Marcus Smart: All-Defense?
Thomas: First things first, staying in the starting lineup would help Marcus Smart’s case a lot. Not many bench players make NBA All-Defensive Teams not because they aren’t worthy, but because, frankly, voters aren’t informed enough to make choices with any substance beneath the surface. As long as Smart remains a sixth man, he’ll continue to get overlooked for his incredible defensive contributions.
If Smart stays in the starting lineup, he will certainly make a case for a spot on an All-Defense Team. Boston has the second-best defensive rating in the league, and the Celtics defense is 1.2 points better than normal when Smart is on the floor, per Cleaning The Glass.
Smart is the rare guy who can guard primary ball-handlers, but also hold up on big guys in the post and the paint. It’s an incredibly important attribute as a switching defense is sometimes the only viable strategy to defend the top players in pick-and-roll.
Christopher: Campaign.
It is very clear to everyone who watches the Celtics on a night to night basis that Marcus Smart is one of the best guard defenders in the NBA. He is an unbelievably fierce competitor who takes a tremendous joy in ensuring that no offensive play gets past his brick wall 6-foot-4, 225-pound frame. He is one of the few people on earth that can guard NBA point guards and can also defend people like Paul Millsap (like he did in the 2016 playoffs).
The only difference between Marcus Smart and the people who make the all-defensive team in front of him is that he isn’t a household name. Is Marcus Smart a worse defender than Victor Oladipo, who made an all-defensive team last year? Probably not, but Victor has the name recognition over Smart. Thus, Smart must campaign.
Patrick Beverly, one of the premier point guard defenders in the league, never made first team all-defense until he proclaimed himself the best defender in the world in 2017. This caught the eye of the voters and got him voted in to first team all-defense that year. Smart will have to be his own hype man if he wants an all-defense award.
Petey: Keep doing what he has been doing for a long time now. Smart is an all-defense level defender. Period. What could help his all-defense case would be shutting down one of the game’s elite guards. Holding one of the Currys, Lillards, or Hardens of the world may start to get Marcus Smart some attention.
If he can string a few of those attention grabbing games together, then his all-defense campaign may gain some real traction. Remaining in the starting lineup may also sway the media members who vote to write Smart’s name down.