I almost he said something else, something like "that's the way we intended to play", "that's our game plan when they try so hard to take away our main option", "Our offense wasn't the problem" - like so many here suggested. Blah, it's not. So, here lies my trouble: Everyone and his Mom know Blazers were going to front and weak-double Yao. And it's not like this is the first time we face this situation or hear "we're impatient", yet, we hear them again. In game one, I see him coaching AB, in game 2, I don't remember seeing that. "Players coach", that's Rick's biggest strength, and biggest weakness.
heard that live on espn last night. playing alongside yao may be a bit unique and a bit challenging for some players, but after so many repeated situation, they still haven't learned enough. that pisses me off a little bit.
When Adelman (not Alderman) comments about defenses fronting Yao, it's time to tune him out. Bunch of hot air. Any NBA team can cut Yao out of the game any time they want to. It's on the other Rockets players to take advantage and make a play because the lane will be wide open. This is when Lowry and Wafer can clean up.
I think that yes we played a bit bad (being optimistic here) but i think that if we had knocked down our FT we would have won. 10 missed free throws. Lost by 4 points. We had that problem with the jazz. probably in practices b4 game 3 we will be practicing our FT's ALOT.
That's what i been saying...it's one thing to know they're fronting Yao, it's another to totally ignore him. When you're not EVEN looking to pass to him or TRY HARD to look for him or ATTEMPT to look for him....then how the heck are you supposed to defeat the fronting??? You're not trying to do it..this team started out by waving their white flags and totally ignore Yao. And when the game is on the line, please remove the ball from Ron Artest. If he's not going to post up and back down and try to drive to draw foul (which is his strength), he has no business of shooting 3 pointers in crunch time!! These shots should belong to Aaron Brooks. I take Aaron's shots over Ron Artest any day!!
at the half during game 1, there was an adelman interview, where he said a problem with brooks was he'll play great and aggressive one game, then the next he'd come out hesitant....and it still happened, way to prevent the obvious
there you see.. once again.. repeated mistakes.. after the repeated "lessons to be learned" approach to those repeated mistakes.. where there is no learning.. the endless pattern.. this is a self-executed failing.. nothing to do with the opposition.. but no one listens.. it is the team not adjusting.. not focusing.. not reacting with a level head to expected strategies. it all self-inflicted..
You know what's more frustrating than the Rockets not having a solution to fronting Yao? People not knowing our freaking head coach's NAME even though he's been here for 2 years now. IT'S ADELMAN!!! And like someone said earlier, if Yao is being fronted, who cares? It's time for guys like Von, Kyle, and Aaron to take it to the hole, because that means TWO big men are being used for Yao. And honestly, why can't we just pull Yao 15-20 feet from the basket and have him set a pick when they're trying to front him. If his man decides to roll off and help on the ball, kick it back to Yao for a jumper. If he decides to guard Yao that far from the hoop, just take it strong to the rack.
Brooks and artest are the impatient ones. They would bring the ball up the floor and not even attempt to solve the front LITERALLY they would just dribble the ball to the other side for 10-15 seconds of one one one, one on two or three dribbling,Put a long jumper up and we were 1 and done.
if u want to be technical, offense was NOT the problem. we shot 50% and scored 100+ pts. defense was why we lost. we can't always say, yao doesn't get the ball this and that. when you score 100+ pts in the playoffs, you score enough.
Adelman went to the finals 2 times, and was runner up for coach of the year.. he took a squad with their 22 million dollar man (or should I say girl?) "injured" and came within 1 fourth quarter away from landing the 2nd spot in the West.. he has 3 D-leaguer on the roster, 2 young inexperienced point guards, an insane small forward who goes crazy very often, and an overhyped center who can't man up and establish post-up position on a guy half his size to save his life.. what I want to know is, how can anyone blame him for anything? it is NOT Adelman's job to coach Yao the fundamentals of posting-up when his defender is SINGLE HANDEDLY neutralizing him by sliding in front of him.. it takes will power, it takes intelligence, it takes strength, it takes strategy, it takes long painful hours in the weight room .. the coach's job is to put in the correct combination of players together, motivate the team, and mentally prepare them by giving them pointers and strategies when faced with different situations.. the center's job is to be able to keep his man behind him and raise his hand for the passer to get it to him... Hakeem didn't need Rudy to "beat the fronting defense" for him.. he manned up and destroyed the 3 guys who surrounded him consistently in the paint.. you threw the ball up to within 5 feet of Hakeem's reach, and 99 out of a 100 times Hakeem will come up with the ball, dream-shake the clowns, and knock the shot down.. it's not like Yao has position and we're not giving him the ball, he cannot get over his defender, he's getting owned in front of our eyes by that flopping piece of crap Pryzbilla and what do we do? we blame the coach of course!
If you really want to be technical, we scored 92, not counting the last 11 in last 30 seconds. In our games against Portland this season, we scored 99(L), 98(W), 102(W), higher than our season average. The way both teams has high percentages has something to do with the way game was called also. Form your own judgment what is enough.
