How the Nets Defense is Staying Afloat

KD and Clax lead a Brooklyn Block Party.

Early in the season, I wrote about the Nets defense looking discombobulated. Since then, the Nets defense has risen to ninth best in non garbage time minutes per Cleaning the Glass, nearly two and a half points better than league average. This isn’t a case of opponents going cold from three either; if anything, Brooklyn may be due some luck on that front. The Nets may not sustain a top ten defensive mark for the rest of the season - indeed, the defense has been league average during the current win streak - but anything close to that might be enough for Brooklyn to pin its contender hopes on given the offensive firepower.

Despite sporting a number of small guards, a paucity of genuine 5s, and some shaky point of attack defense, Brooklyn’s defense has steadied after that disastrous early season stretch. The simple explanation: the Nets are stingy at the rim. Even with the rise of the three pointer, layups and dunks are the most valuable shots in the league. This is partly why teams like Mike Budenholzer’s Milwaukee Bucks (until this season) have been happy to concede three pointers if it allows them to take away shots at the rim. The Nets don’t deter rim attempts; per Cleaning the Glass, only five teams allow more of those shots. However, conditional on allowing those shots, Brooklyn is doing a great job of keeping them out. The Nets rank fourth in the league in opponent rim percentage and third in opponent overall effective field goal percentage.¹

That the Nets allow so many rim attempts is not surprising (see the first line of the previous paragraph); that opponents haven’t converted on those shots is a pleasant surprise given that the lack of a credible rim protector has been cited as a team weakness by pundits ad nauseam. Much of this stems from the excellent defensive work of Kevin Durant and the indispensable Nic Claxton. Durant and Claxton have established a veritable no-fly zone around the rim; lineups with both are in the 80th percentile of all lineups league-wide in opponent rim accuracy per CTG. Claxton is third in the league in opponent field goal percentage while Durant is third per NBA Advanced Stats; the two of them have been elite rim protectors this season. Only Brook Lopez and Ivica Zubac challenge more shots on a nightly basis than Claxton. He is always aware of his rim protection duties, materializing out of nowhere to swat layups away.

Claxton’s defensive value stems as much from his awareness and smarts as it does his length and athleticism. The play below is illustrative for how Claxton covers up for weaker defenders. Toronto runs a Spain pick and roll and by the time Kyrie Irving sleepwalks into a switch on Scottie Barnes, Barnes has a head of steam and is nearly in the paint. Claxton contains Christian Koloko’s roll into the paint before seamlessly pivoting into a clean block on Juancho Hernangomez cutting behind the distracted Seth Curry.

Or here, when Saddiq Bey drives past Joe Harris with ease, Claxton is there to reject Bey’s layup attempt. He reads Bey’s drive early, stepping out of the paint to avoid a 3 second violation before rotating over in time.

Both Claxton and Durant have excelled at bringing these weak side help rotations when guarding in the dunker spot.

And therein lies the secret to the Nets’ defensive competency: even when opposing players get into the paint with ease, they are met by a maze of arms from Claxton and Durant (backed up by the stout Royce O’Neal and a revitalized Ben Simmons).

The Nets lead the league in blocks per game by a fair distance; the gap between the Nets and second-place Indiana is the same as the gap between Indiana and tenth-place Toronto. Claxton and Durant are both in the top ten for blocks per game, swatting away nearly 4 shots per game between them.

The length that Claxton and Durant bring has also forced opponents to shoot a league-worst mark on mid-range attempts. Some of that is fluky, but even if the Nets give up a bit more on short jumpers, it shouldn’t hurt them too much. Brooklyn still doesn’t have answers against beefier big men like Joel Embiid and Nikola Jokic (does anybody?), but Claxton and Durant have brought more rim protection than many expected coming into the season. That may be enough for an offense that has MVP-level Durant, post-suspension² Kyrie on a tear, Ben Simmons gathering steam, and TJ Warren rediscovering his bubble self.

1. This gap in opponent shots allowed vs. opponent shots made at the rim also accounts for the discrepancy between Brooklyn’s bottom ten opponent location eFG% - a measure of how efficient their opponents’ shot profile is - and top five opponent actual eFG%.

2. As a reminder, said suspension was for giving anti-semitism a platform and then doubling down on that stupid decision. All suspensions aren’t equal and this was well deserved.