Offensive Pick and Roll Defense

[2_headedmonster]

The beauty of the pick and roll is its an relatively easy 2-man action that takes three men to defend. From Stockton to Steve Nash and countless in-between, the pick and roll and the options it opens up have been causing defenses strategic headaches for decades. As difficult as it may be, there are certain basic principles to defending the pick and roll to minimize the damage, and the one I want focus on is containing the ball-handler.

Here we have an example of the pick and roll with what 2k would call a soft hedge. The defending big contains from the elbow to basically the baseline in an effort to protect the paint....he defeats the purpose when he doesn't hustle back to his assignment, but hey, he's on the Sixers.

Spoiler

In this example Kobe plays peek-a-boo around a Gasol screen with Big AL providing 'no hedge' or 'zoning up' the screen. Even with about 7 feet of space between himself and Kobe, Jefferson is still shifting with the ball-handler to stop penetration.

Spoiler

Another 'soft hedge' example, but this one is up high. Bass shuffles from elbow to elbow with no regard for his man to stop Felton from turning the corner. Weak-side defense falls into a coma however and K.Mart goes full Suns Gorilla on the rim, but that's not the point.

Spoiler

With the big so intent on stopping penetration, and the time it takes a person to navigate a screen, a late arriving 'hedger' leaves an opening for the ever problematic pocket-pass. This quickness of this pass gets the ball to the big with a head of steam and a rotating defender a second behind schedule.

Spoiler

This is what it would look like if actual humans tried to contain the ball-handler the way its done in NBA2k15... (an example of the matador defense 2k does)

Spoiler

only on 2k the screens aren't as solid, and the big is often so high on the screen that only a blocking foul could save them.

Haven't noticed it yourself? Well here I have a few examples to show how inept the hedging big is at containing the ball-handler. Since the focus is containing, i will be focusing on the soft hedge and no hedge settings as they put the responsibility on the big. Using the Thunder, I ran the same angle pick and roll play, and have the game set to superstar sim as my constants. New to 2k15 is the Pick and Roll defense I.Q, so to make sure I was choosing capable players I went with the defensively stout Chicago Bulls.

This first picture is just default defense without me switching to the Bulls to modify their defense. Here we have Gasol positioned at the freethrow line as the screen is set in position to use the zone-up or no hedge technique. His next move should either be to drop back or go to his right to keep Westbrook from diving into the paint. What does he do instead? Comes up AND closer to the screen, leaving a red ( or blue in this case) carpet to the rim....smile for the camera Russ

Spoiler

So i thought, "hey, maybe im being too aggressive when attacking the screen for the cpu to handle, maybe on 'auto' the defense is indecisive. What i'll do is wait for the screen to get established and clearly set the cpu to soft hedge". Here's how that played out.

Spoiler

With a setting making him responsible for the ball-handler, a close look at Gasol's placement (right side of the key) reveals he didnt shuffle, or even move much, other than to get out of the way. He was satisfied to simply be a witness to Russ' highlight reel.

Ok, ok, with all the complaints about bumping on the perimeter, maybe Gasol is turning his hips ( kudos to 2k for finally having defenders turn their hips and drop their lead foot) to avoid a collision which in the NBA would be a blocking foul. So I take a passive approach more akin to what a slow seven-footer would do. I set the defense to protect the paint, and no hedge/zone up to give Gasol more room for error. As we saw with Al Jefferson earlier, even in this setting, going with or away from the screen, stopping penetration is still the bigs' number one priority. How's Gasol's execution?

Spoiler

Gasol has good depth, but is still too close to the screen. But thats not the biggest issue here. As I approach Gasol literally leaps out of my way to give me a lay-up. Seriously. And again, this is superstar sim.

Alright, i know what you're thinking. "why are you abusing Gasol when you have Noah, a higher rated pick and roll defender, the defensive player of the year and, based on a recent GM's poll, a consensus to repeat there to contain the pick and roll instead?" Yea, i asked myself the same thing. Identical settings as the last Gasol test, surely Noah should do a tad bit better.

Spoiler

ehhh...not so much.

Look, im not pointing it out to say its game-breaking, or even that pick and roll defense is broken. Hell, I've on rare occasions seen these defenses executed better (not correctly), and here's a picture of the cpu running hard hedge and under p&r defense to perfection.

Spoiler

Im posting this because Beluba was unclear when i pointed the issue out to him in the Q&A thread, so i wanted to be as detailed as possible in an effort to get it fixed in the big patch. Mind you im on PS4, any one else notice this?

