Game 5 Thoughts
Jrue Holiday reading the defense, Devin Booker not, and high level offensive execution
After dropping the first two games of the NBA finals, the Milwaukee Bucks have come roaring back to within a game of winning the title. Ahead of Tuesday’s potentially deciding Game 6, here are some of my big takeaways from Game 5.
Jrue Holiday reading the defense
After Team USA dropped exhibition games to Nigeria and Australia, some wondered if the Olympians needed a point guard to organize things a bit. Jrue Holiday is slated to join the team in Tokyo once the finals wrap up. His performance in Game 5 was a fine audition for what he might bring.
Holiday has brought his All NBA defense throughout the NBA finals, but didn’t find much offensive rhythm through the first four games. That changed in Game 5, with Holiday making quick, decisive reads of what the Phoenix defense was giving him.
Let’s start with the game’s opening play: Chris Paul gets nailed by a screen from Antetokounmpo and looks to go under, prompting Holiday to dribble right into a mid range jumper against Deandre Ayton’s lackadaisical soft drop.
One can’t fault Paul for going under, with Holiday shooting 35% on pull-up jumpers in the playoffs (and barely 30% on pull-up threes per NBA advanced stats.) Paul would do the same near the start of the second quarter, allowing Holiday to step into an open three with oodles of space. Look at the amount of separation Holiday has here:
Recognizing that Holiday may be feeling it, Paul proceeds to go over the next ball screen set for Holiday. Holiday is quick to get downhill against the backpedaling Torrey Craig for an easy layup.
If I had to guess, the Suns defenders were not on the same page about Paul switching up the coverage and Holiday recognized that. Mikal Bridges is late on his stunt, by which point Holiday has already launched into his layup.
Suns coach Monty Williams called a timeout a couple of plays later and seemingly got his players on the same page. In the play below, Deandre Ayton steps up to wall off Holiday’s drive with Paul chasing over Brook Lopez’s screen. Holiday recognizes that Ayton playing up means that Jae Crowder on the weak side has to pull in more aggressively to tag Lopez’s roll, opening up Bobby Portis in the corner.
I especially love the extra dribble Holiday takes in the paint there, sucking Crowder all the way in before finding Portis for the 3.
Aggression and decisiveness are both vague terms used with too much profligacy when describing what players need to do. Holiday displayed both in spades throughout his second quarter barrage, quick to read and react to what the defense gave him. Shortly after the Portis three, Holiday found Ayton playing in a deep drop once again. After Brook Lopez take Chris Paul out with what should probably have been an illegal screen, Holiday shows no hesitation in stepping into a wide open pull up three.
Holiday has shot the ball poorly through much of this series and the playoffs in general. On most nights, the Suns probably live with Holiday taking that three, or the mid ranger on the opening play. Credit Holiday for taking what the defense gave him and making all the right reads, whether pulling up, driving, or passing for one of his 13 assists.
Devin Booker’s decision making
Let’s get this out of the way: Devin booker put up 40 points on 50/50/80 shooting. The Phoenix Suns were +12 in Booker’s minutes on the floor, a team high.1 The Suns did not lose because of Devin Booker’s offense.
But - and surely you knew there was a but coming here - Booker left some meat on the bone that did not help Phoenix’s case. The warning signs were even there during Phoenix’s promising first quarter, when they ran out to a 16 point lead. On the Suns’ first offensive possession, Booker, misses both Mikal Brides wide open on the wing and Jae Crowder lifting from the corner.
Booker is a shot maker of the highest caliber, drawing defenders and eyes onto him regardless of where he is on the floor. That opens up teammates.
Contrast this to what happens when Chris Paul gets to a similar spot on the floor and sucks in the defense.
One could argue that Paul and Booker are case studies in what it means to bend a defense vs. break a defense. Devin Booker is certainly more than capable of breaking a defense. Watch him isolate Pat Connaughton and get to his mid range jumper.
Booker makes the shot, but Connaughton still recovers to put in a decent contest. With Jeff Teague in no man’s land, the defense is probably happy that Booker didn’t find Chris Paul with acres of space in the corner, even though Booker made the shot.
Because the result can just as often look like this:
Presented without comment:
Or this:
Pay attention and you will see Cam Johnson in the corner pointing Booker towards Torrey Craig open (and then cutting) on the wing.
It is cliche to say that 3 > 2, but the math here is meaningful. Devin Booker is one of the best mid range shooters in the entire league, making 50% of those looks this past season (in the 97th percentile of the league per Cleaning the Glass.) Restrict it to short mid rangers and that rises to 53%, so the expected value of one of those shots (not accounting for how contested it is) is 1.06 points per shot. Players like Jae Crowder and Mikal Bridges shot upwards of 40% on catch and shoot threes this past season per NBA advanced stats; that’s 1.2 points per shot. Factor in that on the plays in question, Booker’s looks are likely to be well contested while the catch and shoot looks Crowder, Bridges, and Torrey Craig get are not, and it is reasonable to expect the difference to get even wider. That this holds true for as potent a mid range player as Booker only underscores the point further and isn’t novel.
It isn’t that Booker doesn’t make these reads. On one of the last plays of the first quarter, Booker gets Bobby Portis switched onto him and waves Deandre Ayton out of the lane to the weak side. After Booker has no trouble blowing by Portis, Pat Connaughton has no choice but to help off the strong side corner since Ayton has taken Giannis out of help position. Booker makes the simple pass for the open corner 3.
Going forward, in this series and beyond, I would love to see Booker exploit mismatches to pry open looks elsewhere more consistently rather than getting sucked into hero ball. Speaking of which…
Bucks hunt Booker
As is oft repeated, there is nowhere for a subpar defender to hide in the NBA playoffs. In a seven game series, teams will figure out a way to pick on a team’s weak link repeatedly.
