At this point, most NBA fans are familiar with the type of offensive system that D’Antoni runs. His belief, at the end of the day, is that a successfully executed pick-and-roll is an “unguardable” play, so long as the personnel fits.
It all starts with a point guard who is capable of reading and reacting to opposing defenses and making good decisions with the basketball.
As long as D’Antoni’s team has that, he believes that the point guard can successfully orchestrate an offense no matter how the defense reacts to the bread and butter of the coach’s system—the pick-and-roll.
Generally, there are three ways to play the ball handler on a pick-and-roll.
Option one is for the defense to trap the ball handler. A successful trap occurs when the defender that’s guarding the ball-handler fights over the screen set by the screen setter and the screen setter’s defender abandons the screen setter and double teams the ball-handler.
The second option is for the ball-handler’s defender to “fight over” the top of the screen and attempt to stay in front of the ball-handler, regardless of the fact that there’s a screen being set on the defender.
The third option is for the ball-handler’s defender to “go under” the screen, essentially giving the ball-handler exactly what the offense wants—space to operate.
A fourth option is for the defenders to switch, but switching is frowned upon by many NBA coaches because of the options on the pick-and-roll, switching most often results in...
Article Source: Bleacher Report - Los Angeles Lakers
