Hoops Tonight - Heat-Nuggets NBA Finals Predictions: Will Butler & Miami upset Jokic & Denver?

do a full series preview today. We're gonna hit three major matchups for our Chase three point segment for what I expect over the course of these NBA Finals, gonna dive a lot into both sides of the ball, into some schematic things that I expect from both teams, and then I'm gonna give a pick, and then after that I'll give the case for why the other team has a chance to win. You guys know the joke before we get started. To subscribe to the Volumes YouTube channels.

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let's talk some basketball. I love the NBA Finals. I remember growing up, every single time Game one or any of the games would start, you'd have that really cool video that ABC would show as there getting ready to

throw the ball up at center court. And there's a history there, there's a meaning in like a it's almost it has like a very sacred meaning to me personally, And that's why it's a big part of why, like when we're talking about player rankings and you know, one of your guys's favorite players is someone that you think is the best, and like, I'm a little bit slower to get there, and why give so much preferential treatment

to the guys that have won championships. It has a lot to do with how sacred I think the NBA Finals are. This is the ultimate test of a basketball player to succeed on this stage after everything you've done over the course of the previous three rounds. And so I'm really excited for Nikola Jokic and for Jimmy Butler. They both have an opportunity in this series to stamp themselves as one of those guys, as one of the greatest basketball players in NBA history, to lead a team

to an NBA championship. And that's what's cool. Like, no matter what, when this is all said and done, either Jimmy Butler or Nikola Jokich, one of those two guys is going to be stamped as an NBA champion. I'm very, very excited for that. And without any further ado, let's do the usual. We're gonna go through series notes to get started. Denver as of right now as a minus four to twenty favorite rapidly increasing line. Denver swept the season series two zero. Not a ton to learn there.

Jamal Murray missed one of the games. Caleb Martin played twenty eight total minutes in the two games. DeAndre Jordan was getting run, a lot of bones Highland thrown up threes, a lot of guys for both teams that won't be in the rotation at all whatsoever. Seeing a little Tyler Harrow, who I expect to actually make an appearance in this series. But there were some stuff to learn, right Like I got to see a little bit of Bam battling with

Nikola Jokic on both ends of the floor. I got to see Jimmy attacking matchups the way he's been doing this entire postseason, you got to see a lot of what Miami's zone defense looks like against Denver. So I'm gonna share a lot of that stuff with you. But most of our projections are gonna come based on what we've seen from these two teams in this postseason run. So this is gonna be our chase three points segment

Number one. Can Miami slow down Denver's offense? So Denver size will force Miami to play bigger, in my opinion, at least bigger than they did over the course of the Boston Celtics series. I wonder if Eric Spolsher will go back to Kevin Love in the starting lineup in order to combat that, because then you the matchups start to make a little bit more sense. You consider putting Kevin Love on Nikola Jokic. Kevin Love is good at

battling for position. It's a type of defender that'll do just as well against the Jokic type as anybody else, which is more of a statement that jokis just just pretty much gonna destroy everybody, right, But Kevin Love is gonna hold up at least in some of those position battles. I'd put Bam in a bio on Aaron Gordon in that case and kind of have him roaming around on the back line. You put Jimmy Butler and Michael Porter Junior,

which is a better size for size matchup. Probably have Max Struce on Kndavious Cabble Pope and Gabe Vincent on Jamal Murray. You can probably also get away with putting Kevin Love on Aaron Gordon as well. But whether or not Kevin Love is playable in this series will go a long way because of the size matchups and how difficult they get. If you can't go that round, it

doesn't necessarily have to be Love. It could be Zeller, but I think Love is probably a little bit more likely just because he's bigger and stronger as a lower center of gravity. But if those two guys get played off the court, it gets pretty tough because now you're asking Bam at a bio to match up with Nikola Jokic. Now you're putting Jimmy Butler on Aaron Gordon. He's given up a lot of weight and height to Aaron Gordon. Now Max Struce is sliding down to Michael Porter Junior.

Not nearly gonna bother Michael Porter Junior as much as a Jimmy Butler could. And now you're putting on like you're asking Caleb Martin if you move him into the starting lineup to chase around Jamal Murray, which I think that matchup is one that Miami can live with, but they're giving up a lot of size across the board.

