Jarrett Jack and Deron Williams Figuring out How to Coexist for Brooklyn Nets
Jarrett Jack is still learning his teammates, and the Brooklyn Nets are still learning him.
The Nets acquired Jack from the Cleveland Cavaliers over the summer, taking advantage of Cleveland's quest to dump salary and sign LeBron James. But Jack isn't your typical backup point guard who goes in for 15 to 18 minutes a night and runs the reserve unit. He's also an off-guard who plays next to starting 1s, ones like Deron Williams.
The general concept of playing with another point guard clearly isn't lost on Williams. After all, he totaled 742 minutes alongside Shaun Livingston last season, per NBA.com (subscription required), and the Nets outscored opponents by 7.8 points per 100 possessions during that time. But Livingston, a post-up-heavy, 6'7" non-scorer now with the Golden State Warriors, plays in a different manner than Jack, who has made a living pounding the ball.
Livingston's size allowed him to play off the ball a bunch last year and his cutting smarts with post-up ability didn't threaten potential flow in the Nets offense. So far with Jack, it's been a different story.
"They're different players with different styles, but I try to keep my game the same no matter who's out there," Williams said, distinguishing his previous and current backups.
Two athletic, capable point guards sharing the floor can make a team particularly difficult to match up against, but even with high potential playing next to each other, Williams and Jack haven't meshed as well as D-Will and Livingston from the start, though the tandem has actually looked cohesive on defense.
Key phrase: "From the start."
It's still far too early to look at lineup data—especially for two-man units, which obviously need a larger sample size than four- or five-man ones to be legitimate—but there is one Williams-and-Jack-related stat to keep in the back of your mind as the season progresses: 94.1. That's how many points per 100 possessions the Nets average when their two main point guards share the floor.
It's a remarkably low figure, one that would be second-to-last in the NBA, in front of only the Philadelphia 76ers, if it belonged to a team at this point in the season. And it makes sense the numbers would be low, because the ball has often been sticky with two dribble-happy guards playing next to each other early.
This is hardly the first time Jack has played off the ball. He did it in Cleveland last year. He mostly did it in Golden State a couple seasons ago, starring alongside Stephen Curry for much of the 2012-13 season. But it's also not exactly the first time his ball-dominant style has conflicted in connecting with another point guard.
Still, heading to a new team, something that Jack, who has played for seven organizations in his career, is familiar with, is always a learning process.
"I may know theirs, but they may not know mine," Jack said, explaining that grasping teammates' tendencies is a two-way street. "It's all up to each individual player. You try to develop synergy with everybody, but sometimes, it takes a little longer than others."
A mere 17 games into the season, the Nets are just finishing up their first exams of the semester in Jack 101. It's early. But there have been discouraging moments.
Jack and Williams have taken somewhat of a my-turn, your-turn approach to offense. The ball has stuck, the offense has become sporadically stoic, and Williams has found it intuitive to hide in the corner instead of cut promptly. That can change with chemistry, and what's the only way to develop such a thing? Time.
Lately, we've seen progression from the two-point-guard lineups. We're starting to see the ball move and production has increased. Now, the Nets are starting to make plays like this beautiful swing during Wednesday evening's upset victory over the San Antonio Spurs:
"I think we're starting to read each other a little bit more," Jack evaluated after describing the above play. "I think when we're able to move the ball in such a way that we did, it can become contagious."
The ball movement has looked better. The offense has grooved smoother. And the Williams-Jack combination has seemed more fitting, even if coach Lionel Hollins did only use it for a couple minutes against San Antonio.
"He pretty much plays the point out there. I pretty much play the 2," said Jack. "So, I just try to be out there, try to space the floor, try to knock down shots when I can."
Williams points out the relationship is a little more symbiotic than just playing point guard and shooting guard.
"I try to play the same way no matter who's out there," Williams illustrated before clarifying. "I move off the ball a little bit more as opposed to when I'm in with Joe [Johnson] or [Bojan Bogdanovic]."
That is the general concept of a two-point-guard lineup: The guy off the ball has to cut more than he would if he were playing the 1. It's a different mindset, a separate style. Clearly, both Jack and Williams know that. It's the first class you take at Basketball University. But they're still struggling to implement it at times.
Watch below as Jack dribbles the ball up the court, dribbles back out and dribbles some more as Andrei Kirilenko heads over to set a deep screen and then tosses away a pass.
Dribble, dribble, dribble.
That was 14 seconds of straight bouncing for Jack followed by a miscommunication, while Kirilenko tried to get sneaky with a screen. And the whole time, Williams was getting cozy while watching from the other side of the floor.
Williams often heads directly to the corner when Jack takes over ball-handling duties, convoluting the movement within Hollins' offense—though he does sometimes set a screen to open up a big for a pick-and-roll before strolling to the corner, where he usually stands idly.
When D-Will takes over the rock, the attack isn't flawless, either. Remember the spacing of which Jack speaks so fondly? Well, he's not necessarily providing it as well as he could, and it's not even because he's just 2-of-18 from long range. A 35 percent career three-point shooter who's gotten better with age will improve such an anomalous percentage.
The worry is he's not putting up attempts from beyond the arc this season, posting a 12.7 percent three-point rate, easily a career-low.
Hollins has been smart in sticking with his dual-point-guard units through the Nets' first 17 games, even with the way the ball has stuck on occasion. For his team to be successful, it needs this lineup to work, to give the squad a fresh look when the starting unit isn't jelling as well as it should.
Considering Jack is capable of defending shooting guards, and has been a strong off-ball defender in Brooklyn, the matchup nightmares two capable ball-handlers and distributors can create isn't fun for the Nets' opposition. If Brooklyn can develop some chemistry from that standpoint, it's possible Jack-Williams lineups turn into some of its best.
The Nets often look better when they go small. That's been the case for a while.
They made their run at the end of last year when Paul Pierce shifted over to power forward. They've looked strong for stints with Kevin Garnett or Brook Lopez at the 5 and stretchy 4s (like Mirza Teletovic or even Joe Johnson) playing power forward. Jack can fit into those small-ball plans quite nicely.
So, the Nets move forward with a duo that's been wishy-washy through a little more than a fifth of the season with the hopes of improvement, and we're seeing some of that starting to sprout of late. If their two point guards can continue to develop cohesion, it will all pay off down the line.
Fred Katz averaged almost one point per game in fifth grade but maintains that his per-36-minute numbers were astonishing. Find more of his work at WashingtonPost.com or on ESPN's TrueHoop Network at ClipperBlog.com. Follow him on Twitter at @FredKatz.
All quotes obtained firsthand. Unless otherwise noted, all statistics are current as of Dec. 5 and are courtesy of Basketball-Reference and NBA.com.
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