The Defensive Growth of Moses Moody

August 11, 2023
moses-moody-defense

This current iteration of the Golden State Warriors is loaded with outstanding defenders. Draymond Green has arguably been the preeminent defensive player of the whole league for the past decade. Andrew Wiggins is a Rick Ross-level Wing Stopper; ditto for Gary Payton II as a guard stopper. Kevon Looney has built a solid defensive base despite athletic limitations, and the sky is the limit for Jonathan Kuminga based on what we have seen so far.

Yet there is no such thing as too much good defense, provided those players can maintain offensive cohesion. Outside of GP2, they’re not possessed with many strong backcourt defenders and need an increased quality on the wings and in the paint to make up for this deficiency. To get playing time at those spots, you need to show serious defensive gumption.

Moses Moody has been on the fringes of the rotation for the first two years of his career with Golden State and has yet another opportunity to solidify his spot in Steve Kerr‘s lineups. I will go in-depth on the defensive side of his game to answer one question: Is the defense good enough to demand minutes?

Methodology

We’ll break down tape and stats from his rookie and sophomore years to compare and contrast. I’ll separate everything into on/off-ball categories, doing my best to track his strengths and weaknesses in these individual areas and explaining why. Hopefully, by the end, you will have a better idea of what Moses can do, what he cannot, and what he might do.

Rookie Year

Let’s kick it off with his on-ball defense from his rookie season.

Hip/Foot Movement

Lower-body movement and coordination were the major defensive selling points for Moody coming out of Arkansas. He was a true artist with foot placement, hip-flipping, and using his lower body excellently to make up for a lack of traditional athleticism.

Making the jump from NCAA to NBA athleticism and dribble craft is something else entirely. You don’t have the same mistakes to pounce on or the same hesitations in which you can make up ground. These guys are decisive, explosive, and very shrewd with the ball. Even the average players can make you look silly if you aren’t prepared:

No disrespect (maybe a little) to Austin Rivers, but you don’t want him beating off the dribble if you want to stick. You can see how slow he is re-setting his hips and getting back into the play. This was a definite theme of his rookie season.

It would be SO easy to say “Hey, that’s Jalen Green, things happen” and excuse the athletic deficit. But this is the NBA, where a select few hundred of the 7 billion people on Earth come to play. You have to go up against the best athletes in the world on a nightly basis, and you have to learn to deal with them. The foot/hip skills that Moody consistently displayed in college did not translate during his rookie season.

Of the hundreds of perimeter possessions I watched from 2021/22, I found one wire-to-wire defensive stop. Just think about the nickname of the player he’s stopping in the clip below and you’ll see why it’s concerning.

And yes, that was called a foul. So the whole “on-ball” athleticism thing was not panning out.

One shiny silver lining: he was pretty amazing as a rookie for keeping his feet moving and getting superb positioning to draw charges. There were more than a few impressive instances, and the one below was perhaps my favorite. Keeping in front of Keldon Johnson with the proper separation is impressive by itself, and he sells the call like a real vet to boot:

It was a consistent theme of his game and showed up on the stat sheet. He tied for the team lead in charges drawn per 48 minutes with Draymond Green in his rookie season. If you can be in the same stratosphere as Draymond with any defensive stat, you must be doing something VERY right.

Hand Placement

One thing I did love to see was how he uses his hands. Armed with his +7 wingspan, Moody has serious length to bother guys in all kinds of situations. But with albatross-like power comes serious responsibility.

Most young players with that kind of length are constantly getting caught with their hands in the cookie jar. It’s so tempting to reach or swipe, and while Moody was caught his fair share, more often than not he showed an excellent sense of verticality.

With those hands splayed outwards and the lower body keeping him in pace with Jose Alvarado, there’s almost nowhere for the diminutive Pelicans guard to go. He gives no opportunity to draw contact while deterring the strong side of the rim and still manages to affect the reverse layup attempt. That’s the good stuff right there.

