The Signature Series takes a look at a play that’s largely unique to one team. Here’s San Antonio’s “Hammer” set.
The San Antonio Spurs don’t get enough credit for keeping up with the times. Although the end result is often the same as it has always been – Tim Duncan facing up and banking a shot home, Tony Parker shooting floaters in the lane, Manu Ginobili doing Manu Ginobili things – the means of transportation has changed over the years.
San Antonio once walked the ball up the floor, but for the last three seasons, they’ve been a top-10 team in the league in pace.
During that time, San Antonio has relied more on quick-hitting plays in the halfcourt than elaborate sets. Rarely will you see Duncan holding the ball and surveying for long periods of time like he used to. San Antonio got slower, but now they move quicker.
A prime example of how the Spurs have blended their patented half court execution and need for speed is the “Hammer” set they’ve used with great success.
Although there are a few different variations of it, here’s a good look at the basic set by Dan Murphy at FastModel Sports:
The Spurs are masters of movement and misdirection, and the initial action here on the left is nothing much more than that. The real purpose of this set is simple: create an open corner three-point attempt for a shooter.
The Spurs have been able to do just that with frightening regularity. San Antonio was third in the NBA in corner threes last year, and Danny Green was second in the entire league in made shots from that area.
Check out how clean some of these three-point looks deviating from the different Hammer sets are:
As you can see above, all it takes is for a defender to turn their head or help in the paint on the baseline drive. If that happens, they’re getting caught with a flare screen and giving up one of the most desired shots in basketball to a deadly shooter.
There are more physical teams in the league. There are teams that jump higher. But if you want to try and find an offense that’s more mentally taxing on their opponents than San Antonio’s? Good luck.
-D.J. Foster
We need a way for SportVU to track how often players scream "and one" when no foul is called.
— Kevin Pelton (@kpelton) December 18, 2013
@kpelton Heard every time they run the algorithm, the systems self-destruct when they get to Boozer.
— Couper Moorhead (@CoupNBA) December 18, 2013
Trail Blazers 119, Cavaliers 116: Teams keep exposing the weaknesses of this Blazers team — the Cavaliers used their size up front with Andrew Bynum (13) first half points — and it doesn’t matter. Cleveland put up 116 points on the Blazers defense and lost. Portland used a 22-7 run in the fourth quarter take what looked like a lead that would let them coast in for a win. Cleveland had other ideas — Kyrie Irving and Dion Waiters (each who finished with 25 points) sparked a comeback to tie the game, 116-116 with just 7.1 seconds. But that’s Damian Lillard time. He had 36 and his second straight game winner.
Bobcats 95, Kings 87: The Bobcats had no defensive answer for DeMarcus Cousins, who finished with 30 points (on 13 shots), 17 boards, 6 assists and 3 steals. Charlotte had plenty of answers for everyone else — the rest of the Kings roster shot 31.3 percent on the night. Charlotte’s reserves came in and started to take control of the game late in the first quarter and while Sacramento made runs the rest of the night the scrappy Bobcats had answers. Kemba Walker had 24 points and Gerald Henderson 20 to lead Charlotte.
Lakers 96, Grizzlies 92: That’s the Pau Gasol Lakers fans have wanted to see. Not so coincidentally, that’s the Lakers getting the ball to Pau Gasol in the half court where he wanted it. With the game on the line in the fourth quarter the Lakers went to Pau Gasol over and over isolated 15 feet out Zach Randolph. And it worked. Gasol had 7 of his 21 points in the fourth quarter helping spark the Lakers win. Kobe Bryant had his best game since his return as well and had 21, helping the Lakers fought off each Grizzlies run. Meanwhile Memphis really missed Mike Conley (bruised thigh) as they had no threat from three and no good shot creation. Combine that with the lack of Marc Gasol and these Grizzlies are a shell of themselves.
Thunder 105, Nuggets 93: Not sure what to say about this one other than the better team won. Pretty easily. Denver is a good team and they got some good performances — J.J. Hickson had 20 points, Nate Robinson made a run in the fourth to make the game interesting — but OKC is simply playing much better ball right now. Which is why they have won 7 straight. Kevin Durant had 30 and just tore apart the Nuggets switching defense on the pick and roll.
Warriors 104, Pelicans 93: Look at the box score and you see Stephen Curry with 28 points, or David Lee with 21 points and 17 boards, and you’ll miss how much the return of Andre Iguodala meant to the Warriors. He had just two points but with him back in the lineup the Warriors moved the ball better on offense, while on the other end of the court held the Pelicans to 37.5 percent shooting. It was an easy win, and the Warriors needed that. Ryan Anderson had 21 for New Orleans.