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The hopes of the Raptors wing defense rely on DeMarre Carroll, so I thought for this morning’s edition of “what to write since it’s the off-season but we do run a Raptors site so people need something to read while they browse their phone on the bus”, I thought we take a look at some ways Carroll can influence the game by getting steals a variety of ways.
Quick hands
Here it’s about quick hands. He’s pressuring the guard at the top and playing a good angle while obstructing the pass back out to the weak side. He reads that the point guard is about to lift his hand to pass and raises an arm with the hopes of getting a steal. It pays off. Many times it doesn’t but this is the advantage of having active hands and never stopping to play defense.
Recognition of opponent
Here’s some good ‘ol recognition of who’s dribbling the ball. He sees Gortat messing about with a high dribble, and dumps down quickly to get the steal. The nuance of this play is that he’s also making the passing lane for Gortat back out to Pierce difficult. If he aggressively doubles, Gortat just picks up the ball and passes it to Pierce. Instead, Carroll’s only ‘showing’ the double which baits Gortat into dribbling some more, and that’s when he attacks:
Backcourt pressure
Here’s some situational awareness where Indiana’s just too casually bringing up the ball. Carroll sees that the guard isn’t really looking behind him and blindsides him with the steal. Indiana players should’ve probably called and helped their teammate out, but they didn’t and Carroll takes advantage:
Helping others
Carroll has deceptively long arms, and in this GIF you see how easily he picks off the intended pass to the big. Granted, it’s not the best pass in the world but the fact that Carroll didn’t just stick with his man on the perimeter, but actually helped his teammates by dropping down is what the point here is.
Pressure up top
Here’s one where he’s guarding pressuring LeBron James up top into a mistake. He forces him to pick up the dribble in hopes of relieving pressure by making a pass, and is right up on him to get the steal:
Post-defense against bigs
Here’s Carroll in the post being backed down and recognizing that he’s got a size disadvantage. He uses those long arms to poke it out from behind. This play shows his versatility and how you don’t have to worry about him if he gets pinned by a big, because he’s got enough size and smarts to come away unscathed in most such situations.
That’s it from me today!