It also came into play when switched on to bigs. He has a great sense of when to grab and when to disengage in the post, and keeps his arms steady without swiping down to provide the maximum deterrence possible in a disadvantageous situation:

What impressed me most was his sense of when to gamble, and how often it paid off. The arm length and strength combination give him a lethal pair of clubs to dislodge drives. He recorded a ton of strip blocks on drives, perhaps most impressively on this possession against a mammoth Xavier Tillman:

If you’re going to have agility/straight-line speed issues, superior wingspan and hand placement is going to be a prerequisite to make a defensive impact. Moody checked both of those boxes relative to rookie wings and gives him a strong base to build on.

Trail Defense

Trail can be a difficult thing to evaluate because of how context-dependent it is. With the simple truth that an offensive player knows what he wants to do before you can figure it out, finding yourself in trail is common. The main questions are: can you do things to avoid getting in trail, and will you stay under control once there?

The above play is a good example of the margins a defender working in trail has to deal with. Moody is a step late reacting to Deni Avdija‘s movement towards the dribble handoff with Porzingis, setting off a chain of events. The screen further dislodges him, forcing Looney to play higher than he would like to prevent the drive. Moses is too far behind the play to switch on to Porzingis and prevent the roll in what is now effectively empty-side PNR, and Loon has to gamble as the sole strong side protector. Deni makes the read, and Kristaps gets an uncontested dunk. All this cascades from one missed step.

This fell under the more preventable type of play. In this league, you can’t give extra advantages to anybody. It’s not just a question of timing either; look at the angle Moody takes trying to intercept Lonnie Walker‘s curl and how it costs the team another uncontested dunk.

This circles back to the straight-line athletic deficiencies that Moses has. If you’re going to be a step slower than your man, angle, and timing mistakes cannot happen if you hope to stay in the play. Fortunately, Moody is possessed of inherent and learned traits that help him contain well in trail if he gets himself in the right position.

Two things allow Moses to make this play: the wingspan of a large coastal gull and excellent hand placement. Jaylen Brown is going to beat you clean off the dribble sometimes, but he’s never truly out of the play. He breaks down his left arm to keep some measure of pressure on Jaylen from behind as he goes directly into the help, but gives him just enough space as not to risk a lean-in foul draw. He knows Jaylen will have to bring the ball back in order to try and finish over Kevon, so all he has to do is time up his extension. The jump is timed perfectly to get his right arm at the apex and devours the shot attempt from behind the play in a Kawhi-like fashion. This is what ideal trail defense looks like for an athlete of Moses’ caliber.

Of all kinds of on-ball plays, I was most confident I would see improvement in trail going into Season 2. He has the footwork skill, arm length, and hand placement skill to be an elite recovery defender after getting behind the play. It was just about repetition, adjustment, and eventual growth. We’ll get into whether or not that improvement happened later on.

Closeouts

This was another tough thing to navigate and involves a lot of subjectivity. A big factor here is how much the Warriors ask of their wings in terms of paint protection and how it affects their ability to recover to contest outside shots. Here are a couple of plays that show what I’m referring to:

In the top clip, Moody has to shade towards the paint off the corner with Kuminga playing high to deny the Brunson drive. It may seem like he’s abandoning his man, but the team will trade open corner threes for open layups if the initial POA defenders cannot contain the action. So he is making the right play, but it makes him look bad. Though he is a tad late with his help in the second clip trying to dig the ballhandler, he still helps to contain the drive and force a deep three from Rajon Rondo. A preferable outcome to what a Russ/Dwight Howard PNR could generate.

This isn’t to say that all late Moody closeouts were a product of their defensive alignment. He had moments of losing his edge and forgetting to move with purpose, and they led to open shots more often than not:

Yes, it’s much easier to slack off when up 36 in the 4th quarter, but this was no isolated incident; just the most egregious.

