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OK..I am used to playing PTB or a Motion most of last season. I went 22-4 and lost in the div finals. I run and gun from time to time BUT I have never tried Princeton in all my games going back to season 18. I have a pretty good balanced team but not sure if the Princeton offense allows all players to get involved. Anyone have a Love/Hate with using Princeton?

Even though I won playing the Princeton, I'll stick to my PTB or Motion or RNG. Just didnt care for the flow. I did how it allowed my PF to get more involved in shooting as I tend to run with a small line up from time to time. Thanks for the info.

It seems to me that Princeton is the one offense that allows everyone to get involved. If you have a balanced team, especially a good shooting centre, it may work out. I imagine good handling is also necessary.

It seems to me that Princeton is the one offense that allows everyone to get involved. If you have a balanced team, especially a good shooting centre, it may work out. I imagine good handling is also necessary.

You also need DR/PA.

I have been developing players for some time with Princeton in mind. I started using it pretty heavily early last season. My thoughts have changed some from what I have noticed watching my games. Here are some of my thoughts.

- true pg not required. Nor true sg. Passing is required at the guard and wing spots. Combo guards are more effective. Minimum base line skills would obviously vary from division to division but in USA D3 you would want minimum sensational passing at pg sg and sf. Jump range is important for these spots as well. Basically well rounded skills in the six guard skills.

- center is strange in this offense. Passing is important. Respectable minimum. Really doesn't shoot a lot. Either putbacks or 15 foot jumpers. I think you could sacrifice inside scoring at this position to afford more ID, REB, and SB. Of course if you do this you are selling your soul to this offense. Once again guard skills are important.

- pf. May be the most important position. I believe passing is required the least of the five spots here but never should be overlooked. Jump shot is a must. Jump range is a bonus. Handling and driving are required. Think inside based sf to an extreme.

The problem with my thoughts about this offense is it is very sophisticated as far as builds go. A lot of out of position training and it takes forever to finish building a player. When you finally complete some builds it is impossible to find complimentary players on the TL. Except maybe the guards. My pg is 16/11/15/14/14/13 for guard skills. That is probably dime a dozen. The sf, pf and especially the center are difficult to find or they are extremely expensive. I am going to see this experiment through. I like the challenge of being different but it may mean a few more seasons in D3 when I could just go buy a LI team and promote.

Looks like you have put a lot of thought and energy into building this team. Have you given a lot of thought to the type of team that would cause you problems?

For example, would a team with really good guards playing at pg, sg and sf playing a 3-2 be hard to handle or would they be more dangerous if they were playing man to man. How much does their offense impact your plans. R&G or PTB versus Princenton as an example. Where 1 style attempts to stalmate the other style.

I don't know for sure what would give problems as far as offense goes. I am a long way from having the team in place that will be successful in Princeton. My current center is not built for it, he is a place holder until I develop one to take over. I just sold my sg who was built pretty well for it, but had a couple flaws. The placeholder I have at SG is not built at all for Princeton. All of that being said, the dynamics of the inside/out offense is really intriguing. You will post significant game ratings in outside scoring. This would lure teams into playing a 3-2. I think 3-2 against a well built Princeton team is a mistake. When the flow is correct your guards get 5-8 ft jumpers near the basket and your bigs and sf will take 12 footers. All presumably in the soft spots in the zone. These are all really guesses but fairly educated. I have played it enough and even watched teams at higher levels games. You can see when mismatches are exploited and I think you just have to sell out your builds to make it work. I think Manon has a really good handle on how to build it.

I don't think there are specific offenses that would give the offense issues because I don't think the GE operates that way. I don't think one offense puts your team in a position to not get back well on defense compared to others. It should but I don't think it does. I think LI should have difficulty getting back on defense against RNG teams or other LI teams, faster paced. It would make sense, since the offensive guys are attacking the basket and I don't believe it is in the form of an iso clear out. The offense to stop is LI but not because of the style of offense you play. LI is the easiest, mindless to build offense out there. Granted there are well built LI teams, but even bad ones, if you throw enough cash at them, are mildly successful. The TL is full of players that are successful in this offense. The issue is the rebounding advantage obtained by running LI. To combat that, I believe your Princeton PF and Center will need to sacrifice IS for Reb. It would also be wise to have significant rebounding on your SF. I have seen some upper level teams stipulate that high JR is required to run Princeton. I think team passing is way more important, and if you implement a high level of passing, the offense runs completely different than if you plug your RNG team in offense. A good RNG team gives the appearance of jacking up three point shots at an incredibly slow pace when running Princeton. Add passing, and that all changes. It becomes a methodical attack on the weakness in the defense.

These are just my thoughts. I have no hard core data or proof it will work. I just have to take the BB's word that the game is not broken and everything is on even keel. I really enjoy the game, but my goals are different than most. If I never make the NBBA, that is ok with me. I would rather explore the unknown and break the mold. I haven't seen many teams at the highest level run Princeton successfully, at least not in large countries.

I'm on the same boat as you friend and youre perception of the offence is the same as mine maybe at some point we can exchange thoughts.

I have a few thoughts. Going to fire you a BBmail

Thank you for your thorough reply. Even more so, thank you for clarifying that you had no core data or proof. I am often quoted as saying something along those lines on Hattrick (where I feel I have a better understanding of the match engine then I do here)

Not being a numbers guy, sometimes it is easy to be discounted. I appreciate your thoughts and your approach.