And if you really look at how much Miami struggled rebounding against Boston, and then remember post deadline, the Los Angeles Lakers were fourth in rebounding post headline because of this, the size that they added, Anthony Davis really engaging himself, Lebron James when he came back to the team, they got absolutely destroyed on the glass by Denver. You guys might remember a point in Game one where Denver at one point had grabbed twenty of the first twenty three

rebounds in that game. So there's a massive size advantage there that I think is going to be one of the biggest determining factors over the course of the series. And it's gonna be very important for Miami to be able to match up across the board. And I think the Kevin Love minutes and whether or not they're viable or going to go a long way there. So obviously rebounding is gonna play a huge role in this series. But where's the other place that size can become an issue?

In post up situation? So Miami ran a good amount of drop coverage against the Murray Jokic actions, but they also did a lot of switching across the board, and in those situations, Denver absolutely pulverized them over the course of this season attacking those switches. As a matter of fact, they ran thirty post ups in their two matchups with Miami this year, and in those thirty post ups scored forty seven points, so over a point and a half

per possession. A lot of the usual stuff, right Nikola Jokic getting a deep seal drawn a double team and throwing that pass to a cutter, to a shooter, just bullying his way into the lane for a layup, But there was a lot of There was one game where Miami just persistently was allowing Kyle Lowry to switch on to Aaron Gordon, and Denver just backed Nikola Jokic out to the top of the key and posted up Aaron Gordon and just spammed that action Aaron Gordon was just

scoring time and time again, whether it was hitting cutters or hitting shots over the top. So Denver's just way way better at making you pay for switching smaller players onto bigger front court players than Boston was, and that that's a dynamic over the course of the series. That's going to be a much bigger challenge for Eric Spolstra and those guys to deal with than it was in the last round. So what can Miami do to combat that? They tried some doubling. There was a play where they

doubled Nikolajokic. He just drops it off to Vlado Contar under the basket. You know, there's a play where in that sequence where Aaron Gordon was attacking Kyle Lowry all the time, where they ended up double teaming and Aaron Gordon just shoveled it right to Michael Porter Juni You're under the basket for a dunk. So Denver's really good at handling that as well. My guess is Eric Spolster just tries to do a ton of mixing up coverages to disrupt rhythm. So I think we'll see some doubles.

I think they we'll see him leave him on an island every once in a while. I think we'll see some digging and recovering, But I think the post up battle is going to be the main way that Denver attacks Miami over the course of this series, and where I expect them to have the most success. They're just too big and too good at spacing the floor and making teams pay for double teams. It's just a really tough matchup for Miami on that front. In pick and roll, we don't have a ton to work with here. On

the film. There was only four Jamal Murray Nikol Jokis pick and rolls during the regular season where Miami didn't switch and ended up just attacking out of the post. They scored on all four of those possessions, and in all four cases it was actually Jamal Murray making shots

over the top. They did a lot attacking Tyler Harrow, so like they would run a guard to guard screen to get Tyler Harrow switched on to Jamal Murray, and then they'd bring Nikola Jokic up to attack because Jamal was just having too easy of a time ditching Tyler Harrow on those screens and getting into the lane. When I'm saying he's making shots over the top, he's making shots in the short range. These are like little ten foot floaters the occasional layup like he's getting easy shots

in that pick and roll attack. Once again, I expect a lot more of mixing coverages. I think we'll see some drop coverage when guys like a Caleb Martin or or gave Vincent or Kyle Lowry on him. I think we'll see some switching and fronting the post. Miami's a great team when it comes to fronting the post and applying back pressure. So essentially, like when the switch happens, they get in front of Jokic and try to prevent that easy post entry right. So Jokic will push on

his back and create a target up high right. But what Miami will do is they'll offer so much backside help that it's just an extremely difficult pass to make. Now, Yokich is so damn big, he's gonna score on some of those anyway, but it's gonna be that skip pass across the court that's wide open. And I think I think Sposter's gonna really challenge Jamal Murray in particular, to

consistently make that skip pass across the court. I think we'll see some random blitzes, right like, just to disrupt rhythm and to try to catch Jamal Murray off guard. Don't be surprised if we see some super aggressive Miami stuff at the front at the point of attack, blitzing

and getting the ball out of Jamal Murray's hands. And then I wouldn't be surprised if at some point over the series we saw Jimmy Butler switched on to Jamal Murray and basically start switching Jimmy and Bam in that action and doing that same kind of front the post kind of thing, just with a bigger athlete than Jimmy

