NBA 2010-2011 Season - Page 122

On March 11 2011 06:43 MassHysteria wrote:
Haha true holcan...its like going out on a limb if we say the Heat will win it.

Chris Bosh isn’t happy with his offensive role with the Miami Heat and it’s easy to understand why. Of Miami’s three stars, Bosh has been forced to concede the most; LeBron James and Dwyane Wade still function as initiators of the offense, while Bosh has been used primarily as a spot-up shooter on the weak side. When the stars aligned in Miami under the assumption that all three would have to make concessions for the greater good of the team, I’m sure Bosh had a more equal compromise in mind.

Instead, Bosh is used as a taller version of the currently injured Udonis Haslem, the undrafted free agent who made a career for himself by digging in defensively, fighting for rebounds, and knocking down 15-foot jumpers. That’s a significant step back for a star like Bosh, who’s accustomed to not only more offensive involvement, but also to having a system tailor-made to his strengths.

There’s a clear division that separates James and Wade -– who are joined at the hip, even in their press conferences -– from Bosh, and the Heat forward apparently doesn’t think Miami’s offense is a flattering look for his game. Bosh made a point to voice his concerns after the Heat’s loss on Tuesday, as reported by Brian Windhorst for ESPN.com’s Heat Index:

Bosh’s complaint was not getting more touches in the low post. As part of the Heat’s offense this season, Bosh has operated out of the high post and taken mostly jump shots while being a screen-setter for Wade and James. Bosh said he planned to raise the issue with teammates and Coach Erik Spoelstra.

“I’ve got to get back in my comfort zone, I haven’t been in my comfort zone,” Bosh said. “A lot of things are new for me. I just have to be more aggressive in demanding my [the ball] comfort zone, you know I’ll take the fault for that… I’m effective down in the low post area, so that is where I need to start getting the ball. I need to be assertive in demanding it.”

Bosh is certainly right in that his possession usage has shifted away from his established comfort zones. According to Synergy Sports Technology, Bosh is using almost half of his possessions on jumpers, nearly a 20 percent increase from his shot distribution last season in Toronto. Post-up possessions consisted of 36.2 percent of Bosh’s usage last year, but in his more limited role with the Heat, that number has dropped to 24 percent.

However, the data from Synergy also reveals another interesting fact: Bosh is scoring much less efficiently from the post this season than he did in years past. In the 2009-10 season, Bosh scored at a rate of 1.11 points per possession on the block for the Raptors, which put him in the 91st percentile of post scorers. This year has been drastically different, as Bosh is scoring just 0.89 points per possession in his more limited opportunities for the Heat. That level of efficiency places Bosh in just the 56th percentile of post-up offense, and doesn’t put him in a position to demand more touches down low.

There’s a chicken-egg element at work here: is Bosh a less-effective post scorer because the Heat run fewer post sets for him, or do the Heat run fewer post sets for Bosh because he’s become a less-effective post scorer? Or, due to Bosh’s own passivity, is neither the case? It’s difficult to say, but we can begin to broach the topic by looking at something as simple as Bosh’s playing weight.

It’s an N.B.A. cliché that Player X added 15 pounds of “pure muscle” over the off-season, but if we take reports of Bosh’s 2009 pre-season weight gain at face value, then he may have been significantly heavier as a Raptor than as a member of the Heat. Bosh reported his own weight at 250 prior to last season, but he’s listed at just 235 for this year. Could complacency in a summer filled with media attention and free agent courting have dropped Bosh’s hard-earned lean muscle? We know that Bosh been effective throughout his career without being the bulkiest player, but he’s often done so by using his speed, size, and touch to out-class bigger opponents. If he is indeed thinner, it wouldn’t necessarily result in a drastic drop in productivity, but it would certainly make battling opposing bigs in the post a bit more difficult.

Regardless, Spoelstra is a smart, observant coach. If featuring Bosh more in the post were a prudent offensive option, it’s likely he’d explore the possibility. For now, though, Bosh needs to re-establish himself as a capable post-up threat. He may not have as many opportunities to go to work in the low post these days (both by design and his own tendency to float), but the most direct way to get more opportunities on the block is to earn them by merit.

On March 11 2011 10:00 shmay wrote:
Anyone else think the refs are wayyy too sensitive when it comes to calling fouls? Fouls slow down the game so much and it's much more entertaining to let them play and bang bodies a bit.

On March 11 2011 11:34 MassHysteria wrote:
Gasol needs to show more effort in defending the post against layups...even Phil is annoyed.

Nice steal by wade for that James dunk.

On March 11 2011 12:12 Ace wrote:
Where is the Miami Heat hate train?