By Nikos Varlas/ varlas@eurohoops.net
Barcelona made some noise last summer by getting Kostas Papanikolaou from Olympiacos – the player with the best three point shooting percentage in Euroleague – loading its front line with scorers (Nachbar, Lampe) and one great defensive player (Dorsey), but IGNORED for the second straight season its biggest problem.
The Catalans decided not to add any help in the element they are worst not only in comparison with Real Madrid, but against almost every elite Euroleague team. Which is this? The CLEAR absence of a charismatic point guard in offensive creation who will also have the body to avoid being the victim of defensive miss matches, like it’s usually the case with Huertas, Pullen and even Juan Carlos Navarro.
It’s a strange decision that doesn’t fit with the general coaching philosophy of Xavi Pascual, who likes set five vs five game in offense and demands from every one of his players to be able to read the opponents’ defense. The absence of a really good and stable creator is a bigger problem this season for the more reasons. The first one has to do with the Pete Mickael. The experienced forward among many other things was also an efficient passer from the low post in position “3”.
The second one is that Juan Carlos Navarro, battling his chronic feet injuries, is not as explosive as he used to be. Defenses are not collapsing any longer because of his drives, opponents are clearly only afraid of his outside shot and the balance between his scoring and creating ability is not what it used to be.
Front line
Pascual uses a rotation of five bigs and seven perimeter players. The front line consists of Tomic, Lampe, Dorsey, Nachbar and Todorovic. That means less creation and low post game in comparison with last year. Only the Croatian is a clear cut center. Lampe and Nachbar are playing facing the basket and their biggest asset is their mid and long range shot. Dorsey – until proven otherwise – can be only a supporting player in the offense, mainly through pick and roll situations.
All those players with the exception of Dorsey can be considered great scorers, but they need to get the ball systematically on their hands by the back court, which should also create rifts in the opponents’ defense. No one, with the exception of Tomic, can also create situations that will give the back court opportunities to score.
Back court
The seven perimeter players are Sada, Huertas, Pullen, Abrines, Papanikolaou, Hezonia and of course Navarro who, as we explained, is past his primes specially in creation.
Hezonia, the youngster also from Croatia, is a great talent, but he is not ready yet to make a difference in the level of Euroleague and ACB finals. Abrines and Papanikolaou are great in transition offense and can have supporting roles on five on five situations. However, they are not players from the same mold as, let’s say Fenerbahce‘s Preldzic. They can’t be considered creators from the forward position, despite in some cases being good passers.
Who are left? Sada, Huertas and Pullen.
The American is not a cerebral point guard who can be considered a floor general. He looks more like a shooting guard trapped in the body of a point guard, or in the best case a combo guard.
Sada will always be useful, he is capable of changing the rhythm of a game because of his energy and defense and he can make life difficult for every opponent. He has the quality to be a complementary solution and not the player who will help the offensive talent of his teammates flourish every night.
And that leads us to Marcelino Huertas. A streaky scorer, an excellent passer on the open court, but also a defensive liability who is not easy to hide by his team and NOT a top class creator in set game against the really good teams and their aggressive defense.
Ten are waiting and two can’t help them
We don’t even have to use statistics and numbers in order to see what’s the main issue of Barcelona. There are eight players who need to get the ball in their hands under good conditions in order to score (Abrines, Papanikolaou, Hezonia, Nachbar, Todorovic, Lampe, Tomic, Dorsey). Two more players can create their own shots (Navarro and Pullen, despite being doubted even by his coach for the level of Euroleague and that’s evident from his low minutes) and two more, Sada and Huertas, who can’t handle the load of creations for the other ten players.
Huertas is first a scorer and then a creator with the exception of transition offense and Sada without having a reliable outside shot, can’t make defenses collapse on him. The only player in recent Euroleague history who wasn’t a good shooter, but could make things happen was Thodoris Papaloukas – after all he is the all time leader in assists – but Sada is not like him in passing, or in one on one situations.
Barcelona has the individual talent and the units to get far into the season, but we feel that this great unbalance between scorers and creators (in every position) will be a huge problem in games against elite opponents.
At this point we should take a look in the last two lost Final Four semifinals of the Catalans.
At 2012 Olympiacos scored just 68 points, but Barcelona lost having scored only 64.
That night Barcelona had 10 assist and 13 turnovers, a -3 in the most important equation of modern basketball.
From the point guard position in that game – yes it means from Huertas and Sada – Barca got 2 assists and 3 turnovers.
At 2013 Barcelona played great defense against Real Madrid which scored 74 points, a lot less than its average in the season. The Catalans lost again because they scored just 67 points, just 3 more than the previous semifinal game against Olympiacos.
Once again the turnovers (13) were more than the assists (12).
On that night from three point guards (Huertas, Sada, Jasikevicius) Barcelona got 4 assists and 4 turnovers.
At 2010 Barcelona won the Euroleague in Paris, scoring 75 ppg and having a +5 in assists/turnovers ratio (15.5 as vs 10.5 turnovers).
Back then, Navarro was still in his primes, Lorbek and Mickael were the extra creators from the low post and the teammate of Sada was not Huertas, but a more than creative point guard named Ricky Rubio.
Rubio had 5 apg in that Final Four.
Basketball is above everything else team chemistry.
The current version of Barcelona is loaded by pure, talented, great scorers, but also has the less creative ability in its recent history.
On the contrary, Real Madrid has a more than great backcourt.
The defending champions, Olympiacos, have as a “security” for the off nights of Vasilis Spanoulis a player with the talent of Acie Law and the 23 years old Greek guards Kostas Sloukas and Vaggelis Mantzaris in the difficult game against Bayern produced 10 assists and no turnovers.
So the question for Barcelona is the one asked in Catalonia all summer.
Why a classic point guard wasn’t signed?
There was a free agent named Zoran Planinic for example, who could be a perfect duo with the quicker Huertas.
He could keep his teammates happy with his creative ability, he could play the pick and roll and he could even be a threat in the low post against smaller guards.
Because Barcelona needs balance in the offense, good decisions but also tall guards who can defend bigger opponents, something that is also missing.