You have to keep the other team guessing. If you are too predictable, eventually the other teams will figure out how to stop you. That was the point of the Shaq comparisons: he doesn't have enough variety in his game. Nobody is suggesting that Yao should drop his back-to-the-basket game. We just want him to mix it up.
Whoa, verse and terse getting into it. This is almost as exciting as that epic, moomoo and hooroo encounter.
In Gumpy's head, put a 7'6 center 15 foot away to catch the ball is crime. I do not necessarily disagree. With Yao's height advantage, the most effective area for him is down low. Duncan is a power foward. Yao is a center. Duncan is more versitile. Someone posted Yao and Duncan's play DNA, which shows Duncan had a lot more ISOs than Yao and Yao has a lot more post up than Duncan. The way Yao's playing right now is invaluable. Brown said the rest of league want to play like Rip, why did he want to play like the rest of league. This quote applies here
Yao catch the ball like Ducan, put it on the floor, slash to the rim. I honestly dont see that will work for Yao. Or Yao pump fake like Dirk? Why would we want to change the way Yao plays with 50%+ FG percentage. We need good shooters and slasher around Yao though. To me the problem is not Yao's play is predictable, the problem we cant only limit to Yao's play when other team tripple team him.
well, i just don't see the purpose of change for change's sake. true, you want to keep the other team off-balance, but not at the expense of going away from your obvious strengths. this is tantamount to having duncan shoot threes. can he? yes. he can. seen him do it. in fact, he even started at small forward for the spurs for a stretch a few years ago. but is that his strength and, more importantly, is the team better when he is doing that? imo, no. the same logic applies to yao and the face up dribble drive. yao's obvious strength is that every center in the league is physically at a size and height disadvantage to him. EVERY ONE of them. why would we want to level the playing field by having yao face up and penetrate? i remember hakeem facing up bigger, stronger players like mark eaton and arvydas sabonis and shaquille o'neal. it was successful. the question to ask, though, is "why did hakeem face those guys up?" the answer is obvious: because those guys were bigger, stronger, and (maybe most importantly) slower than dream was. that's the advantage he wisely chose to exploit. basketball is not a difficult game. in a one on one situation, find the advantage (with the highest possibility of success) that you hold over your defender and exploit it. over and over and over again. don't get cute. just abuse your defender. yao has that in spades because of his size, touch, and height. asking him to penetrate is choosing the least desirable disadvantage that he has. that's why i brought up the luther head example. why have him practice (at this point) a skill which is counter to his most natural advantage(s)? like i said before, go ahead and work on it later down the line...as in, about 3 years from now, when he should have the posts (high and low) completely mastered. get creative with adding those things at that point. at this point however, he still has a lot of work to do in more important and advantageous areas.
Non sequitur: you only want to try the feasible things. In the interest of variety, Luther could take it to the rim occasionally, instead of always lurking beyond the arc. This would be easier if Yao didn't clog the low post all the time.
that is why all the EuroBall Rule changes are about making all 7 ftrs into jump shooters destroying the post game Rocket River
yao being in the post should not stop luther from driving. not at all. if yao's man can actually defend yao in the post and luther at the perimeter then we have serious spacing issues. nevermind the fact that if luther gets by his man and yao's defender comes over, yao's there for the easy dish and dunk. luther doesn't drive because luther loves the long distance shot and is not a good finisher. as an aside... is it just me or do the rockets (not including tmac) have some of the WORST finishers in the league? we miss more dunks, layups ,and layup opportunities than anyone i have seen.
Of course you need to abuse the other team repeatedly -- when you can. When it doesn't work, you try something else. Ironically, Hakeem was a perfect example: was he pigheadedly stubborn about sticking to his post-ups and Dream Shakes against Mark Eaton? No, his fakes didn't work against the lumbering behemoth, so he tried something else. Nobody is asking Yao to penetrate. At least I wasn't -- I was envisioning an occasional pass or jumper. And nobody wants Yao to face up consistently; we just want him to keep his other skills alive.
not really. i assumed that if yao is doubled, someone is open and with simple ball reversal, the open man will get the ball. if that is luther let him penetrate to 10 feet or even put up a floater at 5 feet. pulling yao away from the basket to 10-15 feet won't stop that double team from coming. nor will it make it harder to stop head from penetrating. the backside double teaming isn't exactly riding yao's bootie. he's usually sagging in the back waiting for a lob (assuming yao does not have the ball). if yao does have it and passes out, the backside defender will just drop back 3 steps and be in the middle of the paint by the time the ball get reversed back to the weakside corner. head's penetration situation hasn't changed one bit. he just doesn't do it enough, and isn't very good at it when he does do it.
Damn man, what more do you guys want out of Yao? You want a dominate low post player. Check... You want a great outside shooter. Check... You want a great free-throw shooter. Check... You want a good rebounder/blocker. Check... There's just so much a 7 foot 5 guy can do on the court especially when ask to do things a 7-5 frame are not capable of doing. I highly doubt Yao will ever posess a face up game ala Duncan, b/c he is too slow, not enough mobility and will cause to many turn over. Its not his game, its simple as that...its like asking Shaq to do the same thing which he only does at the ASG for fun. He just need to improve from what I've mention above and add a little more variety into them. Man, if Yao ever does posess a face-up game like Duncan, which I doubt,I wonder what you guys will be asking out of him after that? Way too many picky people here...
screw the face to basket game. its unrealistic for him to dribble and cross over his defenders. he should keep doing what he has been doing. get good position, shoot over dampier or hook over shaq or take it strong to the hole and get fouled. if you substitute yao with shaq for heat, they would have been up at least 2-1 by now. i know shaq is still good, but come on, he didn't do s...
If Yao is doubled in the mid post, there will usually be plenty of space on the other side of the lane and under the basket. This will be a great opportunity for Luther to take it to the rack. I want variety, not the stagnant, plodding, and often predictable offence we have under JVG.
