Too many excuses.. Yao fans blame everybody else for Yao's problems except Yao (JVG's offensive and defensive schemes).. One of the best coaches in the world is blamed for hindering Yao's abilities. I find this funny. In the beginning of the 04-05 year, Yao was the number 1 option on offense and Houston lost more than they won. They started putting the ball in McGradys hands and the wins started piling up, is this a coincidince? JVG would actually prefer him to be #1 option, so it would really open things up on the perimeter, but the bottomline is he cant handle it. Also, as of right now, McGrady is a better #1 option. If Yao could take on the responsibilities of being a number 1 option, Houston would be unstoppable, simply because McGrady and Yao would both be dominating. I find it assinine that JVG is blamed for Yao's deficencies when Yao is just not ready. Yao is getting closer to being a legit #1 option, but his stamina and mentality arent there yet. If he can grow into the role of being a #1 option he would allow McGrady so much more breathing room, and McGrady would dominate like never before. Bottomline is McGrady is #1 and Yao is #2 and its Yao's fault not JVG's.. Also there is noway a scout wrote this. Thats funny that some actually believe that..
This has 'fan written' all over it. The language is not that of a basketball professional, but that of a fan (albeit a rather thoughtful one). Some dedicated Rockets/Yao fan -slash- JVG hater decided one day that it would be clever to write up a nice long dissertation about Yao, and couch it in some public forums as a 'found scouting report', which would lend the words some semblance of legitimacy, which they would lack if coming merely from a very verbose fan. (FBI PROFILER MODE: ON) I place this person as white male, early twenties, employed, possibly going to college part time, and has played organized basketball up through the junior-high to high school level. He has no girlfriend, drives a car that is at least ten years old, and still lives with his parents. (FBI PM: OFF)
Yao can handle being the #1 option, scoring-wise. If he had enough touches, his high fg% almost guarantees that he'd be a top NBA scorer. But his refusal to utilize his passing skills gets him in trouble. Dominant big men must be able to pass out of the post. Period. Shaq and Dream did it best. Duncan does it almost as well. Yao's measly 1apg lets teams just focus on him when he's in the post because once the ball is in his hands it's a dead end. I've only saw a few times last season where Yao had a clean kickout to a wide open shooter. Tmac does it all the time, on the move. Yao will either score or not, but he won't get the rest of the team involved.
If he was the number one option, his FG% would drop dramatically. I couldnt agree more with your assessment of his passing out of the post. Until he makes teams pay for doubling him, I dont see any possible way he could be a successful #1 option..
Yao used to be a damn good passer out of the post. The first game I ever saw him play was his first season against Seattle. They tried to double him in the second half and he punished them with assists. He wasn't scoring many points but he was killing the Sonics with interior passes in the post. I don't know what happened to his passing since the first season, but it used to be superior. Maybe we need more cutters and slashers. The thing I didn't like about how Van Gundy utilized Yao earlier was to dump it in to him, and have him back down his man. This took too long, and often resulted in a turnover because a guard would rotate to Yao once he initiated the dribble and then strip the ball away. Later in the season, Yao was just catching and shooting or finishing off the pick and roll with TMac. This proved to be very effective, and I give JVG credit for changing his approach.
I was just thinking...how bad is Yao's stamina going to be when he's 30-35? He's a young guy right now and its already pretty bad, when he's older we are going to have a liability on our hands
yes when yao is older in his late 30's his stamina will be bad, but he is still about a decade away from there and its still building
As for the fact that JVG doesn't 100% utilize Yao on offense... Why should he? Tracy McGrady is better than Yao will ever be. McGrady needs the ball to be most effective, shooting, driving, and dishing off. This is when he's at his best, this is when TNT refers to him as "Magic". Making him stand around for a good portion of a game so we can just dump down to Yao negates our biggest offensive weapon. It's impossible to have an offense that utilizes both 100%. Phil chose Shaq over Kobe, and JVG chose Tmac over Yao. Even the "scouting report" said Yao was incapable of leading a team. We tried to make Yao a cornerstone of the offense. The result? edc setup camp in the garm for the anti-JVG'ers.