Mostly I came away impressed with how Moody navigated offering help without sacrificing his ability to provide a closeout. He showed the wherewithal needed to process who he is guarding vs. what he is trying to prevent. Take a look at the tag and recover below against Memphis:

With Jordan Poole directly in the action, Moody knows he will more likely than not have to provide help, assuming (correctly) that Andre Iguodala will have to play up to the level of the screen. Jaren has empty space to roll into unless Moses can provide some kind of deterrence with his tag, which he goes. Tyus Jones, one of the better playmakers in the league, anticipates and hits the skip to the far corner. But Moses is more than ready.

Watch how he chops his feet as he tags Jaren, staying physically ready for a quick change of direction. He’s off to the corner in two quick strides to close down Ziaire Williams. Again, the chopping of his feet allows him to prepare for a drive and ultimately stops Williams from attacking a very strong closeout. There is give-and-take still; the pull-up three is still available, which Ziaire takes and makes, but he was a 28% three-point shooter at the time. Golden State will trade that shot for a rolling Jaren slam all day, and the quality closeout prevented any kind of baseline drive from developing.

Here’s another example of providing great help off of a non-shooting threat and following up with a beautifully controlled closeout:

Again chopping the feet while tagging the roller gives him a platform to close back out quickly. Instead of a foot chop going into the closeout, he plants hard with his right foot in an attempt to deny Josh Christopher the middle. A rapid flip of the hips counters JayGup continuing to go down the middle, and he provides excellent defense on the drive. Even though Gup gets 2 feet in the paint and ends up scoring, denying both the three and the rim look with a healthy closeout is what is asked of him.

One thing I really enjoyed about watching Moses close out on the perimeter is how crafty he is at recognizing situations and giving himself little advantages. I am enamored with his “slingshot” trick, a clever way to toe the line of committing an off-ball foul to create a momentum advantage that makes up for his lack of burst.

Notice how he uses the non-contesting hand to wrap himself around the screener, helping to balance himself and ever-so-slightly shift more of his momentum into the closeout while remaining under control. If he grabs too hard it could be a costly foul. He’s too wily for that, applying just the right amount of force to create a positive result without drawing the attention of the zebras.

A last thing on his smarts when closing out: transition offense. Recognizing when to leak out after closing down the ball takes a long time to master, and the fact that Moody did it often was quite impressive. It’s a simple and effective way to generate transition offense by opening up outlets without sacrificing team rebounding if done right, as he does below:

On the whole, I’d say Moody was pretty superb at closing down the ball for a rookie wing. Three-pointers aren’t going anywhere, and even if it’s not the sexiest form of defense you have to be proficient and smart about it to stick on the perimeter. Moody showed an excellent baseline of skill in this regard in his debut season, a very promising sign for his defensive future.

On-Ball Wrap Up

There was a lot of good and a lot of bad. Moody really cleaned up in the technical areas, especially with foot movement and hand placement, in addition to some flash plays with his hips and swipe timing on the ball. But the lack of true stopping is hard to get past, and it led to him being a negative overall on-ball defender in his rookie season. Fortunately, you can see a skill base being developed, and it wasn’t all for nothing.

The main concern: athletic limitations are much, MUCH harder to improve on than technical limitations. You can teach footwork, hand placement, and much more over time but you cannot teach the athleticism that Jonathan Kuminga or Gary Payton II have. This is something to monitor.

Off-Ball:

To me, off-ball defense in Moody’s role is much more simplified. Some of the on-ball components are baked into this, and since I chose to put closeouts under the on-ball category (truly, you could go either way on this) it leaves us with only a few crucial parts to cover.

Tracking Man

For a rookie wing, this guy knew how to keep his head on a swivel.

According to Synergy Sports, Moses Moody did not allow a single shot attempt off a cut in his rookie season. I will, unfortunately, have to dispute this – I found one (1) shot attempt he conceded off a cut:

Considering it was the last 2 minutes of a 40-point blowout, I’ll let that one slide.

If you paid close attention to a lot of his on-ball clips, you’ll notice how Moody is great at keeping his head moving between man and ball and ensuring he moves his feet to stay between his man and the rim when playing off the ball. That is about 99% of the battle in preventing easy off-ball buckets: attention, attention, footwork, and more attention.

