Minnesota Sports Forum

KAT got to play janitor in college with WCS doing all the heavy lifting on the perimeter and in the PnR. Now that he's the one put in the PnR he's just clueless. He's in no mans land whifing on a block attempt or giving up an easy look because the pocket is wide open, etc. Some of that is on Thibs, but some of that is on KAT too because he just goes for too many blocks that put us in bad defensive position. G has the same problem. Taj doesn't which is why I don't put more blame on Thibs. They both just whif on the block and then even if the shot is missed their man is right there for the rebound and easy put back because a guard has to come down and try to box them out.

Either hedge hard or fall back far enough that you can still be in defensive rebounding position after walling up. The new NBA seems to be hard hedging and/or straight switching if you have the players so I would look to have Towns hard hedge every time just to simplify his role. Also, you can't hide bigs any more defensively unless the other team has a completely inept big because matchup PnR's are used so much more. Just a few years ago it was crazy talk to have a Lebron/Kyrie PnR, but they wanted to make Steph have to play defense and that's how you do it. Could you imagine Jordan/Kerr PnR's back in the day? If Towns is on the court, he's gonna get picked on defensively until he proves he can do something about it. That's just part of the new NBA so having KAT play 4 or 5 really isn't gonna matter. They'll find a way to attack him.

Kahns -- I like the idea of having Towns hard hedge every time. He seems to have a hard time making good judgments, so take the judgment out of his game by simplifying his role. That's a really good idea.

I don't disagree with those of you who suggest KAT may have fooled the scouts, and was quite overrated as a defender in college. But here's where coaching comes in. POBO Thibs went out and acquired a big, tough center who had ranked third among centers in defensive RPM the previous year, but despite his team ranking near the bottom of the league in many defensive measures, coach Thibs decided to leave this guy on the bench for two years. Why? Sure, he's not a great offensive player (although he was remarkably efficient his final year in LA), but his defensive stats are far superior to KAT's. Do you think Clint Capela would have lit Cole Aldrich up like he did KAT Sunday night? I'll never understand why Thibs refused to play Aldrich and continued to put guys on the floor who lacked toughness and defensive acumen...just one of many mind-boggling decisions this guy has made here.

Agree a little bit with everyone here. KAT's defensive issues are "all of the above":

- Not held accountable from day one.
- The set-up at Kentucky didn't tell the whole story - it really is tough to scout college bigs in terms of defensive potential.
- Weak base as Cool mentioned. I've said it a ton of times, but Dieng, KAT, and Patton all are top heavy players that do a poor job holding their ground. The ability to wall up and not get bumped off of position is so important.
- Still lacks awareness and hustle at times, especially in transition.

As for Aldrich, I think his issue is he fouls too much and struggles containing on the perimeter. That being said, I'm surprised Thibs didn't at least give him more of a shot this year.

Q12543 wrote:Agree a little bit with everyone here. KAT's defensive issues are "all of the above":

- Not held accountable from day one.
- The set-up at Kentucky didn't tell the whole story - it really is tough to scout college bigs in terms of defensive potential.
- Weak base as Cool mentioned. I've said it a ton of times, but Dieng, KAT, and Patton all are top heavy players that do a poor job holding their ground. The ability to wall up and not get bumped off of position is so important.
- Still lacks awareness and hustle at times, especially in transition.

As for Aldrich, I think his issue is he fouls too much and struggles containing on the perimeter. That being said, I'm surprised Thibs didn't at least give him more of a shot this year.

Agree. But I'm not surprised Thibs didn't give Aldrich a shot. That would have required Thibodeau to go way beyond the player-capacity limit of his brain.

I think most of us would agree we expect Towns to improve some defensively from where he is now. How much? Will it be enough? Will it be enough to matter? That we don't know.

To me there is a path for him to be AT LEAST adequate instead of being a liability. I agree with coll that physically sometimes his base is a problem. I don't think he will or should bulk up too much. He will get stronger and can learn to use his body over time. He has plenty of physical gifts but he isn't so long and athletic he can just overwhelm people. Porzingis has ridiculous length that gives him an advantage Towns doesn't have. He has had problems staying healthy. KG was just built for basketball. Put him in any era and he would have been a terrific defender. So the progression will mostly come from Towns mentally getting better and it won't hurt if teammates do the same.

It could be worth looking at what some of the top defenders mentioned in this thread were rated a year or 2 or more ago. I seem to remember Drummond wasn't dating well as a defender even last year. Maybe some of the stats still favored him. People say the but...the guy is still young isn't worth mentioning anymore but the guy turns 23 in November. That's still pretty young.

Fun stat: Towns led the NBA in fouls with 285. Of corsesole of that is playing every game and playing a lot of minutes but that's not a good stat to be a leader in. Taj was 15th.