New Orleans Pelicans film room: Dante Cunningham and ineffective spacing

By Matt Cianfrone | Feb 14, 2015

When Dante Cunningham joined the New Orleans Pelicans earlier this year not much was expected of him. As a journeyman who had spent most of his career as a small ball power forward, Cunningham was expected to provide some depth at the power forward spot while filling in with some spot minutes at small forward thanks to the Pelicans lack of options at that spot.

As it turned out Cunningham did much more than that, quickly ascending to the starting small forward spot and handling those duties well. Lately though things are starting to be a bit tougher for the Pelicans with Cunningham on the floor thanks to defenses finally adjusting to what he does well. Nothing shows that difference more than the Pelicans shot distribution with Cunningham on and off the floor.

(data via NBA media stats. Click to enlarge if needed.)

All in all the shooting numbers aren’t terrible. With Cunningham on the floor the Pelicans shoot just 0.3 percent worse from the restricted area and 0.6 points worse from the paint while seeing increases in mid-range and three-point shooting percentages with Cunningham playing.

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The biggest problem though is distribution of those shots, especially because the shooting has dropped lately even when the Pelicans were healthy. With Cunningham on the bench, typically in place of Quincy Pondexter or a guard, the Pelicans see a nice jump in shots from the best spots to shoot from on the floor, the paint and the corner three.

Teams are starting to change the way they defend the Pelicans when Pondexter plays as well and making it very hard for the Pelicans to run any action that has Cunningham on the ball side.

This is what happened recently against the Thunder when Cunningham was in the corner on the same side of the floor as Tyreke Evans.

(still via NBA media stats video)

Against most shooters Roberson would not be able to so brazenly leave and cut off the entire side of the floor for Evans. Since the Thunder don’t have to respect the shot of Cunningham though he is able to, forcing Evans to use up a few extra seconds of the shot clock as he works back to the middle of the floor. Evans somehow made a tough layup after getting to the middle but the fact that Cunningham’s man was able to help so hard made it much more difficult than it should have been.

The same type of problem happens on the pick-and-roll. Typically defenders will do all they can to avoid leaving shooters on the ball side of the floor and scurry back to them at the first possible instance. Against Cunningham that doesn’t happen.

Instead Reggie Jackson stays down into the paint despite Serge Ibaka being in position to defend Davis. While Jackson only makes a lazy attempt to reach in other defenders will surely step farther in and cut off that lane from Davis going forward. The most discouraging part of the whole play is the lack of confidence Cunningham has in his shooting.

Instead of spotting up in the corner and being ready to shoot the corner three if Davis throws him the ball, Cunningham has already started making a cut, which makes an already tough pass for Davis harder to make. Instead Davis took the layup and missed in traffic, some of which was created by Cunningham.

This isn’t to say things are all bad with Cunningham. He has shown a very nice understanding of when and where to cut and has a particularly nice chemistry with Tyreke Evans. He has also been a help on the offensive glass and is a big upgrade from the defense that the Pelicans had been getting from John Salmons and Luke Babbitt at that spot earlier this year.

But it may be time to move Cunningham into bench units with Ryan Anderson and Evans and allow him to work as a pick-and-pop screener for Evans while Anderson spots up to clear out even more room.

The Pelicans clearly found something in Dante Cunningham, now it is just finding ways to continue to make the relationship prosper.

Next: Another Pelicans find will return for a second 10 day deal

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