Post by willtalk on Nov 16, 2022 18:51:18 GMT -8
From my perspective Jones peaked early. She was able to use her length and wingspan very early on. She still had a way to go in respect to learning spacing and awarness as to where other people on the court ( both teammates and opposition players ) were. Blocks do not always define an elite defender. Often they happen because players excel in recovering from being out of position which her physical skills made her good at.. The opposition used to challenge her a lot because of that and she was actually even a better off ball defender than an on ball one. I have yet to watch Beers enough to evaluate her defensive capabilities. One thing is obvious. She will not be pushed arround under the basket. Jomes was and that was because her body type gave her a high center of gravity and she had not learned how to compensate yet. Thats one reason I am curious as to how she will develop farther, especially in her floor awareness. If she is able to become more aware it would give her another upside to develop. If it is because of limited peripherral vision or a lack of mental multitasking ability then she has already hit her ceiling. Its hard to tell with her because in high school she could get by with just her physical skills. She never had to play against higher level post players who would challenge her to improve.
If being high centered is true of Jones double that with Jalena she has that problem and cannot get low enough to position other players. Is just one of her issues. She stands like an oak tree when receiving the ball with her back to the basket. She is not fluid in that position but acts very uncomfortable not being able to position her height against the defender. Then turns out of balance to the basket and misses where the basket is. She is not a true post like Beers is. Beers with her body has learned to feel then position herself into the soft spot to the basket.
Where Jalena is helpful is she is better facing the basket. She reacts much better that way comfort wise on defense and offense. She can coordinate much better getting a look to the basket. She can pass block shoot more comfortly. She does miss opportunity on defense though because she stays pretty low in the key. She feels uncomfortable on defense if she gets to far away from the basket. But slashers no this to and will pull up to shoot a few steps away from Jelena to Flote shots over her.
Watch game film of when the post player on South Carolina whose name is Boston, posted up at 6-5. She moved much like beers very fluid and leveraged her body manipulating the defender. Her moves are the prototype you want all your centers to evolve too.
Notice I also mentioned Danaelle Adams in one of my other post in respect to a player who Beers might be like. She was shorter than her listed 6'
1" height but was athletic and able to use her girth to dominate in the post. As I stated in one of my other posts, I have not really seen enough of Beers to give a good evaluation of her both on offense and defense. I only saw her in an All Star game and she did not show much. But I am not one to put too much stock into one game, especially an All Star Game.
While Jalena surely does not often use good post postioning I would not say she has a high center of gravity in relation to her height like Jones does. In respect to Jones, I was referring to how high her waist is in relation to her over all height. She is known for having long arms and very often one's legs are in preportion to the arm length. She has been able to use those long arms to her advantage defensively and offensively to play taller than her actual height. The thing is that every advantage has a corresponding disadvantage attached to it. The trick is to take use the advantage while mitigating the disadvantage. Unlike with Jones, I think Jalena issue with posting is more of a mind set rather than a physical one like with Jones. Both are correctable, with the right coaching.but the players have to want to.
The issue is that most players follow the NBA stars and traditional posts have become extinct. They all want to play like small forwards. We are seeing the same trend happening in the WNBA. Look at the dominate post players. Wilson and Steward play like small forwards. Its no wonder Kennedy Brown wanted to play wing. The thing is both Stewart and Wilson can also play like traditional posts. You have to get that skill down first.
The death of traditional centers started with Kresimir Cosic who played college for BYU and used to dribble the ball down court and played like a small forward. First player to play all five postions. It was unheard of at that time. Early seventies. He was AA but never played in the NBA. The NBA really did not want his style of play so he became a coach for Yugoslavia/ Croatia and changed the game in Europe. The NBA finally following suit but it took decades and the traditional post skills died with it.