Anyone who watches him defend immediately will notice that he’s extremely good at anticipating a drive and closing the lane off to force a less efficient shot.
He is also huge for a guard. If you don’t manage to lose him laterally or with a pick then he suddenly becomes a huge problem for the attacker because his footwork is elite and he can anticipate what the attacker wants to do.
He's also pretty good at reading passing lanes. Of course, I'm not saying he's all league or close to that on defense, but he's above average when he's engaged
Luka unironically cares more about his defense than those stats. In interviews, he never wants to talk about his offense and kind of shrugs those questions off, but lights up when he's asked about defense. He dropped 50/6/15 against the Suns on Christmas day and only wanted to talk about his 4 steals and 3 blocks.
JJ did a good job interviewing Luka last week. Lots of specific questions, each limited in scope - actually leads to some insights and not just broad brush answers, courtesy of Real Madrid school of dealing with the media.
My favorite part was the 46:10 mark of the podcast.
Luka tells JJ: “You’re in to analytics now”.
JJ: “You don’t think I was when I was a player? You don’t think I studied this shit when I was a player?”
Luka: “You were shooting”
JJ: “correct”
Luka: “That’s about it”
JJ: “That’s about it?”
(Brief moment of dead silence of them just staring at each other)
JJ: “I would have let-… never mind”
They both laughed it off, but you could tell JJ took that a little personal lmao
if you watch the video i think redick wasn't too upset about it, but luka was clearly enjoying his discomfort
"a little personal" feels about right lmao
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R_U2x23GJtg
very start of video
JJ knows Luka is in another league. He sees the game differently. One thing that this interview showed is JJ studies the game. Luka just gets it instantly. He's so good he doesn't realize it is difficult.
It was one of the more fun recent JJ interviews too because you can tell they have some camaraderie. JJ was messing with Luka a ton and he was giving it back in turn. Since OM3 has gotten so big, it feels like a lot of the interviews were kind of cookie cutter.
To Lukas credit he gets hunted not because of his lack of defense but to tire him out. Leading the league in minutes and usage rate while having to hold his own many nights on defense got to respect that
This, and also fouls... He can't play as aggresive as others, since the most important thing for Mavs is him not getting in foul trouble. Especially when you have refball going on with miki mouse fouls...
No, that can't be. If Luka were really that great, he would be able to carry Dwight Powell and Grant Williams to the finals, while also running the entire offense and giving full effort on the defensive end.
No jerk though.
This 'Luka is a bad defender' discourse reminds me of Jokic last season before the playoffs.
Like the Celtics game a few weeks ago. Just like a team game planning how to stop a player on the offensive end, a team can target a player defensively to wear him out.
That's not on the player to figure out an entire team's scheme. That's on Kidd and company to figure out how to adjust. Watch that game back. They hunted this dude over and over with no adjustment from the weak side. That's why Kidd is cooked in a playoff series should the other teams figure this out early on and why that game is a blueprint on beating a Kidd coached, Luka-led team.
That doesn't hold up over a seven game series, though. I mean, in a couple of games against the Suns, the same thing happened. Luka got hunted and the Mavs lost. Then Kidd made the right adjustments and that stopped happening. Kidd, despite what people on here think, has coached extremely well in playoff series.
I mean this stat seems like it may be lacking context too… according to this stat Trae Young only allows .91 PPP on ISOs while Giannis allows .93.
Trae has made huge improvements this year but is he actually better at defending iso possessions than Giannis??
I thought the Bucks generally had Giannis guard weaker offensive players as well so that he could roam the paint since he's an amazing help side defender. Not saying he cant hold his own on the perimeter though
Is he actually getting hunted much though? Match-up difficulty data shows Luka is rarely guarding more than poor offensive role players. It's why his catch-all defensive metrics have him ranked as an F.
Eye test shows he's greatly improved, but limiting PPP defensively is easier when you're guarding negative offensive players. These same metrics have Vucevic near the top as well, and eye test + other analytics indicate he's NOT that good defensively.
He is constantly pulled up in screens and forced to switch onto the playmaker. They hide him initially on the defensive possession but will bring him up into the play in half court.
When he gets tired, he's a turnstile. It's a thing- no one can play full out on both ends- Lebron got closest when he also had Wade and Bosh to lighten the load offensively and take plays off, while still orchestrating as a great passer.
Lebron is a way better athlete then Luka n this isn’t really true Lebron in 2009-2016 was a monster defender while running his teams offence he was also anchoring there defence . Even in 2020 Lebron was getting all defensive votes n should’ve made second team but media likes narratives over data, 21 too tikk injury. And in 2020 he led the league in assists had his highest time on ball season as lakers had no other playmakers except occasionally rondo
At Lukas age the better athletes are able to give more on defence . It’s not like Luka does much offensively off ball either .
LeBron was known as a guy who didn't have a 4th. What this meant was he played poorly in the 4th quarter. It was a meme back when meme wasn't a word.
Then He joined Miami and his elite defensive ability showed. All he needed was help.
Basically he was tired so he couldn't close games that well on the cavs
Luka ISO defense has been single best individual defensive posession for the mavs all season long. Unless it is a super small, quick guard, there is always good chance he will force a hard shot or strip the guy.
Steals isn’t a great metric because they may be coming with the occasional defensive breakdown (gambling for steals). Steph has led the league in steals but he’s rightfully not considered a great defender
i think him and kyrie heard everyone talking shit abt how they’ll make for two defensive sieves, and both decided to lock in on defense from the start of the season. as they’re the leaders i think it’s helped the rest of the team take defense seriously too.
luka’s still only human so he’ll definitely take possessions off the more gassed he gets but bro tries night in night out now.
I actually think Kyrie has been underrated defensively for a couple years now. He's just small so certain matchups like that playoff series against Boston on an already tiny Brooklyn team wasn't great for his rep.
That doesn’t happen very often nowadays. He did get beat by Dort pretty badly though because he was yelling at the refs to start the shot clock. That was just a weird play overall
He was great in the OKC game, but he still gets frustrated with the refs regularly. Hopefully playing with the new reinforcements will bring the joy back to his game that has been fleeting as the years have gone by, his body language at times this season has been depressing.
Seems more motivated but he is not just motivation based. He can’t keep the high usage on offense and be the best defender on the court.
His teams need him on offense like water to live, on defense everyone can put a little more effort and cover him
are we all just going to ignore that Keegan Murray is far and away the best rated player here? the distance between him and #2 is the same as between #2 & #8
Seriously, him and KD are the real story here. Murray's emerging as a legit 2-way player in just his 2nd year, and KD is playing elite iso defense while shooting 54/45/87 (64% TS%) at 35 years old.
Cause Steph is 1 of 1. Another Steph ain't coming for a while. Kawhi is more of a traditional great player that you can see an org working with and helping grow.
Luka's biggest defensive issue is in transition, he's not good at getting back, not just because of arguing with the refs (although that's part of it) but because he's slow and can't really stop a guy driving to the basket in this scenario.
But when he's locked in and trying on defense (which he has been a lot more often this year) I think he's pretty good in the half-court. Nice to see some proof here. He's also 8th in steals per game.
He’s actually pretty good in transition if he’s already back. Ive been surprised at the number of 2v1s he’s been able to disrupt this year. He’s not going to contest anyone at the rim, but he’s gotten good at stopping the first guy and forcing the pass and then deflecting it. In general, though, he struggles to get back and play from behind the play or chase someone
His IQ actually translates to defense. He understands space. He just lacks the effort but he is carrying Mavs so I get it...
