Get ready: We're less than five weeks away from a play-in tournament that could include the Brooklyn Nets and the Los Angeles Lakers. This week, let's highlight 10 more things from the NBA that I like and dislike, including promising signs from this year's No. 1 pick, Giannis Antetokounmpo seeing everything, and Karl-Anthony Towns as the best scoring big man ... ever?
1. Cade Cunningham has arrived
Since a so-so first 15 games, Cunningham is averaging 18 points, 5.5 rebounds, and 5.5 assists on 43% shooting -- and a very encouraging 37% on 3s. The Detroit Pistons -- 6-3 in their last nine, winning almost to their detriment -- look like a real, live NBA team with Cunningham at the controls. For the first time in what feels like forever, you can see a vision here -- with Cunningham as the centerpiece.
Imagine what the Pistons might look like -- what Cunningham will look like -- as both he and Detroit's roster improve?
At 20, Cunningham already commands the game. He is cool, confident, manipulative. He knows how every dribble and fake might bend the defense, and what cracks will open. He plays from one step ahead. At 6-6, he can make any pass. He whips one-handed, cross-court slingshots to corner shooters, and he's smart about throwing them early -- when help defenders are leaning the wrong way. He uses shoulder fakes and slow, hanging dribbles to set defenders up before using screens.
That is veteran guile. Cunningham speeds around Isaiah Stewart's pick, pins Jaylen Brown on his hip, and pauses: Let me see what reveals itself. He then accelerates left, around that seal from Stewart; the two have good timing on that action.
Cunningham has nice lefty touch on layups, hooks, and floaters. He's honing a reliable midranger he can launch going left or right, and even stepping back:
Cunningham has some Luka Doncic in his game. He wriggles his way to his pet spots, and has a knack for keeping plays alive in the deep paint -- a place where lots of ball handlers find themselves trapped. Cunningham pivots and fakes and half-turns, and anticipates how each of those moves might spook one defender somewhere into a false step -- leaving a shooter open.
He's tall and crafty enough to build a repertoire of floater-range shots. As Doncic has shown, an ace playmaker who makes those at a decent rate is the ultimate playoff weapon.
Cunningham is a long way from being in Doncic's league, and the Pistons are a long way from the playoffs. But Cunningham looks the part. The Pistons may get there faster than you think.
2. Ja Morant is everything
Morant is the best show going. He is a highlight machine. He oozes charisma and bravado. He is a superstar -- a candidate for No. 4 or 5 on the MVP ballot now, with more to come.
But what makes him special -- what threatens to make the Grizzlies a contender for a long time -- is the way he galvanizes his teammates. In every sense, he plays with them, and for them. He does not treat them, on or off the floor, like supporting actors in his story, or fungible bit players for his franchise. The Grizzlies belong to all of them.
That spirit flows through the team like an electrical current. The Grizzlies play for each other -- and for Morant. They celebrate him, revel in his accomplishments. It is tangible, and powerful.
Morant's mindset bleeds into his playing style: his willingness to give the ball up and operate as a vicious cutter; how he slows down in semi-transition, waiting to see who might pop open in his wake.
You may have missed this late in a blowout Memphis win this week:
Morant could easily have taken that triple. Maybe he "should" have. He's shooting 34.6% from deep, and any low-stakes attempt is important live-action practice.
But Morant sees Devonte' Graham rotating away from Desmond Bane -- who cooled a bit in February -- and lets Bane have it. Bane misses. But Morant's pass had triggered another rotation away from Ziaire Williams, who gets an easy put-back dunk as a result. The basketball gods rewarded Morant's selflessness.
Who cares, right? Memphis was up 30. That's the point. With the freedom to do whatever he pleased, Morant chose this.
A couple of plays like this every game or two grow chemistry, and establish what the Grizzlies are about.
3. Guard-guard screens for Stephen Curry
The Curry-Klay Thompson pick-and-roll was a crunch-time go-to during the height of the Warriors' dynasty. Golden State this season turned Gary Payton II into a lob-catching screen-setter.
