after 2 games, EVERYONE said the Wolves were too much and the Nuggets were overmatched

So they can't switch now and say Ant needs more help - he simply needs to improve his brand of ball and chemistry, so teammates play better (elevate teammates)..

Unfortunately, the simpleton, "down-hill" skillset isn't 5-man basketball and leaves teammates out.. So Ant's chemistry will always suffer and you guys will be saying he needs more help for the next 20 years just like Lebron's down-hill game.. We've seen this before and the wrong answer that people had was more help instead of better chemistry - simply getting better as a team.

So I was right - chemistry matters and it's the reason for losses just as much as insufficient talent (needing more help).. this is especially true for simpleton down-hill players that yield weak chemistry
.

Not only is it not a drop step, it's not any kind of actual basketball move at all. Like why are we even talking about this? Are you going to post MJ running in a straight line next and talk about how amazing it is that MJ can run in a straight line? OMG, MJ can jump after one step, basketball was solved in the 80's.

Again, you don't even know what a drop step is (which itself is a fairly basic move) and you want to talk about skill? Do you even know how MJ's jump-shooting evolved? I was watching some MJ highlights from the 85-86 season recently and MJ (by today's standards) pretty clearly didn't know how to shoot a jumper properly. And that's okay - we know how to do things better than we did in the past. That's how anything works. It's arguably more impressive that MJ learned how to play basketball without having been taught these fundamentals, but figured out over time at the professional level. But that still means today's players are simply way ahead in terms of skill, since they've been executing much more difficult moves correctly since they were very young. It also means people like you who apparently can't learn literally can't understand what is even happening any more.

What's next, Ant doesn't know how to walk? The more appropriate comparison when it comes to basketball moves and proper execution isn't Ant vs young MJ but rather young MJ versus random 13 year olds in AAU.

^^^ See this is an extremely unpolished and less-talented drive compared to MJ or Lebron - notice the extra dribble and tiny steps - he isn't trying to get to the rack with 1 dribble, which is a standard for goat drivers like MJ or Lebron.. The Ant drive shown above reminds me of a shorter player like Caitlan Clark - she drives like that - tiny steps and extra dribbles... So a shorter guy like Ant simply covers much less ground than MJ or Lebron, which makes his drives an entirely lower caliber of authority and effectiveness.

For MJ and Lebron, the first dribble on their right hand drives is the final dribble and gather step - there usually isn't a 2nd dribble - this type of 1-dribble drive that can get all the way to the rack requires longer legs... These one-dribble attempts often get partially cut-off, thus requiring a tough 4-8 footer that Ant stinks at - he lacks the touch and longer arms to effectively shot-make in traffic from those distances.. In addition to the touch issue, an extended-arm shot where a long arm wraps around a big man is another kind of shot that the 1-dribble gather step drive utilizes... So Ant's little steps and covering less ground is simply a lower level of driving from the goat level established by MJ, Lebron, Giannis and others..

You don't know what a drop-step is - every one I posted was a drop step (1-step vertical) - that's the best way to quickly describe a drop-step and it's accurate.

If you have a better description and example of a drop-step - have at it... I'm waiting.




Maybe you think that every shot requires a running start but that isn't how basketball works.. Accordingly, we're having this discussion because Ant can't catch the ball and then take one step, and then do any of the finishes that were shown earlier - his power and shot-making ability from this common position is literally nothing compared to Jordan and honestly, many other players.....

And yes - catching the ball and taking a step and finishing is certainly a move and it's often called a drop-step... But you can call it whatever you want - "1-step vertical" is the most accurate and concise way to describe it..

Btw, whether you want to accept it or not - the gif shown above is MJ posting up and then doing a drop-step move into a hanging jumper - the drop-step is used to get more power and hang-time.. It's a common move among skilled bigs and post players but no perimeter player was anywhere near MJ at it..

That's one of the main reasons MJ is goat - he's the only perimeter player to play at a goat level on the post - he has the best post game of any perimeter player, by far.. The drop-step power is a part of it, but obviously his footwork and goat turnaround jumper are a big part too.




Ant can't dominate in every way - only the "down hill" (ball-dominant) way...

We can tell this is true because the rare times that he does a post turnaround, everyone busts a nut because it isn't STANDARD..... or much of a "bag"..

It's literally a boring, ordinary, non-dominant post game that people are comparing to MJ... It's pretty funny... Where's his post baseline spin package, lol gtfo you guys are clueless.




MJ made the most jumpshots that anyone ever made in a season in 1987.

