Next game, just watch Gasol's "defense" and "rebounding". (Scare quotes = theoretical application of those concepts to that person's game.)
I love his interior passing, his high-post adeptness, his finishing and shooting; I love watching Kwame rack up DNPs with Memphis. But good lord, he plays defense like his guy has Marburg hemorrhagic fever and rebounds like the sole requirement is tallness. Really.
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I don't completely disagree. He's not a "go get em" rebounder but he seems to block out well, and plays help defense ok. Obviously for the elite teams, we need Bynum back in the middle to shore up rebounding and D.
Still, on offense Gasol just keeps clicking. That high pick-and-roll with Kobe is deadly... he's getting a dunk every game by slipping that screen when his man shows over the top. Also, he seems to have a feel already for triangle spacing and is getting to the right spot every time. Forget the fact that he can actually catch passes, that alone puts him heads and shoulders above Kwame.
At the moment you have Pau playing out of position so I would expect having to battle bigger and stronger 5's would hurt his D and rebounding a bit. He has been doing ok though and as long as Lamar stays a rebounding machine I don't worry too much about giving up excessive second shots.
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