Joe Ingles - Lockdown

Joe Ingles is a special type of player. A former EuroLeague and NBL champion, he’s not just a poor man’s Draymond Green, especially not the way that Coach Quin uses him. His versatility helped the Utah Jazz to ascend into an almost elite team in the Western Conference last year (certainly an elite defensive unit). He can uniquely run your offense from a multitude of positions, and as you’ll see in this video, he can take Chris Paul and Devin Booker on the perimeter, chase Klay Thompson, Kyle Korver, and JJ Redick through a ton of screens, body up Kevin Durant, deny James Harden, and even switch onto the occasional 7 footer. He’s a smart, savvy defender, and he’s crafty enough to create space between himself and a screen. He shouldn’t be quick enough to stay with the guys he stays with, but he’s got some tricks and gets the job done.

Special thanks to Mid Range, (   / @84dw  ) for the excellent work of compiling a breakdown of Ingles’ outstanding postseason defense. Definitely subscribe to that page if you haven’t already.

About 2:10, you’ll see him play behind the post and then as the ball is swung to a better passing angle, he’ll then front. Right after that, you’ll see him properly communicate so he can switch onto JJ and chase. He never gives up on any play and he always always competes. He’s a bit of gamesman in how he’ll body up guys and then pull the chair on them. He’ll initiate contact and get in guys’ heads. He’s great enough with his feet that he can beat guys to spots (3:08 onwards) and stop breaks by stopping ball (can you imagine?). The best highlight is 3:20, when he smartly stays on his feet against a player driving, which allows Rudy Gobert to come in with the volleyball SPIKE. The point is that he’s very aware of the defensive scheme they are in, is an excellent communicator, and just works. That’s all defensive boils down to at the end of the day: how much effort are you willing to put in? Yes, sometimes you get beat, but that is no excuse for not continuing to work on the defensive end, and that’s probably a big reason I like Ingles’ game as much as I do.

I heard some people didn’t think I make good defensive highlights anymore, and while I agree that it’s been more about the easier to get clips (specifically blocks and steals), I still have some know-how about what constitutes good defense. I just don’t always have the time to devote to/have the access to the games necessary to do so. Enjoy!

*What happened was that I had to split up my last video into two parts, but had some clips from the 17/18 season I wanted to incorporate, so the other one is more or less a stand alone clip for 2016-17 (link below), while this is the other half of that video, plus some clips from the 17-18 season, plus a bunch of good defensive highlights that I doubled up from there.

Link:    • Joe Ingles - Lockdown 16/17  

PS. I disagree with the Devin Booker and Kevin Durant fouls. Booker jumps BACKWARD on his shot to create the contact, Joe wasn’t even in jail, so I grossly disagree with that call. As for the Durant one, it might be a superstar call, it might not, but I say that’s good defense and that should’ve been a play on. Even Ingles and KD had a good laugh about that one as Kevin walked to the free throw line.

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