When we play the good teams and get into trouble, we tend to still go one on one and nowadays, take a quick three. The quick look is a good weapon in our arsenal but only when mixed in with running the offense much deeper into the clock. Our offense is at its best when we pass--that is what we need to do with the good teams. Whether the points come in the paint or not is not really the issue. We are playing a version of Phoenix ball. If we pass for the open look, we will hit a high percentage. The scoring will be there. We really don't have the players to score down low consistently. Sheed is showing that he is far better outside. When Sheed is down low, he gets too frantic and often misses. Rip is better at the mid-range. Chaucey can get down low but even he threw up some wild balls against SA on drives. Against Miami, we did not use Ben enough to make Shaq honest--that would be going inside. Dyss has a low post game. For every successful post, Tay often loses the ball or misses. He is better outside, driving or the mid-range. But the key to our offense against the good teams is swinging the ball around. That makes Miami, a rather slow team, vulnerable. It makes SA, a team that collapes and gambles vulnerable.

KCM, reading this article you would think the Spurs are a .500 club. I liked the way he jaxtapositioned smarts/stress and heart/aggressiveness. But then he goes RonRon and loses all credibility.
How do you maintain a .889 win % with 29th best paint scoring. Smarts, less work bigger rewards, less injuries.

When you add up our inside scoring, the free throws made when getting fouled going inside, and the scoring from going inside and kicking the ball out to an open man, the Pistons got more inside scoring than Miami in this game. Hard to believe. All game long I am tallying inside scoring for Miami. But only 4 points off kickouts. Thats right, Eddie and Damon Jones work elsewhere.

Here is the data:

Scoring inside, Mia. 52 points on 45 shots Det. 38 points on 28 shots

Misc. F/T's Mia. 2 points Det 9 points

Inside F/T's Mia. 11 points Det 16 points

Kickouts Mia. 4 points on 5 shots Det 17 point on 12 shots

Non-inside Mia. 32 points on 23 shots Det 26 points on 33 shots

Total inside Mia. 67 points on 59 shots Det 71 points on 49 shots

Surpringly, Miami was less efficient with their inside scoring than we were. Miami had 10 more shots either inside the square or from kickouts after the ball went inside the square. But Miami scored less points from their inside play, after you count us getting a more points at the line from busting it inside and forcing the foul.

Conversely, it turns out that Miami was more effiecient from their outside shooting. What gives.

Pretty simple. The Pistons were focusing on their perimeter game, forcing Miami to come out and guard the perimeter. So when we went inside, it was easy buckets for us.

And, on the flip side of things, Miami, due to Shaq especially, forced us to really concentrate on our interior defense, leaving plenty of easy shots for Miami on the outside.

Now, a lot of this was simply Miami shooting better from the outside than we did. I don't think our outside shots were that heavily contested.

Bottom line though, no way you can complain about lack of inside scoring in this game when we outscored Miami from inside play. Despite all the fireworks from Wade, Shaq, and Williams, we used going inside to better advantage than they did.

Non inside scoring @ 33 shots; inside shots @ 49. Maybe we were focusing on inside shots. But we didn't force them, we made the smart tactical play.
Still Heat took 10 more inside shots. 59 to 49

To an extent, we were looking to go inside. However, trust me, we simply sat up a play to get an open outside shot many times in that game. I'd say the best part of what we did, the other team never knew if we were going inside or out the next play. They could have the perfect defense set up against us to prevent us from going inside, and bam, we hit them with a simple pick and roll with Sheed nailing a three. Frustrating as all get out to try to guard the Pistons. At least if we are hitting any shots at all from the outside. These last two games, for the most part the shot has not been falling. Just enough in the Miami game at least.