How the Celtics’ Jrue Holiday is finding new ways to ‘raise hell’ on defense

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How the Celtics’ Jrue Holiday is finding new ways to ‘raise hell’ on defense




Nov 19, 2023; Memphis, Tennessee, USA; Boston Celtics guard Jrue Holiday (4) reacts during the first half against the Memphis Grizzlies at FedExForum. Mandatory Credit: Petre Thomas-USA TODAY Sports


By Jared Weiss
3h ago



BOSTON — What is Jrue Holiday’s position? He’s a combo guard one quarter, and a big man the next.

The Celtics want to be versatile, and he can do pretty much everything on both ends of the floor well. But in his return from an ankle sprain Monday night, Joe Mazzulla had a new position for him: free safety.

“Tonight it was Jrue’s turn to like — we didn’t start him on (Nikola) Vučević, we didn’t start him on (DeMar) DeRozan. We kind of put him on another player to where he could be a free safety and go make plays and raise hell in our shift activity,” Joe Mazzulla said. “So he kind of tonight was the catalyst towards our weak-side defense because of his activity and his ability to not have to worry about an All-Star but be able to just kind of roam and play free safety. So it just adds a layer to our defense, but it starts with the buy-in from our team.”

What exactly does it look like when Holiday raises hell in their shift activity? The way the Celtics help on a string — aka shift activity — can vary based on how Holiday is being used that night.

They are defending in drop coverage more often with Kristaps Porziņģis at the five, which requires everyone to get in on helping. Boston generally calls its drop coverage “14” and switch coverage “15” when making changes on the fly, meaning everyone but the center is in switch in 14 while everyone is switching in 15.

Because they were facing Chicago, which has an elite midrange creator in DeRozan and a high-post scorer in Vučević, it made sense to stay in drop coverage. But the risk with drop is that when DeRozan is getting downhill, it can be hard for his man, Derrick White, to catch up chasing over a screen. So early in the game, Holiday made a move to make it clear to DeRozan that he wasn’t just going to get where he wanted.

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With Holiday out there, the Celtics have been showing elements of a defensive scheme called “Next,” something they’ve toyed with in the past but are leaning into even more now. You’ll often see this defensive alignment, where a guard is chasing the ballhandler over a screen and a defender sinks off the closest shooter to “gap” the ballhandler and make them pass.

Usually, gapping means jumping in the lane to briefly mess things up, then quickly recovering back to the shooter they left open. But Holiday takes “nexting” to the next level. He called “red left” which tells White he’s going to switch on to DeRozan and White then takes on his man.

This worked perfectly, because DeRozan was snaking the screen, meaning he was going across the paint after going over the screen. He does this because he wants Al Horford, the dropping defensive big, to switch onto him in what is called a “veer.” That would give Vučević a cross-match with a guard as he rolls through the lane, giving DeRozan a chance to lob it over the top to him or find an open shooter as the Celtics try to help.

With Holiday jumping in there, the Bulls lose the advantage, DeRozan has to pick up his dribble and the play is broken. But the play is not over, and that’s where Holiday makes another phenomenal read to call a switch.

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Watch again when DeRozan passes it to Coby White, Jaylen Brown overshoots his angle on White and gets left behind, Holiday spots it and immediately jumps off DeRozan for a low switch you don’t see too often. Typically, switches happen up near the ball to try to prevent the offense from advancing the ball toward the hoop.

But Holiday has shown a great sense of when playing farther back can both serve as a safety net on the action and lure the offense into a spot where he wants them. In this case, he wanted White to drive so Holiday could pressure him against the baseline, forcing him to pass out.

Holiday also has been impressive with his backside help, when the play is away from him and he needs to play an improvised zone without giving up an open shot. So on this play where the Celtics are scram switching White off Vučević in the post, Holiday did a nice job shifting into the most vulnerable passing lane to get a deflection.

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This was a good gamble both in knowing his personnel — his man DeRozan way up top isn’t a 3-point threat — and staying in a position so he could recover to DeRozan if Vučević didn’t make the pass he saw coming.

The Bulls ended up getting the deflection and Alex Caruso hit a contested 3, but this was the ideal process for how Boston can guard opposing bigs without putting Holiday on them.

“Any time Jrue is on the floor, making those reads, I’ve definitely learned a lot,” Brown said. “I’m looking forward to our growth as a team, but Jrue’s versatility has been key. Just his energy level, his presence on the defensive end, I think has also helped me be a better defender this year because I think I’ve been doing a lot better job in that area.”

There is still more work for the team to understand how he works and vice versa. On one play in the middle of the game, he helped off Caruso to double the post and Horford didn’t realize it was coming. So he was late to rotate over and Caruso got the layup. In the first quarter, when Holiday locked up a whole possession but then tried another one of these high-low zone switches. White missed it and Chicago scored.

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White and Holiday have been working together on a lot of these zone switches and they’ll need to be talking telepathically by the playoffs if the Celtics are going to stay in drop coverage in a full series. But while Holiday works a bit differently than Marcus Smart, another versatile free safety who was the fulcrum of the defense for years, it’s been clear Holiday is going to keep their defense at an elite level if they all can stay connected.

“Any time you add Jrue back into the lineup, it’s going to help your defense,” White said. “He just does so many things out there that impact winning. It’s nice to have him back. I think the last couple of games for sure we’ve locked back into that mindset and got back to the team we wanted to be.”


Bob


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