You just don't know the game

Go youtube "michael jordan 1987" and tell me that guy couldn't shoot.... lol... He was the greatest 2-point jumpshooter ever by 1987.... And he always shot at today's standard from three when he had today's volume, but he didn't start taking threes above "bailout volume" until 1990.

After 2 games, everyone said the Wolves were too much and the Nuggets were overmatched, so they can't switch now and say Ant needs more help.

There must be another explanation and it's intuitive - teams win via chemistry and/or talent, so the Wolves clearly lack the chemistry part since everyone said they had more than enough talent after 2 games - their talent was evident.

So it's clearly a chemistry issue - the "down-hill" skillset isn't 5-man basketball and leaves teammates standing there with little to do.. It doesn't elevate teammates and gets solved - teams learn to live with Ant's down-hill stats and shut down his teammates.

Ant must evolve out of this trend of weak chemistry because some guyw never learn the chemistry part and therefore needed to pursue talent-based winning instead (teaming up with opposing franchise players and forming "super-teams").. Talent-based winning blames all losses on "not enough help" instead of taking accountability for having weaker brand of ball and chemistry than an opponent (like the Nuggets).

It's especially alarming to excuse Ant from blame for losing with a 57-win top seed, while MJ is blamed for losing with 30-win lottery teams.. You're supposed to get excused when you have a bad team like the 19' Lakers or the 85-89' Bulls - you don't get excused when you have the top seed in the damn conference, the DPOY, 6MOY, an All-NBA teammate, and "length everywhere" (according to Lebron)... It's clearly a brand of ball and chemistry issue that Ant faces, due to his simpleton, "down-hill" skillset.

Since you don't watch the games the Wolves are the 3 seed and Denver is the 2 seed, it's a close matchup that can go either way and there is a ****ton of variance in 7 game series, another thing you always ignore and just assume it was Jordan's brilliance alone that they won, not that but a with healthy dose of good rng.

ant had 44 pts on 65% shooting and was the lone wolf playing defense gm4 but that's prolly due to his weak chemistry

"tiny steps" lmao

Twog, let's not pretend that you can break down the film of a modern player. You have zero ability to absorb new information and clearly weren't paying attention to what your coaches were saying, which is why you barely even understand 90's basketball. As to what a drop step is, you have to know what the opposite of a drop step is first - what is it?

It's not even clear that you have any actual understanding of the fundamentals as taught to like 10 year olds. Do you even know pivot works? Is this why your college coach never gave you playing time?

No, it's not about calling it whatever I want - it's about exposing the fact that you have literally no idea what you're talking about. I'm also trying to help you understand the demise of your basketball career and that it's most likely due to your complete inability to understand even the most basic elements, rather than something something lebron james soft whatever.

Exactly - the series was supposed to be close, which is why Ant can't blame some sort of talent deficit.

History shows that casts play great with great chemistry - Ant isn't fostering the chemistry that Jokic is, so his teammates aren't playing as well.

It's quite simple

The reason that Ant doesn't produce the same chemistry that Jokic does is because his down-hill skillset isn't 5-man basketball he scores the same way every time, while Jokic catches the ball everywhere and plays 5-man basketball - he gives defenses far more looks and strategic considerations, which leads to more possibility of defenses making mistakes and also fosters better chemistry

Twog, it's hilarious, some poor coach must have actually tried to teach you how to do a drop step at some point and years later, all you got out of that is, uh, it's like when you take a step and shoot right?

How embarrassing.

MJ had the goat drop-step shown earlier itt - if you disagree, show a better one from Ant.. Otherwise, you just sound dumb like someone who never played asking questions to someone that did

Ant needs 2 and 3 dribbles to do what MJ and Lebron did in 1... There's no comparison.. MJ and Lebron got the basket in 1 dribble - again, there's no comparison.

Of course Lebron lacks the jumpshooting... So MJ is the only guy that hhas everything - goat jumpshooting, goat rim attack and goat scoring diversity, goat clutch, never carried by teammate in any series

There isn't a single aspect of basketball that Ant is anywhere near MJ at.
.

Like what even is this drivel, do you literally have no idea what you're supposed to look at here? Also why are you faulting Ant for literally creating a wide open version of a shot that MJ looked to create all the time? We also already established that Ant is more efficient than MJ 3-10 feet out.

Also, Ant is probably taller than MJ now:

https://www.nbcsports.com/nba/news/t...es-since-draft

I believe Anthony Edwards was measured at 6-4 without shoes before this recent growth. MJ's height without shoes is generally estimated at around 6-4 1/2 or so.

Edit: I thought MJ was generally longer but I'm not sure any more - their wingspan might also be around the same.

