It's official: Yao is the only center in the league who can shut down Amare

Well actually Shaq guarded him one on one and outplayed him.... I think so at least

 

Amare did not guard Shaq one on one.. Shaq guarded Amare one on one.... Amare is not a good defender IMO.....

But he is one heck of a player off course..

 

Who is the better player, Amare in 2005 or Kemp at his prime?

 

Yeah, it's really weird the one-on-one match ups between Yao and Amare through out their careers. I mean, Yao is a weak defender against mobile power fowards , but Yao does surprisingly well against Amare, who is one of the best PF in the league. I think it has to do with the psychological aspect of it; Yao seems to get up for the big match ups like against Shaq and Amare.

 

Kemp in his prime was a beast in the 96 finals he was the best player on the floor. and thats saying something , because jordn was at his best in the 96 finals. in his prime he was considerd the second best player on the planet. it's a shame how quickly his career went down the drain.

 

In the previous mathcup, amare had 19, 9 and 6 TO in 37 min, while shooting 5-15. Yao had 14, 10, and 0 TO in 28 min while shooting 6-11. SO lets see, Yao had the BETTER shooting percentage, and 6 LESS turnovers. Not only that, but Amare made only one bucket with yao guarding him, while yao made at least 10 points with amare guaring him.

 

It is definitely a big achievement that Yao can shut down Amare for one game.

KH

 

Amare wasn't guarding Shaq one on one it was a double or triple team most of the time. I hate the zone defenses which allows double teams without a player not having the ball.

 

If Amare can continue improving his game, he'll be better than Kemp ever was - he's arguably getting there right now. It'll be fun to watch the kid grow up. You can see he's taking more jumpers and hitting them, but he's still so raw yet already this good, it's scary.

 

Well, I look at it this way. The Rockets played the Suns more competatively then the Heat did last night. We actually kept it close until the 4th. Not sure if thats saying a whole lot about our team.

 

Amare is a clone of Kemp at his prime with the exception of a few things. Kemp was leaps and bounds better shooter from the outside. On the other hand, Amare attacks the rim a bit stronger and plays a little bigger. IMO, Kemp has a slight edge on Amare but Amare will surpass him once he develops his outside game and improve on his D a little.

The main reason why Yao can shut Amare down is because he knows Amare cannot shoot so he backs up a little bit and use his length to his advantage. If one day Amare can develop that jumpshot, Yao will have major issues when guarding him.

 

Suns is a nightmare in matchup for any team. They literally
have all-stars at all positions. You couldn't afford to double-team
anyone of them, otherwise someone will drop 30 on you easily.

 

Sorry. No more Amare cant shoot bull. I am surprised he shoots
jumpers pretty well this year. His offense is better than Kemp
ever was. Kemp at his best scored slightly over 20.

 

As of right now, I would still say Kemp, but if Amare keeps improving at this pace he will surpass him fairly soon.

 

You cant really say Shaq had the opportunity to shut down Amare simply because Phoenix was allowed to run there up-tempo brand of offense, which took Shaq out of the game.

The Heat's game plan was to run a half court offense, dropping it down low to Shaq and have him take advantage of Phoenix's weak interior. On the Heat's first 3 plays of the game it was working as Shaq scored easily on 3 straight uncontested dunks on the Heat's first 3 plays of the game. Then after an ill-advised long distance shot (I forget by whom) the Suns ran there fast break to easy points at the other end. From here, it looked like Miami went away from there game plan and instead settled for firing up long distance jumpers which clanked iron. This allowed Phoenix to switch the tempo of the game to one that favored there helter-skelter fast paced offense. That basically took Shaq out of the game and forced Miami out of its original game plan in going down low to Shaq to settling for long range jumpers, clanking them and getting Phoenix started on fast break after fast break.

So to say Shaq failed at shutting down Amare is incorrect here in my opinion as he never really had the opportunity to dominate the game as only he can do. You just cant expect Shaq to keep up with this type of tempo.

BTW.... this is also the main reason why The Rockets stayed much closer in the game with the Suns then the Heat did. Because the Rockets never abandoned there game plan, kept continuing to try and pound the ball down low, slowing down the game and kept Phoenix out controlling the tempo of the game. So props to JVG for not allowing his team to go away from it game plan like Miami did last night...I cant believe I just gave JVG props on something?

That's also why Amare didn’t have as many points as he usually does......cause the Rockets cut off the number of dunk attempts he usually receives by preventing Phoenix from running the fast break at all.

All this.....from just running a half court set against Suns. If Miami had continued to do this, Shaq would have had a big game and shut down Amare, who would have been non-effective in a half court game like he was in the Rockets game, and the Heat might have won the game.