Boom

As the third quarter was dwindling down in the Golden State Warriors’ home-game contest against the Orlando Magic (which seemed like an eternity ago — but was actually just a month ago), Dennis Schröder brought the ball down as Steve Kerr was calling out the play to run. In the Kerr era, the Warriors have favored one certain play to end quarters — a fact that has been known throughout the rest of the league and one that most opponents have come to expect the Warriors to unholster whenever they possess the ball to end quarters.

It was notorious enough for JJ Redick and LeBron James to mention it on the now-defunct Mind the Game Podcast:

JJ and LeBron were laughing about this play because it's a play the Dubs have been running for 10 years, specifically to end quarters ("Fist Out"/"Ram Exit").

Everyone knows what it is and knows when it's coming, but it still works: pic.twitter.com/5ZG1MnDTHP

— Joe Viray (@JoeVirayNBA) May 1, 2024

As such, Kerr was holding out his fist to call out the play:

A play I have termed as “Ram Exit” (and one the Warriors call “Fist Out,” hence Kerr’s play call) is called as such because it involves two main components. First, a “ram” screen, which is a screen for a player who comes up to set a ball screen for the ball handler. In the case against the Magic, Moses Moody is the designated ram screener for Gary Payton II to come up and set the ball screen for Schröder:

In most cases — and in its ideal form — the ram screen is nothing more than window dressing for the actual meat of the set. The ram screener (Moody) subsequently comes off of an “exit” screen in the corner, set in this case by Kevon Looney. Note how Moody’s defender (Paolo Banchero) drifts his attention away from the exit screen action because of the initial ram screen action (helped by a bit of Schröder manipulation magic):

This sequence occurred on February 3 — back when Schröder was the new kid on the block and Jimmy Butler was mired in the midst of Miami Heat drama. A month later, Schröder is now Cade Cunningham’s backup in Detroit, part of a package that sent Butler to the Warriors as their brand-new shiny toy.

The danger of facing someone like Schröder not long after trading him is that he is still quite aware of his previous team’s playbook. “Ram Exit” isn’t a difficult play to remember, nor is it hard to make out Kerr holding his fist out and immediately knowing what happens next. This isn’t a phenomenon exclusive to the Warriors — most teams know each other’s plays and take measures to stop them, both on the fly and in pre-game planning. Execution, however, is easier said than done, despite any sort of institutional knowledge that should help.

When the Warriors — down by a single point to the Detroit Pistons with under a minute to go — were about to get into their after-timeout (ATO) set Kerr drew up, Schröder saw an all-too-familiar setup. It didn’t take long for him to take away the meat of the set: Steph Curry as the initial ram screener and exit screen recipient. Schröder was having none of it from the get-go; just peep at how adamant he is at not detaching himself from Curry throughout this possession:

Schröder voraciously top-locks Curry to take away the exit screen, while the Pistons switch the ball-screen action up top involving Butler and Moody. The designated exit screener (Draymond Green) finds himself all alone on the wing, unable to set Curry free with Schröder placing himself between Green and Curry. Meanwhile, Green’s defender (Jalen Duren) has no qualms with leaving Green alone and dropping back in the paint in order to take away any potential Curry backdoor cut.

With Butler unwilling to take Cade Cunningham off the dribble, he forces Green to make a decision with the ball instead — the obvious one being to shoot the three with practically no Piston minding him, unafraid of his ability to shoot the ball from that distance in a high-stakes situation.

To be fair to the Pistons — and as GSOM legend and DubNation HQ stalwart Eric Apricot often puts it — no one ever got fired for sticking to Steph Curry. Certainly no one would get fired for leaving Green alone with an open shot on the perimeter, if the alternative was the greatest shooter of all time being provided even a sliver of breathing room. But this was one calculated gamble Green made them pay for:

In an alternate universe, Schröder’s institutional knowledge may have been enough to get the Pistons the win. There was no real defensive breakdown; the Pistons stuck to the coverage plan that — for most of the night — “worked,” in the sense that Curry had an inefficient (by his astronomical standards) 32 points, all of which he was made to work for in the face of copious ball denial and top-locking.

In a similar manner that Green maximized the room provided to him in the possession above, Curry also found (and created) room through which he was able to score. Unlike Green, the room he was working with were, more often than not, within tight spaces.

Butler’s presence as a possession stabilizer and secondary scorer (26 points, 9 rebounds, and 5 assists on 9-of-17 shooting, 64.7% True Shooting), Gui Santos wearing a blue collar and making himself a presence in the margins, and Moody’s timely defense and ball pressure on Cunningham all played a significant part in this victory against a surging Eastern Conference squad. But it was Green’s boomshot — in which he was left wide open on a play the Warriors call “Fist Out” — that was the knockout punch.