You don't even know what a drop step is and you think you can evaluate basketball moves?

What does that have to do with having proper jump-shooting form? I'm sure some guy who had the most strikeouts on a curveball ever in a season or something by 1987 wouldn't objectively have anything remotely close to one of the best curveballs in baseball if he had to play in today's game.

The game evolves - MJ was great for his time, but we have a much better understanding of the game collectively.. Also, MJ was Ant's age in 1985, so I'm not sure why you're talking about MJ in 87.

.
List of skills that MJ was GOAT at:


* turnaround jumpshot

* reverse layup

* 2-point jumpshooting

* triple-threat (pre-dribble, stationary position)

* combo leaper (1 or 2 legs)

* quickness above 6'3"

* quickness off feet

* hangtime

* left hand at the rim

* post game (non-bigs)

* baseline spin package

* steals

* defense (non-bigs)

* low turnovers for high-scoring perimeter players

* 4h quarter and clutch

* scoring diversity/team chemistry/elevating teammates

* jab-step

* hop-step

* first-step

* drop-step (for perimeter players)

MJ had goat jumpshooting form

You have no clue

85' MJ.............. 25.8 PER... 7.3 BPM... 7.4 VORP.... 0.213 WS/48... 28.2.. 6.5.. 5.9.. 2.4.. 0.8.. 59.3 TS
24' ANT........... 19.7 PER... 3.3 BPM... 3.7 VORP.... 0.130 WS/48... 25.9.. 5.4.. 5.1.. 1.3.. 0.5.. 57.5 TS

MJ's efficiency was superior despite facing max defensive attention (carrying scoring load), while Ant has a developed team (4th year team) and All-NBA teammates to take defensive attention away from him.. Meanwhile, Ant can exert less defensive energy by virtue of having the GOAT defender on his team...

All-NBA teammate + the goat defender = more help than MJ 3-peated with

It's like twog's coach at some point taught him some a few basic moves back to simplify the game because honestly a 6-7 athletic dude didn't need much other than a functional brain and some super basic basketball knowledge to do well at lower levels back in the 90's

But then it turns out that twog couldn't even handle it, which led to a 4-point college career and life-long trauma, which leads to some weird MJ worship and Lebron hate some reason. And decades later, twog mistakenly thinks he figured out what his coaches were asking him to do (maybe after the 100th time he screwed up in practice, the coaches are like, forget I said this and just do this even simpler thing, which I guess twog then proceeded to screw up again) and somehow his (poor) understanding of these basic moves allows him to evaluate modern players.

I mean it's hilarious, the man is literally not capable of coaching 8 year-olds despite literally spending his life obsessed with basketball.

I'm just noticing the way he drives and that's just how a shorter player looks - he can't drive like Jordan or Lebron, who try to get to the hoop in one dribble whenever possible - it's a different caliber..

There's a chance that young Wade covers more ground.




^^^ that's exactly where he ISN"T superior to MJ, even old MJ in 97' or 98' (MJ stats here... Ant stats here).

Ant lacks the touch and longer arms/hands to have good efficiency on paint shots outside the restricted, or just outside the at-rim area.. So he's bad at 3-10 footers, along with mid-range overall (35%), while his at-rim supposedly was equal to 92' Jordan but certainly not 80's Jordan, and today's at-rim is of course inflated due to rules/format/strategy.

Ant is inferior from the 3-10 foot range because he lacks the touch and longer arms needed to finish wrap around bigs from that distance like the gifs seen above - "Ant-hands" Edwards needs to hold on to the ball until the last instant before releasing, and often shoots little 2 foot jumpers when he's forced to hang in the air at the rim.. It's cute but obviously not on MJ's level.




If that was true, then he would be drop-stepping and demolishing bigs like we saw MJ drop-step on Barkley or jack Sikma on the previous page of this thread.

He would be driving with more authority against taller guys like Gordon and going for footwork that allows getting to the rim with 1 dribble whenever possible.. This would open up an entirely more authoritative way to attack the rim that we saw from MJ or Lebron, where their 1 dribble attacks led to tremendous spin-move game and finishing when cut off.. Ant lacks all this.

jordan had no downhill game and had to resort to 360 fadeaway low percentage prayers in the paint

caitlin clark > ant > jordan

This aged poorly in less than 24 hours.

Wow solved SGA gets a road win. Unlucky Luka is so bad he can’t beat him even with Kyrie (averaging 15 ppg this series)

MJ
Jokic

Peak no one else is in the conversation.

Jokic already has a better peak than LeBron you say? Nah.