I just hate JVG being so conservative. Normally elite teams will play a 10-12 players rotation in the regular season, carefully manage their starters' minutes and keep their star players fresh just for the playoffs. In the playoffs, then they will shorten their bench. JVG is playing playoffs basketball in the regular season now. He has a rotation that only has 8 - 9 players, he has to play his starters a lot , especially his two star players because all his offense do is try to get the ball to Yao and T-Mac and let them work on their own. Why and why doesn't he give VSpan and Novak at least 5-10 minutes playing time? They have to own it in practice? Come on, some guys could be a super star in practice and still can't play in the real game. How do you develop them if you don't play them at all? How can they gain experience and learn their lesson if they can't play any meaningful minutes? Regarding the Bonzi situation. Yes he is lazy and yes he is irresponsible. But if he wants play, let him play. Give him 10-15 minutes per game and see what he can do. I am sure a fat ass Bonzi is still better than Padgett and Howard in 10 minutes playing time. You have to work him into game shape, not by sitting him!
Bonzi wants to play. Any few words you hear from him is that he wants to play and is ready, but JVG won't let him. I don't know how anyone can defend JVG on this matter. He's putting his own personal feelings above the team winning and that's sad.
Bonzi has been saying he's "ready" since before the regular season. He clearly wasn't ready a few games in. Why trust what he says now?
I don't think the 36 minutes was the main problem of his low energy in the 4th, but rather the heavy minutes in the 3rd. He didn't get his usual rest on the end of the 3rd, unnecessarily. He was never able to recover from that. JVG has to take it into consideration, that Yao was battling 4 quality big men in the Pistons, not some quick fronting scrubs. I would rather to have him stay with the routine, even to risk being donw a couple of points in the 3rd quarter, to reserve a fresh Yao in the fourth. If Yao was able to have the energy to make couple of shots in the beginning of the 4th quarter, TMac might have a lot easier, and the rest of the team would follow. In other words, that couple of minutes rest in the 3rd could mean a Rockets blowup win, don't forget that Yao caused 16 fouls on those 4 big men in 3 quarters. Of course, hindsight is 20/20, and I can never prove that what if. However, Yao did have strong 4th quarters in the past, even just this season, when he had good rest in the 3rd.
He was ready then and ready now. I don't know if you've ever seen bonzi played, but he's always had that big chubby look and will never be skinny. I believe his word over JVG's cause JVG is petty and stubborn.
JVG is not good at assigning playing time for players. Total playing time is nothing, it's more about the intensity of certain moments. Yao is the focus on both offensde and defense for every poseesion, so opponents can easily wear him down. JVG got to think a way to allocate his player's energy.
Hey he is the coach isn't he? You cannot let one player get away with something and not the others because it causes friction. You have to lay the law down for ALL players to follow. If Bonzi doesn't meet the minimum health standard then he needs to get off his butt and put the work in. Lets talk about things that really matter like how the team collapses due to poor choices on shots, the fact they stopped going into Yao and kicking it out, and stupid turnovers and fouls.
Well said! If we continue to run Yao and Tracy in the ground this early in the season on this short of a rotation we are looking at another lottery season. The bottom line is JVG must step outside his "comfort zone" and infuse some offense into his rotation. With Deke, Battier, Padgett, and Howard you are lookting at little to no offense. We are basically down to 5 guys that we put on the floor that are capable of scoring. Head, Alston and Snyder are not consistent. We have two players capable of generating offense. I fail to understand why he cannot see this! He played Novak a portion of one quarter of one game and declares him "not ready". We have yet to see Vspan or the spark plug that he could be. There were times in the preseason where (when Yao was not playing) the offense was wide open and racking up points in an up and down, fast paced tempo. The team was fresh becuase he was using more players. I had hoped that maybe he was making a commitment to changing his offense, however this was clearly not the case.
Well we arn't doing much on the court during the 4th quarted at this point. Why not put a guy who has proven he can put the ball in the bucket through his carrier. Worst case things stay the same but who knows he might be able to turn things around.
I want Yao to not chase guards on our defensive perimeter. Do you think that could be a bit tiring? Does any other big in the league do this, let alone someone of Yao's size? JVG is completely burning out Yao's youth. Because of all this running around, the big fella will be broken down long before his time. JVG is applying the same strategy he followed in NY: a quick burn, then quit -- leaving behind a devasted franchise with no future.
I think you've got it. JVG is fighting for his job, and not really caring what that does to his players.
Aint you enough with all the YAO sould-do or should-not-do stuff? STFU! YOU desperate YAO HATER pretending to give good suggestions to Yao Pls just CUT the Crxp.
NOBODY can do what you are asking for. Pushing and shoveling for 36 minutes is insane. The "dominant" franchise players you have in mind are either: guards who don't get into wrestling; or big men who don't play as hard throughout the game on both ends of the court and who don't weight 310 lbs. Try leave a 350lb defensive lineman out there for 36 minutes, he wouldn't be able to move his feet. Pushing and wrestling wears one down MUCH faster than running around.
They either don't play their big that hard on offense (pretty much all teams) or they live with the consequences (Shaq). NOBODY, not even Shaq or TD in their primes, try to be the focal point of offense on every pocession AND play active D on the other end of the court.
There's that McGrady guy who gets the ball a lot, no? And I distinctly remember Tim Duncan trapping McGrady hard on pick and rolls in the 4th qtr, leading to some stagnant Rockets offense.
The solution is establish a 3rd scorer! When Yao and Tmac are feeling it, milk them two. But when the third scorer, be it Bonzi, Novak, or whoever, gets hot, Yao and Tmac can take a breather. They don't need to sit on the bench. They draw defense by just standing on the court and they can play D on the other side of the court. Good teams ALL do this. Spurs don't get TD work his ass on every pocession. Mavs don't get Dirk work his ass on every pocession. And Heat don't work Shaq on half of pocessions. They have Manu, Stackhouse, Walker, etc to be the focal points in some minutes during games. Can you imagine Mavs not playing Stackhouse, Heat not playing Walker, both argubly not as good as Bonzi? Can you imagain Spurs not playing Barry, an inferior shooter to Novak, for 10 games?