With Draymond Green out, the Warriors have leaned even further into having guards and wings screen for Curry. The Curry-Jordan Poole two-man game has been especially slippery -- and produced a clutch triple in Golden State's comeback Thursday in Denver:
Pretty much every two-man combination of Curry with another guard or wing has produced heaps of points, per Second Spectrum. Such variety is disorienting. It adds even more unpredictability to Golden State's read-and-react system -- already perhaps the hardest offense to scout.
Guards just aren't used to defending on-ball screeners. Having a lightning bolt like Poole screen for the greatest shooter ever is unfair. He can slip the screen, flare for 3s, dart into the lane -- whatever he wants as the defense focuses on Curry.
It will be interesting to see how the Warriors balance all this when Green -- their fulcrum on both ends -- returns from injury. Will he repair the defense to the point that Kerr feels at ease extending the Poole-Thompson-Curry trio? Thompson isn't the same player yet, but he's shooting 36% on tons of 3s. Defenses treat him as a five-alarm blaze. Poole is ascendant.
Golden State is plus-78 in 86 minutes with all three on the floor. The Curry-Poole-Green trio was dominant last season. Golden State with Poole has more speed and physical ability -- and becomes less dependent on pinpoint passing.
Kerr has lots of options, but this is one to monitor. The Warriors are 16-14 in its last 30 games, but if Green is healthy, they stay in the inner circle of contenders until proven otherwise.
4. Getting really worried about Danilo Gallinari's defense
Gallinari is basically doing his job. He's shooting 39% from deep, and manufacturing points -- with old-school, wheezing manufacturing technology -- when Trae Young rests. The Hawks have poured in almost 1.21 points when Gallinari shoots out of a post-up or passes to teammate who fires -- fifth among 102 players with at least 25 post touches, per Second Spectrum. (His numbers on isolations aren't so rosy.)
Gallinari was never the most agile dude, but his lack of mobility today is jarring. He cannot stay in front of anyone.
Playoff offenses -- if the Hawks caw-caw through the play-in -- will be merciless. Unless Gallinari is raining 3s, it will be hard to keep him on the floor against good opposing lineups.
Creakiness is sapping Gallinari's offense in subtle ways. He barely gets to the rim, and his well of free throws is drying up. Gallinari depends on weirdo, arrhythmic step-backs, turnarounds, and fadeaways. He's good at those, but they are tough sledding against good defenses.
Only $5 million of Gallinari's $21.45 million salary for next season is guaranteed. The Hawks will have options this offseason if they want.
5. Karl-Anthony Towns' left hand
It sounded audacious when Towns crowned himself as the (future) big man shooting king, but it's really not. He hits 50-40-80 marks like clockwork, and he's playing in an era of higher 3-point volume than the only other candidate -- Dirk Nowitzki.
Towns should aim higher: Could he become the most well-rounded scoring big man ever? It's on the table, depending how you classify Kevin Durant and LeBron James (among other unicorns).
Towns is efficient from every spot, in every manner: post-ups, spot-ups, drives, fast breaks, whatever. The implicit promise of Towns was that he would dial in on defense and on the glass when the Wolves provided a supporting cast worth his while. We're there.
Towns is there on offense, and he's still improving. He exists in the highest plane of skill development -- the inner sanctum where only the best practice skills-within-skills beyond the reach of everyone else.
Towns has ratcheted up his face-up game -- a focus of his offseason work, and one that meshes with the philosophy of Minnesota Timberwolves head coach Chris Finch. Towns is averaging about 11 drives per 100 possessions -- three more than last season, and double his career rate, per Second Spectrum. There is no traditional center who hangs with Towns' combination of shooting, speed, and agility:
It should be illegal for a man so large to be able to stop on a dime, avoid a charge, and casually flick in that floater. Outrageous. The Wolves have scored 1.1 points per possession when Towns shoots out of a drive, or dishes to a teammate who fires -- 17th out of 153 guys who have recorded at least 200 drives, per Second Spectrum.