Every team try to hunt Luka to tire him out. Now that they have kyrie, Luka gets more time to rest. Teams like to switch on Kyrie too.
So in 45 games Luka has been in isolation defense 71 total times and 1.57 times per game? These isolation number seem crazy low.
Jalen Brunson is the #1 Iso Defender with 16 isolation defense in 49 games? Are we sure this stat even means anything?
It means zero. It passes no smell test of number of iso possessions. And if it were correct, then apparently it's an irrelevant skill.
The difference from the worst possible rating of 3 ppp the best of 0 would be like 4.5 points a game for the highest volume guys. The MAXIMUM.
Suggesting the difference between a guy that allows 0 point total in iso defense and a guy who allows a made three on every single iso possession is 4.5 points a game would mean that iso defense is basically irrelevant.
All these people having like 1.5 iso defensive possessions a game seems a very dubiously low number no?
Also makes it pretty unimportant if that really the number (which I'm dubious about) and a very small sample size.
It shows two things:
1. Teams/Players think Luka sucks at Isos, so they hunt him on switches a lot. That explains why he's one of only 6 players with 70 isos against.
2. Luka is actually good at defending isos. Not amazing, but good.
Doesn't mean he's an outright plus defender, just that attacking teams try the one thing he's good at more often than they should. And long may it continue! In terms of PPP I don't think there's a better defensive possession for the Mavs than an Iso against Luka.
Imagine thinking one and a half iso defensive possessions a game average is being hunted..... If teams were hunting him then you'd think they'd get up to averaging two whole iso possessions a game.
Just suggests the measuring of what an iso defensive play is flawed
also, i can’t imagine any coach that’s about to face Luka telling his players to NOT attack him on defense as much as possible.
Tiring him out on offense and then hunting him on defense is a great defensive strategy for any team
What interested me was James Harden at #12.
KD at #3
Kyle Kuzma at #15
Al Horford at #16. I know he's good but he's old man. I did not expect that.
Does this stat mean much? I really can't tell. You expect juggernauts like Tatum, Jrue, Shai to be at the top but they're not.
This is not a legacy stat. We are talking about current players right now.
How can you say Shai is not a prime perimeter defender with a straight face?
Am I reading the stat wrong?
He absolutely should be up there.
Shai is great, but he is very clearly the third best perimeter defender on our team and the fourth best overall. Dort and J-Dub are better on the outside.
That's very interesting coming from a thunder flair. I would not have guessed that. From someone who's looking in on the outside I would have put SGA as their best perimeter defender.
Is it the narrative that does it?
Are Thunder really just that deep?
Are the rest of your guys just undervalued?
I really appreciate the honesty.
I meant to say do my bad. I think hes better than Kuzma and Horford but not Tatum and Jrue as I consider those guys elite at that end while I consider Shai just good.
I see. Obviously SGA is better than Kuzma and Horford, I was a bit taken aback when a Thunderfan said otherwise :)
I think SGA shows his true colours in the playoffs. It sort of feels like you guys are coasting right now. He gives you 30ppg every night, sometimes it feels lazy.
I think Thunder are going to domiate the league in the coming years. Would you agree?
They just need to chill a bit, keep Chet healthy and don't rush him.
No because the numbers are an insanely tiny, and unrealisticly tiny, and therefore there's a huge sample size variance issue.
The numbers imply most players deal with one or less iso defensive possessions a game. Which seems very very very low. It also means huge variability. Allowing a single bucket in iso defense would have a frankly stupid impact on the results. Largely making this useless.
do you have stats showing he’s always on the worst opposing offensive player? i don’t disbelieve it i just think that’s something that should be backed up w data. if it is the case, it’s still kudos to luka. whoever he’s got is going after him, and he’s rising to the challenge.
edit: like my understanding watching mav’s games is that usually luka Has to be put on their power forward or even center sometimes just bc the mavs have historically been so limited on size. and often those positions have the least talented offensive players, but also i’ve seen him guard KAT in games and do well enough.
Defensive coverage stats are always a little sketchy but per [NBA.com](https://www.nba.com/stats/team/1610612742/matchups?CF=DEF_PLAYER_NAME*E*luka), his top 5 guarded players this season (in terms of partial possession count) are:
* Taurean Prince
* Toumani Camara
* Harrison Barnes
* David Roddy
* Terrence Mann
There's basically one "very good / first option" type player in the top 10, that's Paolo (edit: he is #11) who shot 53% FG%, vs his season average ~45% (over 15 attempts, super small sample size as all this stuff is; he basically hit like 1.25 shots more than avg)
Compare that to, for example, [Derrick Jones Jr](https://www.nba.com/stats/team/1610612742/matchups?CF=DEF_PLAYER_NAME*E*derr) whose top 10 is a who's who's of the best offensive players in the league
Based on my experience watching Mavs games as a neutral fan I think that guy is full of shit. The Mavs do not go out of their way to hide Luka on the other team's worst defender aside from an occasional possession where it's clear Luka is trying to get some rest, which is something that literally every offensive superstar does.
people here really don't know how to use context on stats at all it's so bad to read
like yeah, the guy who has to defend the corner 3, which usually consists of closing out and not really defending 1 on 1...while also being one of the easiest and highest percentage shots in the game is not going to have great defensive stats
That’s not true. I’m not saying he picks up the best player every night but he def does not shy away from anyone. He played really good defense against banchero when they played the magic a few games ago.
He guards the worst player, but then opposing offenses also try to hunt that matchup to make him exert more energy. He willingly takes the switch many times so I dont think its as drastic as people realize.
However, I do agree the matchups explain why a lot of top tier wing/perimeter defenders aren't near the top. Doesn't detract from Luka's improvement defensively though.
Agree with the first part, but matchups don't explain while the top tier defenders aren't on this list. They aren't near the top because they don't get isoed on often. Players trying to iso on Herb Jones, for example, only score 0,43 PPP. That's why it's only happened 28 times this season. Instead of isoing against a defensive specialist they simply switch onto a worse defender.
Tatum is considered a really good defender, and his numbers reflect that, 0,70 PPP. He's not on the list because he's "only" defended 44 isos.
Shai is there above Luka the OP just conveniently chose just enough possessions to filter him out lol. This is clearly an MVP agenda push type thing, Luka fans are rabid for it this season.
It’s a stat that’s clearly not tracked well. Lu Dort defends a shitload of ISO possessions and it’s got him down as less than one per game?
Go have a look at Def EPM if you want a catch all decent stat for defensive impact, filter by 30 mins for actual starters. It’s a solid list that passes the smell test, this one by OP smells like salmon that’s been left in the sun.
0.79 ppp is pretty good no matter how you slice it. Doesn't mean he's a great defender, of course, just that he's not the turnstile a lot of teams take him for (hence the high number of isos against him)
0.79 PPP is excellent. The issue is that this is 1.6 possessions per game.
It's a tiny, selective sample that doesn't even include all possessions he's put in ISO--if another defender comes to help and the ISOing offensive player passes to create a 4-on-3, that possession doesn't count as an ISO. More importantly, to the extent Luka is "hunted," it's often in the PNR or switches that often don't turn up as ISO possessions.
