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I run an outside team with a handful of SB monsters. One of them is the current nr. 1 in BB:

Brendan Sutherland
World
Ranks #1 in BLK
Ranks #1 in BLK / game
Ranks #2 in BLK / 48min

In Season 23 I started playing with some SB bigs and the 3-2 zone. This was before the anouncement of the BBs.
With the GDP it's even more effective than before. I have 6 players with OD 14+ and 3 guys with ID 15+/ SB 17+. That's enough to stop most of my opponents. The most interessting game was against the south korean national cup winner from this season. (75247917) His roster is about 4 times more expensive than mine. But it was enough to stop him for most of the game (at the end of the game Stamina was too low -.-). I had problems blocking him, but my team could still alter his shots. He had more rebounds and shots than my team but couldn't benefit from it because his players could shoot some easy shots.

Speaking about defense:
My team hold the others to 25% FG in the league until ASG. Now it's about 28-29%. That's still teh best defense number in the league. Because of my high SB players my team has almost 300 blocks in 17 games (one was a walkover). That's around 600 possible points which they stopped immideatly. For me, that's a huge number.

As a conclusion of the last (almost) six seasons I would say: I wouldn't buy or train players without SB. Even guards. One of my trainees played 10 games as a PG this season. He has 14 blks.

Last edited by Nachtmahr at 09/18/2014 12:44:01

I guess there is only one player in BB with SB=20 and he's playing in your league :) He's got also pretty decent secondaries and inside skills. Ask his manager how he feels about him/if he has any thoughts/does he see any change in a game.

1. No. M2M will always be the strongest defense. Every other defense has some stronger parts but also weaker parts than m2m. But bottem line is that you can maximize the effect of 3-2 zone with SB.

2. I don't think so. The best defenders will play against him. With best defenders I mean high OD players at the perimeter and mid range and high ID+SB players inside the paint. The weakest part of the 3-2 will be if a low OD player tries to defend mid range shots. So you will need a decent OD on your bigs. If you don't have such players, than yes: the 3-2 zone will have a big disadvantage in this area.

3. I'm playing with three SGs and two Cs. I need the SGs because of the firepower. My Cs have really low IS to keep them cheap. Another benefit of the high SB is that you can play with low RB skills. My best rebounder has only RB 12, but my guards have between 5 and 8. As long as I can stop my opponents from scoring, they can have the rebounds. It's just a matter of time until one of my players get the ball. With this balanced RB skills I have the strongest RB in the league. My team gets around 55 rebs/game. I said it a couple of times: there is always a tradeoff. One or two over the averaged skills supress some other skills. If you don't do that, your players get too expensive.

2. Have you done any analysis on the 3-2 zone against quality Princeton team or a loaded gunslinger at PF in a Patient. These I suspect are natural enemies of this 3-2 zone with shotblockers.

Unless the Princeton team has guys who have IS to go with their driving, and can pass exceptionally well, the 3-2 will eat that up. My experience against good 3-2 zones (i.e., not those with a C defending at SF) is that you're going to have to hit a lot of drives or create open inside shots because the already-low shooting percentage from outside is killed even further. I'm kind of the opinion that so-called "open" shots are actually opposed by the OD rating of the defense, so in a 3-2 those "open" shots are less effective than they would be because of the increased OD. And of course they're not highly effective to begin with.

The one weak point may be if the PF/C on the 3-2 don't have much OD, since they will still be called on to contest a fair amount of deeper perimeter shots and occasionally even threes. But the SB is a nice recovery tool for that too. I suppose if the guard/SFs are foul prone or not as good at defending the drives, that can also be a point of attack, but if they're too bad at it then you figure the drivers get down low and face the SB monsters inside.