Watch this possession below and how frequently his head moves:

This part of his game was absolutely dialed. No notes.

Rotating/Helping

The answer to the question “What is Moody’s defense like in rotation?” is “yes”, to quote Mr. AVO Nekias Duncan.

He seemed to get just about everything right. This is where the technical proficiency and great sense of timing can really be shown off, and boy did he show off at times.

Getting thrown into PNR roll-man defense situations with Jordan Poole defending the ballhandler? Not a problem:

Rotating out of the corners to prevent drives? Sure thing.

What about last-second switches onto cutting bigs? Covered, and then some.

Just look at how he high-points the ball to obliterate the layup, then immediately gets vertical to prevent the putback attempt. Explosive stocks potential AND a technically sound follow-up play? You have my heart, Moses.

The below possession was easily my favorite:

He shades off Kleber in the corner (feet chopping, of course) to discourage the initial Brunson drive, and the kickout puts the whole defense in rotation. This gets Luka going downhill against Steph, and Kleber has only to execute a strong “Gortat” screen to prevent Moses from interfering with a clean layup. But Moody can feel it coming and shakes the dubiously legal screen at the last minute to punch the ball out of Dončić’s hands. It’s perfection.

This kind of rotational impact from a true wing is SO impressive, mixing the physical tools and smarts necessary to put himself in the right spots and create event plays. I think it was by far the most outstanding part of his defensive game in his rookie season, and it left me wanting to see much more.

Rebounding

This was the main part of Moody’s off-ball game that I found lacking. Despite his constant responsibilities as a low man sluffing in from the corners, he recorded a paltry 8.4% defensive rebounding rate, in the 22nd percentile amongst wings. That was a disappointment to me considering his length, but the problems showed up on the tape. It wasn’t for a lack of trying, he was just physically outmatched at times:

He’s just not physically strong enough to hold up against big forwards like Grant Williams, and considering his defensive role as a corner helper, that was primarily the type of guy he was tasked with boxing out.

At times, he was still able to show off the technical skill and vertical athleticism/wingspan to make up for his lack of size. He has a knack for high-pointing the ball (reaching the ball at the apex of his jump) which you can see in this battle for the zenith with Josh Hart:

He also does the small things that I really appreciate in a wing rebounder. As always, Moses is using active feet and court awareness to his advantage:

As the shot goes up, he’s moving his feet from a lateral position to get closer to the rebound area while staying ready in case an offensive rebound and quick kickout happens. It puts him in a spot to help the Warriors with a rebounding numbers advantage while doing his best to prepare for open second-chance threes.

It’s a major theme in his game across the board, in case you haven’t noticed: smarts and technical skill make up for athleticism in many ways.

We have now finished the half marathon known as his rookie season tape. But this is a full 26.2. Strap in.

Sophomore Year

On-Ball

Boy, did we have some drastic changes in this category. Let’s jump right into what made him such a different player on the ball vs. his rookie season.

Hip/Foot Movement

Before we dig into his defensive stopping from last season, I encourage you to go back to the beginning for his struggles, and who his most impressive stop came against.

After digesting that Slo-Mo possession, prepare yourself for what comes next.

Three of these guys would have blown past him like Mark Few through a DUI checkpoint. Look how he seems to be the aggressor on these possessions, not falling behind but utterly containing these drives with his hands and feet. Though LaMelo is not the most explosive athlete in the league, he has excellent handle and change-of-direction skills, but that didn’t seem to be a problem for Moses.

These weren’t the only outstanding point-of-attack possessions he put on tape. Especially in the playoffs, real clamps were present all year. Kevin Huerter tried to take him off the dribble a few times in the first-round series against Sacramento, and it went rather poorly for Red Velvet:

Notice how quickly he’s flipping his hips to counter these crossovers. The difference in his flexibility and hip speed is night and day compared to his rookie season. As I said before, athletic development is one of the most difficult things to achieve, yet he clearly took a step in this regard. How did this happen?