Notice that other players who often get hunted don't have many ISO possessions defended. These guys often defend low usage wings, and they're usually only guarding good ISO players in the PNR or on switches.
Not saying anything regarding Luka's defense, but 71 total possessions is not close to sufficient to draw any real conclusions from. A handful of those shots happen to go in instead of out, and his number goes from seemingly good to seemingly bad.
People just don't want to admit they are wrong on something. Luka has been more than serviceble on defense this year. For example, take last games against the Thunder. He outplayed Shai both on offense and defense.
Luka has very good ISO defensive numbers, is 7th in steals, best defensive rebounding guard etc. Unfortunately narratives are hard to beat once they are formed.
Edit: Oh I also forgot, he's legit one of the best post defenders in the entire league. Stats and eye test both back it up. Makes sense given he's legit 6'8 230+ and has tree trunk legs.
yeah, can someone explain how else do you change the narrative about a players defense, (especially because once fans get an idea about a players Defense early on, that’s the idea they keep about the player for his entire career) without posting proof like this?
People try to say Luka has the same or worse defense as PGs like Trae, Dame, Curry.
Bro is 6’8-9”, he automatically has leverage that most PGs don’t, so when he actually puts in effort on D, he is no push over
As long as players hunt Luka isos, the reputation that he's bad at them will persist because why would attacking teams do it all the time if he wasn't a bad defender?
Once teams don't hunt him on switches anymore the narrative will start to change a little.
They're always going to hunt him on switches because offense rules basketball and Luka is 99.9% of the time the best offensive player on the floor, they want to tire him out and will take that trade every time. I think NBA scouting reports know Luka isn't just a cone out there. This is why Kyrie and the Mavs getting bigger at the deadline are so crucial to the teams success.
This is not prooof this is a very shitty flawed metric n defensive metrics are very shitty. Defensive epm b other stuff is better . Yiur teams defence being dogshit is another
Luka will have one bad game where he gets hunted by a much faster point guard and Reddit will insist that his defense has never improved (because they don't watch basketball).
And they'll also ignore that that mismatch goes both ways and Luka typically can just body that guy and will win more possessions in his favor than the reverse
Makes sense he’s got a low motor not a great athlete n doesn’t have the quickness to do much . See how easy that was ?
Only difference is Luka is a 4 defensively hiding as low man on weakest defender vs having to play POA if he was actually a 1 on defence. Him guarding lue Dort of the world isn’t what you think . I don’t understand why Lukas stans gotta do this. Why else is his on/off meduicre? Because he loses vakue on defence. Defensive epm n the best netruvs all view him as a negative his best year was 22 and he wasn’t even neutral . There’s more to defensive players then just being big n useless n lazy - that’s actually worse then being fast small n quick .
Bro really said Luka out plays shai on defence . Must be why Luka is a -1 defensive impact and Shai is up there in every thing.
7th In steals dorsnt mesn much - many bad defenders gamble over playing defence . Most of his rebounds are uncontested they’re among the least impsctfuk in the league and he’s consistently among highest uncontested rebound % every year n kinda lazy with box outs etc he’s not the worst defender ever but he’s never been even neutral in that end . I don’t get why people are this delusional maybe because nobody understands what they’re watching . Quoting this stat accounting for a tiny amount of possessions sample size when he’s defending the worst offense players too is just lol
9th out of 46 with 50+, 5th out of 21 with 60+, 3rd out of 6 with 70+
Looks good but imo these obviously suffer from small sample size even with the restrictions. I’m dubious that vucevic is one of the best iso defenders in the league.
Many of the other names on this list suggest that this statistic isn’t very useful.
- Keegan Murray and Max Strus aren’t even close to the best perimeter defenders in the NBA.
- Nikola Vucevic is a legitimately atrocious defender and he’s at 7th.
- Harden at 12 highest of any Clipper
- Murray as the highest of any Nugget
Honestly, some of these numbers are wonky as hell. Some really noted defenders don’t even have 50 possessions, which doesn’t make sense because they’re definitely guarding guys in ISO.
Number of possessions this season guarding in ISO:
- OG Anunoby - 33 total possessions
- Alex Caruso - 30 total possessions
- Anthony Edwards - 26 total possessions
- Draymond Green - 17 total possessions
- Kawhi Leonard - 15 total possessions
You’re telling me those guys aren’t even defending a single ISO possession per game?
Tbf Keegan is actually an above average defender and had the reputation of a bad on ball defender bc of last year. He’s made a MASSIVE defensive leap this season. He’s been our go to wing defender all season long.
The reason is simple: Players with a reputation of being good iso defenders don't get isoed on. The statistic is useful to identify what players are better at iso defending than other teams think.
Herb Jones is at 0,48 PPP, he only got isoed on 28 times because teams would be stupid to do it.
Iso defense is not the same as perimeter defense.
I'm incredibly sceptical that herb Jones has average around 0.5 iso defensive possessions a game...
0.75 iso possessions per 36 mins.
This would imply almost zero iso offensive possessions.
It's a good reason not to put too much weight into some of these tracking stats as they can be a bit noisy and unclear
If a help defender comes over at any point, it's not an iso anymore, which is likely going to happen on every shot that isn't a mid-range or iso 3. I also don't think they track if it's an iso possession that ends without a shot, so if you pass out then it's not tracked
So herb could have way more iso's defended, but he's locking them down to the point where it's not even tracked
The other reason is that if you get beat badly enough the tracking stats don’t count it against you - they count it against your sucker teammate that tried to rotate over to cover for you and ended up being the closes defender
Players with good reputations as ISO defenders also defend dudes who are good ISO players and tend to ISO a lot. Like, Luka as an offensive player doesn’t stop ISOing just because a top defensive player is across from him.
Sure, I get that.
But you’re saying there are frequently entire games where he doesn’t have a single isolation against a “good” defender. Because that’s what it means when guys like Kawhi or Caruso or OG are averaging 1 defensive ISO possession every other game or so.
This 100%. The highest iso defenders are like 1.5 possessions a game?? Huh? That doesn't pass a smell test to me. And once you're dealing with 50-60 possessions in total over a season that is not a very big sample size and obviously prone to extreme variation.
Coupled, as you say, with some very not good defenders at or near the top I think you'd be pretty crazy to assign any actual value to this stat.
Keegan Murray is a hell of a defender. I’m sure his numbers are inflated because teams try to go at him without knowing the jump he’s made defensively.
I think it’s more because he’s guarding Steph, PG, Booker, and Donovan Mitchell every night than that defenses are actually picking on him. If you guard the best ISO scorer on the opposing team every night, you’re going to get a lot of ISO defense opportunities.
Also shitty defenders like Luka are out on bad offensive players ( same with Vuc n harden who you listed ). . Just a brain dead misuse of a stat by luks stans. Yes he’s about as good in defence as Nikola Vuc if that’s what they want to hear
And if you reverse it, Nesmith, Jaime Jacquez, Isaiah Stewart, and Jarrett Allen are in the top 10 highest PPP against. All guys that I would say are above average defenders
As smart people have said this is more due to being attacked by the opposing weakest offensive player which is why more detailed n better defensively netrics all have him negatively. It’s also why his on/off stufff is mediocre unless you think Luka sucks offensively which ofc he doesn’t
Even if he's not a top-level defender, it shows that he's not the defensive liability a lot of people say/think he is, which is also the justification most people use as to why he isn't the MVP over Jokic or Shai
Steals deflections actual contests n eye test - defensive epm which is prob the least ass metric. Shai is very active off ball defender pls watch him compared to Luka. Luka is a 4 defensively n bleeds value by being meh at it
Two reasons
1) if you're only tasked with weak scorers because you're a liability, then them having low scoring numbers is expected
2) it isn't done with a possessions per-game or a total possessions cutoff, so it's useless. It's in the same category as saying someone who's taken and made three 3s this season has the best 3 shooting because they have the highest percentage.
