Grizzlies Lack Focus on Defense

Memphis can go toe-to-toe with Golden State on offense, but it lacks the defensive discipline necessary to lock Stephen Curry and Co. down.

For all the focus on the Warriors’ shooting ability—and just in case you’ve been unplugged from the sport for a while, there’s even more of it now than there was before—the team doesn’t get quite enough credit for how it makes hay with the threat of the longball.

Drilling down more specifically, Golden State has teams so afraid of its three-point flair that it can generally back-cut them to death, quietly sneaking behind the defense into the paint while opposing wings are overly focused on what’s happening out in front of them.

The Warriors, who’ve utilized perhaps the most beautifully chaotic offense in recent memory, have long been pros at this. Stephen Curry’s shooting helps open things up, but his willingness to serve as an off-ball screener makes it an even more challenging task to guard such an unscripted style of play. Draymond Green’s passing ratchets up the pressure, as does Klay Thompson’s sharpshooting. And having a player like Jordan Poole seemingly makes things unfair again, in the way it was during those years when Durant was a Warrior.

On some level, though, that’s something worth watching in this semifinal series with Memphis. For as talented as the Grizzlies are, with an offense that can go toe-to-toe with Golden State, they at times lack the defensive discipline necessary to lock down a team that plays this way.

The Warriors, who closed out possessions with cuts nearly twice as often as the average NBA team during the regular season, finished 17 such plays that way in Game 1 with Memphis. Hell, in the second quarter alone, Golden State had seven plays that ended with cuts—as many as the Grizzlies’ offense produced all game. (And the Warriors scored on six of those seven possessions.) For the game, Golden State essentially converted on 13 of its 17 plays stemming from a back-cut, according to Synergy Sports.

This is maybe the place where a young club like Memphis is most in a bind, trying to pay full attention to the Warriors’ shooters while not losing sight of whoever might be creeping behind for an open layup or dunk. It feels like death by a thousand cuts when the concern over Curry, Poole and Thompson leaves you getting beat at the rim by a wide-open nonshooter like Gary Payton II. That was the case in a key sequence with less than two minutes to play, with the Grizzlies’ defense preoccupied.

Memphis is talented beyond its years. But the decision-making and focus can lack at times.

Jaren Jackson Jr. was in the conversation for Defensive Player of the Year, finishing fifth in the voting. But for all the good he does, he frequently lands in foul trouble still. The same is true of Dillon Brooks, a highly active wing defender who helped limit Curry to 0-for-7 shooting Sunday when serving as the primary defender on the two-time MVP. He’s had five fouls or more in four of the Grizzlies’ seven postseason contests thus far. And none of this even touches on Ja Morant, who is incredibly slight, often unable to stay with his man and at times targeted on defense because of his perceived shortcomings there. Trying to stay tethered to Poole, Morant was the one who got back-cut by Payton with 1:35 left to tie the contest at 114.

The Grizzlies can inflict some damage on Golden State in this series. But if they can’t properly identify when and where the Warriors are cutting, it may not be as entertaining a matchup as folks are hoping for.