Victor Oladipo - Defensive Dynamo 17/18

Victor Oladipo. All-NBA Third Team. All-Defensive First Team. NBA All-Star. Most Improved Player. Steals Leader. Vic was arguably the best guard in the revived Eastern Conference this past season. Oladipo finished in the top 10 in scoring (23.1 points per game) ahead of DeMar DeRozan, Joel Embiid, Bradley Beal, Sixth Man of the Year Lou Williams, Jimmy Butler, Kemba Walker, and the aforementioned Paul George. He finished in the top 20 in Player Efficiency Rating (PER) and Box Plus/Minus (better than the Rookie of the Year Ben Simmons and Defensive Player of the Year Rudy Gobert), and his Value Over Replacement Player was elite. In that category, he finished just in between former MVPs Kevin Durant and Stephen Curry, with a higher rating than Steph, Chris Paul, Kyrie Irving, and Al Horford.

Following a trade where the Oklahoma City Thunder supposedly swindled Indiana out of Paul George for next to nothing; the Pacers have proven themselves a playoff team with a shiny new All-Star. He’s always been a dynamic defender, but Oladipo’s offensive onslaught on the league has elevated his status. He took the summer to remake his game, and his body (quick shout out to the great Micah Lancaster and I’m Possible Training), and those transformations have vaulted Victor to very elite company.

Zach Lowe describes Oladipo’s defense on his the pod with David Thorpe (April 13, 2018): “It’s so hard to do what he did, which is lead the league in steals without almost ever gambling out of position. It just takes so much focus on the scouting report, attention to detail, but at the same time tenacity and aggression and IQ. To manage that is really hard to do.”

At about 5 minutes, we see one of my favorite things that Oladipo does better than most players in the league. I’ve talked about this in many videos, but getting your arm past the hip of the screen on ball screens is the optimal way to get through, and Vic is so strong, fast, quick, and long, that any type of dribble handoff (DHO) action, when just going through the motions, will immediately get blown up when Vic is around.

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