Golden State Warriors: 3 ways to mask D’Angelo Russell’s defensive woes

3. Draymond Green

Help Defense

In the Warriors’ ‘death lineup’ they use Green as a small-ball center. He is strong and smart enough to guard big men in the post, however, where he is most valuable from this position is helping and rotating when one of the Warriors’ perimeter defenders gets blown by.

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He will step in from the weak side to bump the roll-man in pick-and-rolls, as well as meet players at the rim to contest dunks and layup attempts.

He is quite short for a shot-blocker so he uses his length in order to reach the ball when athletic players get some air on their way to the rim. However, this is not always enough and often players give away needless fouls trying to defend players at the rim.

Most players use ‘verticality’ while going up to block shots. This means jumping directly upwards, rather than into the body of the attacking player. This is a tactic that players use to avoid fouls.

Green has a unique tactic which he uses to stop himself from fouling players while also making himself more effective as a shot-blocker. He jumps backward, away from the offensive player.

This makes sense because he jumps with the offensive player’s motion. It also gives him more time to get a hand on the shot.

The second block and the last block of this video show him clearly jumping backward slightly in order to give himself more time and avoid fouling.

Leadership

The last thing that will help Russell out defensively is Green’s leadership on defense. In their famed small-ball lineup, Green can often be found underneath the rim on defense, behind all of his teammates.

From there he is able to see the whole floor and he is often the first to let everyone know what play the offense is running. This allows the other Warriors to react quickly and make any rotations or switches they need to make.

He will bark orders to Russell and all the other new pieces on the Warriors roster, telling them where to be at all times.

Despite all of Steve Kerr’s fancy defensive strategies and concepts, the single biggest factor in how well the Warriors’ defense will cope with Russell, is undoubtedly Draymond Green.