Very rarely does an NBA coach directly commission a story, but Rick Carlisle, so enthused by the performance of star big man Kristaps Porzingis, did so after the Dallas Mavericks' win over the Cleveland Cavaliers. "What KP is doing defensively," Carlisle implored according to Tim Macmahon of ESPN, "will somebody please write a story on that?" 

Carlisle's motivations were fairly transparent. Quite a bit of attention has been paid to Porzingis' struggles on offense since returning from a torn ACL, especially in relation to the ascent of teammate Luka Doncic into MVP candidacy. Porzingis has indeed been better defensively, and Friday was a banner night for him with four blocks in a 42-point win. Carlisle wants to pump up his star. He can't reasonably do it offensively. 

So he pointed the blogosphere in another direction, and I, being a responsible journalist, have decided to answer the call. Let's dive into what Porzingis has done defensively this season, how much praise it deserves, and what it means for Dallas' future as a potential championship contender. 

How the Mavericks have played defensively with Porzingis on the floor

We'll begin by looking at a few key numbers and where they rank (or would rank, if applied to a team's overall performance) within the league. 

Points allowed per 100 possessions: 108.3 (17th)

Points allowed per 100 possessions with Porzingis on the floor: 107.1 (15th)

Points allowed per 100 possessions with Porzingis on the bench (but active): 105 (12th) 

If you're wondering how the first number can be bigger than both the second and the third, it boils down to the one game Porzingis missed, a win over the Memphis Grizzlies in which Dallas allowed 115.1 points per 100 possessions, which is not counted in these totals. Such a poor defensive performance without Porzingis, especially over the larger sample size a full game presents, bodes well for him, but in games he has played, Dallas has been better with him on the bench. 

Those numbers don't tell the entire story, though. There is a bit of randomness working against Porzingis statistically, specifically when it comes to opponent shooting. When he has been on the bench so far this season, opponents are shooting 35.3 percent on 3-pointers, exactly league-average. When he plays, however, they are making 37 percent. They are also making 75.5 percent of their free throws when he is on the floor compared to 73.5 percent when he sits, and obviously, defense does not affect free throws. You may question how impactful those numbers are, but remember, two percentage points equal two whole points over 100 possessions, and that is essentially the difference between Dallas with and without Porzingis. When you combine those numbers with the harder job Porzingis has in playing most of his minutes against opposing starters, it is fairly easy to say that he makes their defense better. 

At this point in the season, though, samples are too small to read too much into any defensive numbers. A perfect example of this is in the lineups in which Dallas is playing its best defense with Porzingis. They are coming with rim-running specialist Dwight Powell, not the switchable Maxi Kleber, on the floor, but are based largely in shooting numbers that are likely to regress and an unsustainably low free throw rate allowed. The Kleber lineups will get better. The Powell lineups should get worse. There isn't much value in spending too much time on either specifically. Porzingis needs to be judged independently. Fortunately, the tape and the numbers both strongly support him in one important area. 

Porzingis as a rim-protector

By practically any metric, Porzingis has been among the NBA's best rim-protectors this season. Opponents were shooting only 44.2 percent against him within six feet of the basket entering Friday, per NBA.com, and while that number doesn't have him in the historic territory Anthony Davis is treading towards this season, it does rank him 11th in all of basketball among players who have appeared in at least 10 games and ahead of two-time Defensive Player of the Year Rudy Gobert. 

He is fourth in the NBA with 2.3 blocks per game and is leading a Dallas defense that, on the whole, has been very effective at the basket. Opponents are shooting 62.4 percent within three feet of the basket, the sixth-best mark in the league, and while Dallas is frequently among the best defenses in the NBA when it comes to deterring rim attempts in the first place, it's worth noting that only 27 percent of the shots Dallas is allowing are coming at the rim. That figure is 10th-best in the NBA. This all tells a simple story. Opponents are avoiding Porzingis at the basket, and when they attack him, it's going badly. 

This is what happens when the wingspan of a 747 meets good positioning and the right scheme. Dallas has always veered towards drop-coverage against screens and will continue to do so with Porzingis. The closer he is to the basket, the more effectively he can protect it. Things get much more difficult for him when he has to play further out on the perimeter. 

How has Porzingis defended in space?

Defending the perimeter has always been Porzingis' greatest weakness on that side of the floor, and the Mavericks have built their scheme around mitigating that weakness. But smart offenses adjust, and the Toronto Raptors, in particular, succeeded in forcing switches that left an overmatched Porzingis dealing with ball-handlers that were just too fast for him. 

Some of this is a physical inevitability. Porzingis is 7'3'', and moving laterally at that size is extremely difficult. Porzingis has never been adept at changing direction and coming off of a torn ACL, he just doesn't have the foot speed to stay in front of players like Fred VanVleet and Pascal Siakam. 

That doesn't absolve him of his fundamental sins, though. His reaction time on plays like these are too slow and leave him vulnerable to more decisive playmakers. He has to anticipate situations like these. This becomes especially problematic when he plays flat-footed defensively, a somewhat frequent issue in which he'll lunge towards a perimeter player and sacrifice fluidity in his hips seemingly with the expectation that he won't have to change directions again. 

Dallas has done well to try to scheme away situations like this as much as possible, but doing so in the regular season is one thing. Doing so in the playoffs is another. Even if he plays all of his minutes at center, which he likely will on the biggest stages, switching is an inevitability against the best offenses. Playing drop coverage against playoff LeBron James just amounts to giving him a runway before he dunks over you. Porzingis doesn't need to become Draymond Green, but he needs to at least be good enough not to get hunted. Staying light on his feet consistently and trusting his size to give himself a bit of extra slack on the perimeter would be a good start. Experience will be his best teacher in anticipating attacks off of switches.  

What is encouraging for now is that Porzingis' effort has mostly been there when it comes to defending beyond the basket. Even when opponents score on him, he's closed out well on bigger shooters without leaving his feet. 

Few of Porzingis' defensive issues can be ascribed to laziness, and as long as that remains the case, he will be able to improve in his weaker areas on that end of the floor. 

So, did Porzingis deserve a story about his defense? 

Probably, yeah. The casual discourse is always going to veer towards offense when players of Porzingis' caliber are involved because evaluating offense is much easier. Stats are more revealing, and measuring an individual's impact within the framework of a team is far simpler. 

Defense requires a degree of nuance that is harder to parse in 280 characters. It is also, frankly, less valuable on the individual level than offense is. It's why James Harden competes for MVP awards every year while Tony Allen never even reached the Mid-Level Exception in terms of salary. 

But on the team level, winning games is just as much about preventing the other team from scoring points as it is scoring them yourself. Porzingis has been essential to Dallas in that regard, and the fact that he has been means a lot in the face of the criticism he has drawn. If Porzingis looked disengaged defensively, it would be a worrying sign about what his offensive issues have done to his psyche. It's also the sort of thing that trickles down. If the highest-paid player on the team isn't trying on defense, why should anyone else?

Defensive effort stems from offensive performance in a lot of players, but Porzingis isn't letting his issues on one end prevent him from making an impact on the other. It's quite the reverse. Porzingis is actively ensuring that he makes an impact on one end as a means of making up for his lessened impact on the other, and regardless of what happens on offense, he deserves some commendation for that.