Trading for Kyrie Irving was questioned by many Celtics fans who believed that his liability on the defensive end was worse than IT’s. The departure of Avery Bradley was already going to hurt the team on the defensive end, and adding Kyrie was just going to make it worse. The first couple games of this year, however, we’re seeing a new weapon in the Kyrie Irving arsenal, defense, and lots of it. The Celtics are one of the top teams on the defensive side, and Kyrie is a big reason for that.
Defensive Struggles in the Past
When we watched Kyrie play defense on the Cavs, he seemed to not be putting in maximum effort and didn’t rotate at all. He had one of the worst defensive ratings at the PG position, allowing 112 points every 100 possessions. Through 11 games this season, Irving has a 97 Defensive Rating, which is a huge improvement from last year. His defensive plus/minus is a net positive for the first time in his career at 1.0, compared to his previous season of -2.3, the worst of his career. The criticism for his defense was well deserved, but now it seems like he’s much more engaged on the defensive end with Boston.
Kyrie Irving’s defense this season has 100% impressed me.#Celtics pic.twitter.com/JrCicw6kdc
— Evan Singleton (@EvGuyBoston) November 6, 2017
The rotation, active hands, and effort are all there, and it’s showing results. He’s leading the league in steals with 24 steals, and he’s third in steals per game with 2.2. Irving seems to be buying into the Brad Stevens system and defense was one of the main vocal points in the offseason. When asked about the team defense, Kyrie stated:
“Aw man, it’s our staple…Our defense sometimes has to be our best offense when we’re not able to score on certain possessions. We understand that, but when you have the luxury of having some of the guys out here that have the length and the defensive understanding, it makes our jobs a lot easier to go out and execute on that end of the floor.”
Team Defense Wins Games
The Celtics have been playing much better team defense than they typically do, which contributes to Irving being able to pick-off passes and close in on players to make them turn it over. The Celtics have three guards in the top 20 in steals. Former Celtic Avery Bradley is behind Marcus Smart but ahead of Terry Rozier. I thought the guard defense was supposed to get worse though? Hmmm…
The excellent defensive play is only going to open up the floor more in transition for him. The Celtics’ defense has also improved greatly through drastically improving their defensive rebounding. They aren’t being outnumbered in the rebounding totals every night, which is leading to more fast break opportunities. In order for the Celtics to keep the streak going, they have to bring the intensity on the defensive end every night. With players like Smart, Rozier, and newcomer Daniel Theis coming off the bench, they bring the size, speed, and physicality to wear down an opponent.
IT vs. Kyrie
I don’t look at Kyrie’s horrible defensive rating last year and automatically point at him being a bad defender. IT last year also had a horrible defensive rating (same as Irving to be exact) and still got a vote for DPOY. Why? EFFORT. The one thing I could never knock IT on defensively was that, despite being the shortest guy on the court, he put in maximum effort on defense every night. I believe with that mentality, Kyrie can be an effective defender day in and day out because of his size at the PG position and how well he moves his feet.
We all know Kyrie Irving is an offensive superstar and can do things with the basketball that have never been done before, but if he keeps improving defensively, he’ll be an all-around superstar and be in the conversation for a top five NBA player. Now, let’s see him cook the Hawks last night!
JTA (@jtalden11)