The most unorthodox defender in NBA history | Matisse Thybulle

This is Matisse Thibault, and if you watch a 76ers game, you might see him flying through the air like a Matrix character, and while that's impressive, it's the way that Matisse does this that makes him one of the most unique defenders in basketball history. The most basic defensive concept is to stay between your man and the basket, but when you watch Matisse, half the time his man is between him and the basket. You might think, well, he's just chasing his man over the screen, and that's true, but if you watch him for a while, you realize there's more to it than that. In this coverage, the typical move is to hustle back in front of the dribbler, but he's happy to stalk the ball and make a play from behind. Same thing in transition, most defenders try to sprint in front of the dribbler, but Matisse is thinking about coming from the backside to attack the ball. This time he's tracking James Harden, and Harden gets away, but then Thibault just teleports into the corner to block a three-pointer instead. As crazy as it sounds, I think he prefers playing defense from alongside or even behind a ball handler. He doesn't ever deliberately let his man by, at least I don't think, but his repertoire is rear-view dominant, and this is so atypical that it catches offensive players off-guard, making Thibault the hunter on defense instead of the hunted. When he chases guys around screens, he's looking to make plays defensively in rear-view pursuit, either flicking at a dribble with his 7-foot wingspan, or looking to spring up with that reported 40-inch vertical leap and stamp a jumper. Even on a more normal-looking play, he never really gets back in front of the ball, instead sitting on Zach Levine's right hand and then swallowing his layup attempt. Before Matisse, only three guards had officially blocked two shots every 100 possessions, Danny Green in 2018, Tracy McGrady in 2001, and Michael Jordan in 1988, and Green and McGrady played a ton of small forward. Last year, Thibault set a new standard for guards by averaging 2.6 blocks per 100, and he's right behind it again this year, thanks to that length and his leaping technique. Most players need a dip or some kind of wind-up to jump well, but Matisse just springs right off his strides, bouncing on his toes without needing much of a setup. He's got Zach Levine at his crosshairs here, hops a bit to avoid contact, and then just bounces right up to stuff the 6'10 Tony Bradley. And right here, Bradley winds up, but Matisse just bounces off the floor, and he's two feet off the ground before Bradley even takes off. Here's another look at him blending his strides into a jump. He gets a huge spring off this back foot, taps the front one, and somehow grazes this 30-footer. And this is how he surprises shooters with his closeouts, getting high enough to tip even Kevin Durant's shot. MJ could jump like this as well, transitioning from running to leaping by transferring the energy off his back foot, tapping the front one, and then vaulting into the air. Matisse primarily jumps like this. Heck, he's ready to jump like this most of the time, and it produces plays that defy physics, like jabbing at the rock, and then pivoting around and catching a shot out of nowhere. And again, most players try to slide in front of the dribbler, but Thibault makes plays from behind them. Chasing players around screens is such a big part of perimeter defense in today's game, and Matisse is generally good at making himself skinny and staying near his mark. But his athletic tools change the rules for him coming off of these picks. This is usually a clean shooting pocket for Dame Lillard, but Matisse attacks his airspace from, like, seven feet away, then jumps again to bother the shot. Jumping early into a shooter's airspace is a common Thibault technique off of screens. It doesn't always avoid a clean shot—more on that in a minute—but it's a great way to throw off shooters from the side or even from behind because he's up above their release point at times, which can be disruptive. And since he covers so much ground, he can take risks denying the ball and then recover around a screen. It's not a block, but it does move a great shooter off the three-point line. Later in the same game, Buddy Heald tries to fire one, and Matisse is so accurate targeting the ball that he gets a piece of it. As a reminder, here's what a more normal defender looks like in a similar situation, and as he goes around the screen, he's still on the ground when the shot is released. Matisse's leaping also deters shots from even going up. His length bothered Steph Curry in Philadelphia, with the threat of a contest pushing Steph inside the line. Then he retreats, Matisse is ready to jump, and that little move gives Curry a step, but now Thibault has him where he wants him, and that's going nowhere. It's an incredibly noisy stat, but according to tracking data, when Matisse is guarding players, they consistently shoot below their expected field goal percentage, and while it's unlikely he'll always be in the top five like he is this year, he does make a ton of jump shots really difficult for many of the league's best perimeter scorers. That wingspan and his fast reactions also help him in passing lanes, and he's among the league leaders in steals too. When the ball is in front of him like this, he often looks to make a play and he's reading passers with his hands adjusting to the level of the ball here to force the turnover. Here's some more matrix Matisse snatching a pass out of the air to save a layup in transition. So the man is a playmaking artist on defense, but is there a cost to his radical defensive style? Here's a quintessential Thibault possession. He starts with Durant, and then instead of recovering to get back in front, tries a reach around for the steal, which leads to a foul line shot that he nearly blocks from the side, but then he gets behind the ball again, forcing backline help, and it ends up in a dunk. Here's some more chaos, starting with a lunge into the passing lane, which frees up Lillard, and now Matisse is pursuing him from behind, which actually works out okay until Lillard gets a step, and Matisse instinctively reaches for the steal, which forces help, and Philly gets away with a Tyrese Maxxie foul at the rim. Thibault isn't actually that great at keeping penetrators in front of him, especially in traditional man-to-man situations. He can be fantastic when he yields space and is on the move like this, but in more stationary spots, he's vulnerable to shifty horizontal shakes and can't always recover to alter the shot. He swipes at the ball a good amount like this, and every time Matisse falls behind the action, a teammate needs to step up while the rest of the defense adjusts. This shows up in screen navigation, where he takes a line to Durant's outside hand instead of moving back in front of him, which occupies He loves to reach around ball handlers for the steal like this, and sometimes nothing comes of it, but other times those really wide, circuitous routes around screens don't end well for the 76ers. Here's one where he dodges the screen, and a normal defender would slide in front of the dribbler, but Matisse goes for the reach around, which pulls over a teammate, and that's an easy pitch-and-catch for three. Here's a different kind of gamble from the same game. Instead of closing to the shooter, Matisse will take away this corner pass, and while some coaches actually teach that, I'm not sure jumping like this is in the plans for Philly, and again the defense is exposed. It's clear that Thibal is a wrecking ball when he's flying all over the court and making plays, but it's not clear how much his misses actually hurt. Every major one-number defensive stat views him as a positive, but some view him as a defensive player of the year candidate, while others think he's merely a good perimeter defender. I think the more interesting question is how valuable can a defender like this be without having much of a presence in the paint? He spends most of his time glued to elite perimeter players and isn't much of a paint protector as a result, and even when he roams off a bit, he's not exactly Draymond Green in help situations. Another question is whether Matisse's style is as valuable outside of Philadelphia's drop coverage, and whether he needs a strong rim protector behind him, like Joel Embiid, to slow down penetrators while he pursues them from behind. My sense is that Matisse is in a good situation in Philadelphia, and that his strong statistical indicators aren't a fluke, but I also want to see more. I want to see him in the playoffs more, or even in a different scheme, because he is such a unique defender, and it's hard to really gauge how valuable all of his chaos out there really is. As of now, I don't think he can match the impact of the elite big men of the league, but he is so destructive out there that it's easy to see why Matisse Thibault is an all-league-level defender. To support this channel, check out Patreon.com slash Thinking Basketball. We have a ton of extra content, in-season proprietary stats that update daily, and more. Let me know what you think of Matisse. Unique players can be very hard to evaluate, and I know some coaches are frustrated by all of his chaos. As always, thanks for watching, hope you enjoyed it, and that you are having a great day.