Monta dominates the ball, but never the line. OKC’s two guard is a foul-seeking missile.
Ellis is third in the league at 19 field goal attempts per game but is merely 19th overall at 5.5 free throws per night. Contrast this with another two guard, James Harden. The bearded foul sponge shoots nearly half as many shots (10.1), yet notches 6.4 FTAs per game–good for 10th in the league. It’s not even that Harden is better at getting to the rack because James only averages 3.2 rim shots to Monta’s 5.2.
Enough with the numbers.
Why is Harden so superior in this respect? There are a few reasons that players keep accidentally fouling JH. Harden is bigger, he has fantastic lateral dexterity, he’s an awkward lefty. Perhaps, most importantly: James Harden is a genius flopper. He has all the start-and-stop contact absorption of Chauncey Billups, but adds a ref-hypnotizing nuance to the dance. When Harden finds contact real or imagined, he whips his head back as though God yanked his beard skyward. It is difficult to witness a man’s head wrench backwards and not blame an exterior culprit.
Monta has the physical ability to draw more fouls, but he eschews Harden’s slight of head, slight of hand. When I asked Ellis about flopping, he said, “That’s not me,” and qualified it with, “That’s what they do.”
They. Them. The Warriors two guard has his own way of doing things, and likely won’t change. He comes from a pocket of Mississippi where the neighborhood kids built a peach basket hoop, without irony, out of necessity. Even in a world of players who hail from provincial pockets of poverty, insular Ellis appears a world apart.
But, it would be nice if Ellis took a page from his old pal Corey (gasp!) Maggette and indulged in some fakery, even if it goes against his trusted approach. The Warriors consistently rank near the bottom of the league in drawing fouls, and it’s become a particularly acute problem since their starting center started avoiding the line. Monta’s aesthetically pleasing, “make the layup at any cost” approach could stand to be leavened with some flailing and play action head fakes.
ESS… please don’t say “rim shots” 😛
*now on to the rest of the article*
Monta doesn’t need to flop more…other players need to flop less.
And the refs needs to stop falling for that corny bullshit. It ruins the game and rewards offensive laziness.
Ironic how Monta is the one who gets penalized for not “cheating” the system.
@World B. Free
Ultimately, man, I agree with you. Sadly, that’s not the state of the sport these days and, like a government, it’s incredibly hard to change this. The stars of the game like Kobe and Wade have learned to live at the line, and if we changed the way we called that stuff those stars would not be the impact players they are today. The NBA would be terrified to do anything like that.
@Evanz
Hi-yo!
Peter Guber is a Holywood guy. Can’t he find someone to give Monta some acting lessons?