Perfect example last night against the Rockets of Klay using his gravity to create a wide open lane for AD to the rim. Such a simple action that could be used often for Coop & AD but rarely, if ever, is.

5 comments

1. Klay’s elite PnR game with rolling bigs is nothing new, btw. And I don’t mean just in his prime years with Bogut, Zaza, Looney, etc. He’s still elevating bigs in the short roll game even in his “washed” years because his gravity is still that elite.

   He showed it with Lively last season, but the best and strongest example is by far his last season with the Warriors during which Klay established a legitimately unguardable 2-man game with rookie Trayce Jackson-Davis that was so lethal it catapulted him from not playing at all the first half of the season to starting with Klay alongside Steph, Draymond, and Wiggins for the last 10 games of that season (as in after watching Klay and TJD run it off the bench for a few weeks, it was decided it was too impactful to be limited to the 2nd unit so Podz was demoted back to the bench and Klay resumed his starting spot bringing TJD with him). That starting lineup finished the season with an 8-2 record and a 25.5 net rating (118.8 ORTG; 93.4 DRTG).

   As far as the impact of said 2-man game on TJD’s individual production: in his rookie season playing next to Klay, TJD had a 70.2 FG% and was in the 95th percentile in the league at finishing at the rim. Last season, he averaged 57.6 FG% and this season 59.8 FG%.

   TJD, himself, in an interview right after his rookie season ended when talking about how much he hoped Klay was coming back (it was before Klay announced he was leaving to sign with the Mavs, obviously):

   > “I don’t think people understand just how good Klay is. The reason why I’m getting wide open dunks is because they’re putting two on the ball almost every time because if he gets just a little bit of space, he’s going to hit the open shot. And so a lot of the dunks that I had were because of him. So, yeah, obviously you like playing with him because of that – you get easy dunks or he’s going to get a wide open shot.”

   All of this to say that, at minimum, Klay and Coop should have an already established 2-man game by now that they can go to to get Coop umpteen wide open downhill looks just like Klay got TJD. You know, make the kid’s life a little easier sometimes instead of forcing him to create his own looks with shitty spacing on the court. Instead, I honest to god can’t recall a single time it’s been run all season.

2. The last frame summarizes the peak AD experience

3. When, not if, Flagg starts taking and making more 3’s he will get that attention that will help open up for others as well.

4. Tay Klay is washed man 😭 move to defending kuminga

5. this is just reed shepard being a dumbass on defense lol, completely forgets theres a hof big man rolling on his left with the center already defending klay.