Butler up front. I think the Heat'll have a much easier time handling the pick and roll stuff because it's a little bit more of an area where Spolstra can come into the come into play with his schematic approach. But I do think we'll see a good amount of that in this series. And then the zone. So zone was a huge factor in this Boston Celtics series, as Spolster used it basically to plague Boston into their worst offensive tendencies. Didn't work against Denver. They ran thirteen possessions

of zone. Denver scored twenty points, and it looked exactly like what you expected. Boston never got the ball to the middle of the floor. Denver just parked Nicola Jokics right at the foul line. He's this huge target and then when he turns and faces it's a lob thread at the basket and Aaron Gordon and three elite shooters around him. It's just way too easy, and Jokic just

like got this touch pass thing going. They'll just throw the ball up high to him and he'll just catch it and already make the read and just fling the ball to where it's supposed to go. So I don't think zone's gonna be an option. The reality is Denver's just really hard to guard. You have all the jokes Murray stuff, and Murray's just so dialed in with his pick and roll shot making right now that I don't know how the hell you guard him. They have elite

off ball threats. Knave's Cable Pope and Michael Porter Junr are both knockdown shooters. Aaron Gordon with the lob threat that he is under the basket, with his ability to duck in for easy seals and dunks. With what he does on the offensive glass, they're just really difficult to guard. And all those guys can make plays on their own as well. Aaron Gordon, we talked about attacking in the post.

He's good with those transition slot drives too. Kntave's cable pope and his pull up shooting in trouble handoff situations. That was a big factor in that Lakers series. Michael Porter Junior in his ISO pull up shooting, especially against smaller defenders, Bruce Brown and his semi transition drives getting to the basket with his athleticism, the Lakers were a truly elite defense, in my opinion, a better defense than this Miami Heat team, and Denver just completely cut them

to pieces. And that was with the best defensive player in the world and Anthony Davis on the floor too. I honestly, God don't know what the answer is. And so that's that's gonna be the biggest factor in the series. Is is there any chance that Miami can slow down Denver on the offensive end? Number two? Can Miami keep up with Denver on their offensive end of the floor. So I think we'll see Kntavo's cobble Pope start on Gabe Vincent and then Caleb Martin when he comes into

the game, presuming that he comes off the bench. I think we'll see Aaron Gordon start on Jimmy Butler, but I also think we'll see some contavious cobble Pope and some Bruce Brown there as well. I want to kind of split this into three sections. I want to look at guard pick and rolls, I want to look at bam ISOs, and then our third section of the three

chase three points is gonna be Jimmy Butler stuff. So in guard pick and roll, so this is anything that's like Kyle Lowry with the ball, Gave Vincent with the ball, Caleb Martin with the ball, high pick and roll with bam Adebayo, I think we'll see Yo Kitchen a high drop coverage just like he's done throughout this playoff run

with a lot of weak side help. So the skip pass is gonna be what's open if slash when Miami wins games in this series, I think it's gonna be with one of the big factors is gonna be red hot three point shooting, specifically on those skip passes to the weak side with the way that Denver loads up on pick and roll. But here's the thing. Denver's defensive rotations, just like Miami's, are outstanding, and they're gonna get contests

on those shots. They're not gonna be easy and they're not They're definitely not gonna lose shooters as frequently as Boston did. Boston was a very sloppy defense relative to the amount of talent that they had. Bam ISOs, he ran six ISOs and post ups versus Denver scored four points on him. He had one really nice quick move against nicolay Yo Kitchen a post up where he hit like two quick up fakes and then got to the baseline and made like a little bank shot off the glass.

