Yao could be unstopable if our guards could put the ball inside the paint

The league has completely taken notice to the Rockets....why with 2 allstars are they no in the playoffs and why do they lose to Seattle?

It is all about being able to play under pressure and our point guard is having a bad year...this is not just any point guard, but our primary scoring threat....he is not converting at a high %...you can chalk up turnovers, yao not being aggressive, our bench, the waste of Griffin (Eddie and Adrian), not having a true 3...blablabla....

but the reality is that if Stevie was not having a bad scoring year, this team would have won tonight and would be 3-4 more wins in the column...we are just having a star player who is killing our offensive flow......really unprecendented in league history according to Bill Walton...that a 3 time allstar is having these types of scoring issues....

That is what this is...this team would be at least 38-25 right now if Stevie had his A game...

 

I don't think he needs to be at a perfect position every time, and nobody can. He can be the transferring point, and he has to get the touches. Inside-out doesn't mean your center gets perfect position every time and shoot it every time, it's about variation, and it's about to move the defense and look for your EASY offence. No matter it's due to faigue or not, after his 31 points against Shaq, everyone on the court SHOULD know if we want to win the game, we have to get him touches. They had a noticable lead, they could slow down, even wait for Yao Ming. What's the hurry? Would that be better to run some set offence than taking contested jumpers? Wouldn't it be better to get a team win, instead of improving your stats from 2 points to 6?

 

BTW, how do Cato and MoT play for 57 combined minutes and only get 7 total REBOUNDS???

What's up with SPOON's DNP?

 

Yes the Rockets have turned into a jumpshot team but when the Rockets do drive to the lane and get hacked there's no call and it's results in a turnover.

 

i still think for this team to go to the next level, it will need a real pg, who can also knock down the open jumper.

 

from the bench or something? when we went up 67-52, yao then went to the bench with 4 fouls and didn't come back in until 6 minutes later and had to play the next 1:30 of the 3rd tentatively to avoid foul number 5. kinda hard to feed him then.


actually, it's amazing yao got 21 shots considering how much he was on the bench from fouls.

 

Steve can knock down a open jumper but this season he left his shot back in the 2002-2003 season.

 

When Shaq picked up his 5th foul (with <3 mins left), Yao should have established position in the paint EVERY TIME DOWN THE FLOOR...not try to set up high pick and rolls plays...let our PF do that (if need be).

 

we need Stevie back...contrary to what some will say, if Stevie had his jumpshot back...we would be far better off and talking about 4 or 5th seeds.....everyone get some positive vibe that is comes back.,.,.

also, I thought the substitutions were odd tonight by JVG too....

 

the biggest blind francis defender yao hater of the century.

you posted the above in the game thread... um... did you notice how when yao went to the bench no points were scored for 5 and a half minutes? the announcers did.

 

YES YES YES !!!

And he was setting the high pick and rolling into that position, but was getting ignored.....

DD

 

No Way. Cato is a guy that has to wait under the basket to get rebounds and points. He can't do the PnR staff. That makes him too fat from basket and make him useless. Taylor is too short to do that.

 

psssssst... IIRC there were only 3-4 from Stevie to Cato

 

the high pick was odd...he was successful in setting position without the high pick early in the 3rd and should have milked it

 

He got 4 dunks on the pick and roll today......

DD

 

I was at the game... it was lost in the first half of the fourth quarter when they stopped going inside to Yao.

21 FGA by Yao is the most deceiving stat in the game. The perimeter players lost focus for 5-6 minutes, essentially making the game up for grabs.

After a timeout later in the fourth, play goes to Yao, promptly draws ONeal's 5th foul. They had this all quarter long... Yao was unguardable 1-on-1 until that point and the Lakers stubbornly refused to double all night.

Great game, but this team is mentally still not there.

 

Who cares a basket is a basket and a assist is a assist. If the other team can make an adjustment to that lob pass from Steve to Cato then keep milking it.

 

after that Yao demanded the ball and get the 5th foul of Shaq and buried both FT's. Later, he drove to the basket and was hacked by Shaq but refs didn't have the guts to call the last foul on Shaq.

The last 20-footer taken by Yao didn't seem to be by design. The play was broken at 1000 places and SF picked up a loose ball from floor and threw it to Yao.

 

Here's something to chew on:

Put Yao with one of Hakeem's championship supporting casts, we beat the Lakers by double digits.

 

they lost the game when yao had four fouls and left in the third, they lost their momentum and only scored 2 points or something the next six minutes.

also... i really don't think the guard play was that horrible tonight, cat shooting stunk but i thought francis played fine but those offensive fouls were no good.

the game was lost on bad calls:

1. francis goes for the dunk, cook undercuts him. dirty play, no call. yao gets two free throws so i guess it didn't matter that much, but the dunk would have given us more momentum.

2. shaq hacks yao seven times on his second to last shot and yao ends up missing a hook.

3. that kick ball was what lost the game finally for us.

but hey... look, without Karl Malone. THE ROCKETS ARE BETTER THAN THE LAKERS. at least head to head.

i for one am proud of that.