[2_headedmonster]

Update:

Thanks to Steve I was able to get some eyes on this information. Hopefully it gets addressed.

[ThatMichiganFan]

Great job man. Awesome research and good explanations of what happens in real life compared to what happens in game. Glad that Steve saw and it letting the 2k devs know.

P.S- It's nice to see a constructive thread instead of just bashing the game or the devs.

[jeebs9]

Very very nice breakdown... So good I'm re-reading as we speak.

Pick and Roll is the one thing that kind of bothers me. There are different styles of containing a pick and roll. It's about who is your personnel. The Heat which played a aggressive trapping the ball handlers. While the third off-ball defender would rotation or play a safety role. Zac Lowe has a huge breakdown on grantland.

The Bulls on the other hand play a style called ICE. Where the big men floats back and plays a zone. While they over load the strong side of the floor with an defender literally in the lane. Like you mentioned. But that doesn't happen in 2k. But I never feel a difference between each team.

I also wish we could do something about how we played down screens on floppy/curl sets. Some teams let the big men come out and cover while a third player covers their man and then recover when the defender getting screened is clear.

[2_headedmonster]

Quote: Originally Posted by jeebs9

Very very nice breakdown... So good I'm re-reading as we speak. Pick and Roll is the one thing that kind of bothers me. There are different styles of containing a pick and roll. It's about who is your personnel. The Heat which played a aggressive trapping the ball handlers. While the third off-ball defender would rotation or play a safety role. Zac Lowe has a huge breakdown on grantland. The Bulls on the other hand play a style called ICE. Where the big men floats back and plays a zone. While they over load the strong side of the floor with an defender literally in the lane. Like you mentioned. But that doesn't happen in 2k. But I never feel a difference between each team. I also wish we could do something about how we played down screens on floppy/curl sets. Some teams let the big men come out and cover while a third player covers their man and then recover when the defender getting screened is clear.

Yea, i really respect the effort this development team puts into their game, and it must be a balancing act to determine what to spend precious development time on. But you're right, the pick and roll hasn't fully been captured correctly. But to be completely honest, they were close on the ps3/360 with 2k13 and 2k14 after letting lead-passing over-power it in 2k11, and nerfing screens in 2k12.

With this current generation they have all the options there, they just have to get them to work properly. Soft hedge worked well last-gen and defenders didn't navigate the screen as if they called it themselves, so i have faith they can get it done. I will say however, the no-hedge options has never been done correctly.

The implementation of all the new pick and roll defensive ratings, addition of ICE defense and lateral quickness gives me loads of optimism and are signs of great things to come in my opinion. It shows attention to detail and that the tools to make personnel and scheme matter are being put in place so progress-impeding bumps can stop being a defensive crutch.

In regards to determining how to defend off-ball screens, it was put in Live last year by OG, so i can only imagine with a fully cycle with 2k, he will add it here as well.

[BegBy]

I find when a big defends the pick and roll well I tend to get caught up in a contact animation that would way more often than not result in a foul call. Maybe even charging for some of them.

In the Q&A thread I asked for new hedge animations for 16.

Awesome thread. Hopefully through sliders and roster edits and patches we can improve on what we have this year.

[raiderphantom]

Great breakdown. PNR is basically the staple of the league now and it's usually pretty messed up in 2K. The last couple 2K's it always seemed like there was never a hedger and/or there was no weakside help because 2K was concerned with leaving a shooter open. I know Czar touched on that before. If it wasn't that then it was another defender helping from the strong side which is a no no.

There's multiple ways to stop it but I've always believed in the hard hedge with the ball defender having the option to go over or under. But Ice defense has definitely proven to be very effective as well and is probably the most used in the league now whenever possible. I haven't adjusted to using Ice yet but I've had issues with the hard hedge myself because the my hedger never seemed to get in position quick enough and the controls still don't feel very responsive when trying to manually move him into position.

I haven't tried it too much vs the cpu yet as I've been trying to master the triangle this year. In 14 Last gen it was too easy to make the kickout and the extra pass for a wide open 3. There was no close out at all. I thought with the new ratings it would be improved but I guess there's still a lot of work to be done.

[aimlessgun]

Interesting. So far big men have been quite good at containing me off a pick. Basically the only time I get a clear run at the hoop is if I fake towards the screen, catch my man in the animation, and then reverse direction.

Just running off the screen and sprinting to the hoop almost always results in the big stopping my penetration. However I am an SF with only 85 speed.