Our lack of a legitimate frontcourt rebounding presence was made painfully obvious last night, with Yao trying to block the shot on every drive and the Mav's collecting offensive rebound after offensive rebound. The clearest example of this was when Yao stepped out to contest the Terry drive, which resulted in Dirk getting that big putback. We all know that Yao doesn't have a good second jump, and can't contest a shot and then grab the board. We also know that when Juwan Howard went down, we lost our best (and only) rebounding PF. T-Mac's a good rebounder, but he's nearly always out guarding Dirk, which keeps him out of position, and when Sura's not in the game Mike James has a tendency to mix boxout assignments. So what should Yao do, continue to step out an contest drives, or just stay on the ground and get into good position for defensive rebounding, which will probably lead to more foul trouble? The Rockets and Yao need to decide. It may be time to bring in the Spoon man. Regardless, an athletic Cato-type PF will be our most pressing need this offseason...
What this team needs is for Yao to block the shot. Ideally, we would have a rebounder to protect the defensive glass.
that wouldn't be bad if deke weren't old and if yao didn't have relatively low stamina. playing two people that play the same position at the same time and then just sliding one over to their true position for some reason just makes me uneasy.
No worries there really, it is logical that we would be outrebounded with such a small lineup. We had 3 guards in the game at that point when the Mavs got like 4 offensive boards in a row, and McGrady was playing PF (he had 9 rebounds in the game). On that specific play you are talking about, Terry penetrated inside and both McGrady and Yao went at him to try and block his shot, Terry as a result just shot the ball up and it BADLY missed off the backboard, only to have Dirk uncovered coming in and crashing the boards and putting in a layup dunk. We are too short for them, they can put a lineup together that can play Dampier, Dirk, Howard, Stackhouse, Finely. They don't even have Van Horn (6'10") and are not playing Bradley (7'6"). That is probably why we have been so badly outrebounded in the series. Mo T or J Ho wouldn't have been of much help in that category. What they would have given you at the 4 spot offensively they would have evened out on the defensive end. Bowen or McGrady are better defensive options on Dirk.
