This is about the Suns and mostly an eyeball test meaning I didn’t look anything up.
Would this year’s Suns be the first “offensive juggernaut” team to win a championship if they do?
I don’t have the actual stats but I think the past champions each had at least a top 10 defense.
Who else was a contender with “no defense” ?
The nuggets weren’t a top 10 defense last season according to defensive rating. The last time before that was 2018 Warriors (ranked #11) and before that you have to go all the way back to 2001 Lakers who were ranked unusually low at #21. Even more odd than that, the 2000 Lakers were ranked #1.
No but that’s a good point and they happened to win. I just would have guessed because they were no.1 throughout the season that they would have been a better defense. What were they ranked ?
I feel like that says more about the inconsistency of using defensive rating.
Or teams change year over year.
Only 3/7 guys on the team who played 1500+ minutes in 2000 also did so in 2001.
Green and Rice were gone. Harper and Fisher missed a combined 100 games. Guys like Rider, Fox, and the corpse of Horace Grant replaced a lot of those minutes and none of those guys were good defenders at that point in their careers.
I’m confused by this comment… Only 3 title teams have not had top 10 defenses according to defensive rating since 2000. That’s not inconsistent
No, the big gap between the 2002 and 2001 Lakers
Yeah but they played very stingy defense in the playoffs and were well choreographed in their rotations/communications/etc. Nuggets turned it on when it mattered and it’s clear Malone prepared them well
They were not a top 10 Defense in the regular season but in the playoffs it seemed that way.