More defenses are slotting speedier power forwards onto Towns, and hiding centers on Jarred Vanderbilt. That gifts Towns a size advantage; he brutalizes in the post. He has improved using his left hand:
He has counters for everything.
Towns is entering his prime. The Wolves are finally winning, but how soon can they win big? Minnesota is still searching for two-way support players around Towns, Anthony Edwards, and D'Angelo Russell. Edwards is almost six years younger than Towns. Jaden McDaniels is 21, in the middle of an uneven season. Malik Beasley is scorching after a chilly start.
Russell has been steady enough for Minnesota to semi-reasonably think it might have a three-man foundation -- and not just a Big Two in Towns and Edwards. Russell's contract expires after next season; he's eligible for a max extension this summer. Minnesota owns all its first-round picks, and it appears willing to push some chips in, sources say. But how many? And for what?
6. Shoot it, Tobias!
Tobias Harris' usage rate has shrunk to microscopic levels with both James Harden and Joel Embiid on the floor -- a trend that raises obvious questions about his place on the Sixers as soon as this offseason.
On the bright side, more than half of Harris' shots in those minutes have been 3s -- higher than his normal rate, evidence that he recognizes his new role as a (highly compensated) spot-up fourth option.
That number -- or at least his raw number of 3s -- should probably be even higher. Harris has hit between 38% and 43% on catch-and-shoot 3s in each of the last four seasons, and those are the looks Harden and Embiid will spoon-feed him. If he's open, he has to let it fly. There should less tolerance for this:
That's a nice rotation from Darius Garland. Harris demurring isn't super damaging if both Harden and Embiid are on the court, with time to reset. But Harris has to be greedier. In this same game, he passed up another open corner 3; the possession ended in a shot clock violation. Sometimes a better look isn't around the corner.
7. Evan Fournier's missing playmaking
Fournier is a career 38% 3-point shooter who runs a nifty pick-and-roll, yet you don't feel his impact the way you would a lot of players with that profile. And that's leaving aside his below-average defense.
He's just not a good enough passer. Fournier has never averaged more than 3.7 assists in a season, disappointing given the playmaking load he carried with the Orlando Magic. He's dishing a career-low 2.1 per 36 minutes on a New York Knicks team starved for passing.
It's a combination of so-so vision and Fournier's shoot-first approach. Picks are vehicles for pull-up jumpers. Fournier sees some advanced passes, but misses too many profitable ones:
That has to be a lob to Nerlens Noel. Only 10.8% of Fournier's pick-and-rolls have led to assists, the 29th-lowest rate among 208 ball handlers who have run at least 100 such plays, per Second Spectrum. That is on par with Fournier's usual numbers.
He has proven overmatched as a starter in the postseason. Fournier's a solid player, but he's a sixth or seventh guy on a good team.
At least playing alongside more ball-dominant guys -- including Julius Randle -- has Fournier spotting up for more corner 3s. He is money on those shots, and they have comprised 16% of his attempts -- double his usual rate, per Cleaning the Glass.
8. Points off turnover is stupid
We need to abolish this as some kind of telling stat. This isn't football. There are live-ball turnovers (i.e., steals) and dead-ball turnovers, and they are so different in how they impact the subsequent possession as to make combining them irrelevant.
Steals are among the most valuable events in basketball. A team's ability to snatch them, and then capitalize, tells you something about that team. Dead-ball turnovers function about the same as made baskets; the team who coughed it up gets to set its defense.
We have tools to make finer distinctions. Both Inpredictable and Cleaning the Glass measure scoring efficiency off steals and defensive rebounds. Those numbers are easy to digest, even in TV-friendly soundbites.
9. Giannis Antetokounmpo, seeing it all
In Antetokounmpo and Nikola Jokic, the NBA has two former MVPs (arguably) exceeding their MVP seasons and still possibly trailing a third player -- Joel Embiid -- for this season's MVP. This three-man race is bonkers. Both Antetokounmpo and Jokic are on pace for the highest Player Efficiency Rating ever.