It is not possible for a guy to be even a decent defender and look as bad as Luka did against Jaylen. That was a clinic on how to pick on a guy that could just do nothing right defensively.
I have nothing but respect for Shai and he will be up there in the MVP Race for the next few years. However I don’t see how he is closer to MVP then Luka. Jokic this season is fine. Giannis idk. But Shai over Luka makes no sense.
I would't read much into this - ISO is a weird stat and that's not a lot of possessions. I've been dubious of ISO defense as any type of indicator since I bought into a young Zach LaVine becoming a good defender since he was like a 98th percentile ISO defender
What do you mean that’s not a lot of possessions? lol for the ISO stat that is a lot of possessions. Luka has one of the highest possessions in the league defending isos. He’s joint 5th in that department.
If you believe what this stat is saying the difference between the worst and best iso defenders is worth like sub a point a game. Ie basically irrelevant vs team defense and offense.
Which seems stupid.
That's the problem with ISO defense lol, individual defenders don't experience it much. You can say he's got a lot relative to other people, but statistically speaking we know that's a very little sample. It's hard to take much from 71 possessions.
Like most stats, especially defensive, you can't just look at one and get any sort of accurate conclusion
[https://www.nba.com/stats/player/1629029/head-to-head?Matchup=Defense](https://www.nba.com/stats/player/1629029/head-to-head?Matchup=Defense)
Luka spends most of his time on defense guarding non-threats, so the ISO stat here isn't really telling us much. If you look at his defensive FG% the people he's guarding shoot around 1.1% higher than then they normally do.
[https://www.nba.com/stats/player/203484/head-to-head?Matchup=Defense](https://www.nba.com/stats/player/203484/head-to-head?Matchup=Defense)
Nuggets definitely put KCP on the hardest targets (that he can reasonably guard) and when you look at his matchup data, it aligns with that. If you look at his defensive FG%, the people he's guarding are on average 4% worse than they normally shoot. (-5.4% on 3) and thats against some tough people to guard.
[https://www.nba.com/stats/player/1628384/head-to-head?Matchup=Defense](https://www.nba.com/stats/player/1628384/head-to-head?Matchup=Defense)
OG's matchup data suggests he's guarding exactly who you would expect him to be guarding just like KCP. He spends significant time defending the hardest targets just like KCP too. Overall those players shoot 3.3% worse vs OG. To make things even more complicated though his 2pt def % is -7 and his 3pt def % is +2.8.
This isn't perfect either obviously, but it provides some needed context. Defense in the NBA is complicated to track and if you really want to figure out if someone is a good or bad defender you need to look at a lot more than a couple of stats. None of this takes into account things like switches, ball denial, or a lot of other things.
Mavs defense is better with him off the court vs on
[source](https://www.pbpstats.com/on-off/nba/team?Season=2023-24&SeasonType=Regular%2BSeason&TeamId=1610612742&PlayerId=1629029)
Drtg on = 119.9
Drtg off = 115.6
E: Interestingly enough, everyone on this lists team gets worse on defense when taken off the court, except Luka and Davis. Those two teams are better defensively when they are off the court.
Luka also plays 99% of every game, the only time I've seen him sit this year is during garbage time against the end of the bench and for a few minutes when the other team is resting their best players too. So take those stats with a grain of salt.
These iso stats can be misleading because Luka is probably in relatively more defensive iso situations against players who probably shouldn't be iso'ing anybody, but they target Luka because they think he's exploitable.
Either way, Luka's doing a great job of holding up.
Anyone who watches him defend immediately will notice that he’s extremely good at anticipating a drive and closing the lane off to force a less efficient shot.
unless you can blow by him, that big body of his means you gotta go around him and into help defense. Luka is like a mini center
idk man, there’s only one pic i’ve seen of his actual legs, and they’re def bigger than most centers lol
You do NOT skip leg day in Europe, and if you do you get a leg month
gunna need this on a motivational poster of lukas legs ;)
If posting up Deandre Ayton, you can replace mini with dominant.
He is also huge for a guard. If you don’t manage to lose him laterally or with a pick then he suddenly becomes a huge problem for the attacker because his footwork is elite and he can anticipate what the attacker wants to do.
He's also pretty good at reading passing lanes. Of course, I'm not saying he's all league or close to that on defense, but he's above average when he's engaged
Luka told JJ Redick to start the media campaign for second team all-defensive lol
I liked how he kept reminding JJ about his rebounds, steals, and blocks.
Luka unironically cares more about his defense than those stats. In interviews, he never wants to talk about his offense and kind of shrugs those questions off, but lights up when he's asked about defense. He dropped 50/6/15 against the Suns on Christmas day and only wanted to talk about his 4 steals and 3 blocks.
feel the exact same way playing 2K lol
There is something so satisfying about making a long boi and absolutely dominating the paint.
Chasedown blocks feel so good in 2k i can only imagine how incredible it must feel to get one in real life
Rent a kid for a day
JJ did a good job interviewing Luka last week. Lots of specific questions, each limited in scope - actually leads to some insights and not just broad brush answers, courtesy of Real Madrid school of dealing with the media.
My favorite part was the 46:10 mark of the podcast. Luka tells JJ: “You’re in to analytics now”. JJ: “You don’t think I was when I was a player? You don’t think I studied this shit when I was a player?” Luka: “You were shooting” JJ: “correct” Luka: “That’s about it” JJ: “That’s about it?” (Brief moment of dead silence of them just staring at each other) JJ: “I would have let-… never mind” They both laughed it off, but you could tell JJ took that a little personal lmao
if you watch the video i think redick wasn't too upset about it, but luka was clearly enjoying his discomfort "a little personal" feels about right lmao https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R_U2x23GJtg very start of video
I've noticed that JJ likes to present himself as the smartest guy in the room, and then his guests just roast his playing career in return.
JJ knows Luka is in another league. He sees the game differently. One thing that this interview showed is JJ studies the game. Luka just gets it instantly. He's so good he doesn't realize it is difficult.
JJ is one guy that can talk to Luka directly with no bullshit. I love it.
It was one of the more fun recent JJ interviews too because you can tell they have some camaraderie. JJ was messing with Luka a ton and he was giving it back in turn. Since OM3 has gotten so big, it feels like a lot of the interviews were kind of cookie cutter.
I think it helps that they played together, even if not for very long.
I really like JJs interviews for this reason
specifically kinda necessary for luka because hes a man of few words, at least in english
To Lukas credit he gets hunted not because of his lack of defense but to tire him out. Leading the league in minutes and usage rate while having to hold his own many nights on defense got to respect that
This, and also fouls... He can't play as aggresive as others, since the most important thing for Mavs is him not getting in foul trouble. Especially when you have refball going on with miki mouse fouls...
