The Blazers only had one capable frontcourt scorer, so Chuck Hayes saw limited minutes. The Lakers have 3, so Chuck Hayes is going to have to play a major role if we are to win this series.
#1 Yao gets a new hairdo. #2 Landry plays more minnutes. #3 Landry makes FTs. #4 AB shoots 20 3-pointers. #5 Artest shoots 15 3-pointers. #6 Battier shoots 10 3-pointers.
The fast break thing is tied to the turnovers. Somehow, we managed to win game 1 with a high number of turnovers. That will not continue. The Lakers are long and play the passing lanes. We can break this D down even more by taking care of the ball.
1. Get Yao the ball 2. Rebound the basketball 3. Play hard throughtout 48 minutes (at the beggining of the 1st and the 3rd as well)
First off, I would take the Lakers' Game 2 strategy and fire it right back into their faces. Phil Jackson [wisely] started Odom in order to gain a Yao vs. Gasol one-on-one match up early on. He figured his team would come out firing and Gasol could hopefully get Yao into early foul trouble thereby limiting his minutes and never allowing Yao to get into his rhythm. Well guess what? It worked. I say we do the EXACT same thing early on to Gasol and the Lakers. We all know Gasol is going to front Yao but one noteworthy point I noticed with Gasol is: while he initially takes typical fronting position in front of Yao, he doesn't always hold that position because he's either afraid Yao might catch a lob pass or Yao might simply win the positioning battle. Point being: if Yao is persistent and patient enough, Gasol will concede position eventually. In which case, we need our ball movement and passing to be crisp. Find Yao, get him the ball and let him get hot early on. This will get the Lakers thinking and hopefully will get Gasol into foul trouble. Gasol in foul trouble means more Bynum. More Bynum means Yao goes for at least 25. Make it happen. Second, don't get discouraged by Kobe's 40-point effort. Battier's on-ball defense was still about as solid as you could ask of somebody. I highly doubt if you replaced Battier with Artest, Bruce Bowen, Tayshaun Prince or whoever -- that they could have prevented Kobe from going off last night. Kobe is all jumpers and pull-ups so there's still no need to double him. Let's hope playing on the road combined with Battier's incessant defense might throw Kobe into a bit of a funk. Unlikely, I realize -- but we cannot make the mistake of "overadjusting" in a situation like this. Third, we definitely need to get the Chuck Wagon at least 20 minutes again. If you can't see the value in Chuck getting heavy minutes in a series like this then there's really no hope for you. He's a one man wrecking crew out there. Simply stated: the Lakers do not score when he's in the game. I'm not big on +/-'s but there's a reason he was a +15 last night. He's an absolute terrorist defensively and probably the most underrated player in this series so far. Provided he can stay effective in this role and out of foul trouble, there's really no reason he shouldn't be getting at least 20 minutes per game. Fourth, limiting turnover's and our transition defense MUST improve. They held a 20-to-5 edge in fast break points. Most of which were points off TO's. There's not really any adjustment you can make to counter this problem other than to play smarter and limit bad decisions.
1. Give Yao The Damn Ball - It's not hard to realize he's our team's best and most efficient player. He's the hands down best center in the NBA right now. He doesn't even have to score, he just needs touches. Because he creates a lot of open looks for himself and for others. 2. Give Lowry more minutes than Aaron Zero Assists Brooks. - It's obvious right now. Kyle Lowry is about 10x the player Aaron Brooks will ever be. Lowry has a brain, is tough, plays defense, attacks the rim and most importantly passes it to Yao 3. Stay out of foul trouble - We don't need any ticky tack fouls taking our players out of the game. We need all of our current players playing. 4. Force their best players to play defense - Odom and Gasol are average defenders. They are nothing special. Scola and Yao have to expose them defensively, because Gasol had his way offensively last night. Odom makes Gasol better because of his presence. Kobe Bryant also needs to waste some energy guarding Artest, Wafer or Battier. 5. Play Hard nose defense - This is our only chance of winning. We need to play defense to win, we don't need to run fast breaks and create turnovers. We need to just stop them from playing there best basketball. That's it.
Get Shane, Yao and Ron to move on the perimeter when AB and Lowry beat their man. That is how the 2nd unit is so effective, they move off the ball into open spaces. The first unit needs to do the same. DD
mostly agree except for i don't think they need to worry about TO too much. Most of those TOs are aggressive plays that resulted in a no call by the refs. Those will likely go into Rockets' favor in game3 and 4. If anything, Lowry and Wafer should keep attacking the rim more to help Yao get Lakers' bigs into foul trouble As for Brooks he is too small to get fouled when he drives. When Lakers clog the lane, he really had no where to go. The thing he needs to improve is that he must no hesitate to shoot the 3 ball when he's not covered. The 3 ball is what he does best and I am frustrated by how many wide open looks he passed, and i am not even talking about the opportunities in transition. That I think we need to hold back to play Rockets' tempo, but when the play is set and you are wide open, by all means, shoot it. Same for Berry, I don't know what's wrong with him, passing wide open 3s to Lowry. This is the only thing he's good at, if he doesn't shoot the ball, what else he could help the team.He is probably too old and lost focus, but could careless, as he probably won't play much. anyway the most important in game 3 and 4 will be points in the paint and get Lakers' big into foul trouble.
That's exactly right. Poor PG decision making/patience and lack of ball movement resulted that Gasol didn't need to play defense much last game. If they want the mismatch, you have to make Gasol play defense. Shoot the open ball, repost, swing the ball, and penetrate.
I agree. Right now Wafer is not handling the pressure well. Brent Barry needs to get more minutes. He has championship experience and he will start hitting those threes once he gets into a rhythm. He is also a better ball handling than Wafer. Also, Yao needs to MOVE HIS FEET. He look like he was stuck in mud. He has to move his feet in order to defend Gasol better. And if Gasol is fronting, grab a rebound for crying out loud, play some defense, and move around. Don't just lean on Gasol and do nothing else.
If the Lakers go small, Yao can pull out Gasol and have the other guys attacking the basket. Ron, Scola, and Landry wiill have an easy time against Odom or Ariza. At the same time, It would save Yao energy on the offensive side so he can use it on defense. I think this can be an option if their usual counter to fronting defense against Portland doesn't work.
With Joey and company as the refs, fouls would be called on Yao even if the dude didn't play. Rocks could have won the game with Yao in foul trouble last night, if refs had made the right call on Kobe's elbow to Ron. NBA is just a GAME, and not a fair one.
