2finsider.espn.go.com%2fnba %2fplayoffs%2f2012%2fstory%3fpage%3dPERDiem-120601%26_slug_%3dnba-playoffs-oklahoma-city-thunder-key-adjustments

seems interesting

[Man Mountain]

Thunder's changes boost chances
OKC shows how it can succeed against the Spurs (PER Diem: June 1, 2012)

Now they're rolling: Scott Brooks and the Thunder made some key adjustments in their Game 3 win.

The Oklahoma City Thunder made a ton of adjustments to win Game 3, but the best one may have been done unwittingly -- and it nearly doubled their chances of winning.

I'll ramp up the suspense by saving that tidbit for last. First, allow me to pay proper respect to the other shifts Thunder coach Scott Brooks has made in his game plan.

In particular, Brooks finally used Thabo Sefolosha as the extra perimeter player in his small lineups. For some reason, he has been extremely reluctant to do that over the past two seasons, and even when Eric Maynor went out this season, he rarely turned to Sefolosha with the Westbrook-Durant-Harden group.

Instead, Brooks has bizarrely insisted on riding Respected Veteran Leader Derek Fisher down the chute, particularly in Game 2. That changed Thursday night, perhaps permanently. Sefolosha is better than Fisher at nearly everything. He defends better, rebounds better, shoots better from 3, has a better PER and, most importantly at Hollinger HQ, is more Swiss. I don't want to get carried away -- we're talking about a guy with a 9.81 PER -- but if we're choosing between him and Fisher, it's not much of a fight.

While arguably this move came two games later than it should have, if not two months, late is always preferable to never.

Moreover, Brooks' defensive tactics were outstanding. Between putting Sefolosha on Tony Parker, following up on his late Game 2 strategy of switching pick-and-rolls and repeatedly pushing Parker away from the screen, Brooks kept the Spurs' brilliant offense out of sync all night.

This is one area where Brooks is vastly underrated. He takes a lot of flak for his late-game play calling and personnel strategy, but he's done some sharp stuff at the end of games defensively all season. (One great postseason example: Against the Lakers in Game 4, halfway through the fourth quarter, Brooks put Durant on Kobe Bryant and started fronting Andrew Bynum, sending the Lakers into a tailspin.)

It should also be pointed out that San Antonio was inevitably going to lay an egg. Manu Ginobili entertained reporters the other day by explaining the concept of regression to the mean. He was talking about his shooting slump in the second round, but he might as well have been talking about the fact that San Antonio was eventually going to have a bad game.

The Spurs had an absurd stretch in which they won 20 in a row, 34 of 37 and, most insanely, 24 of 27 on the road. No team keeps playing that well forever, and when the Spurs finally stopped, they fell hard. Averaging barely 0.9 points per possession with 21 turnovers in Game 3, the Spurs didn't just regress to the mean -- they went all the way through it and out the other side.

All that said, Oklahoma City's best and most important adjustment may have been completely unintentional:

Slowing the game down.

You read that correctly. The young, athletic Thunder have little chance of winning an up-and-down, end-to-end game against the veteran Spurs. Everybody has been saying the opposite, and everybody is 100 percent, dead wrong. The Thunder's best hope, if not their only hope, is to limit the pace to something less frenetic.

The evidence for this is simply overwhelming, if you care to look (and a big shoutout to TrueHoop Network blogger Timothy Varner, who first pointed this out to me, and Aaron McGuire for this chart that outlines all the evidence in gory detail).

Remember in Game 2, when they showed Spurs coach Gregg Popovich in the huddle yelling "Pace! Pace! Pace!" and making the international gesture for "hurry up"? There's a reason for that. San Antonio is almost unbeatable when it plays fast. In the regular season, when the Spurs played in a game with at least 96 possessions per side, they went 28-3 with an inhuman plus-9.6 efficiency differential. That's Jordan Bulls territory, and that's even though one of those games was a 40-point loss to Portland where Popovich played the third string.

Keep the game to 95 possessions or fewer, however, and San Antonio's invincibility wanes, with a 22-13 record and a plus-5.5 efficiency differential.

The differential for the Thunder isn't as large, but it does cut in the opposite direction. They've actually played better this season when the game has slowed down. When Oklahoma City has played in games with 96 possessions or more, it's 19-8 with a plus-4.8 efficiency differential. The rest of the time, the Thunder are 28-11 with a plus-7.5 differential.

Thunder vs. Spurs: Fast and Slow
Fast * Slow**
W-L Differential W-L Differential
San Antonio 28-3 +9.6 22-13 +5.5
Oklahoma City 19-8 +4.8 28-11 +7.5
* At least 96 possessions/** 95 possessions or fewer

Juxtaposing those differences, you can see how badly the Thunder need to keep the pace reasonably slow. In a fast-paced game, the Spurs have a nearly five-point advantage, which translates to San Antonio winning two-thirds of the time on a neutral court. In a slow-paced game? The advantage shifts to the Thunder by about two points, which translates into the Thunder winning 57 percent of the time.

