It’s become increasingly clear that when Michael Porter Jr. is on the court for the ‘Ggets, the opposing team targets him on defense. Not every possession or anything, but it’s just a thing that they are always thinking about: “How can we arrange things so that MPJ is the one guarding the dude with the ball, and that the dude with the ball isn’t Patrick Patterson?”. Because as bad as Porter is on defense, there’s still no way that P-Pat would be able to score on him, unless by accident.
Luckily for the Clippers, they don’t have to worry about Patterson ending up with the ball if they don’t ever play him. The Nuggets have no such luxury with Porter. They have to worry about his defense, because if they want to win, they need some of the bountiful offense that he provides.
I don’t blame Porter for being bad on defense, and I’m not saying that just because I hate defense and wish it didn’t exist as a concept. I’m saying that because I understand fully how easy it is to get good at offense while the other side of the ball is more nebulous. You want to be a good offensive player? Easy enough, just go to the gym and practice jumpers for the majority of your formative years. It might be slightly more complicated than that, but that’s what Porter did, and he came out of it with one of the smoothest strokes in the league. But if you want to be good at defense? You can’t go to the gym and practice that by yourself, and neither can you go to the gym and practice with others, unless you miraculously have a gym where the pick-up players don’t suck at all aspects of basketball. It’s easy for things to become unbalanced.
I admit I’m drawing on my own personal experiences here, because I totally suck at defense and I have no idea how to be better at it. Can’t I just keep shooting jumpers in peace?