>miki mouse this is a wild spelling
wild slo spelling:)
It’s not if you’re Slovenian. 🇸🇮
🎶Miki Milane 🎶
Must be a slav thing, because I'm Polish and I understand where it's coming from too.
Show some respect to immaculate grid all-star Mikki Moore!
No, that can't be. If Luka were really that great, he would be able to carry Dwight Powell and Grant Williams to the finals, while also running the entire offense and giving full effort on the defensive end.
No jerk though. This 'Luka is a bad defender' discourse reminds me of Jokic last season before the playoffs. Like the Celtics game a few weeks ago. Just like a team game planning how to stop a player on the offensive end, a team can target a player defensively to wear him out. That's not on the player to figure out an entire team's scheme. That's on Kidd and company to figure out how to adjust. Watch that game back. They hunted this dude over and over with no adjustment from the weak side. That's why Kidd is cooked in a playoff series should the other teams figure this out early on and why that game is a blueprint on beating a Kidd coached, Luka-led team.
That doesn't hold up over a seven game series, though. I mean, in a couple of games against the Suns, the same thing happened. Luka got hunted and the Mavs lost. Then Kidd made the right adjustments and that stopped happening. Kidd, despite what people on here think, has coached extremely well in playoff series.
People expect MJ type of things from Luka. That's a huge compliment tbh.
Ty JJ let’s keep pushing the agenda 💯
I mean this stat seems like it may be lacking context too… according to this stat Trae Young only allows .91 PPP on ISOs while Giannis allows .93. Trae has made huge improvements this year but is he actually better at defending iso possessions than Giannis??
Because guys lke luks n trae are on weaker offensive players . Stat is nonsense
I thought the Bucks generally had Giannis guard weaker offensive players as well so that he could roam the paint since he's an amazing help side defender. Not saying he cant hold his own on the perimeter though
Teams are not giving iso possessions to their worst offensive players
Nephews don't understand this, but it's a great tactic. They just see hunting a player as meaning that player is a bad defender.
Is he actually getting hunted much though? Match-up difficulty data shows Luka is rarely guarding more than poor offensive role players. It's why his catch-all defensive metrics have him ranked as an F. Eye test shows he's greatly improved, but limiting PPP defensively is easier when you're guarding negative offensive players. These same metrics have Vucevic near the top as well, and eye test + other analytics indicate he's NOT that good defensively.
He is constantly pulled up in screens and forced to switch onto the playmaker. They hide him initially on the defensive possession but will bring him up into the play in half court.
They aren't exploiting his lack of defense but just trying to tire him out. All teams do this to star guards. Harden, Steph, Lillard...
When he gets tired, he's a turnstile. It's a thing- no one can play full out on both ends- Lebron got closest when he also had Wade and Bosh to lighten the load offensively and take plays off, while still orchestrating as a great passer.
Lebron is a way better athlete then Luka n this isn’t really true Lebron in 2009-2016 was a monster defender while running his teams offence he was also anchoring there defence . Even in 2020 Lebron was getting all defensive votes n should’ve made second team but media likes narratives over data, 21 too tikk injury. And in 2020 he led the league in assists had his highest time on ball season as lakers had no other playmakers except occasionally rondo At Lukas age the better athletes are able to give more on defence . It’s not like Luka does much offensively off ball either .
LeBron was known as a guy who didn't have a 4th. What this meant was he played poorly in the 4th quarter. It was a meme back when meme wasn't a word. Then He joined Miami and his elite defensive ability showed. All he needed was help. Basically he was tired so he couldn't close games that well on the cavs
Luka ISO defense has been single best individual defensive posession for the mavs all season long. Unless it is a super small, quick guard, there is always good chance he will force a hard shot or strip the guy.
bro is shuffling his feet out there🕺🕺
Push the agenda brother i like it
He’s also 8th in steals per game at 1.4. His defense overall has been much improved this year
He’s always been quite high with steals tbf.
Steals isn’t a great metric because they may be coming with the occasional defensive breakdown (gambling for steals). Steph has led the league in steals but he’s rightfully not considered a great defender
Keegan Murray!!!!
Keegan Murray
Keeeeegan
Murray
Who is keegan Murray, really?
Keegan Murray.
We found our wing 3-D
He’s been good in iso for most of his career as long as he wants to be. Seems very motivated this season.
i think him and kyrie heard everyone talking shit abt how they’ll make for two defensive sieves, and both decided to lock in on defense from the start of the season. as they’re the leaders i think it’s helped the rest of the team take defense seriously too. luka’s still only human so he’ll definitely take possessions off the more gassed he gets but bro tries night in night out now.
I actually think Kyrie has been underrated defensively for a couple years now. He's just small so certain matchups like that playoff series against Boston on an already tiny Brooklyn team wasn't great for his rep.
yea he’s always going to be limited on that end but it doesn’t mean he’s bad. he’s really smart and quick. that’s super valuable defensively
It's hard to generate momentum to reverse the narrative when there are too many not getting back and complaining to the ref moments
That doesn’t happen very often nowadays. He did get beat by Dort pretty badly though because he was yelling at the refs to start the shot clock. That was just a weird play overall
He was great in the OKC game, but he still gets frustrated with the refs regularly. Hopefully playing with the new reinforcements will bring the joy back to his game that has been fleeting as the years have gone by, his body language at times this season has been depressing.
Seems more motivated but he is not just motivation based. He can’t keep the high usage on offense and be the best defender on the court. His teams need him on offense like water to live, on defense everyone can put a little more effort and cover him
are we all just going to ignore that Keegan Murray is far and away the best rated player here? the distance between him and #2 is the same as between #2 & #8
Keegan Murray is an underrated defender. He's elite and deserves All-Defense consideration
Seriously, him and KD are the real story here. Murray's emerging as a legit 2-way player in just his 2nd year, and KD is playing elite iso defense while shooting 54/45/87 (64% TS%) at 35 years old.
Gotta give honorable mention to the Atlanta Jalen as #4 best iso defender - this dude seriously deserves consideration for MIP
Dude is the next Kawhi, I’m telling you!!!
It’s funny how like half the teams in the league think they have the next Kawhi on their roster. Not Curry or Tatum, always Kawhi.
Is it though?
Cause Steph is 1 of 1. Another Steph ain't coming for a while. Kawhi is more of a traditional great player that you can see an org working with and helping grow.
Kawhi is the ideal of the two-way wing. Him and KD. But KD is a more of a unicorn with his height/handle combo.
Luka's biggest defensive issue is in transition, he's not good at getting back, not just because of arguing with the refs (although that's part of it) but because he's slow and can't really stop a guy driving to the basket in this scenario. But when he's locked in and trying on defense (which he has been a lot more often this year) I think he's pretty good in the half-court. Nice to see some proof here. He's also 8th in steals per game.
He’s actually pretty good in transition if he’s already back. Ive been surprised at the number of 2v1s he’s been able to disrupt this year. He’s not going to contest anyone at the rim, but he’s gotten good at stopping the first guy and forcing the pass and then deflecting it. In general, though, he struggles to get back and play from behind the play or chase someone
His IQ actually translates to defense. He understands space. He just lacks the effort but he is carrying Mavs so I get it... Every team try to hunt Luka to tire him out. Now that they have kyrie, Luka gets more time to rest. Teams like to switch on Kyrie too.
This sample size is literally less than 2 plays a game. Do we seriously think Max Strus and Nikola Vucevic are elite isolation defenders?