We're not talking about some minor, marginal shift. A jump from 33 percent to 57 percent means that Oklahoma City's odds of winning don't just increase; they nearly double if they get the pace down to 95 possessions or fewer.

Why is that? Looking a little closer, we can see that each team benefits on both sides of the ball from playing its preferred pace, but the biggest changes come at the defensive end.

Everybody focuses on the Thunder's athleticism and finishing ability in the open court, but a fast-paced game does more to expose their poor transition defense than to highlight their offensive brilliance. Meanwhile, the Spurs defy expectation by dramatically improving defensively in an up-tempo game, presumably because they manage to maintain floor balance even in the face of a helter-skelter environment.

Thunder vs. Spurs: Fast and Slow
Offensive Efficiency Defensive Efficiency
Fast* Slow** Fast* Slow**
San Antonio 109.2 108.6 99.6 103.1
Oklahoma City 106.6 107.6 101.8 100.1
* At least 96 possessions/** 95 possessions or fewer

If you look at the first three games, form has held. The first two games had 98 possessions per team, and the Thunder lost both. Game 3 slowed down to 91 possessions, and the Thunder kicked butt.

It's a fine line for the Thunder, who have to play small and slow. Their best lineup this season used Kevin Durant at the 4, a grouping that encourages the opponent to play small as well and speeds up the game overall.

I'm not saying they have to turn this into a glacial, Raptors-Pistons rock fight either. Even in Game 3, there were 25 fast-break points by the two sides.

But the first two games were played at warp speed, and the Thunder have little or no shot in that environment. Between Parker's turbo jets, San Antonio's depth and the Spurs' superior ability to maintain floor balance in transition, a fast-paced game is exactly what the Thunder don't want.

It's an important distinction heading into Game 4. Brooks' adjustments worked, and part of the reason they did may have been that they slowed down the Spurs in the halfcourt too. If you want a barometer of success for the Thunder on Saturday, watch the pace. If it's slow, they have a chance, although their task remains daunting -- especially since the Spurs are likely to throw in some counters to Oklahoma City's Game 3 adjustments.

If it's fast? They're toast. You'll likely hear the opposite in the next 48 hours, as this belies conventional wisdom and our subjective impressions of each team. Alas, the evidence couldn't be clearer.

[obijuan]

Didn't TimVP find that pace phenomenon? I'm confused!?!

[benstanfield]

This is called "hedging one's bets."

[Budkin]

:lol Hollinger

[Dr. John R. Brinkley]

Didn't TimVP find that pace phenomenon? I'm confused!?!

I'd be very surprised if 48MOH didn't get their insight from Timvp. Yes, it seems all of ESPN's "best minds" get their insight from Timvp. Which is even more hilarious/impressive that stat guru Hollinger is doing the same.

Seriously, Timvp deserves to get paid for his analysis.

[obijuan]

I'd be very surprised if 48MOH didn't get their insight from Timvp. Yes, it seems all of ESPN's "best minds" get their insight from Timvp. Which is even more hilarious/impressive that stat guru Hollinger is doing the same.

Seriously, Timvp deserves to get paid for his analysis.

http://www.48minutesofhell.com/playing-small-wont-hurt-the-spurs

found it at the end it quotes TimVP but no credit from ESPN again LOL

[iManu]

Thanks LJ!!! :hat

[ElNono]

So, is he keeping his Spurs in 5 pick?

[rascal]

Hollinger is a front runner.

[Budkin]

So, is he keeping his Spurs in 5 pick?

He changed it to Thunder in 4.

[timvp]

I did think it was rather interesting when I pointed out that the Spurs are so unbeatable in fast paced games while the Thunder become susceptible when the pace quickens. Especially because the lazy analysis of this series would be to suggest the Thunder should look to run at any and every opportunity to take advantage of their young legs.

It looks like others took that finding and expanded on it by making a chart. Cool.

Hollinger gushing over the discovery prior to Game 4 is a compliment since we here at SpursTalk were talking about it before the series even begun. It's also notable that the trend has continued in this series as the Spurs won two fast paced games and then dropped a slow paced game.

[greyforest]

I'd be very surprised if 48MOH didn't get their insight from Timvp. Yes, it seems all of ESPN's "best minds" get their insight from Timvp. Which is even more hilarious/impressive that stat guru Hollinger is doing the same.

Seriously, Timvp deserves to get paid for his analysis.

Goes to prove that it ultimately only matters who you know, not what you know.