Why Yao can't get the damn ball?

learned it from charley rosen...or was it RiceDaddy?

 

I see couple of problems with tonights game and Yao's touches.

1) Refs were unbelievably bad, all those Bradley taps could of being called fouls. By going over Yao's head, he had to foul over the top on every possession. He was literally draped over Yao's shoulders all night long. Rocket guards also should of adujsted, fake the lob pass and bounce pass the ball into Ming. Bradley doesn't have the foot speed to reach around. Those passes Mobley were throwing were too predictable. Also if you looked on the stat sheet, Mav's had 16 more free throws than the Rockets.
2) Not to blame all on the Refs, Rockets guards also completely broke down in the 2nd half when Mavs zoned up. The guards, particularly Mobley simply gave up getting Yao the ball. I remember one play where Yao was on the Strong side couldn't get the ball, the ball was swung to Mobley on the Weak side and Yao also rolled to the weak side post. What did Mobley do, he chose to drive into the baseline where Yao camped. The resulting collision forced a turnover. This didn't happen just once, I counted 3-4 times when Mobley simply refuse to pass into the post.
3) Yao need to sharpen his low post moves, particularly the drop step. He's getting too predictable with the fade away and the turnaround. I haven't see a power move from Yao at all in the game. I think Ewing is messing with Yao's head with his patented turnaround, which Ewing missed regularly in Knick's uniform.
4) Stevie lack poise and leadership. Although he's a special player, he just looks uncomfortable at the point position with Mobley. The 2nd half was an example of how the Rocket offense that completely went away from the inside out post game and reverted back to ISO.

 

I agreed Yao doesn't handle the ball well, but not hustle? C'mon now, he's the one that did all the work on defense inside and he's the one that get offensive rebounds when the team missed and put it back for 2. Like I say, he can dominate the game if he wants to be, but Rockets did not involve him in the offense much tonight. They preach about inside out offense and I hardly see that tonight.

Also they need to tell Yao to establish the position on the right side of the basket instead of the left side. He's more effective on the left side of the basket since he's right hander.

 

Out of all of Yao's problems, his stamina must be the worst. I'm beginning the think his stamina will be problematic his entire career. After a few games into his 2nd year Yao looks like he'll never be able to suck it up and play an entire game like so many great players had to do to help their team win in tough situations.
Its a bit upsetting to watch our big man suckin wind 4-5 minutes into the game. Hell, you can see his performance greatly drop off after this point and I think that's why SF doesn't pass the ball to Yao down low, its because he knows Yao's too tired to be effective. He has trouble running up and down court and getting opportunity baskets and blocks...this is what happens to OLDER players of his size, not 23 year olds.
This one factor affects so many different aspects of his game. If Yao wants to be someone we can rely on to take us to a championship, he has to give us more than 5 STRONG minutes a game. Otherwise he'll be like so many other guys in the NBA...you know that 'big dude that had so much potential' syndrome.

 

Yao was fronted by the 7-4 Iranian giant in the Asian games, the Chinese guard threw a simple lob pass over to Yao, who scored two points. End of story.

Also, Yao being a phone booth rebounder is due to positioning and limited motion span in the air at 7-6 and 310 pounds.

Yao doesn't have slow reaction time. He's amazingly quick with that off balance jumper a couple games ago. First the ball bounced off the backboard, changed direction and was quickly scooped by Yao, who while falling was bumped in the air, lost his balance yet still hit the shot. All happened in a second. There was hardly any reaction time in that series of action.

 

I think we're all a little guilty of having our eyes fixated on Yao whenever he's in the game. Things tend to get exaggerated when you do that.

One thing I did notice though, was that Yao was trying to be very physical and aggressive in the post and he seemed really ackward getting his shot off after the move. That will take practice to develop. The other thing is that a lot of his shots are "good misses" meaning they roll around the rim or hit the back part. He's just off slightly for some reason. His first two games he couldn't miss but now, I feel like I'm cringing whenever he puts a shot up.

 

You give our Guards too much credit! Their passing into the post player is poor!

 

1. First, the 7-4 iranian gian presents a MORE favorable matchup for Yao then Charles Outlaw or Eduardo Najera. First, that dude is probably slower than Christmas morning to a five year old, He couldn't chase down a lob if you gave him all day, and his leverage and high center of gravity make him easy pickings. That dude is not an NBA Player. You may not think it makes that much of a difference, but really, it seriously does. Second, the other four guys on the Iranian team are probably Division III quality help defenders. They're not tracking down any lobs.

