Chicago Sky
Through five games this season, Kamilla Cardoso has continued progressing through a promising young career on paper: most of her core offensive stats have increased significantly, including big gains in her usage and assist rates, while her turnover rate has actually gone down. The list of centers who’ve kept up similar stats2 over a whole season is mostly made up of the most efficient offensive bigs in league history, per Sports Reference.
The issue is that Cardoso is making a lot of rookie mistakes, ones she wasn’t even making last season. Some positives offset these, which I’ll get to, but it’s still a concerning development to backslide in Year 2 in ways that aren’t dependent on opponents’ game plans.
She is having problems with her coordination and being too loose in the post:
That issue usually leads to Cardoso passing out of post touches rather than creating her own points, which is at least better than turning it over, but it limits her post usage nonetheless.
She’s had issues matching up on time in transition:
Her screening hasn’t gotten any better:
Her ball screen coverages have been lacking, both in disruptiveness and in recovery timing:
Part of this issue, of course, is the fact that Cardoso is 6’7 and has very good dexterity in tight spaces, but under no circumstances should she be asked to make closeouts in space.
The point of having Cardoso is, at least in theory, a lockdown drop big who can take care of the paint well enough that the point of attack defenders can be active at the level and over ball screens without worrying about getting burned on the drive.
This is something Ariel Atkins excels at. This is something Rebecca Allen is good at. This is something Kia Nurse is certainly better at than trying to lock a ball-handler down completely.
Angel Reese is better in hedge than in drop, but Tyler Marsh could always have Reese hedge ball screens and Cardoso drop; plenty of teams have their 4 run a different coverage than their 5. Chicago’s current setup is a misuse of its players.
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On the bright side, the stats I mentioned at the beginning aren’t totally misleading. Cardoso’s process with the ball in her hands has gotten better, and the passing we loved at South Carolina is showing up more often as a result. She’s gotten better at identifying when she has a scoring opportunity to attack, and her ability as a roller has come along. The finishing still lags when she has to adjust on the move, and she over-relies on a baby hook, limiting her scoring.
So, the progress report through five games: Negative, but not without some positives.
Indiana Fever
Let’s play some extremely small sample size theater! (All stats per PBP Stats)
- DeWanna Bonner in 76 minutes with Caitlin Clark: 6.7 points and 3.3 assists per 100 possessions, 29.4% true-shooting on 11.0% usage, shot quality3 of 0.501
- DeWanna Bonner in 56 minutes without Caitlin Clark: 29.8 points and 2.6 assists per 100, 66.0% true-shooting on 23.0% usage, shot quality of 0.454
Bonner has played with the ball in her hands for a decade, but after having pick-and-rolls (PnRs) make up over 25% of her offensive play types since 2013, per Synergy, she is running them just 9.5% of the time this year. She isn’t exactly a usage sink,4 but her offensive value has always come from the fact that she can absorb a good amount of on-ball reps and turn them into marginally positive offense regardless of the conditions or usage type.
That’s not what the Fever want Bonner to be next to Clark. They’ve asked her and her career 30.4% 3-point mark to be an off-ball shooter, to attack closeouts at 37 years old, and to keep moving and finish plays as a player who hasn’t done that since Tamika Catchings was still playing in Indiana. Those are things Lexie Hull and Sophie Cunningham do, not Bonner. And the offense is far better with Bonner on the bench as a result.
I’m not really sure there’s a solution here, given this was a problem that anyone could’ve seen coming from a mile away. Among possible salves, Bonner should be playing as the secondary playmaker whenever one of Clark or Kelsey Mitchell is sitting. Stop screwing around with Sydney Colson and Cunningham and Mitchell as the primary facilitator while Clark is out, considering all three have proved in years past that it’s a role they cannot perform in, and play Bonner there, a role she did in Connecticut for a few years. Run more inverted actions with Clark, Mitchell or Hull screening for her instead of the opposite.
Maybe Bonner can get back the offensive usage she had during Barack Obama’s first term as the season goes on. Until then, this is Indiana’s reality, so stop trying to fit a square peg in a round hole.
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Phoenix Mercury
AT in space is a nightmare, and the Mercury have a bunch of good-screening guards.
Alyssa Thomas is an elite point guard. This has basically been true for the past nine years, but despite running a ton of PnRs at Maryland, she wasn’t used as a primary ball-handler in the WNBA until Stephanie White showed up in Connecticut. Even still, her coaches did not dare to ask: What if we actually played our best point guard at point guard?
Well, none of her coaches until Nate Tibbetts.
Tibbetts is playing Thomas as Phoenix’s point guard, and not just in the “makes the most assists” kind of way. No, Alyssa Thomas ranks in the 68th percentile in reps as a PnR handler, per Synergy, and the Mercury have a 58.1% true-shooting on those reps, which is really good. It turns out that it’s very difficult to defend a tank engine when it’s barrelling downhill and equally capable of breaking a defender’s ankles and hitting a look-off skip kick-out pass.
What makes Thomas-led PnRs so difficult to defend isn’t just how good Thomas is. It’s also the fact that she is still 6’2 and a quality post scorer, so she has to be defended by a forward. As a result, when she runs a PnR, the point of attack defender is almost always a player completely inexperienced in that defensive role. This also inverts most of Phoenix’s PnRs, meaning the smaller player screens for the bigger one, so it’s not just Thomas’ defender but both defensive players involved in the play who are forced into unusual roles.
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The Mercury front office seems to have targeted guards who are good screeners, which only makes this situation crueler for defenses.
On the clips below: Monique Akoa-Makani sets a great screen on Nneka Ogwumike, while Skylar Diggins tries to hedge, but Diggins is completely inexperienced in how to provide a disruptive hedge; Ogwumike is unfamiliar with point of attack footwork and Thomas drive right by her, while Erica Wheeler has never needed to train hedging or paint switching as the roll defender; Sami Whitcomb twists the screen and Dearica Hamby is unable to navigate ball screens as the point of attack defender, while Kelsey Plum takes the wrong angle in her unfamiliar role; and so on.
This isn’t just an exercise in maximizing Alyssa Thomas. It’s also a crash course in how to take a guard/wing room with just one player making well-above-minimum salary (at least until Kahleah Copper is healthy), and make it far more impactful than it would otherwise be. Guard screening is a marginal and underused skill, and by finding players who can do so well, Nick U’Ren and co. have found a way to maximize a roster with few pieces kept from 2024 and limited options in free agency.
Compare this roster-building approach to the one undertaken in Indiana, as previously described. The Fever brought in big names, but it remains to be seen how many synergistic lineup options they truly have. Oh, and Akoa-Makani, Kitija Laksa, Lexi Held (see here) and Kathryn Westbeld are under cheap team control for three more years should Phoenix want to keep them around.