Like a Silicon Valley divorcee, Moses found self-improvement through yoga. I’d also like to take a moment to acknowledge Kevon Looney being credited for athletic improvement. That’s my king right there.

That newfound athleticism led to some improved screen navigation as well. I found myself wowed at how quickly he went from dying on a high proportion of screens to flying around them as if they weren’t there. Watch the subtle shift of the hips below and how little time the screen costs him. It’s hard to not be impressed.

It’s a good re-screen by Mo Bamba that should create separation. Moses simply slides over it like a trout over a riverbed, hardly noticing the impediment. That is quite different from a rookie season where he simply did not have the short-area agility necessary to make these plays. Maybe I should try yoga.

Of course, there was the typically great foot movement and body control that made him a great on-ball charge taker from the get-go:

The hip movement only enhanced footwork and solid foot speed, turning him into a different beast with his lower body and unlocking a new level of on-ball prowess. And that’s before we even get to his hand/arm usage.

Hand Placement

Much like his rookie season, this was an area where Moses excelled on the tape.

There were definitely sore spots with getting a bit too in-your-face with his hands, resulting in unnecessary fouls. But on the whole, I came away dazzled with how good he is at verticality and knowing when to gamble.

The clips under hip/foot movement contained lots of impressive hand usage, which you are free to go back and look for. I loved seeing possessions where he could quickly change his hand positioning to adjust to the situation, as he does on this Terry Rozier corner drive:

He flashes quickly in case he has to contest the pull-up, drawing his hands back quickly to prevent a lean-in foul. He smoothly checks with the left hand before going vertical as Rozier begins to drive, never swiping down and focusing on containment instead of outright stopping. Rozier does get two feet in the paint and hit the turnaround, but that’s excellent process by Moses not conceding the easier shot by keeping his hands where they need to be.

That impressive hand placement and activity frequently paid off with event plays on the ball. I love seeing a guy go full wacky inflatable tube man to deter passing on the ball and getting rewarded for it.

Happy feet, timing, activity. All things that will endear you to a defensive-first coaching staff.

Though the risks did not pay off sometimes, there were echoes of Death Lineup-era Iguodala when he committed. He yoinked the ball with a high frequency on the ball with clean strips and hand strength:

Look how precise that timing is. With Fox, he waits for the hang dribble before pouncing; on Hayes, he perfectly anticipates the pull-up.

I’d be remiss if I omitted the instances where the gambles didn’t pay off. You need to see the bad to appreciate the good, and there was bad:

But that’s not to say his hand skills were a detractor to his game. Far more often than not he was making impact plays with his gambles, and did an excellent job keeping verticality on the ball and denying passing lanes. This, combined with his newfound athleticism, made him quite dangerous on the ball.

Trail Defense

The athletic improvements led to far less avoidable trail defense for Moody in his sophomore season. This unlocked a new level of his proficiency in trail, both in preventing it and executing it when thrust into the situation.

Getting around screens in trail was certainly a problem. A lot of anticipation, foot speed, and agility goes into perfectly locking into trail. He wasn’t able to put it together on possessions against some great off-ball movers, and the tape showed it:

Working out the angles takes time and repetition. As the season went on, he put together stronger and stronger showings in trail.

Notice how quickly he anticipates the action, scans the floor, and then locks his eyes on Pat Connaughton. He takes a great angle and keeps his feet in motion (in sync with his hands per usual) to close down the drive and block the shot.

It’s pretty ridiculous how often he ended up blocking shots in trail. That wingspan and anticipation made for some serious event creation in a disadvantageous situation, which most wing defenders cannot physically do.

Bonus points for ripping the ball away from Landale to deny the second chance. The below possession against Devin Booker felt so casual that it made my jaw drop:

There are going to be instances where he gets knocked off the ball by screens. Guys end up behind the play all the time. If Moody can continue this athletic development and continues to his hands and feet to get back in the play at a high level, he could really thrive in trail going forwards.

Closeouts

The major issues with Moody’s closeouts in his rookie year were A) heavy paint responsibility and B) not being able to stay under control while aggressive. Despite being in many of the same situations, he showed marked improvement closing down the ball for the entire season.

