Defending Wemby BREAKDOWN 🧐 + How De’Aaron Fox’s return impacts the Spurs’ lineup 🏀 | NBA Today

Defending Wemby BREAKDOWN 🧐 + How De’Aaron Fox’s return impacts the Spurs’ lineup 🏀 | NBA Today

Prodigy meets the prototype for the fifth time ever tonight. Hey, welcome inside our Los Angeles studios. I’m Malikica Andrews and it’s Friday and you know what that means? It means it’s NBA Cup day. And tonight, Kevin Durant, Victor Webyama, they lead their squads into their first game of group play. Now KD spoke at Shoot this morning about the Rockets first ranked offense. Let’s take a listen together. I think it’s all I think we’ve done a great job of making ourselves available. We want to double out myself. Guys are making plays out of it. um you know teams to team and if I’m not that type of defense even where we aren’t you know myself I’m not I’m not involved in the game offensively maybe I’m not making a lot of shots and they still want to implement that doubling it helps out the defense and we got to continue to just keep making forward all right so now here with our senior writer Tim McMahon who is covering these two teams for us howdy Tim howdy Malikica all right now that we have our little Texas twostep going on take us inside for for lack of a cheesy line here the the Rockets offense their liftoff this season. Yeah, I mean you add Kevin Durant suddenly the offense looks a lot better but these last couple games KD’s been in a in a mini slum. Nothing to worry about but it hasn’t mattered. The Rockets have kept right on rolling and that’s been because of two so two two young stars who are taking off. Talking about a men Thompson and now Paris Shingun and Amin told me back in the Bahamas even before camp started KD said to the guys hey we need you young guys to be leaders. Don’t just go looking to get me the ball. That’s no way to play basketball. I’ll let you know when I want it. Yeah, but you guys got to be aggressive. And that chemistry between Alpie and Amen. Look out. We’ve seen that on full display in the early goingings of the season here. And in the Spurs, they have lost two straight. They’ve been subpar performances from Victor Webama, at least by his standards. But tonight, he’s facing one of his childhood idols in Kevin Durant. What have you heard about how he’s thinking about this? Well, look, I think he’s probably thinking a lot more about what type type of defense he’s going to see and also about dealing with Alpi Shingon on the other end. Albby has given uh Wim the business before on on the NBA floor. So, you know, he had a 46-point performance against him a couple years ago. That’s not the kind of thing that Wimby forgets. But again, Wimy’s in a little tough spot himself. They’ve hit a speed bump. Seeing that aggressive double teaming type of defense, the physical defense, he’s focused more on figuring out from a mental standpoint. Miss Johnson and the coaches are encouraging him to be more physical. Fight for early position. Lower your shoulder. Create contact. Be aggressive. Right. Just because it’s KD on the other side. That fundamental that can’t change for Victor Webbyama. Thank you, Tim. See you in just a little bit. Let’s see how Wemby has dealt with those double double teams that Tim just mentioned. I got a double team over here. Richard Jefferson. Sorry you guys couldn’t see me. Perkins. Come on now. My man has come into the the season trim here. Rich y’all. McMahon just talked about this, the double teams that Victor Webbyama is facing. But check this out. The Rockets, the team that has double teamed the least this season when looking at opponents, right? So, taking a look at this perk Webby has struggled there. Why is that? Well, because one, he’s averaging 25 points a game and the the motto is going to be and Richard heard this in the locker room. You’re not going to beat someone else is. And so this area right here, he’s being guarded by Jordan Goodwin. And look, the double team comes, they do a great job of reposting him. And then all of a sudden, a trap comes, he has to make a hang time pass that leads into a he with us type shot, right? And then look right here. Marcus Smart. Look at him doing his work early. The worst thing for a big is having a guard get to their legs. That’s a that’s a pet peeve for a big. Now look, you already see Jackson Hayes is already over there, right? The trap is starting to come. So now he kicks it out. They repost. Now the traps happen and all of a sudden Marcus Smart, one of the high IQ guys defensively, baits Wimby into a foul. I hate this area for a post player. So now they’re going to have to make an adjustment, put him at the free throw line so that he can’t be doubled. But that’s typically not what the Houston Rockets do. They don’t double a whole lot of guys right now. And let’s just talk about how the Rockets have gotten it done offensively, though, because they’re one of the best teams in the NBA right now. They’re bigs. They’ve led them best rebounding percentage, the second most points per game. They also lead the league in three-point percentage at 43%. So, Richard, how does it look to you? Well, to me, when you look at the depth that their team have, they do it with their defense. Their defense leads the offense. They are elite defensively. You talked about not doubling teaming many times. Do you know who doesn’t? The Boston Celtics. You know who used to coach the Boston Celtics? Eay Udoka. So, he has a high level of accountability. Then you have April not being able to shoot, but think about Joic and Aaron Gordon. Aaron Gordon has improved, but you can put him on the dunker spot, then you have a playmaker in the middle, but when you got weapons to the side of that, it becomes a problem on the offensive end. Shams, what do you have for us out of San Antonio? Malikica, sources tell me Spurs star guard Darren Fox will make his season debut on Saturday night at home against the New Orleans Pelicans. And he’s gone through his final workouts in preparation after rehabbing an offseason hamstring injury. But today’s his ramp up day for that Saturday debut. And Fox is the first of some returns here for the Spurs. Rookie guard de Dylan Harper as well as center Luke Carnett are working