2. You miss my point about raction time. During that play, the ball fell Right to Yao, right into his phone booth, so to speak, and he tossed it back in. It's not Yao not recognizing what to do, getting his hand up, etc, it's getting his 300 pounds to cooperate in time. Why do you think he loses almost EVERY SINGLE tip off at the beginning of the game? He's not a quick leaper, not at all, even worse when he has to do it on reflex.

 

Will somebody in HOUSTON want to chat with thru MSN?My Msn is rougeking@963.net .Pls chat with me about YAO!

 

No, that Iranian giant wasn't slow, he's pretty quick at his size, at least quicker than Bradley. Granted, he's not an NBA player, but his height and huge wing span makes a big difference. Help defenders are non factors in this scenario. When help defenders come, there's no point throwing a lob pass but to swing the ball to the weak side for an open shot. Help defenders can only come in time when spacing isn't good enough.

Reaction time is of two sides. The mental processing part I think Yao is good enough in. As for quickness, Yao is indeed not a quick leaper or fast jumper. So he loses tip offs. But tips offs are different from getting a lob pass. The man being fronted always has advantage in position to catch the pass. If Yao has to leap far and high to get a lob pass. That's a bad pass in the first place. The keys to beat fronting are good spacing, quickly swinging the ball around - so help defenders will be punished - and a good lob pass with an arc that's neither too high nor or too low, that lands to the post players side, or somewhat behind the post player, not between him and his defender. When those things can be done, we should actually welcome fronting, instead of getting worried about it. Fronting is something used frequently when teammates coordination is bad.

 

Mobley took too much time and the pass is a little high and slow. But I admit that Yao should catch it.

 

...


Nautic
______________________________
"They looked like a team with a lot of talent, but with five guys trying to do too much by themselves. They're not looking to get the ball to their teammates. When a guy gets a shot, it's like a desperation shot. There's no continuity. You're not going to win if guys are thinking about themselves more than the team."
___Rockets guard Steve Francis (Nov. 4, 2003)

"They looked like a team with a lot of talent, but with five guys trying to do too much by themselves. They're not looking to get the ball to their teammates. When a guy gets a shot, it's like a desperation shot. There's no continuity. You're not going to win if guys are thinking about themselves more than the team."
__TNT Analyst Jeff Van Gundy (Dec. 20, 2002)

 

Its interesting to see what each of us interpret from the game. My 2 cents: We don't get Yao the ball enough. We throw maybe 3-5 good entry passes a game to him. We settle for the outside shot way to quickly. The way we're playing, its a Frances & Mobes show. If they're not on (like last night) we're hurting.

I love our 5-2 start. Our defense is great! Our offense is still learning. We have to feed the post more and let the play develop off Yao. He's a great passer and will feed the guards for better looks than what we got last night.

Too much dribbling? Yes. The really great teams never put the ball on the court much--they passed.

The 2-on-1 last night where Steve took it Nowitski and didn't pass it to Boki was sad. I kept thinking of LeBron's first game and him giving up a dunk to feed Ricky Davis...unselfish. Recommend Steve and Mobes need to take a lesson from the rookie.

 

Seriously, Yao needs to learn to step out and pop a jump shot, dunk after an offensive rebound, maybe take some diffrent shots that's not in his reptoire. In short Yao needs to find diffrent ways of being an attack. If it takes that much work from other players to get Yao a shot, then Yao is a franchise level player yet, he'd be a role player. Franchise players help themselves to two points and make the game easier for his teammates, if need your teammates to make it easier or even possible for you to score, then you're just not a franchise player.

P.S. when I said franchise I mean the literal term and not francis.

 

Sorry, but I have to disagree. That guy is NOT NBA material. If he were, there would be NBA scouts all over him (like they were for Yao). Also, the Iranian government is less controlling of their international athletes than is China. If this guy were even remotely NBA quality, he'd be playing here already.

 

I can't understand for the life of me why the gaurds don't have the ability to feed Yao the ball in the post. They make the easy look impossible. They seem to hesitate too much and allow the defense to react thus giving up inside position. I'm tired of having to see Yao fight for RE-POSITION on every single attempted set-up. Just swing the ball around and fire it inside. No wonder Yao gets winded early.

 

Do we have to have a "Give Yao the damn ball" thread after every loss?

Maybe the admins can just put a sticky to the GYTDB thread so they don't have to create one after every damn loss.

 

by the way, yao has to reset after recieving the first pass because he is too far outside of the paint. passing the ball back out gets the defender to change positioning allowing for less resistance so yao can get closer to the paint.

face it, yao is not very fast and in the NBA, that is a killer.

 

2 word for u:

GET OUT!!!!!