Hamstrung: These players are hurting their own teams in the NBA Playoffs

Everything becomes magnified under the lens of the NBA playoffs. Teams’ strengths look even stronger as they have multiple days to prepare for the same opponent over and over. Their weaknesses become more glaring as well, as the opposition hones in on the one player or tactic that throws a glitch into the system and forces them to adjust. In some cases, a weakness is so glaring that it hamstrings the entire operation.

Already in the first round of these playoffs, we’ve seen several examples of this in action.

Enes Kanter: Oklahoma City Thunder

You may or may not have seen Thunder coach Billy Donovan whisper to assistant coach Maurice Cheeks during Game 1 that he, “Can’t play Kanter.”

Donovan took his own message to heart in Game 2, slashing his best bench big man’s minutes in half (16 in Game 1, eight in Game 2) and doing all he could to avoid having Kanter on the floor at the same time as James Harden. Kanter played only four minutes prior to an early fourth quarter stretch where Steven Adams was on the bench with foul trouble and Donovan apparently forgot that Taj Gibson was an option. When Kanter come on early in the fourth, the Rockets went right at him in pick-and-roll, extending their lead by four points while he was in the game.

Kanter is  a wonderful offensive option for a team desperately in need of somebody other than Russell Westbrook that can create a shot, but his defensive is so detrimental that he simply can’t be on the court. He can’t guard pick-and-rolls in space, and there might not be anybody in the league that creates more space in pick-and-rolls right now than the Rockets. They station their shooters three to four feet outside the 3-point line to give James Harden more leeway to operate, and when Clint Capela dives through the paint, that creates even more room. It’s tough for anybody, but nearly impossible for someone whose feet get stuck in the sand as much as Kanter.

Dwight Howard: Atlanta Hawks

We’ve come a long way, baby, since Dwight was the best defensive player in basketball.

John Wall has toyed with Howard in the pick-and-roll to such an extent that the Hawks pretty much yanked him in Game 2. “Just went with some of our smaller groups and he didn’t get back in,” Hawks coach Mike Budenholzer said, according to USA Today. “Just a little bit of a gut feel.”

Howard played just eight minutes after halftime, only one more than Ersan Ilyasova and three fewer than Mike Muscala. It didn’t help that they were -10 in his 11 first-half minutes after going -21 during his 29 minutes in the opening game of the series.

It’s difficult to see Dwight suddenly recovering to become as fleet of foot as he once was, and it’s entirely possible that he’s now the kind of player that just gets played off the floor during playoff series. Teams tend to defer toward shooting and flexibility in the postseason these days (How many times during the last two Finals can you remember both teams having a center on the floor?), and Howard provides neither.

Jeff Teague: Indiana Pacers

Teague hasn’t been removed from the floor yet like Kanter and Howard, but he’s arguably having just as great a negative effect on his team’s defense. Whether it’s guarding Kyrie Irving one-on-one (in Games 1 and 2) or switching onto LeBron James or Kevin Love in the post or out of pick-and-rolls, the Cavs have targeted Teague and exposed him as an ineffectual defender.

He didn’t get switched onto Bron or Love quite as often in Game 3, but that was because the Pacers had to junk their entire defensive strategy since it was a disaster across the first two games of the series.

Dewayne Dedmon: San Antonio Spurs

The Grizzlies played somebody off the court with spacing (!) for maybe the first time in the Grit N’ Grind era in Game 3. Dedmon simply couldn’t hang with Marc Gasol on the perimeter, or with Mike Conley attacking him in open space. Dedmon got yanked less than three minutes into each half, with open pick-and-roll looks seemingly the culprit each time. Knowing the Spurs, they’ll figure out a way for him to somehow dominate the next game.

All of the bigs: Portland Trail Blazers

Check out these numbers: Noah Vonleh, -39 in 42 minutes. Moe Harkless, -30 in 64 minutes. Al-Farouq Aminu, -19 in 47 minutes. Meyers Leonard, -4 in 20 minutes

Next: The Toronto Raptors are losing to the future, again

The Blazers haven’t even really tried anyone else in the frontcourt, electing to go hyper-small with Jusuf Nurkic still sidelined by injury. They spent 20 of the 48 minutes of Game 2 with Aminu or Harkless playing center. It did not work out well for them. Eventually, the Warriors decided to treat them like they were Tony Allen, and that was the end of the Blazers being competitive in a contest where the Dubs were without Kevin Durant and Shaun Livingston. Yikes.