their way back as well. So reinforcement and depth here will be on full display for the Spurs pretty soon. But even more critically now, potentially a long runway with Victor Womenyama and Fox. Small sample size for them last season. Only five games together, a total of 120 minutes. So seeing how Fox can carry that offensive burden with Wemby because only two players in each of the last seasons have averaged 20 points, five assists, and at least one steal per game. Luca Donuch and Darren Fox. And now De’aran Fox joining on his way here to join Victor Webbyama for the first time this season. Shams, thank you so much. It’s not that often, right, that you get to acquire an allNBA garden November. So how will things change with the air and back? That sounds like a question for Bobby Marks. Well, I think when you look at it, Malikica and Richard did the game on Wednesday night against the against the Lakers here. When you have no De’Aran Fox, it puts a lot of pressure on Stefon Castle here. So, when you put Fox back in the lineup here, take Julian Champaga out, that certainly solidifies your starting five here and it adds to your depth. Dylan Harper right now out with that injury. There are only five games as Sham said played together and here’s a couple plays that we’re going to show. This is from the Wizards game last year. Make Victor a passer here. Simple give and go here. Remember, no Chris Paul though right there. Give and go. Simple play here. The second play is look how much attention is drawn to De’aran Fox here. And this is what’s going to help Victor out from a spacing standpoint here. Right up top. Three guys are coming to him. That opens it up for Victor. ISO one-on-one. Probably an offensive foul there, but a simple layup there. That’s what we didn’t see in that Laker game on Wednesday night. Two simple plays that Darren Fox is certainly going to help with when he comes back. Bobby’s breakdown. I love it. He mentioned it, Rich. You were on the call for that game. How do you see Fox helping out alleviating some of these issues that we’ve seen early for WBY? Well, you’re adding an allNBA guard. You can add Aaron Dearron Fox to any team on this league. It’s going to make him better. They’re just getting him. And obviously because of injuries last season, they didn’t get an opportunity to play together. Think about Pace downhill. So Pace downhill, he’s one of the fastest guards in the league. the defense flattening out. Now you throw it back to Wimby. Now he’s got people closing at him. He’s got shot selection. Yeah. If you look at in the slips and pick and rolls and post up spaces, De’aran Fox is going to kill you if you don’t give him multiple players uh that type of attention. But he is a score first point guard. So that’s going to be a little interesting next to Web. No. Yeah, he’s score first. But Wendy’s right there. Yeah. But but so but so is Jaylen Bronson. And we saw how well him and Carl Anthony Towns did last pick and roll. But Shout out to Shout out to D Fox. That was old veteran trick right there. You know what I mean? Don’t come back for Aan Thompson and the Rocket. Come back for the P. I’m just saying we all didn’t done it. I didn’t done it right. I ain’t coming back for Shaq, but I’ll come back for you. But here’s the thing. I’m looking at Yes, De’Arren Fox is a scorer, but I’m looking at when you talking about an allNBA guard and elite talent, one of one a big man like Wimby. I What comes to my mind? Twoman game. how that twoman game is going to look. Whether that’s post cut, whether that’s dribble, hand off, whether that’s pick and roll, pick and pop, because we know Wimby can shoot the three, that’s what I look at. But adding De’Arren Fox is going to take so much pressure off of Wimby and it’s going to open up so many easy buckets. Well, and look, there is a lot of pressure on Wimby now. The way defenses are selling out to stop him. And Darren Fox is an experienced point guard, scorer, passer. He’s all that. He is experienced. and the chess match that Wimy’s struggling to figure out right now. He’s going to help with that. He’s going to help get them organized. He’s going to help when, hey, you’re putting two there, that’s going to create advantages for him. And he’s also going to take pressure off Stfan Castle, a rising young star, but not a pure point guard, leading the league in turnovers. Right now, he can play his natural spot. He’s been good offensively this year, but yeah, turning the ball over five, six times a game. Yeah, I don’t want if you’re to him, it’s like somebody else come. He had Chris Paul and he had DM Fox last year. Now, he doesn’t have a a true point guard on the team. If you’re talking about Castle, this is what I say. I did I believe De’Arren Fox’s first game. It was in Atlanta. Game winner. So, Dear Fox comes off left. Wimby slips out. He throws it to Wimi. That twoman game is going to be so hard. They ran it the very first time to win the game against Atlanta. The first time those guys were on the court, they ran a two-man game and got an open shot for Wimby. Got fouled, end up going shooting free throws. Well, well, think about the easy looks for guys like Harrison Barnes when Dylan Harper get back. So, you talk about the depth of the Spurs and the young the athleticism. Boy, they’re going to be great because you got to worry about too in the open court. You got to worry about a 77 guy pushing the rock and getting downhill. And now you got to worry about the Aaron Fox who’s one of the fastest guys in the NBA with the basketball. The guy that’s led the league in total blocks by far two or more is going to be blocking the ball to the fastest point guard possible in the game. How is he going to help? Just off that number right there. And he’s going to be doing it for the very first time against the New Orleans Pelicans. Take that for what you twoame winning streak for the Pelicans. Take it easy.

The NBA Today crew previews NBA Cup action, then Shams Charania shares details on when De’Aaron Fox will make his season debut with the San Antonio Spurs.

0:00 Kevin Durant’s comments
2:34 Defending Wemby
4:48 Shams joins the show
5:56 Fox’s return

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