This can take on a variety of forms. It is most obvious when a team’s best isolation scorers hunt out mismatches and then go one-on-one (see Booker on Connaughton above.) However, the best offenses can exploit weak defense in a variety of different ways, thereby enlarging the toolkit at their disposal. Milwaukee put up an offensive rating of 135 in Game 5 and it wasn’t repeated isolation that helped them do it.
Devin Booker is arguably one of the weaker defenders on the Suns. The Suns have consistently been worse on defense with Booker on the floor than with him off. Even this past season when the Suns had the league’s sixth best defense, they were over 6 point worse with Booker on the floor than with him off. Suns lineups with the four other starters (Bridges, Ayton, Crowder, and Paul) gave up just 93.6 points per 100 possessions without Booker, in the 100th percentile of all lineups league wide. That number fell to 113.3/100 with Booker on the floor.
Booker is a solid enough on ball defender, but struggled when put through repeated screening/switching actions in Game 5. Here, he leans towards switching onto Khris Middleton before bailing, leaving Mikal Bridges behind the cutting Middleton and surrendering a layup.
Perhaps it is unfair to fault Booker too much there; Bridges overplays Middleton and that’s just a great cut from Middleton and find from Giannis.
This is less excusable from Booker though:
After waltzing around aimlessly in no man’s land, Booker recognizes that Jae Crowder is forced to switch onto PJ Tucker in the corner…and does absolutely nothing about closing out on Brook Lopez.
The problem for the Suns though, is less about what Booker does than that the Bucks are proving very adept at hunting Booker out. Take the play below for example; as soon as the Bucks engineer a switch with Booker on Lopez, they swing the ball to Giannis for a drive to the rim. With the bigger Jae Crowder pulled out of position and Brook Lopez a threat on the lob, it isn’t reasonable to expect Booker to present much of a second line of shot blocking defense behind Deandre Ayton.
The problem there is less that Booker is a bad defender than that he is the worst of the five-man Suns lineup on the floor. It reminds me a bit of Lebron’s Cavaliers hunting out Steph Curry; Curry isn’t a terrible defender, but he was certainly the worst defender of the Hamptons Five and the Death Lineup before that. When it comes to mismatch hunting, comparative advantage is more relevant than absolute advantage.
And the margins are extremely fine at this level, especially with the Bucks executing as well as they are (we sure have come a long way from whatever ailed them against the Nets.) Booker is early to call out a switch here, but takes a step too far out before tagging Bobby Portis on the roll. That leads Cam Payne to delay his double on Giannis on the low block. This play led to a Giannis and-one, with Payne arriving late and fouling Giannis in the process.
Credit the Bucks’ beautiful offense there, with Portis’ screen and Connaughton’s zipper cut serving as a decoy action to put Phoenix’s help defenders in all sorts of confusion.
The beautiful Suns offense
The Bucks poured in the points in Game 5, but let’s end by appreciating the Suns’ offense. Much as I harped on Booker’s decision making above, Phoenix is not staring down the barrel because they didn’t put points on the board; after all, they had an offensive rating of 129.3, in the 89th percentile of playoff games per Cleaning the Glass.
The Suns are a joy to watch because of the variety they bring out of the same starting alignments. It is fun to see the different ways they get into their sets, and the myriad variations out of them. Even when opponents know what’s coming, or effectively cover an action, Phoenix finds a way to get its players to their spots. Take the Spain pick and roll below that the Suns ran in the third quarter. As a reminder, a Spain or stack pick and roll involves a shooter setting a back screen for a big screening for a ball handler.2 Here, Booker pitches the ball to Cam Johnson on the wing before pivoting into a back screen for Deandre Ayton, who set the ball screen for Chris Paul once Paul receives the ball from Johnson. Even though Jrue Holiday switch assignments reasonably fluidly, Paul is able to get a sliver of daylight, which is all he needs for his patented elbow jumper.
It’s hard to know what the Bucks can do there; a contested Chris Paul elbow jumper is probably preferable to an Ayton alley oop, a Booker above the break three, or a Cam Johnson corner three.
Another Suns staple is their “Elbow” action. This typically starts off with a basic Horns alignment: shooters filling the corners, the 1 (typically Deandre Ayton) and either the 3 or the 4 (oftentimes Mikal Bridges or Jae Crowder) near the elbows. The 1 screens for the 3/4, out of which the Suns run a host of variations. Here’s what it looks like (ignore Bobby Portis gambling and allowing Crowder to waltz to the rim):
It isn’t hard to hear the Bucks players and coaching staff screaming ELBOW! as the Suns bring the ball up the floor. One will often see Brook Lopez slapping his elbow once he recognizes what is coming. Here, Khris Middleton jumps out to get around the Ayton screen, prompting Mikal Bridges to smartly cut behind Ayton and get an open lane to the rim.
A few plays later on a similar play, Middleton is more conservative, so Bridges floats out to the wing. The Suns pivot straight into an alternative, with Ayton running right into a high pick and roll with Booker, giving Booker a runway to his mid range spot.
Monty Williams’ offense has been one of the most aesthetically pleasing elements of this NBA season, as has the Bucks’ shape-shifting defense. Selfishly, I hope this series goes the distance.
I will again make a plea for never referring to a player’s plus-minus numbers, but rather, referring to a team’s plus-minus numbers while the player was on the floor.
I wrote earlier in the season about the Charlotte Hornets’ game-winning Spain pick and roll play against the Sacramento Kings for what it’s worth.