Bigs: Size vs. athleticism

[East Coast Mustang]

Something I've been wondering about for awhile: what's the best way to go with this? It seems like Larry's approach going forward is to get "smaller" bigs who are athletic and can run the floor. I think he said, or someone paraphrased him saying awhile back that he'd take a team of 6'7" guys who are athletes over a traditional lineup.

Strategy wise, you can try and run teams out of the gym, but it seems like a team like Gonzaga is always going to be a problem. You can't expect a guy like Ben Moore at 6'8" 205 to defend their 7'1" 290 Eastern European center and not give up a fair amount of buckets and boards. Next year, our tallest returning players will both be 6'8" -- Ben and Ojeleye. I know we're splitting hairs arguing over an inch or two here or there (insert mrydel/94 joke here) but it seems like we could really use another 6'10+ rim protector going forward after this season. We were really spoiled with Cannen and Yanick the past two years in that regard.

[RGV Pony]

just my own observations, but it seems like the deeper into the tournament things went, the high profile teams with "bigger bigs" (thinking mostly about Towns, Cauley-Stein for UK and Okafor for Duke) saw the smaller guys play a more prominent role. It was the guards & wings who rose up. Kaminsky was a different type of player..21 & 12 in the championship game but seems like it was their other guys who would have made a difference had they stepped up like Winslow or Jones did for Duke.

[hoopmanx]

Smalller and athletic in elite ball tends to mean uptempo, pressing, depth etc. We have that type of personnel, but we don't play that style and Larry seldom has over the years. We've had more athletes than most everyone we've faced the last two years and we play half-court, don't press till we're down etc. Just having the athletes doesn't mean the style will follow

[Boston Pony]

See Golden State Warriors...

[Rebel10]

See Golden State Warriors...

We don't run that style of offense. See SMU.

[Boston Pony]

Disagree both times are tempo style with guard driven offense. SMU will work it into the active bigs with passing a key not iso. Big difference is how Golden State uses the 3 compared to a reliance on the pick & roll. The game is changing back to athletic and long wings. One thing I'd like to see this season is more 3s

[Rebel10]

Not only are styles different
But GS also has more than one lights out outside shooters. Last year we only had one lights out outside shooter in Nic. Hopefully the new players will be better outside shooters.

[JasonB]

LB made the comment when he first got here that we would man up when they got off the plane and run. He wanted a guard oriented lineup. The new rules change things slightly with a bigger emphasis on wing play instead of the guard (see Sam Decker).

However, with our personell, he was constrained to the double post.

I think you will see a much different look from the team this year.

[Rebel10]

LB made the comment when he first got here that we would man up when they got off the plane and run. He wanted a guard oriented lineup. The new rules change things slightly with a bigger emphasis on wing play instead of the guard (see Sam Decker).

However, with our personell, he was constrained to the double post.

I think you will see a much different look from the team this year.

He never said anything about wanting a guard oriented team. He said that he wanted long athletic players. The style you see us play is the style you see us play is the style LB has always played as Hoopmanx has said.

[Pony_Law]

I think the reason LB would want 5 guys thwt are 6'7 and athletic is in his mind that means he could play Perfect defense. If you actually had a team of 5 6'7 guys you could in theory switch on every screen and rotate on any doubles and not be exposed.

[whitwiki]

Exactly

[RGV Pony]

For real

[Pony Boss]

Totes

[PonyFan32]

Nailed it.