NBA legend Olajuwon: Post play isn't dead — if you're good
The NBA is a copycat league, or so they say. But that’s a bit redundant. All leagues are copycat leagues. Heck, most industries are copycat industries. Find something that works, and everyone else will try to mimic it.
Because of that principle, small ball continues to become more and more prominent in the NBA as the 23-0 Warriors plow through the league with it. Simultaneously, the bell continues to toll for the passing of the prototypical big man. Post play is dead; long live 3s.
Is that a matter of scheme and best practices, though? Or is it simply a product of the players who make up the industry? Ask one Hall of Fame center, and he has a pretty compelling answer.
“If a 6’7” guy is guarding me, I’m going to get a layup all day,” Hakeem Olajuwon, who led the Rockets to championships in 1994 and 1995, previously told FOX Sports. “He’s too small. He doesn’t have the size. So, now what do they do? Guard with two or three guys, double-team. Then you swing it around to shoot threes.”
Sounds easy, right? But NBA defenses are tilted toward denying looks at the rim. Nowadays, you don’t see many players digging into the post and looking to score as a first option. As the numbers have taught us, eight-foot fadeaways are about as efficient as an old clunker on the highway.
Back in the day, defending the post meant stopping the ball once whoever was on the block actually had it. Today’s defensive schemes -- not just defending post-ups, but in every way -- are far less simplistic. Especially on teams that like to go small, the focus has changed to denying the entry pass however possible.
If that means fronting, then front. If it means wings with arms that stretch across the court diving into passing lanes, then so be it. If a player doesn’t have the rock in the post, then he can’t create or score from there.
So, what would Hakeem do if he were going against such strategies? He dove deep into Xs and Os with FOX Sports, and it boils down to this: As with any offensive success, it starts with taking what the defense gives you. These days, that means setting screens.
“A whole lot of it is in the pick-and-roll,” Olajuwon theorized. “You want to keep running your offense, so you leave the post quickly and set a pick for your guy. Then you create a mismatch on the other guy. Or you can go back and set a pick on the other post. You don’t get the ball on the set play. You get it on the move. On the offensive end, the first thing you do is run down the middle and set so you can position for the play. So, the set play is a good way to run the game, but if you want to be a great big man, you have to find a way to be more creative. To me, in the pick-and-roll, you have the freedom to be creative.”
Finding success within an offense takes activity, whether that’s creating the activity for yourself with a screen or forcing the defense to move in directions to which it feels uncomfortable traveling.
As Olajuwon will attest, the post-up game isn’t dead.
“People who are saying the post game is dead don’t know anything about basketball,” he said.
But priorities have changed. Today’s big men are looking for ways to get two of the game’s most efficient shots: layups or spot-up threes.
Olajuwon was ahead of his time in that sense.
“Anybody who has a good post game can cause a lot of trouble, because you can’t guard them, even if it’s a guard [posting up],” he continued. “If a smaller guard is guarding me, my advantage is inside. I’m going to post him. That’s the way the mentality of the post is.” From there, Olajuwon has options, particularly if he forces a double-team. “When you double-team, that leaves opportunities for wide-open shots or three-point shooters.”
It’s a tiny irony that the only two post-merger teams to start 15-0 (this year’s Warriors and Hakeem’s ’93-’94 Rockets) have a history of exploiting mismatches in the post. No, the Warriors aren’t feeding guys like Andrew Bogut or Draymond Green with the backs to the basket. But it was only two years ago that the offense of former Warriors coach Mark Jackson imitated his own past playing style, focusing on finding individual post mismatches and exploiting them. Contrast the way Golden State plays now with the way it looked when Klay Thompson constantly had his behind sealing a defender at 12 feet, and you’ll wonder what the heck changed before remembering there was a switch on the bench.
The difference in mentality between Klay and Hakeem: Thompson was looking to score. Obviously, Olajuwon had about as many moves as possible down low, but his mind was far more advanced than anyone playing around him.
“When you double-team, it’s not by choice,” he detailed. “They force the double-team. They force the double-team, because if you don’t double-team, they just go one-on-one all day.”
The trick, as Olajuwon advised: Don’t get too stubborn.
Fred Katz covers the NBA for FOX Sports. Follow him on Twitter: @FredKatz.