The short-area agility allowed him to get much closer to the ball without sacrificing drives. Not only did he contain drives, but he also managed some outstanding recoveries.

In both of these clips, he does an incredible job breaking his feet down in order to contain dribble relocations. The first one impressed me most because of the quick tag on Adebayo before closing down, again emphasizing his responsibilities in rotation. The second is just flat-out silly, completely flipping his momentum around and finding an ever-so-small block window to deny the Malik Beasley three.

We’ll go back to his rookie year closeouts out of low man rotations to emphasize how different he is with his athleticism and decisive movement. See if you can guess which comes in which season:

The loading of his inside foot makes all the difference. Instead of being high in the air and unprepared to swing his momentum around, Moody breaks himself down in the second clip expecting to close out into the corner. With the momentum on his side, he’s able to quickly spring at Keegan Murray for a quality shot contest late in the clock.

Here’s another instance of him rotating to cover the big man and closing out. Only this time, he completely runs his man off the line and *still* recovers to contest the middy.

Not only was Moses able to maintain his level of activity in the paint, denying drives as the low man and tagging rollers from the wings, but he turned those possessions into strong closeouts. Yet another part of his on-ball game is falling into place, all because of…yoga??

On-Ball Wrap Up

This was about as night and day it gets compared to his rookie season.

Impressive stops. Much fewer athletic limitations. Better foot speed to accentuate his footwork skill and elite hand placement. It was all there. I don’t have words for the changes he underwent; it was just astounding.

Off-Ball:

Home stretch, people. Stay locked in.

Tracking Man

Yet again, Synergy did chart Moody with zero shot attempts or free throws conceded out of cuts. For those keeping score at home, that means he allowed one (1) basket off cuts through the first 1,500 minutes of his NBA career. Pretty good if you ask me!

He’s constantly keeping his head in motion and keeping active, preparing for all scenarios to deny his man. What stood out the most was the level of activity he was able to manage while also keeping track of his own man.

While still in a position to cover a skip pass to Lonnie Walker, Moody recognizes the brief opening for Anthony Davis at the nail and moves at lightning speed to blow the play up. Awareness, anticipation, and great hand strength to boot. This is awesome stuff.

Positioning is a major part of the equation. On this below possession, he offers nail help to deny Fred VanVleet the drive while staying between the ball and his man (Siakam). At the last second, he commits on the drive to force the kick and closes down with the idea of preventing the drive. Leaving the 32% shooter open to deny the paint touch is great stuff, and he keeps his feet sliding to avoid allowing the open three unnecessarily before FVV is fully in drive mode.

Moody’s superb attention to detail made him a great off-ball tracker the entire season. This is one part of his game I have no concern over going forward.

Rotating/Helping

Once again, Moses looked first-rate in rotation for a wing.

I’m absolutely enamored by the way he gets vertical when contesting shots in rotation. He jumps into the opponent in a Goldilocks fashion (not too hard, not too soft) and does everything he can to affect the shot without fouling.

When he got his timing and jump apex right, it produced some explosive blocked shots off the ball. He can close gaps in a hurry and use his condor arms to erase layups from the weak side.

You can also consider me a huge fan of how he navigates being the roll man defender in pick-and-roll/screen actions. Those arms can make up ground quickly, and he can position himself very well to make an impact:

The footwork and positioning skill brought the usual amount of charges drawn, including ones in rotation as you see below against Jimmy Butler:

In this switch-heavy scheme, it’s very important to have players that can make an impact either navigating the screen or switching on to a big. Not only is Moody capable of doing so, but his processing speed to recognize when to switch is outstanding for his age/experience level. Count the switches he makes in the below clip, all coming one after the other:

There’s not much more to say about his rotational skill compared to his rookie season, which was already well above average. Moses is just chock-full of smarts and court awareness with the physical tools to make an impact, and you could see it whenever he got on the floor.

Rebounding

Save the worst for last, I guess?