So he had like a significant quickness advantage there. But I don't expect that to play a significant part in the series, especially since Bam really kind of lost confidence over the course of that Celtics series and struggling to finish really anything. I think, like, obviously it's a wild card. You feed him a little bit early in Game one, and maybe he beats Jokic off the dribble a few times, and it kind of fuels his confidence and then everything

gets better from there. But I don't expect it to be a huge part of this series which takes us to number three. Can Jimmy Butler play Nikolay Jokic to a draw? So as I look at this series, Miami's biggest advantage is the Jimmy Butler matchup hunting thing we

saw the like. Lebron, for instance, was the best offensive player in the Lakers series for the Lakers right, and a big part of that was just the ability he had to not only make plays in high pick and roll, but to persistently bring weaker Denver defenders into the ball screens, get switches, and then work his way down to the block. And it was more challenging for Lebron because D'Angel Russell couldn't make a damn shot and Denis Shuter couldn't shoot

off the move. So soon as they moved Jamal Murray off of Austin Reeves, they didn't really have a good option to go to because those picking pops or those ghost screens were going to guys who couldn't make a

play when they would catch. Right, It's gonna be a little different than with Miami because Caleb Martin and gave Vincent him extrus are all red hot from three, and Jamal Murray's gonna have to guard one of those guys, and so you're gonna see a lot of Jimmy Butler bringing Jamal Murray up into the screen and working him down on those clear side ISOs like we saw a lot against Boston. He had nine points on seven post ups and ISOs during the regular season, so well over

a point per possession. He had some success against Jamal Murray with those typical little short jump shots that you've seen over the course of this playoff run. He was just toasting Michael Porter Junior off the dribble. He's just too slow. He did attack Jokic a few times on switches, and Yokic actually did a pretty nice job forcing him into contested jumpers, although Jimmy did make one of them. But I don't think Jimmy's gonna spend a ton of

time attacking yokicchen switches. I just don't think that that's gonna be as you know, productive for them is attacking the guards. But again, that's Miami's biggest advantage in this series. Can Jimmy Butler do what he's done all playoffs, preferably like what he did in the first round, where he's great in every single game, just persistently attacking the weaker Denver defenders on the floor. My three points were brought

to you by Chase Freedom Unlimited. Earn five percent on travel through Chase, three percent on dining including takeout, three percent at drug stores, and one point five percent on everything else. How do you cast back? All Right? My pick, I'm going with Denver in six. My gut says Denver and five. But I just can't do that anymore with this Miami Heat team. They're just too good at finding a way to win basketball games. But I think Denver's too big. I think they're too smart to fall victim

to some of Sposal's strategic plays. I think they're too confident and too good to fall victim to some of Jimmy Butler's psychological intimidation. I think Jokics will consistently make them pay for weak defensive personnel in a way that others for the Heat have not been able to. I pretty much think they're better than Miami in every single way aside from the coaching staff. But I don't think

that is gonna be enough to matter now. Miami's path, they need Jimmy Butler to dominate from start to finish, just like he did against Milwaukee and be the best player in the series. They need Eric Spolser to pull off the impossible and finally figure out a way to schematically disrupt Denver's offense when no one's been able to. They need red hot three point shooting from the role players,

just like they had in the Celtics series. And they need some kind of major offensive contribution from one of the heat role players, whether like last round it was Caleb Martin, maybe it'll be like Bam out of Bio. Tyler Harrow again could make an appearance in this series. Maybe he's that guy. But they need someone else to average twenty points per game in this series, just simply because of how powerful Denver's offense is for them to have any chance to keep up. So I'm going with

Denver in six. But that's Miami's path. We're gonna be doing breakdowns every single night after the game, and then during the two days off in between, we'll always do a film breakdown, so you're gonna get two videos for every single game during the NBA Finals. Like I said later this afternoon, I'm gonna be going with liv and she's our our biggest Nuggets fan on staff, so we're gonna talk a little bit about the Nuggets. They're going with the Nerd Sash guys on Wednesday and then obviously

Game one on Thursday. As always, I appreciate you guys, and we'll see you next time. The volume