Maybe I’m buying into too much of the hype for Smart around DPOY voting time, but a lot of people talk about how he really organizes their defense and calls out coverages from the point guard spot. To me, the Clippers should easily have the personnel to play the best defense in the league, it may just come down to coaching and them communicating and playing as a defensive unit with no weak spots to attack *COUGH*MORRIS*COUGH*. I mean last year, I think to start the year with PG they were a top 5 defense, so I don’t have a long ways to go. But just have to get those reps in as a healthy team and there is no reason why they shouldn’t be top 2 at least.

Definitely wouldn’t mind the Ty bringing in a guy like Vogel who headed the best defense in the league for like 2 of the 3 years he was the Laker’s coach.

Smart, Robert Williams, and Horford are a defensive trio that really might be hard to replicate. Given I might still put both PG and Kawhi above Jaylen and Tatum, Clippers still have a higher overall potential if they can surround those guys with a group that will play championship level defense. RoCo and Batum are both plus defenders that need to play a lot. Mann is probably the best guy to have in that Smart role. Smart was another guy for years they pegged as probably not a real “point guard”, and they kept bringing in guys like Kyrie, Kemba, Schroder to start ahead of him. Getting rid of Schroder and letting Smart really lean into that defensive point guard role really had them take off as probably the best team in the league.

If there’s anything I’m taking away from these playoffs is it really makes me wonder if the Clips should lean more into an all defensive lineup of Mann, PG, Kawhi, RoCo, and Batum. Mann probably still has a ways to go to get to Smart’s level of defense, but probably a better point of attack defender than anyone they’re going to get for a minimum contract. If I were the Clips, I would try and get Mann to work out with Smart this summer.