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Each week, HOOPSWORLD NBA analyst and coach Anthony Macri will open his notebook and offer an assortment of observations on games, players, and teams from throughout the league. Coach Macri serves as a player development consultant for the Pro Training Center and Coach David Thorpe, working with a variety of NBA players on their skills and game understanding. The Coach’s Notebook appears on HOOPSWORLD every Thursday.

The Art of Mid-Season Team Synthesis

In the days leading up to the trade deadline, analysts and fans around the league considered ways their teams could improve just by adding or subtracting different pieces.  Add a superstar here, subtract a few role-players, and voila, instant contender.  Or, give up some draft picks and an overpriced expiring contract, receive a talented but inconsistent player who only needs a change of scenery to make things work.

Of course, trades are never quite that easy to make happen, and beyond that, after the deal is consummated there is the reality of integrating players into a system where (at least in most cases) other players have just departed.  This makes the task even more difficult as the new players must adjust, the coaching staff has to re-organize, and the players who were present before the trade have to grow accustomed to new teammates.

The biggest trade leading up to the deadline was the deal that finally landed Carmelo Anthony in New York.  In their first game following the deadline, most of the key players that the Knicks acquired were active and got minutes.  Their integration seemed reasonably smooth, and it was a combination of a unique personnel mix and solid gameplanning by coach Mike D’Antoni that allowed such a seamless transition.

By bringing in pieces that are familiar with each other (Anthony and point guard Chauncey Billups), the Knicks managed to form a connection with their new best player, and Billups’s presence gave him a real crutch as he felt his way around the game.  As a result, Carmelo was able to focus on doing what he does best, with physical and efficient rim attacks and quick release jumpers.  Billups was very solid in his New York debut, and the former Denver duo managed to showcase some of the chemistry that had helped the Nuggets become one of the most efficient offenses in the league prior to the trade.

The D’Antoni gameplan also helped with the process of bringing the new players in and making them comfortable.  New York ran a few simple sets that were directly out of the Denver playbook, making the two new players feel at home.  D’Antoni also seemed very content to give Billups the freedom to create and find opportunities outside of the normal New York open motion style.  While the Knicks seemed a little disjointed at times (they went to a few more isolations than normal and the spacing was a little tighter than it has been throughout the season), the product was successful enough and showed promise for the futur

Obviously, any trade can look positive (or negative) after just one game, and winning may have covered up a significant number of underlying issues.  The real test for the value of the Carmelo Anthony trade (or any of the trades finalized over the last few days) will be how teams are able to reconfigure their team in a relatively short time so they are competitive this season.  While Anthony provides scoring pop and is the sizzle component of this trade, it is acquiring Billups at the same time that will determine how successful the Knicks will be this season.  By bringing in both, New York essentially pairs the core of Denver’s formerly efficient offense with Amaré Stoudemire in what will likely be an up-tempo, fast and furious attack.

With their new pieces, expect to see an increasing amount of strongside pick and roll play, and a fair amount of high-low flashes by Anthony and Stoudemire.  New York will also benefit from finding transition post-ups for Carmelo.  It seems likely he will need to alter some of his prime operational areas, specifically finding more chances to catch outside the three point line with higher frequency (Anthony’s tendency is to find areas closer to the rim to operate, but D’Antoni’s system will ask him to seek out greater spacing when he catches the ball).  For his part, Stoudemire should have to work less to get offensive opportunities (they will occur more naturally as teams cue on Melo and Billups), but he will need to direct his energy toward hitting the glass (and his work on the offensive backboard should keep his game averages high).

There is an art to rebuilding team cohesion following a trade – one which requires the players and coaching staff to be working together, painting a mural with the same vision and on the same surface.  Over the next few months, expect to see some teams struggle to pull it off, while others will create a masterpiece that can stand the test of time.

Ball Screen Defense

Two teams not too involved in the flurry of trades that came through on Thursday were the Miami HEAT and the Chicago Bulls (James Johnson’s departure from the Windy City notwithstanding).  Instead, the Eastern Conference contenders took the floor in the evening for a matchup of two of the league’s best defenses (though it can sometimes be easy to see the names and focus on their respective offenses).

{AUTHOR_BOX}One of the most interesting and often telling aspects of team defense is the way teams attack the ball screen.  The HEAT and the Bulls have the ability to defend the pick and roll/pop in a variety of ways, and they both  change up their plan based on personnel, location, and how settled they are in their halfcourt defense (transition situations will dictate a different approach, for example).  However, both Miami and Chicago have  standard go-to defensive strategies for thwarting pick and rolls that they use most of the time.

Miami’s approach to guarding Derrick Rose in ball screen action involved a medium hedge and trap.  Without over-committing, the defender on the screener steps out and attempts to prevent Rose from turning the corner.  Rose’s defender trails him on the play, and then the two defenders coral him.  Most of the time, when an observer thinks trap, they think the main purpose is to generate turnovers and get steals.  Here, however, Miami is only looking for steals after-the-fact.  Instead, their main goal in this soft trap is to get the ball out of Rose’s hands.  They are confident in their backside rotations and their commitment to the defense exposes Chicago’s lack of consistent dead-eye shooter.

Conversely, Chicago’s primary approach was to "bust" Miami’s ball screen attempts.  This involves having the defender on the ball handler be the one to step out parallel to the high shoulder of the screener, essentially inviting the ball-handler to refuse the screen.  The screener’s defender stays back with a foot near the paint, shading to protect any straight line drives on the baseline side.  This defensive tactic is vulnerable in two ways: first, if an aggressive ball-handler can get to the level of the screen before the defender steps out to "bust" it, the defense is in real trouble; second, a screener with good range can punish the sagging defender by popping high and wide and hitting jump shots (having Bosh miss a bunch of jumpers probably helped this strategy’s success).

While both teams employed more defensive strategies than just the two mentioned here, understanding their base defensive approaches gives some insight into their overall philosophy.  For the HEAT, it involves strong backside rotations while forcing secondary players to make plays.  Meanwhile, the Bulls attempt to keep their opponent in the small side of the floor, make ball reversal difficult, and invite teams to dribble into their awesome help defense.  For both, watching them play on the defensive end is a true thing of beauty.

Have questions for Coach Macri? Be sure and drop by HOOPSWORLD on Mondays at 2PM Eastern for the Coach’s weekly basketball chat!  You can also follow Coach Macri on Twitter @CoachMacri.