Offensive Urgency & Spacing

While there have been some GREAT foundational and core improvements to offense by The Czar, one of the things that still affects gameplay is the lack of Offensive Urgency. Many of the bad, video-game only habits of cheesy players is augmented by the fact that offensive players too often don't move with purpose.


Take the typical cheeser camping out for steals in the back-court refusing to get back on defense. There's a basketball reason this is a bad idea--its a basic one too. One of the first things you learn on offense in basketball if your man leaves you, is to sprint to an open area on the court (within your wheelhouse) but watching offensive movement in NBA 2K19 our AI teammates barely notice when defenders leave them. In the past they'd cut to the rim, but now that a help defender drops middle (more on that later) thats no longer effective. Think about it, when a center's man is late up the court he's taught to run to the rim, but offensive players consistently show little awareness or urgency in this area. They'll literally let a beat player catch up to them instead of taking advantage of an easy scoring opportunity.

The other issue is that in so many other areas of gameplay, Neutral Outcomes protect users from bad decisions. A player can miss a steal but still remain in textbook, perfect defensive position--and that's horrible, horrible balance. Things like steals in H2H should always be Risk/Reward. If you're successful you steal the ball, if not? You have to risk something...thats literally the 2nd H2H Commandment. Missing means you lunge at the ball and are Whistled or Miss and the result is being out of the play. THIS is how missed steals look:

The worst aspect of these Neutral Outcomes might be the missed steals in transition. Defenders cant be in a dead sprint, miss the ball without losing a step and taking themselves out of the play--not in a balanced game. Thats just bad gameplay. Watch here as Millsap and Harris, swipe at the ball and miss but remain step-for-step with Butler. In the second clip it actually gets Harris closer. NO WAY.

Here's a much better interaction. Grant misses, and loses momentum correctly but Chandler has no urgency whatsoever--its like he's on a leisurely stroll. When he SHOULD create even more distance by sprinting to the left corner and wait to receive the ball. He shouldn't let Grant catch up after that bonehead mistake. I try to wait for him to get open but he never does.

Gortat misses a steal here and AGAIN: Keeps textbook position. Embiid gets upcourt for the dunk but he's in the play when he shouldn't be:

Watch JJ and Butler, I keep waiting for one to sprint to the right wing as I try to avoid the hit-stick steal from Harden (who's covering JJ) but NOPE. They're both literally jogging--and Redick runs TO the defense on the left side.

 Adams is hanging around in the backcourt but Amir won't sprint to the rim--So I gotta take it myself:

Embiid does this perfectly, he sprints to the rim to beat a "late" Noel twice:

 We should NEVER see stuff like this, watch as Durant goes for the steal, misses but somehow still cuts off the drive of Simmons, thats really bad and unbalanced gameplay. You simply can't be two places at once:

Lack of balance also affects the spacing, the advantages of spacing and the core way people play defense. For instance, its impossible to double down and recover to the 3pt line--you have to choose. That's vintage being-two-places-at-once But not in 2K. Defenders can crash down on the post player and still get a smothered contest on a 3pt shooter. Things like this aren't authentic to the core aspects of basketball. The double down animation has to be slower to break and foot planting/momentum has to play a bigger role here:

Poor movement also kills spacing. Watch here as JJ (who's job it is to space the court) cuts to the FT line making it easier on the defense when they double. The offense also has to counter the help defender going middle, instead of cutting behind him to create easy steals (like Ben did here) they should cut in FRONT of him. This is a better interaction overall as it takes away easy baskets without making the offense stupid:

 JJ cuts to the basket in stead of to the right corner here. Killing the spacing again:

Here the spacing is reversed, Jimmy cuts to the rim and Simmons spots up? NOPE. This breaks the play if the double had been more effective:

In the end there are many more great options offensively than bad in 2K19 thanks to Czar's hard work with playbooks, but there are still some things we could see better done next year. Until next time guys.