I just saw a ridiculous thread on how you can't build around Yao. Well I don't think the rockets have done a great job in building around Yao, exhibit A is Tmac, I don't think Tmac is a great complement to Yao, in that he is a jump shooting volume scorer. Yao is not KG, who is a jump shooting post player, Yao is not even Duncan, who scores from further away from the basket than Yao. The closest comparison to Yao is actually Shaq, in that he is not a great defensive player, a good one but not great. But offensively if you can get him the ball in the right spot it's game over. The key thing here is that you need more than just shooters to make it work. During the lakers 3-peat, kobe was much more agressive going to the basket than he is now, kobe is much more of a jumpshooter these days. That's why the lakers became a worse team. When shaq went to miami, wade became that attacker to the basket and miami won a championship. Look at miami this season, one of the reasons they suck is that wade is now much more of a jump shooter than he was during that championship season. As badly as shaq needed that guy that attacks the basket. Yao needs him even more, Yao is less mobile than shaq, therefore he is more vulnerable to double teams and junk defences. He really needs someone who is willing to attack the basket to open the game up. It's no wonder that when Tmac attacks the basket, the rocks are better, and what's more, Yao ming is much more effective. Right now, Kobe would not help, because he is a jump shooter, tmac is a jump shooter, wade is becoming a jump shooter. There are not really any more attackers to the basket these days because guys like to pro-long their careers and attacking the basket is hazardous to guy's careers. If rockets could've gotten iverson, then I think it would've really helped Yao, past that I don't see many people that can really help the rockets become a championship team. There are lots of guys that "Could" attack the basket. Wade, kobe, tmac, baron davis, deron williams, but none of those guys attack the basket enough to make a difference to Yao. The only players in the league who could make a difference right now for the rockets would be. Chris Paul Allen Iverson Tony Parker Steve Nash I think even if we lost Tmac and replaced him with these 4 players, the rockets would be instantly better because these guys attack the basket. The flip side is that none of these guys are available for anyone on our roster including tmac.
now nonsense. Find some way to get Yao the calls he deserves. how could you build around a player who is treated like a clown by David Stern?
you know what? we are not suppose to talk how to build, we are not paid by rox boss. we are fans we only point out the problems feeling about the game....and bashing the players, coach and organzation.
to build around yao, we need at least 2 players who can shoot 50%+ consistently when open to fill up the rest of the starting spots beside yao, t mac, and a play maker. hehe like hell it's gonna happen
Wrong. Yao IS a jump shooting post player. he competes with T-mac in taking those elbow jumpshots. I'd rather have KG, Duncan and Shaq anyway. Instead of building around Yao, here's better big men that we could build around T-Mac: Duncan D. Howard KG Boozer Amare
With Yao in your team, you gotta play inside-out. That's how the team benefit most. Few years ago, when we had Barry, Westley, Tmac (his jumpers used to be better), Padgett....around Yao, we were a pretty good team. If we play inside out, we gotta have some good shooters, like peja, korver, michael redd.....you name it.
If you think of Yao as Rick Smits and then look at how that Championship Pacer's team was built, you realize that you need help in the post. The Pacers had two really good rebounders that could also score on both sides of Smits. That was Antonio and Del Davis who could both rebound and score. That was a realy imposing front line. Who do we have? Scola, Bonzi and Hayes. Umm Hayes is great but he need to go in favor of someone like David Lee from New York. Bonzi is fine but he's a guard. The Pacers also had a gunner who was the all time leading 3 point shooter in Reggie Miller. Do we have that deadeye gunner? Nooo Maybe Novak can develop into that type of shooter like Kapono was for the Heat. If you noticed, the Heat are really sucking without Kapono this year cause all they gotta do is defend Shaq like Yao. Nobody else can score and they all stand around watching...sound familiar? Their guard Travis Best was at best an average point guard. Alston fits this decription fine. Yeah we should try to get another great PG but really, we need balanced scoring in order to play the inside out game. If you want to make the Rockets into a Championship Calibur team, take a page out of the Pacers Organization. Build your team like they did. T-Mac can score but he's not the three point threat that Reggie Miller was. He needs to take it to the hole. He thinks he's Miller but he's far from it.
The problem with your logic is that Smits (or Dream) didn't have to deal with an NBA zone. The answer to building around Yao has always been speed and athleticism. I don't have the time or inclination to verify, but I have a strong suspicion that Reggie Millers' and MarK Jackson's Pacers weren't dead last in the NBA in transition baskets.
why would you rather build around the one guy who you can't count on to be healthy? in my opinion, trying to build around and turn either of these guys into champions is an uphill climb, but the climb is less difficult with yao than with tmac. ill always root for him to prove me wrong, but he's a proven loser and is well past his prime, so its hard to see him getting any better than he is now, which simply isn't enough.
That Pacers team with Smits and Miller would have broken any zone defense. They could also push the ball and Smits would lay back cause he wasn't the fastest guy out there either. They had the horses to play any style. We need to start Scola at PF because he's as good as anyone once he figures out the NBA game. We need to replace Chuck Hayes and we need to get a stronger small forward instead of Battier. Great so Battier can play defense. Can he score? Del Davis and Antonio Davis were two very athletic dynomo's for the Pacers who could rebound, play defense and score. We should trade Battier in favor of someone who can pull down about 7-10 rebounds per game and can put up around 15-20 ppg. Hayes can come off the bench or we can trade him too. The PG situtation is unbelievable. I cannot believe we have all these PG's an none of them plays worth a crap. I think this is a function of playing time myself. Mike James with playing time does a lot better. SF with lots of playing time gets much better. Alston is our current PG and is servicable as long as his teardrop is falling. We need to find another big man to back up Yao in the post besides Scola. SG we have T-Mac. Do we have any other SG's that work? Lot of chemistry issues here. We need T-Mac back to make a push and T-Mac needs to play with the word "TEAM" in his head. If we fall into the lottery this year, my first item on my wish list would be to get an imposing athletic big man to go next to Yao. Can you imagine if we had Horford??? Alston is servicable as our PG but a guy like Horford next to Yao would be unstoppable.
No one in your list is more a post player than Yao except Shaq, who doesn't have a mid-range shot anyway
Because rofflesaurus is a TOF, . BTW, TMac should be "around" the players in his list, not the other way around.
it's been 6 or 7 years, rockets is always trying to build the team around yao, three coaches, dozens of players in and out. but rockets still struggles. whatz the problem here. if you always fail to sovle a problem, maybe you ain't on the right track at the very beginning.
Management is the problem here. They took the Kobe Shaq model and tried to duplicate it. When in fact the way they should have built it is the Pacers model. Too much money tied up in two players T-Mac and Yao to get quality role players for balance.
I am not sure we have been building around yao. Please name one player other than TMac which you think can be part of a champion team (after the big trade)? The glue guy maybe, but glue is useless if all you have are foundations (yao+tmac). sura/barry/wesley were right players, if they are 5 years younger. hayes and head are right players if they are 3 inches taller. scola and brooks give us hopes.
