stop trying to force feed yao in the fourth

i'm glad that someone is saying this. i agree that the force-feeding of Yao in the 4th is one of the biggest issues with this team.

its kind of odd actually, because statistically, Yao is your most reliable option for generating points - when he can actually get off a shot, or create a foul. the problem is getting him in position to receive the ball and execute a shot, which never seems to happen when the chips are down.

so what do you do as a coach? go away from your best option? you'll be grilled the next day if you lose and you didn't go to yao. but it seems that in close and late situations, the yao plan is much less effective than it should be.

anyone have stats?

 

You either a) are joking b) majorly lacking basketball knowledge or c) didn't watch the game. I apologize for being offensive, but the all the Rockets tried to do was force feed Yao resulting in burning most of the shot clock trying to find a passing angle.

 

not just that - but attempting it every time really seems to tire Yao. he's fighting wrestling matches for 20 seconds straight on every offensive possession, and as a result does not seem to rebound or defend as well.

its just all around bad. if you want to do it, pick your spots and allow yao to recover. don't abuse him and shoot yourself in the foot in the process!

 

In the 4th I think Artest should get the all in the post more.

 

Those guys are clearly not the go to guy during crunch time.
Wafer has the potential. But If you do not develop him, he will never be.

 

Edit : I think Artest should get the ball in the post more down the stretch.

 

in between

force feed every single trip down the court

and

going away from yao


somewhere there lies the truth.

 

thecabbage, great points. I like the 1-4 high or low with brooks or pnr with artest and brooks weakside forcing a switch meaning a pg swithching to artest and a sf on brooks.

 

The key is "force" feed Yao.

The rockets might as well announce it out loud. Its that obvious at times. Ofcourse thats how we play but it doesn't mean we have to do it so obviously. We need superior ball movement and some guys will get open sooner or later. Move the ball better until Yao has some space. Also sometimes Yao has to be determined to take that shot. Just like he is predetermined to kick it out, he has to take it strong to the hoops regardless of triple teams. Zero dribble if its crowded and lean in on the defender like he does so well, calls will come more often than not. I also see Artest do too much 1 on 1. Its alright when he makes the shots but he needs to move it much more.

We must still feed Yao but often times you (opponents) can see easily that guys are trying to dump the ball to him so weak side interference is a huge problem. Coach has to do a better job of atleast making that weakside defender take long sprint to Yao. Its way too cramped up down there most of the times. Every post player will get stripped if they play it like they do to Yao.

 

The real issue is how to do a better job of feeding Yao in the fourth.

The Rockets just need to play the offense--keep moving, keep passing the ball and the ball will naturally get to Yao. Along with everybody else on the team.

 

I saw it the same way choujie did. It was the panic after the initial look for Yao that stagnated the offense. They looked for him, saw that he wasn’t available and didn’t look for him again. Which is why he was missed when he flashed through the lane with his man pinned a couple of times.

Both Adelman and Morey said they did a poor job of rotating the ball to the weakside. But that was to be expected with the change in point guards. It’s a learning process.


[rquoter]

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/6281593.html


Counterattacking

After the Portland Trail Blazers threw the predictable fronting defenses at Yao Ming down the stretch Tuesday, holding him without a shot or point in the final 5½ minutes, the Rockets went to work Wednesday on ways to take advantage of such defenses.

“We talked about things we have to do and make sure we’re in the right spots,” coach Rick Adelman said. “If they take something away, you should have an answer for it. I said that was going to be a problem for us going like we are. In the past, we’ve gone to Tracy (McGrady). Now we have a different group. We have a young point guard (Aaron Brooks). We had Rafer (Alston) before, who knew what he was doing. It’s just repetition.”

Brooks admitted he made a few mistakes on play calls but said other changes have been made.

“I think we were a little selective in our play-calling,” he said. “That’s on my part. We have to find different ways to get Yao the ball. We didn’t do that last game, but we have some other stuff in mind.

“We have to work on different ways to score in the fourth quarter.” [/rquoter]

 

They already stopped because the ballhandler (AB) can't do it. Are you satisfied?

 

thacabbage I tend to agree with a lot of your posts and this one is no different. However, there's 3 things that must be made clear.

1. This is Yao's team.
2. It's Yao's time.
3. We have no truly great players on this team. Our 'greatest' player is Yao.

You win with your star and you lose with your star. If Yao can't get it done now he's never going to get it done. I know he's failed us in the past and it's very frustrating to see how "unclutch" he is in the crunch time and sometimes down right appalling.

However, we shouldn't shy away from Yao. Rather we need to get Yao comfortable in these situations by continuing to go to him in these regular season games. I'd much rather have the ball force fed to Yao and let him create for others by getting double teamed as opposed to our younger players like Brooks, Wafer etc trying to force the issue and turning the ball over or getting rejected.

The points you mentioned though are the exact reasons why it's hard for me to get too excited for the post season because I feel the lack of a great wing who can take over in crunch time i.e (healthy Tmac) will be our achilles heel. I can see us breaking down in crunch time and going on dry spells. But my worst fear and more embarassing would be to depend too heavily on Brooks and Wafer. That has the potential to be an EPIC Fail in proportion to Luther Head against the Jazz. We're going to have to learn to live and die with the play of Yao. It's all on you now. YAO. Ain't nothin new for him the he's carried the weight of an enitre country most his life.

 

all of you are trying to be smarter than ra. please read the article in today's houston chron.

looking for yao is always a right thing to do no matter which qt. when a team fronting yao, it also means the team will also put an extra player to prepare for rox throwing a lob pass. it leads a twisted defense scheme normally no team wants to do it in 48 minutes.

it's up to rox other players to explore the weakness of this twisted defense.

in the last game, when yao moved around and reposted in the paint area, there were a quite few chances yao was open but our players were not able to grab the opportunities. matt and bill was screaming at our players not being able to see yao a few times in 4th qt after yao reposted.

ra had them worked out yesterday. ab also admitted he made a few mistakes. since the paragraph of the article is talking about fronting defense. it's logic to say those mistakes are related to how to beat fronting defense.

 

Some of guys saying we need to force feed Yao must dont watch any games. Yao doesnt have to "ups" or quickness to jump & move for ball if its thrown over his man in the post when he's fronted. Half of you are right, we need develop another player for crunch time. As of now, I still would trust brooks or artest with the last possessions of the 4th quarter than giving it to yao. This is yao's team and he's our best player, but the last minutes of 4th quarter isn't his strong suite. Not knocking yao, but his standard transmission has no clutch