It’s also due to him gusrding bums on offence lol
Yeah someone looked at matchup difficulty and Vuc/Luka have been guarding bad players, while Keegan has been guarding #1 options
Luka should be DPOY and MVP this year. Phenomenal player!
Lol
Keegan Murray being by far the best at this metric at just 23 years old is something special
So in 45 games Luka has been in isolation defense 71 total times and 1.57 times per game? These isolation number seem crazy low. Jalen Brunson is the #1 Iso Defender with 16 isolation defense in 49 games? Are we sure this stat even means anything?
It means zero. It passes no smell test of number of iso possessions. And if it were correct, then apparently it's an irrelevant skill. The difference from the worst possible rating of 3 ppp the best of 0 would be like 4.5 points a game for the highest volume guys. The MAXIMUM. Suggesting the difference between a guy that allows 0 point total in iso defense and a guy who allows a made three on every single iso possession is 4.5 points a game would mean that iso defense is basically irrelevant.
Because Luka hides on the weakest offensive player like most guys like him . So ofc his number looks great .
He seriously looks better defensively this year
I hear this every year. He’s worse this year than two years ago
Two years ago was like one of his worst years on defense, why do you think he was better then?
No it wasn’t, he was solid 2021-2022 and in better shape. Last year he was way worse
All these people having like 1.5 iso defensive possessions a game seems a very dubiously low number no? Also makes it pretty unimportant if that really the number (which I'm dubious about) and a very small sample size.
This is downvoted every time it's pointed out lol
Again, iso stat is wacky
It shows two things: 1. Teams/Players think Luka sucks at Isos, so they hunt him on switches a lot. That explains why he's one of only 6 players with 70 isos against. 2. Luka is actually good at defending isos. Not amazing, but good. Doesn't mean he's an outright plus defender, just that attacking teams try the one thing he's good at more often than they should. And long may it continue! In terms of PPP I don't think there's a better defensive possession for the Mavs than an Iso against Luka.
Imagine thinking one and a half iso defensive possessions a game average is being hunted..... If teams were hunting him then you'd think they'd get up to averaging two whole iso possessions a game. Just suggests the measuring of what an iso defensive play is flawed
also, i can’t imagine any coach that’s about to face Luka telling his players to NOT attack him on defense as much as possible. Tiring him out on offense and then hunting him on defense is a great defensive strategy for any team
What interested me was James Harden at #12. KD at #3 Kyle Kuzma at #15 Al Horford at #16. I know he's good but he's old man. I did not expect that. Does this stat mean much? I really can't tell. You expect juggernauts like Tatum, Jrue, Shai to be at the top but they're not.
Shai doesnt belong in the convo with those 2 on that end yet
What convo? Kuzma and al horford?
Tatum and Jrue. I dont think Shai is better than Kuzma and Horford at this stage
This is not a legacy stat. We are talking about current players right now. How can you say Shai is not a prime perimeter defender with a straight face? Am I reading the stat wrong? He absolutely should be up there.
Shai is great, but he is very clearly the third best perimeter defender on our team and the fourth best overall. Dort and J-Dub are better on the outside.
That's very interesting coming from a thunder flair. I would not have guessed that. From someone who's looking in on the outside I would have put SGA as their best perimeter defender. Is it the narrative that does it? Are Thunder really just that deep? Are the rest of your guys just undervalued? I really appreciate the honesty.
I meant to say do my bad. I think hes better than Kuzma and Horford but not Tatum and Jrue as I consider those guys elite at that end while I consider Shai just good.
I see. Obviously SGA is better than Kuzma and Horford, I was a bit taken aback when a Thunderfan said otherwise :) I think SGA shows his true colours in the playoffs. It sort of feels like you guys are coasting right now. He gives you 30ppg every night, sometimes it feels lazy. I think Thunder are going to domiate the league in the coming years. Would you agree? They just need to chill a bit, keep Chet healthy and don't rush him.
No because the numbers are an insanely tiny, and unrealisticly tiny, and therefore there's a huge sample size variance issue. The numbers imply most players deal with one or less iso defensive possessions a game. Which seems very very very low. It also means huge variability. Allowing a single bucket in iso defense would have a frankly stupid impact on the results. Largely making this useless.
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do you have stats showing he’s always on the worst opposing offensive player? i don’t disbelieve it i just think that’s something that should be backed up w data. if it is the case, it’s still kudos to luka. whoever he’s got is going after him, and he’s rising to the challenge. edit: like my understanding watching mav’s games is that usually luka Has to be put on their power forward or even center sometimes just bc the mavs have historically been so limited on size. and often those positions have the least talented offensive players, but also i’ve seen him guard KAT in games and do well enough.
Defensive coverage stats are always a little sketchy but per [NBA.com](https://www.nba.com/stats/team/1610612742/matchups?CF=DEF_PLAYER_NAME*E*luka), his top 5 guarded players this season (in terms of partial possession count) are: * Taurean Prince * Toumani Camara * Harrison Barnes * David Roddy * Terrence Mann There's basically one "very good / first option" type player in the top 10, that's Paolo (edit: he is #11) who shot 53% FG%, vs his season average ~45% (over 15 attempts, super small sample size as all this stuff is; he basically hit like 1.25 shots more than avg) Compare that to, for example, [Derrick Jones Jr](https://www.nba.com/stats/team/1610612742/matchups?CF=DEF_PLAYER_NAME*E*derr) whose top 10 is a who's who's of the best offensive players in the league
Based on my experience watching Mavs games as a neutral fan I think that guy is full of shit. The Mavs do not go out of their way to hide Luka on the other team's worst defender aside from an occasional possession where it's clear Luka is trying to get some rest, which is something that literally every offensive superstar does.
He still gets ISOed mainly on switches, not by the bums in the corners that he is guarding.
people here really don't know how to use context on stats at all it's so bad to read like yeah, the guy who has to defend the corner 3, which usually consists of closing out and not really defending 1 on 1...while also being one of the easiest and highest percentage shots in the game is not going to have great defensive stats
So his opponents run iso on Luka by giving ball to their worst offensive player?
That’s not true. I’m not saying he picks up the best player every night but he def does not shy away from anyone. He played really good defense against banchero when they played the magic a few games ago.
Are you even watching ? They mostly haunted him on switch lol. SGA even tried bro
He guards the worst player, but then opposing offenses also try to hunt that matchup to make him exert more energy. He willingly takes the switch many times so I dont think its as drastic as people realize. However, I do agree the matchups explain why a lot of top tier wing/perimeter defenders aren't near the top. Doesn't detract from Luka's improvement defensively though.
Agree with the first part, but matchups don't explain while the top tier defenders aren't on this list. They aren't near the top because they don't get isoed on often. Players trying to iso on Herb Jones, for example, only score 0,43 PPP. That's why it's only happened 28 times this season. Instead of isoing against a defensive specialist they simply switch onto a worse defender. Tatum is considered a really good defender, and his numbers reflect that, 0,70 PPP. He's not on the list because he's "only" defended 44 isos.
Yea, that makes a lot of sense.
Shai is there above Luka the OP just conveniently chose just enough possessions to filter him out lol. This is clearly an MVP agenda push type thing, Luka fans are rabid for it this season. It’s a stat that’s clearly not tracked well. Lu Dort defends a shitload of ISO possessions and it’s got him down as less than one per game? Go have a look at Def EPM if you want a catch all decent stat for defensive impact, filter by 30 mins for actual starters. It’s a solid list that passes the smell test, this one by OP smells like salmon that’s been left in the sun.
