Do experienced coaches believe that combo defenses are performing better than you would expect from the players's bbiq?

The last couple of seasons I have lost several games to far inferior teams that play these combo defenses. I have a highly skilled man team that loses to these teams that are 50 rating points and more worse and whose bbiq is a grade lower, say B in man and press vs. A in my man.

So it would seem to me that somehow the combo is putting those two Bs together in a strange and possible unfair manner.

This also would go along with what seems to be the success of the press. Of the top 20 rpi teams in Allen right now about half are combos and a quarter press.

So I guess I will follow along and go combo...
I love not being able to play straight up with a top team. I need to make my bbiq less.

With so many teams being combo and successful, bbiq must be weighed differently in gameplay depending on if you use a combo d or not. Would you agree?

I play either half court man/press or full court press almost all of the time with man to man as only a fall back option.
If I and HD coaches like me are willing to devote the extra practice minutes needed to play multiple defenses then what is wrong with that?

Nothing. That's not my point. But I doubt that you are putting 20 or 25 minutes into each defense as most people do with one defensive set.

15 press + 15 man = more than average spent on a single set defense.

So that's why it's effective because the engine sees more time spent in general?

But is it better to know two somethings 3/4 or 3/5 as well as your opponent knows one thing? Or does the engine not consider your team to be playing man defense until you get to the three point line?

Yes, I have felt for quite some time that this was the case, cal.

with the way players develop these days, EVERYONE should be putting 50-60 minutes into team practice plans!

Good point mccabemi. I do, however, already do that.

If you think about it logically, a team that can give teams different defensive looks is generally more challenging to go against.

The primary reason I run combo is because of the offense I run(fastbreak) and thus I recruit athletes to press but the secondary reason is that I can give people different looks.

However, I still think the toughest defense to go against is a m2m with 5 guys that can all defend and have spd/ath or a ridiculously athletic pressing team.

I've also been tracking champs and final 4 teams in the past few years and I have not seen many that run combo defenses

IE, it might be good for "lesser" teams as you are saying, but at the sweet 16 and beyond levels, I haven't seen it be that successful.

grant, I don't necessarily disagree with your premise, but it's also not addressing cal's point.

A team running hcp/zone or hcp/m2m isn't giving "different looks", they're running the same halfcourt defense all the time. What cal's saying (and I agree) is that, all else being equal, the base D in a combo defense seems to overperform given weaker iq's.

Quote: Originally posted by dalter on 11/26/2009grant, I don't necessarily disagree with your premise, but it's also not addressing cal's point. A team running hcp/zone or hcp/m2m isn't giving "different looks", they're running the same halfcourt defense all the time. What cal's saying (and I agree) is that, all else being equal, the base D in a combo defense seems to overperform given weaker iq's.

Good point re: different looks. I suppose I use itdifferently that what he's referring to. I guess I'd stay with the idea then that it does seem to help "lesser" teams at a disadvantage by helping them "overperform" but I haven't seen it work at the sweet 16 level and beyond.(Though I could be wrong, I am still relatively a noob.)

I was under the impression that the combo defenses were just better than the straight defenses - that is, they generally combined the better aspects of the two defenses in question. That means that A in press - A in man combines to make a defense that is better than A in press OR A in man... and that would make sense, as it takes more work to develop A-A than it does to develop just A.

Therefore a B+/B+ could definitely... and this is all just conjecture, of course, I have no actual knowledge here... perform the same as an A and not a B+.

Yes, cornfused, I think that's another way of saying what's been said. And what daalter and I see happening. But it doesn't really address the problem I have with the premise that the combo is better implicitly. Especially under the formula that for half the court I will run at B+ and then I'll change d at halfcourt and run at B+, or I could run at A the whole time.

I think there are very few real teams that run a combo and certainly not a press all game.

When you see the point guard guarding the other point guard all the way from the baseline, that is not a press. That is man to man. He's just working hard on d.

Anything is possible, but that's certainly never, ever been stated.

The old party line was that if you had a press/m2m team that had B iq's in m2m, they were not supposed to perform as well in the base halfcourt m2m defense as an otherwise identical straight m2m team with A iq's.

Now, the extras afforded by the hcp (to's, mostly) might help outweigh the relative deficiency in m2m. But overall, that combo team should play worse halfcourt defense (fg%, fouls, etc.) than an identical straight m2m team with the A iq's.

That's how it's supposed to work. I agree with cal that's not how it's working.

Quote: Originally Posted By grantduck on 11/26/2009

Quote: Originally posted by dalter on 11/26/2009
grant, I don't necessarily disagree with your premise, but it's also not addressing cal's point.

A team running hcp/zone or hcp/m2m isn't giving "different looks", they're running the same halfcourt defense all the time. What cal's saying (and I agree) is that, all else being equal, the base D in a combo defense seems to overperform given weaker iq's.

Good point re: different looks. I suppose I use itdifferently that what he's referring to. I guess I'd stay with the idea then that it does seem to help "lesser" teams at a disadvantage by helping them "overperform" but I haven't seen it work at the sweet 16 level and beyond.(Though I could be wrong, I am still relatively a noob.)

If it helped a lesser team overperform, it wouldn't stop there. It would make any team better -- decent to good, good to great, great to fantastic, etc. There's no chance that it would only have that effect for a lesser team.