defending as building
It can be hard to muster the same motivation for protection that you do for creation. Culturally, the affirmative case is sexier and more celebrated. It can feel much better to build than to defend.
Watching the NBA playoffs this spring has been a pleasure. The Finals between the Thunder and the Pacers were suspenseful and highly competitive. We got a lot of the best of the narrative goods a 7-game series can offer.
One reason the games were so entertaining and suspenseful was defense. Both teams played clever, urgent, carnivorous defense. So often a brilliant offensive player or offensive team looks listless on defense. They take a break and make a bet when the other team has the ball. They haven’t left the floor but they’re present in the way someone watching someone else play blackjack is present.
Not so, for OKC and Indy.
The wizardly Sam Anderson (seriously, go buy and read Boom Town if you have not) interviewed the Thunder and their bald terrier of a guard, Alex Caruso, shed light on the mindset that makes the OKC defense crackle. Caruso: “We don’t feel like we’re trying to stop you from scoring. We feel like we’re influencing you to give us the ball.”
The Thunder and the Pacers found a way to turn defending into building. Passive receipt became active pursuit. They weren’t at the mercy of the other team’s offensive splendor. They chose and then asserted an identity, a story of who they were, when the ball was (ever more temporarily) in the other team’s hands.
-eric