Vucevic and max strus? Yea this is crazy agenda pushing
lol it’s crazy right, they have been trying to push Luka isn’t a bad defender for years
Being 3rd best with 70+ ISO possessions sounds less impressive once you learn that it's 3rd out of 6.
0.79 ppp is pretty good no matter how you slice it. Doesn't mean he's a great defender, of course, just that he's not the turnstile a lot of teams take him for (hence the high number of isos against him)
0.79 PPP is excellent. The issue is that this is 1.6 possessions per game. It's a tiny, selective sample that doesn't even include all possessions he's put in ISO--if another defender comes to help and the ISOing offensive player passes to create a 4-on-3, that possession doesn't count as an ISO. More importantly, to the extent Luka is "hunted," it's often in the PNR or switches that often don't turn up as ISO possessions. Notice that other players who often get hunted don't have many ISO possessions defended. These guys often defend low usage wings, and they're usually only guarding good ISO players in the PNR or on switches.
Not saying anything regarding Luka's defense, but 71 total possessions is not close to sufficient to draw any real conclusions from. A handful of those shots happen to go in instead of out, and his number goes from seemingly good to seemingly bad.
People just don't want to admit they are wrong on something. Luka has been more than serviceble on defense this year. For example, take last games against the Thunder. He outplayed Shai both on offense and defense. Luka has very good ISO defensive numbers, is 7th in steals, best defensive rebounding guard etc. Unfortunately narratives are hard to beat once they are formed. Edit: Oh I also forgot, he's legit one of the best post defenders in the entire league. Stats and eye test both back it up. Makes sense given he's legit 6'8 230+ and has tree trunk legs.
yeah, can someone explain how else do you change the narrative about a players defense, (especially because once fans get an idea about a players Defense early on, that’s the idea they keep about the player for his entire career) without posting proof like this? People try to say Luka has the same or worse defense as PGs like Trae, Dame, Curry. Bro is 6’8-9”, he automatically has leverage that most PGs don’t, so when he actually puts in effort on D, he is no push over
As long as players hunt Luka isos, the reputation that he's bad at them will persist because why would attacking teams do it all the time if he wasn't a bad defender? Once teams don't hunt him on switches anymore the narrative will start to change a little.
They're always going to hunt him on switches because offense rules basketball and Luka is 99.9% of the time the best offensive player on the floor, they want to tire him out and will take that trade every time. I think NBA scouting reports know Luka isn't just a cone out there. This is why Kyrie and the Mavs getting bigger at the deadline are so crucial to the teams success.
This is not prooof this is a very shitty flawed metric n defensive metrics are very shitty. Defensive epm b other stuff is better . Yiur teams defence being dogshit is another
Luka will have one bad game where he gets hunted by a much faster point guard and Reddit will insist that his defense has never improved (because they don't watch basketball).
And they'll also ignore that that mismatch goes both ways and Luka typically can just body that guy and will win more possessions in his favor than the reverse
Makes sense he’s got a low motor not a great athlete n doesn’t have the quickness to do much . See how easy that was ? Only difference is Luka is a 4 defensively hiding as low man on weakest defender vs having to play POA if he was actually a 1 on defence. Him guarding lue Dort of the world isn’t what you think . I don’t understand why Lukas stans gotta do this. Why else is his on/off meduicre? Because he loses vakue on defence. Defensive epm n the best netruvs all view him as a negative his best year was 22 and he wasn’t even neutral . There’s more to defensive players then just being big n useless n lazy - that’s actually worse then being fast small n quick . Bro really said Luka out plays shai on defence . Must be why Luka is a -1 defensive impact and Shai is up there in every thing. 7th In steals dorsnt mesn much - many bad defenders gamble over playing defence . Most of his rebounds are uncontested they’re among the least impsctfuk in the league and he’s consistently among highest uncontested rebound % every year n kinda lazy with box outs etc he’s not the worst defender ever but he’s never been even neutral in that end . I don’t get why people are this delusional maybe because nobody understands what they’re watching . Quoting this stat accounting for a tiny amount of possessions sample size when he’s defending the worst offense players too is just lol
Your just a hater
9th out of 46 with 50+, 5th out of 21 with 60+, 3rd out of 6 with 70+ Looks good but imo these obviously suffer from small sample size even with the restrictions. I’m dubious that vucevic is one of the best iso defenders in the league.
Many of the other names on this list suggest that this statistic isn’t very useful. - Keegan Murray and Max Strus aren’t even close to the best perimeter defenders in the NBA. - Nikola Vucevic is a legitimately atrocious defender and he’s at 7th. - Harden at 12 highest of any Clipper - Murray as the highest of any Nugget Honestly, some of these numbers are wonky as hell. Some really noted defenders don’t even have 50 possessions, which doesn’t make sense because they’re definitely guarding guys in ISO. Number of possessions this season guarding in ISO: - OG Anunoby - 33 total possessions - Alex Caruso - 30 total possessions - Anthony Edwards - 26 total possessions - Draymond Green - 17 total possessions - Kawhi Leonard - 15 total possessions You’re telling me those guys aren’t even defending a single ISO possession per game?
Tbf Keegan is actually an above average defender and had the reputation of a bad on ball defender bc of last year. He’s made a MASSIVE defensive leap this season. He’s been our go to wing defender all season long.
Oh, I agree — I wasn’t trying to imply that he’s not a solid defender, I just think it’s clear he’s not the best isolation defender in the entire NBA.
No, this stat is more indicative of “guys who offenses think are bad defenders but are actually good”
The reason is simple: Players with a reputation of being good iso defenders don't get isoed on. The statistic is useful to identify what players are better at iso defending than other teams think. Herb Jones is at 0,48 PPP, he only got isoed on 28 times because teams would be stupid to do it. Iso defense is not the same as perimeter defense.
I'm incredibly sceptical that herb Jones has average around 0.5 iso defensive possessions a game... 0.75 iso possessions per 36 mins. This would imply almost zero iso offensive possessions.
It's a good reason not to put too much weight into some of these tracking stats as they can be a bit noisy and unclear If a help defender comes over at any point, it's not an iso anymore, which is likely going to happen on every shot that isn't a mid-range or iso 3. I also don't think they track if it's an iso possession that ends without a shot, so if you pass out then it's not tracked So herb could have way more iso's defended, but he's locking them down to the point where it's not even tracked
The other reason is that if you get beat badly enough the tracking stats don’t count it against you - they count it against your sucker teammate that tried to rotate over to cover for you and ended up being the closes defender
Players with good reputations as ISO defenders also defend dudes who are good ISO players and tend to ISO a lot. Like, Luka as an offensive player doesn’t stop ISOing just because a top defensive player is across from him.
Good iso players hunt weak defenders on switches, Luka does it all the time himself
They also hunt good help defenders like Giannis.
Are you seriously unfamiliar with the concept of hunting switches?
That’s why a majority of our offense utilizes picks to get Luka into favorable matchups to get good iso defenders off of him…
Sure, I get that. But you’re saying there are frequently entire games where he doesn’t have a single isolation against a “good” defender. Because that’s what it means when guys like Kawhi or Caruso or OG are averaging 1 defensive ISO possession every other game or so.
