There is a myth that setting a great screen is only a post players job. Setting a great screen doesn’t take any freak athletic ability. So why aren’t more players better at it? The logical answer is because setting a great screen will never show up on SportsCenter or be talked about in the newspaper.
However, setting a great screen takes, basketball IQ, toughness, and unselfishness. To be a great picker you need to care about your teammates because if you set a great pick they are usually the one that will get an open shot while you will get nothing but a forearm or elbow to the chest from the defender. If your lucky your teammate who scored might point at you as they run down the court.
A fact that has long been known in the NBA: Pound for pound, the best picker in the league is a scrawny 6’1 175lb guard named John Stockton. He has three NBA records; assists, steals, and the best picks.
Ask NBA players and coaches which players set the most effective picks, and you will wind up with a laundry list of tough, physical, big men. Power forwards such as the Jazz's Karl Malone, the Knicks' Charles Oakley, the Pistons Dennis Rodman and the Grizzlies' Otis Thorpe were mentioned often. Those players are 6'8" or taller and 225 pounds or heavier. But somehow John Stockton (6'1", 175) was mentioned more often than any other player. "I wish my fours and fives would set picks as effectively as Stockton," says a Western Conference coach. “He won't flatten you like Malone or Oakley, but he won't ever set a lazy screen.”
OTHER UTAH JAZZ TIDBITS
On the court Stockton 's style is as simple as his wardrobe. "He's as steady as the ticktock of a clock," says Malone . "Other point guards come into the league, and they've got the flashy moves and the endorsements. Then they come play against John, and he teaches them that you can play this game without putting the ball between your legs 20 times before you do something with it. He just keeps making the plays, game after game, and year after year."
One of Stockton 's off-the-court interests is flying, which he indulged in last summer when he briefly took the controls of an F-16 jet under the supervision of a pilot with the elite Air Force Thunderbirds. In his description of the pilots, he came close to describing himself. "They're normal guys outside the plane, but inside they're pretty special," he said. "When you watch them, you realize it takes only the slightest touch to do some amazing things. It's like everything else, I guess. When you get guys who are the best in the world at what they do, they make it look easy."
Go to a Jazz practice, and you will find that every player has his shirt tucked in his shorts at all times. "That's the rule in games, so why not do it in practice?" Layden says.
Businesslike and unpretentious, Sloan demands an honest day's work from his players. Longtime followers of the Jazz knew better than to ask him if he would reduce Malone 's and Stockton 's playing time after Utah clinched the best record in the West. "Players get paid to play, not to rest," he says. "If someone's driven 200 miles to watch us play and paid a bunch of money for tickets, we're not giving him his money's worth if Karl and John are sitting on the bench."
Malone acknowledges that Utah 's run of success will be in danger within a few years. "I think after John ,Hornacek, and myself leave, they're going to have a hard time getting players to come here," he says. "I like to tease our owner by pointing to some of these young guys with shorts down to their ankles and 12 tattoos and telling him, 'You're going to be paying someone like that $100 million someday.' Larry just shakes his head and says, 'I'll sell the team first.' When we go, it's going to be the end of an era."