Antetokounmpo is averaging 29.7 points, 11.5 rebounds, and six dimes. He's shooting 55% from the floor, and he's quietly up to 72% at the line -- and 75% since Jan. 1.
Antetokounmpo and Embiid are neck and neck at 29.7 points. LeBron James is at 29.3. Might we get a new version of David Robinson going for 71 on the last day of the season to win the scoring title?
Oh: Antetokounmpo remains a Defensive Player of the Year candidate.
If his improved foul shooting translates into the postseason, there isn't a whole lot anyone can do to contain him. He's going to score 30. The only question is whether he'll get 40, and how many open shots his teammates hit.
That's what stands out beyond the numbers: the refinements on the edge of Antetokounmpo's game -- including his passing. He strings together more artful rapid-fire dribble sequences. He's stretching himself in the midpost -- and putting up some of the most efficient numbers of his career on post-ups and isolations, per Second Spectrum.
Every night, Antetokounmpo slings a few passes he wouldn't have made even last season -- or wouldn't have executed with the same precision and predatory timing:
Some of Antetokounmpo's moves used to look awkward -- almost labored. He makes that bad boy look easy. It's not. The key is in the disguise -- how that one-handed laser flows right out of his dribble, so that the main help defender involved (Duncan Robinson) has no idea what's coming until it's too late. Robinson is still lurching toward Antetokounmpo when the pass is airborne.
Don't sneeze at Antetokounmpo's career-best six assists. He's doing that despite having ceded most pick-and-roll duty to Khris Middleton and Jrue Holiday. Antetokounmpo is setting those screens at the highest rate of his career, per Second Spectrum -- the end point of a gradual and healthy recalibration of his game.
Milwaukee has won six straight. Are the Bucks finally hitting their postseason gear?
10. Bad play-in luck for the No. 1 seed
I proposed this a year ago, when it appeared Utah's reward for a rampaging regular season might be a healthy Lakers team with LeBron James and Anthony Davis.
Catching an under-seeded No. 8 team was always a possibility. But the play-in -- which is amazing, by the way -- semi-randomized the last two seeds. With some jumbling now baked in at the bottom, why not allow for it at the top -- by letting the No. 1 seed pick its first-round opponent?
The Miami Heat are two games up in the race for the East's No. 1 seed despite injuries across the roster. Their prize might be ... a first-round series against the Brooklyn Nets with (maybe) all three of Ben Simmons, Kevin Durant, and Kyrie Irving?
That's not some moral tragedy. This is sports. This would be bad luck, nothing more. But pick-your-opponent is an easy fix that fits the more chaotic ethos of the play-in.
I can hear the objections. The league might argue that any delay in setting the postseason schedule mucks up its calendar. Meh. Pick-your-opponent removes some (not all) of the incentive to win the play-in tournament, since winning would no longer entitle you to the No. 7 seed; the top seed could pick you as its patsy.
I don't really care. If you wish to avoid the whims of play-in life, finish sixth. I really, really don't care about the notion that picking opponents would insult the lower seed and stoke tension. It's the freaking playoffs. You need bulletin board material?
The loudest disagreement would come from aggrieved No. 2 seeds: If No. 1 gets to pick, why can't we pick too? Why should we get the Nets when the No. 3 seed gets the Cleveland Cavaliers?
A few teams have pitched a full postseason draft in which the top three seeds pick opponents from among the bottom four, sources say. I'd be fine with that, but it also extends the calendar and warps the incentive structure a bit. It would eliminate the current race for No. 6 -- a fun trickle-down effect of the play-in -- and create some scenarios where it's better to finish fifth than fourth.
(That said, teams already spend the last two weeks of the season jockeying for preferred seeds.)
In the name of simplicity, perhaps start with just the No. 1 seed picking its opponent?