It seems like man then zone then press. That's all I see lately with the big teams.

Keep in mind, I haven't played in nearly 8 years and I'm just getting back into it... but that was always the case. When you have a massive talent advantage, you can afford to put a premium on Def, which then enables you to get the most out of man. When most (not all) choose zone, it's to slack a bit on defensive rating and maximize offense. When most choose press, it's to focus on Ath/Spd as a premium, while being less concerned about Def.

Generally speaking, man has the highest ceiling, but requires the talent advantage to maximize it. In my experience, press is 2nd and zone is 3rd in terms of ceiling. While it's the inverse in terms of the floor. If you have less of a focus on Def, you can do ok with zone, while you'd be exposed by good coaches if you ran man.

Posted by mlatsko1 on 6/4/2019 3:07:00 PM (view original):
Keep in mind, I haven't played in nearly 8 years and I'm just getting back into it... but that was always the case. When you have a massive talent advantage, you can afford to put a premium on Def, which then enables you to get the most out of man. When most (not all) choose zone, it's to slack a bit on defensive rating and maximize offense. When most choose press, it's to focus on Ath/Spd as a premium, while being less concerned about Def.

Generally speaking, man has the highest ceiling, but requires the talent advantage to maximize it. In my experience, press is 2nd and zone is 3rd in terms of ceiling. While it's the inverse in terms of the floor. If you have less of a focus on Def, you can do ok with zone, while you'd be exposed by good coaches if you ran man.

mlat - 8 years! no way man, thats crazy, welcome back. i am not sure where we played but i remember you way too much for it to be 8 years :) but i'll believe you if you tell me that is legit! does that mean you only played pre-potential? i thought we played together in the potential days (i can't keep the years all straight though, they run together).

only thing - absolutely false that man > zone > press at the highest level in the olden days. or man > press > zone. press was by far #1 and its not even close. when you are 12 deep with ridiculous talent, there is only 1 defense that can make meaningful use of that ridiculously deep talent, and that is press. man is a great system and is much more forgiving, but its almost impossible to do things like win 5 titles in 10 years, compared to something like press. im not saying press is best for everyone, just that ultra talented teams coached extremely well are way better running press - talking like, avg caliber championship team and higher. the difference is really stark when you get in the range of teams who are huge title favorites.

some might call this an opinion, but i'd go so far as to call it fact - the best single-season team would run fb/fcp, and the best system to try to rattle off insane stuff like 5 titles in 8 years, is press without fb (motion/press is my personal preference). maybe a coach significantly better than any of the elite coaches in the game's history could do that with fb/fcp, but its just SO unforgiving - i think someone would have to be a lot better than mere mortals like oldresorter or myself to make fb/fcp optimal for crazy strings of titles. could be wrong, never tried to do it myself.

in today's game, its the same engine, so the theoretical best team is still press defense and its still not close. but with the randomness and stuff, its way harder to go 12 deep without talent loss, so that theoretical team is just way harder to achieve. i think man prevails in high d1 in today's game, by a lot, for that reason. BTW, since you left, before HD 3.0 (~3 years old), press dominated to the point that many folks felt it was overpowered and should be nerfed.

I feel like man is less forgiving than press because it is the easiest for opposing coaches to exploit. Particularly at d2 and d3 where it's very tough to have every one of your recruits above average defenders. Typically you are going to have at least one weakness, and that's easy for someone to exploit.

Posted by Basketts on 6/5/2019 12:23:00 AM (view original):
I feel like man is less forgiving than press because it is the easiest for opposing coaches to exploit. Particularly at d2 and d3 where it's very tough to have every one of your recruits above average defenders. Typically you are going to have at least one weakness, and that's easy for someone to exploit.

well, it depends what aspect we are talking about i guess. its harder to hide a man defender that any other poor defender (although you can change your lineup around just like the other coach can), but one of the toughest things in this game, especially in 3.0, is having a lot of depth season in and season out. in zone and man you can take a couple walkons no problem. press you really need to be 12 deep to be elite, so you have to execute nearly perfectly in recruiting to build a really good press team. man you can take risks and make mistakes without wrecking your chances at being great. and god forbid you really struggle and have 8-9 players - zone is fine, man is moderately hurt, and press teams become complete garbage!

so from game planning standpoint, yeah, man is less forgiving. but from a recruiting standpoint, press is way less forgiving. and just like low def can really hurt a guy in man (Good man teams shouldnt really get those guys), low sta makes a player unusable in press - and more extremely than the def in man. at least that man guy can play backup and hide somewhat, and still can contribute to offense, rebounding, passing etc. a low stamina press player gets red and takes a massive rating hit and becomes garbage in every way.

