How did Denver build a championship defense to pair with Nikola Jokic’s historically great offense? This detailed film room study examines how the Nuggets season long defensive principles of shrinking the floor, overloading sides and recovering horizontally with speed and communication locked down the Miami Heat in Game 5 of the NBA Finals and helped them win their first NBA championship.
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More on relative defensive ratings: https://thinkingbasketball.net/2022/10/02/the-best-playoff-teams-common-opponent-offensive-and-defensive-ratings/
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Ben Taylor is the author of Thinking Basketball, a Nylon Calculus contributor, creator of the Backpicks Top 40 series & host of the Thinking Basketball podcast.
Stats courtesy:
http://www.pbpstats.com @bballport
https://www.basketball-reference.com
https://stats.nba.com
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Footage in this video is owned by the NBA and its partners. It is intended for critique and education.
Music by csus (instrumental)
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24 Comments
Thanks for all the support this year! We finally have apparel: https://shop.thinkingbasketball.net
Jokic was great too. But Aaron Gordon was DPOY level good. KCP with his high IQ steals and Christian Braun
They took a lot of what Golden State does, with players who play similar roles as switch, versatile defenders, and shooters who move, provide spacing, and willing to knock down shots.
I just love that we have the reincarnation of Larry Bird and Bill Walton all in one guy
So, you're saying that defense won this championship?
i hope they upgrade their bench this coming season. they need a back up big
Congratulations ⛏️🗻
Clearly, Jimmy and Miami need a shooter and a better center
The sequence at 4:52 was a beauty
Even michael malone playing D 😭
They won because while ALL the players from BOTH teams were playing badly and falling under pressure, Jokic drops a casual 12-16 fg. When everyone else fails, he doesn't.
It should be a requirement for all nba fans to watch thinking basketball. We've had too many uninformed opinions being thrown out there for too long and no one is better at educating on the intricacies of the game than Ben Taylor.
As usual, beautiful video. I don’t know what happened behind the scenes, but this mediocre-to-bad defense in the reg. season was remarkably improved in the playoffs.
Such a well-deserved Championship.
this really makes you think of what the hell happened to the supposed “defensive team” of the celtics vs the heat
Thank you for the upload. It's been a good season
Since the avalanche won last year and the nuggets won this year it’s the broncos turn
Crazy how butler can't score on anyone over 6'3 lol truly an overrated player
Thx, a great analysis for sure❤
jokic showed them why he is the 3 time MVP.
After discovering this channel around 3 years ago, I haven’t been able to genuinely enjoy any other bball breakdown videos… the bar has been set too high
8:34 is so beautiful Jimmy being a foul baiter doesn’t pay off
Please do a top 10 player video this year!
Take a video about this , The world is now ruled by one community of people, the world Satanic elite, you can also call them the committee to meet the Antichrist and prevent the 2nd coming of Jesus, Trump called them the deep state, at the moment it consists of about 10,000 people, the main ones there are Rockefellers, Rothschilds, Windsors, Baruchs, they, their ancestors, descendants and other people who enter there have the mark of Lucifer, which, if they bring the antichrist and do not allow the 2nd coming, they will receive eternal life after the x hour, and the rest of humanity, for all the time that they have lived, they won't get anything, so all people should know about the existence of a world government (Jesus who was a The Prophet of God, not God.God will send Jesus as a reward to humanity, if humanity deserves it, for this it is necessary to fight Lucifer and his elite)
Let's hear it for the Nugs!