Alex Caruso on How He Defends Elite Scorers
The Bald Eagle shared some tips on how to lockdown the best of the best.
Alex Caruso was on The Old Man and the Three podcast recently and he talked about how he would defend the NBA’s elite scorers.
Caruso told J.J. Reddick and Tommy Alter that the most important thing when defending really, really good scorers is to make them uncomfortable.
And to do this, he says, you have to be spontaneous and throw different coverages at them.
“I have to remind myself to climb up into guys to get them off rhythm. That’s the only thing I can think of,” he says.
“That’s the big thing too is throwing different coverages at guys, throwing different looks at guys,” he continued. “You let them get a rhythm off one-on-one, but if you give them the same look all night, they’re going to figure it out.
“Eventually, they’re going to figure out what move [they] can get to… You gotta blitz them every now and then,” he added. “You might even throw it back and hedge once or twice… You gotta switch it up on guys that are elite scorers.”
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Caruso has been one of the best defenders in the NBA these past few seasons.
He’s the Chicago Bulls’ primary defender and is constantly guarding the opposing team’s best scorers, and the majority of the time does a fantastic job of slowing them down.
In 2023, he was voted onto the All-Defensive First Team for the first time in his career.
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