Hey! The one conference I remember was a run in the GLV. I think we shared a conference, then maybe we passed S. Indiana back and forth.

I could see that being true at the highest level of D1. But in D2 and D3, I don't recall ever being feeling threatened by a press team. Maybe it's because creating a dominant press defense at those levels, means seriously sacrificing elsewhere. So when I'd see those teams, I was able to easily take advantage of other factors. Most of my D2/D3 teams were really strong and rarely had a disadvantage on the perimeter. I recall many times that I'd be running man when I saw a press team, I'd intentionally go uptempo because I just had more talent. I think that's why I frame my opinion like I do. I know there were some really good press teams in the lower levels, but it was consistently man teams that were winning titles.

To be totally honest, my favorite defense at lower levels is zone. If you can build a team with a strong SF and you understand how/when to use +/- and 3-2/2-3, it's rewarding. With man, a lot of opponents try to target a weakness. With zone, I used to see people try a variety of crazy and unpredictable stuff to get an edge.

Posted by gillispie1 on 6/5/2019 12:37:00 AM (view original):

Posted by Basketts on 6/5/2019 12:23:00 AM (view original):
I feel like man is less forgiving than press because it is the easiest for opposing coaches to exploit. Particularly at d2 and d3 where it's very tough to have every one of your recruits above average defenders. Typically you are going to have at least one weakness, and that's easy for someone to exploit.

well, it depends what aspect we are talking about i guess. its harder to hide a man defender that any other poor defender (although you can change your lineup around just like the other coach can), but one of the toughest things in this game, especially in 3.0, is having a lot of depth season in and season out. in zone and man you can take a couple walkons no problem. press you really need to be 12 deep to be elite, so you have to execute nearly perfectly in recruiting to build a really good press team. man you can take risks and make mistakes without wrecking your chances at being great. and god forbid you really struggle and have 8-9 players - zone is fine, man is moderately hurt, and press teams become complete garbage!

so from game planning standpoint, yeah, man is less forgiving. but from a recruiting standpoint, press is way less forgiving. and just like low def can really hurt a guy in man (Good man teams shouldnt really get those guys), low sta makes a player unusable in press - and more extremely than the def in man. at least that man guy can play backup and hide somewhat, and still can contribute to offense, rebounding, passing etc. a low stamina press player gets red and takes a massive rating hit and becomes garbage in every way.

I see what you are saying. That makes sense. I feel like high stamina players are a bit easier to recruit than 70+ or 80+ defenders at d2 and d3. Maybe that's why press is so popular outside of d1.

Posted by Basketts on 6/5/2019 12:30:00 PM (view original):

Posted by gillispie1 on 6/5/2019 12:37:00 AM (view original):

Posted by Basketts on 6/5/2019 12:23:00 AM (view original):
I feel like man is less forgiving than press because it is the easiest for opposing coaches to exploit. Particularly at d2 and d3 where it's very tough to have every one of your recruits above average defenders. Typically you are going to have at least one weakness, and that's easy for someone to exploit.

well, it depends what aspect we are talking about i guess. its harder to hide a man defender that any other poor defender (although you can change your lineup around just like the other coach can), but one of the toughest things in this game, especially in 3.0, is having a lot of depth season in and season out. in zone and man you can take a couple walkons no problem. press you really need to be 12 deep to be elite, so you have to execute nearly perfectly in recruiting to build a really good press team. man you can take risks and make mistakes without wrecking your chances at being great. and god forbid you really struggle and have 8-9 players - zone is fine, man is moderately hurt, and press teams become complete garbage!

so from game planning standpoint, yeah, man is less forgiving. but from a recruiting standpoint, press is way less forgiving. and just like low def can really hurt a guy in man (Good man teams shouldnt really get those guys), low sta makes a player unusable in press - and more extremely than the def in man. at least that man guy can play backup and hide somewhat, and still can contribute to offense, rebounding, passing etc. a low stamina press player gets red and takes a massive rating hit and becomes garbage in every way.

I see what you are saying. That makes sense. I feel like high stamina players are a bit easier to recruit than 70+ or 80+ defenders at d2 and d3. Maybe that's why press is so popular outside of d1.

One reason press is so popular in D2/D3 but not so much in D1 is because it's MUCH easier to fill a whole squad of viable players in the lower divisions.