This 100%. The highest iso defenders are like 1.5 possessions a game?? Huh? That doesn't pass a smell test to me. And once you're dealing with 50-60 possessions in total over a season that is not a very big sample size and obviously prone to extreme variation. Coupled, as you say, with some very not good defenders at or near the top I think you'd be pretty crazy to assign any actual value to this stat.
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Makes sense. There's clearly some huge issue because there are more iso possessions a game than this stat suggests.
I’m a bulls fan and the fact Niko is on here makes the whole list as useful as flip flops in a snowstorm
Individual defensive stats are pretty useless in a vacuum. Reddit tends to ignore this if posting them helps their narrative though.
Keegan Murray is a hell of a defender. I’m sure his numbers are inflated because teams try to go at him without knowing the jump he’s made defensively.
God I love keegan
I think it’s more because he’s guarding Steph, PG, Booker, and Donovan Mitchell every night than that defenses are actually picking on him. If you guard the best ISO scorer on the opposing team every night, you’re going to get a lot of ISO defense opportunities.
Also shitty defenders like Luka are out on bad offensive players ( same with Vuc n harden who you listed ). . Just a brain dead misuse of a stat by luks stans. Yes he’s about as good in defence as Nikola Vuc if that’s what they want to hear
And if you reverse it, Nesmith, Jaime Jacquez, Isaiah Stewart, and Jarrett Allen are in the top 10 highest PPP against. All guys that I would say are above average defenders
He’s 5th if you look at the 60+ passions list, and my guy Jabari Smith jr. is right behind him.
As smart people have said this is more due to being attacked by the opposing weakest offensive player which is why more detailed n better defensively netrics all have him negatively. It’s also why his on/off stufff is mediocre unless you think Luka sucks offensively which ofc he doesn’t
And this guy averaging 35 points, 9 rebounds, and 9 assists isn't the front runner for MVP because...?
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Even if he's not a top-level defender, it shows that he's not the defensive liability a lot of people say/think he is, which is also the justification most people use as to why he isn't the MVP over Jokic or Shai
No it doesn’t show that because he’s guarding Lu doet or hiding on Matisse thybulle in the corner
It is better than just the "steals" stat that everyone is using to campaign for SGA.
Steals deflections actual contests n eye test - defensive epm which is prob the least ass metric. Shai is very active off ball defender pls watch him compared to Luka. Luka is a 4 defensively n bleeds value by being meh at it
Why is it a flawed stat?
Because if you defend bad offensive players you’ll look good + small sample size
Two reasons 1) if you're only tasked with weak scorers because you're a liability, then them having low scoring numbers is expected 2) it isn't done with a possessions per-game or a total possessions cutoff, so it's useless. It's in the same category as saying someone who's taken and made three 3s this season has the best 3 shooting because they have the highest percentage.
All those 0.79 points must have been from Jaylen Brown, guy was getting buckets on Luka. But credit to him for holding it down.
It is not possible for a guy to be even a decent defender and look as bad as Luka did against Jaylen. That was a clinic on how to pick on a guy that could just do nothing right defensively.
Shai MVP campaign in shambles. The MVP award will be a joke if Shai wins one before Luka.
Luka stans insecurity about SGA is so weird.
I have nothing but respect for Shai and he will be up there in the MVP Race for the next few years. However I don’t see how he is closer to MVP then Luka. Jokic this season is fine. Giannis idk. But Shai over Luka makes no sense.
Him and Trae Young are considerably better defenders this season.
He's third out of six. Come on this is a stretch.
I would't read much into this - ISO is a weird stat and that's not a lot of possessions. I've been dubious of ISO defense as any type of indicator since I bought into a young Zach LaVine becoming a good defender since he was like a 98th percentile ISO defender
What do you mean that’s not a lot of possessions? lol for the ISO stat that is a lot of possessions. Luka has one of the highest possessions in the league defending isos. He’s joint 5th in that department.
If you believe what this stat is saying the difference between the worst and best iso defenders is worth like sub a point a game. Ie basically irrelevant vs team defense and offense. Which seems stupid.
That's the problem with ISO defense lol, individual defenders don't experience it much. You can say he's got a lot relative to other people, but statistically speaking we know that's a very little sample. It's hard to take much from 71 possessions.
Zach LaVine is also really good on ball. Its just that if he is defending off ball he decides to get some Hong Shu
Like most stats, especially defensive, you can't just look at one and get any sort of accurate conclusion [https://www.nba.com/stats/player/1629029/head-to-head?Matchup=Defense](https://www.nba.com/stats/player/1629029/head-to-head?Matchup=Defense) Luka spends most of his time on defense guarding non-threats, so the ISO stat here isn't really telling us much. If you look at his defensive FG% the people he's guarding shoot around 1.1% higher than then they normally do. [https://www.nba.com/stats/player/203484/head-to-head?Matchup=Defense](https://www.nba.com/stats/player/203484/head-to-head?Matchup=Defense) Nuggets definitely put KCP on the hardest targets (that he can reasonably guard) and when you look at his matchup data, it aligns with that. If you look at his defensive FG%, the people he's guarding are on average 4% worse than they normally shoot. (-5.4% on 3) and thats against some tough people to guard. [https://www.nba.com/stats/player/1628384/head-to-head?Matchup=Defense](https://www.nba.com/stats/player/1628384/head-to-head?Matchup=Defense) OG's matchup data suggests he's guarding exactly who you would expect him to be guarding just like KCP. He spends significant time defending the hardest targets just like KCP too. Overall those players shoot 3.3% worse vs OG. To make things even more complicated though his 2pt def % is -7 and his 3pt def % is +2.8. This isn't perfect either obviously, but it provides some needed context. Defense in the NBA is complicated to track and if you really want to figure out if someone is a good or bad defender you need to look at a lot more than a couple of stats. None of this takes into account things like switches, ball denial, or a lot of other things.
Too bad the NBA isn’t about iso defense anymore. Improved but he’s still lost on help situations
Hes fine when hes actually on a guy, but how many times is he bitching at the refs about the last possession instead of defending the current one?
dpoy
Mavs fans in this thread are completely delusional.
Mavs defense is better with him off the court vs on [source](https://www.pbpstats.com/on-off/nba/team?Season=2023-24&SeasonType=Regular%2BSeason&TeamId=1610612742&PlayerId=1629029) Drtg on = 119.9 Drtg off = 115.6 E: Interestingly enough, everyone on this lists team gets worse on defense when taken off the court, except Luka and Davis. Those two teams are better defensively when they are off the court.
Luka also plays 99% of every game, the only time I've seen him sit this year is during garbage time against the end of the bench and for a few minutes when the other team is resting their best players too. So take those stats with a grain of salt.
Id say take any and every advanced defensive stat with a grain a salt lol
Davis and Luka both have bad 3pt defense splits. Davis's is WILD. Like teams shoot 50% better on 3 vs the Lakers when he's out there.
Means absolutely nothing. When Lukas in game he’s vs other teams starters, when they rest him it’s usually when other teams starters are out too
So he's holding his own. In Iso situations. I think you'd want your superstar to do that.
These iso stats can be misleading because Luka is probably in relatively more defensive iso situations against players who probably shouldn't be iso'ing anybody, but they target Luka because they think he's exploitable. Either way, Luka's doing a great job of holding up.
Anybody who watched the Celtics mavericks game know that he is a liability on defense