Let me be clear about Yao and McGrady. Everything you say about McGrady is absolutely correct. He is the #1 option. In fact, the dude is so good, that he should spend the first part of the first quarter getting Yao off. We know he is gonna get his, but we gotta make sure we get the foul count advantage in our favor, so we can make best use of him driving the bucket later in the quarter. And it helps our team most when Yao gets off and stays out of foul trouble. The only thing that I disagree with on your comments is "we tried to make Yao a cornerstone of the offense". Actually, he is one of the 2 cornerstones of this offense. He is the 2nd most productive offensive player that we have by far, and he is one of the most efficient offensive players in the NBA...period. Just because he doesn't throw up 25 a night doesn't mean he isn't one of the key cogs of our team offensively. Yao brings so much attention that between him and McGrady, they are both responsible for about 80% of our scoring, either by scoring the points themselves, or by drawing the defensive attention so the other players can operate. The thing that would benefit us the most is if Yao stayed out of foul trouble and got the opponents in foul trouble. To do that, he has to get the ball early in the ballgame and make a move with it.......Nicky. The other factor in TMac's game is to force the action to the basket early in the game. TMac shouldn't settle for those outside jumpers early but should pound it inside, with the pass, or dribble drive, forcing the opponents to foul or give up the easy buckets. In general, we have to play aggressive to the hoop at the beginning of games. Foul count for and against is a critical factor in momentum and whether or not players play tentatively or aggressively. Especially on our team, where Yao gives us such a huge advantage because he is such a good foul shooter as a big man, we have to use that to our advantage. When a team like Miami is playing or San Antonio, they don't get the use out of the penalty situation because they've got a bad FT shooter on the floor, or they have to take out that star player who can't shoot FTs in favor of someone who can shoot FTs but can't contribute otherwise offensively.
It does appear to be written by a fan…I would not think a professional scout would write like a 12th grader…however since a lot of scouts are former players…
It's an interesting read. But it's obvious that whoever wrote it is a big fan of Yao, it's hardly unbiased. I'll agree that Yao could be better utilized on offense (my big issue is that the offense takes very little advantage of Yao's passing ability), and he is a pretty solid post defender, but the league's most unstoppable player?....come on now. Maybe they meant TMac. I'm a big fan of Yao, but let's not get carried away. This is how all those unrealistic expectations of Yao start, a la last season when he averaged 18 & 9 & was still called a bust by several "experts." Nonetheless, it was entertaining.
Sounds like edc wrote it..... If that is written by an NBA scout, much less a Rockets scout I'll shave my head..... oh wait I already do that
from ktvoss: I'm a JVG fan, glad to know he's one of the best coaches in the world. I'm a Yao fan too and I pity any Rox fan that isn't. ktvoss go back and re-read this thread. Look at how jopatmc very well broke down the reasons why JVG was criticized by whoever wrote this "report" (and many NBA analysts and announcers) specifically in the context of Yao's strengths. And note how he responded back to LongTimeFan's post. That's called . You make it sound like any criticism of JVG in any context if off-limits even if it's the best thing to do for the team. If you can defend the reasoning why Yao's forced to go out to the 3 pt. line defensively then do so (always broken down plays, slow guards with limited perimeter D, Yao disregards JVG's instructions and lunges out there anyway?) Most of the guys that have bashed this "report" have not attacked other's people's arguments or blithely dismissed them without reason. ktvoss, this is the offseason and I'm bored at the moment, so tell me what you think here (or what you think JVG's thinking here): Almost everyone agrees (myself included) T-Mac may be the best player in the NBA. A solid majority here would agree that T-Mac's the best playmaker on our team (myself included). So... (a): Where should JVG look to tweak schemes in order to improve the team with the roster he ends up with? What worked and what didn't, and who was most affected by what didn't work in your/his opinion? (b): How, as a coach, can you help T-Mac to be even greater than he is? (c): Why did T-Mac want to come here again?
I don't think it's real. But it was pretty entertaining. He spelled deferring wrong. Yao is great And now we have Stro!
Since I'm bored too at the moment. Let me give you my answer: a. With the addition of Stro, we should also work in the plays between Stro & Yao, let them feed off each other. At the same time, perfect that little pick n roll with TMac & Yao, or now Tmac & Stro, or all three of them. I would think with Yao and TMac's passing ability and their ability to draw the attention of the defense, Stro will have hell of season next season. b. As a coach, TMac can still improve, though not a whole lot because he's already one of the greatest in the NBA. I love the way TMac took up the responsibility of defending nirtwuzzky in the serie. I would think TMac could become defensive player of the year. c. T-Mac wants to come here because he got to play with a tremendously talented big man called Yao Ming. He knows what Yao can do and what kind of teammate and person Yao is.
I remember reading that he used to have like 31 inch or something..but got injured..now he's all mass! I am still glad we have Yao. I hope he's developing..getting stronger.
