The Rotation: Hometown heroes

The NBA regular season is a freight train that waits for no one. With multiple games nearly every single night, it can be difficult to keep up. As a solution, we humbly offer The Rotation — a daily recap series sharing three big stories from the previous night, one focused on a player, one focused on a single play, one focused on the big picture.

Welcome to Westworld

By Chris Stone (@cstonehoops)

The year is 2016 and the NBA season is underway. Dwyane Wade, a career 28.4 percent three-point shooter, has started the season by draining more triples than Steph Curry, the greatest shooter of all time. This is our reality.

Sure, it’s a small sample size — one game and 16 combined attempts between the two — but don’t tell the Chicago Bulls’ Twitter account that. Near halftime of Chicago’s opening night 105-99 victory over the Boston Celtics in which the Bulls connected on 11 of their 25 threes, the account unleashed the pettiest of clapbacks in response to offseason criticisms regarding the team’s roster construction:

Over the summer, Chicago engaged in a massive reshuffling by shipping out Derrick Rose and letting Joakim Noah sign with the Knicks. To fill out its opening day roster, the Bulls brought in both Wade and Rajon Rondo on free agent deals and also dealt away Tony Snell for Michael Carter-Williams. There is a common thread among the three new additions: none of them have historically been good shooters, or even mediocre shooters. Wade, Rondo and Carter-Williams are all sub-30 percent three-point shooters for their respective careers.

The fit was — and still is — odd for a number of reasons. The new collection of guards are not particularly complimentary players next to Chicago’s star, Jimmy Butler. Butler himself is a below average career three-point shooter (32.8 percent) and excels offensively with the ball in his hands. Fred Hoiberg’s offense is also historically reliant on three-point shooting to help space the floor and open up driving lanes. His high efficiency offenses at Iowa State were what made him attractive to NBA front office personnel. But here is the same front office that hired him seemingly trying to undermine his success by providing him with players that aren’t the best for the system he’s succeeded with so far.

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On Thursday night, none of that mattered. It was as if the Bulls had all taken the train to Westworld and inhabited an alternate universe where they could do as they pleased. Butler, Carter-Williams, Rondo and Wade combined to drain 10 out of 15 three-point attempts, including Wade’s ridiculous step-back long ball to seal the deal late in the fourth. Maybe all of them have made a historic leap, suddenly transforming into quality outside shooters. More than likely, though, those numbers will normalize in line with their prior performances, and tonight will be a forgotten memory.

Don’t worry. We’ll always have that highlight reel to prove tonight existed. To show the world that Jimmy and Michael and Rajon and Dwyane can all occasionally get hot from behind the arc. We’ll always have this trip to Westworld.

That New Blake Griffin

By Chris Manning (@cwmwrites)

Last season was lost for Blake Griffin. In season where a lot else went wrong for the Clippers, Griffin didn’t make much, if anything, better. There was the incident where he punched a team trainer and broke his hand. A quad injury took him out in the playoffs, basically writing the end to the Clippers’ season.

If Tuesday night’s Clippers-Blazers game is any indication, though. Griffin is going to make up for lost time. He wasn’t necessarily perfect for the whole game — he struggled, mostly in his first stint — and what he tried to do still needs refining. But the Griffin we saw Thursday is the one we’ve been waiting for, maybe the one we were supposed to see last season had his year not been spent largely in a suit.

For starters, Griffin was simply given more to do than he has been in years past. He wasn’t always directly leading the offense, but Los Angeles designed sets for him where be was able to attack on his own without Chris Paul or another point guard setting him up. This allowed him to dish to others or score for himself. The paint was a bit packed when he made his move, but he looked to be skilled enough to make it work. Griffin was also active on the board, really crashing and capitalizing when the Blazers didn’t bother to block him out:

And quick, direct Griffin post moves were back too in situations where the Clippers made him their lone interior focus. Who would have thought Mo Speights would open up new places for Griffin to thrive?

Griffin also shot threes and looked fairly comfortably doing it in a development it feels like we’ve waited a few seasons to see. He was only 1-3 — and the Blazers really didn’t make an effort at defending him, a key part of making this work — but there’s still a lot to like here. Just a take a look at the three he made: he took it without hesitation, the form looked good, the arc looked good and it’s pretty obvious that there is something to build on here:

Overall, last night was a good rebirth for Griffin. This is a big year for him — it’s a contract year, maybe the last year of the Griffin/Chris Paul/DeAndre Jordan/J.J. Redick Clippers and the perceived value of Griffin has maybe never been lower.

Until Paul took over a little late, this was Griffin’s team and his offense. He was confident, played with a focus and the only drawback was that he seemed just a little bit antsy on night one. Everything we wanted to see from Griffin — the threes, the ball handling, the focus — was there. There’s still room to expand that universe, but the foundation was laid last night for something different.

The Griffin redemption tour is on — 27 points and 13 rebounds in his return is pretty good — and here he is smacking away the haters:

Home Comforts

By Adam McGee (@AdamMcGee11)

As Dwight Howard and Dwyane Wade made regular season debuts for their hometown teams in Atlanta and Chicago respectively on Thursday night, the lights shone brightest on them. In Howard’s case he had joined a team who thrived playing basketball in a style which he wouldn’t seem to fit; while in Chicago, there may be no distinguishable style just yet, but there are established personalities who won’t bow to Wade’s whims.

The comforts of home may have sounded appealing, but for two men who have been used to an element of control, returning home at a time when their declining abilities were being scrutinized could come at a cost to their respective fortunes this year. Both the Bulls and Hawks stopped waiting for their saviors when they were rejected by these hometown heroes in free agency years previously, and so the eventual arrival became more about fitting in than standing out.

For an Atlanta team that had been picked apart on the glass by Tristan Thompson in the Eastern Conference Finals for the past two seasons, the hypothetical Howard is incredibly important. While 19 rebounds were evidence that Howard was doing what he always did on the boards, almost everything else seemed tailored by the culture of his new team.

This was not about endless post touches. Howard was active and frequently in motion. He looked somewhat at ease in alternating pick-and-roll duties with Paul Millsap or in making the extra pass to find an open shooter. This was the often divisive center working to fit in with his new teammates. If the smiles of his coaches and teammates are worth anything, it seems as if they’re prepared to let him fit in. It might sound simple, but in coming back to the physical place that once was home, Howard may have found the basketball home he was looking for all along.

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In Chicago, the offseason storylines had been dominated by the Bulls’ lack of 3-point options. On Wade’s arrival, he did what his team needed to do. Noted as a poor shooter from distance throughout his career, Wade ignored all that has gone before in making four long balls in his first game. Whether it was beating the shot clock from way beyond the arc or knocking down the dagger from the wing as the Celtics got within reach; Wade was calm and measured when it was time to shoot. It was if he’d said to himself, “I’ll be our spacing”, and at least on this night, he was right.

For two players who have had illustrious careers decorated with wins and accolades, the hero’s welcome on their return home must have been nice.

Finding a way to win will require fitting in for Howard and Wade, and after one game, they’ve managed to do that. Now there’s just 81 more to go.