It wasn’t for a lack of trying. I love how Moody checked his immediate area to find a body, and often looked like a strong rebounder in isolated situations. You can see that impact below.

He gets really low going for his boxouts, applying the football mentality of “low man wins.” The vertical spring gets him there for high-pointed boards, allowing him to beat guys like Bam Adebayo to the zenith of the ball.

Unfortunately, this did not translate into an overall improvement in his defensive rebounding impact. I wouldn’t call going from the 22nd percentile to the 27th a leap as much as simple statistical variance. But if rebounding is going to be his defensive weak spot, I will absolutely take it.

Conclusions

I went into this article with very little expectation of improvement, and frankly thought there would be much less to uncover than this. What I found was a player completely reversing his defensive forecast while building on existing strengths.

His off-ball defense (outside of the rebounding) is damn good for a wing, and this only got better going into his second year. That’s not going to keep you in the lineup, but it’s a great thing to have. The problem from his rookie season was that no amount of rotational impact off the ball can make up for being a poor on-ball defender. Wings have to make their money at the point of attack, not on the low block.

The improved athleticism unlocked everything going into his second season. He was aggressive and fully shutting down drives instead of merely containing. The foot movement and agility complemented his game excellently, and the hand placement/strength combined with his overall discipline looked fantastic. Now he can pair a strong on-ball game with his quality off-ball game. That may just be enough to keep Moody in the lineup on a nightly basis while he fleshes out his offensive role.

It’s worth pointing out that growth is never truly linear. This isn’t 2K; sometimes you regress, other times you stay stagnant before making a jump, and sometimes you don’t grow at all. The point of this article isn’t to create a forecast of a future All-Defensive player. Exploring outcomes, both positive and negative, is always the name of the game. Keep your mind open to all player development possibilities and you will never be surprised.

By the end of this piece, I had completely changed my mind about Moses’ defensive potential. The leap in athleticism is opening new doors to new outcomes, and I cannot wait to see what he puts on the tape next year.

Thank you for finishing this marathon with me.

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Tyler and David are joined by Swish Theory contributor Neema Djavadzadeh (@findingneema23) to discuss how the prospects on the G-League Ignite have looked to start the season. They start off discussing the astounding development of Scoot Henderson before digging in on Sidy Cissoko, Leonard Miller, Mojave...
March 24, 2023
Tyler and David are joined by Swish Theory contributor Neema Djavadzadeh (@findingneema23) to discuss the Houston Rockets. They begin by discussing Jalen Green and his path to stardom before taking a deeper look into the development of Kevin Porter Jr, Jabari Smith, Tari Eason, and Alperen...
March 24, 2023
Tyler and David are joined by Swish Theory Editor-in-Chief Matt Powers (@DraftPow) to discuss the development of Pascal Siakam and OG Anunoby. Later, they touch on Creighton prospect Arthur Kaluma and how his blend of ball-handling, athleticism, and motor could lead to similar outlier development...
March 24, 2023
David and Tyler welcome their first guest Yosef (@ThunderFilmRoom) to break down the development of the young Oklahoma City Thunder. They start off discussing the growth and long-term fit between Josh Giddy and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander before digging into Tre Mann, Aleksej Pokusevski, Jalen Williams and...
March 24, 2023
Tyler and David are back to discuss the opening week of games around the NBA and the performances that caught their eye. Later, they take a deeper look at the Dallas Mavericks, focusing on the development of Luka Doncic, Christian Wood, Maxi Kleber, Dorian Finney-Smith,...
October 17, 2022
David and Tyler launch the Finishing Touch podcast with a discussion on the best (and worst) teams when it comes to developing draft picks and take a closer look at Keldon Johnson, Devin Vassell and Josh Primo of the San Antonio Spurs. 
October 15, 2022
Kris and Larro welcome @oscar_hoops from The Strickland and Swish Theory to break down what went wrong with the Knicks last year, how their new additions change the dynamic on both ends of the floor, discuss key rotation decisions, Tom Thibodeau's tenure, and the franchise's...
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