Too much dribbling for AB. I wouldn't pick on Ron, he is the best guards we have, he has the ability and right to make some random shots. I have to blame AB,again,again. As a PG, he has the responsiblity to organize the offense , deliver the ball to his teammates, to make offense decisions,to pass the ball to the proper player and make the shooters feel comfortable. Unfortunately, I have seen AB missing the lots of offense opportunities . the offense skill of AB is better than Rafer ,The fatal thing is AB makes too many bad offense choices . Sometimes he should pass the ball to Scola, but he passes to Ron. Sometimes he should pass the ball immediately to Yao, but he hesitate to shoot or drive to the basket like a chicken with no head. Ron is too strong ,Ron is slow, so Ron needs to some dribbling.and It is OK and acceptalbe becuase he is a SG. Howerver, AB, as the PG, Dribbling too much , His poor vision and passing skills are fatal,especially when we met solid teams in playoff like JAZZ. AB shines sometimes, but it doesn't mean Rockets can win the playoff with him.In playoff ,we met Top teams and Top defense.Bench AB, I can see his playstyle is not the Rockets needs.He can be a sniper ,but you can't win a war with a sniper
And if we did give yao the ball utah would smoother him and tip the ball aways then you would be saying something different. The shot just wasnt falling for us last night and i'm not talking about the outside shots, missing all those layup and put backs killed us. When we did give yao the ball we needed someone to cut and not just sit around waiting for him to pass it out.
Look, I'm not talking about giving Yao the ball for the shot. I'm talking about using Yao in the post and giving him the ball so that the defense will collapse inward and then we can yoyo around the perimeter much more effectively. Ball movement leads to defenses being out of position. Players cannot move as fast as the ball, especially players in a defensive stance. You throw it in, he throws it out, you throw it back in, he sees the defender coming weak side and he throws it out weak side. They have to keep moving the BASKETBALL, especially against teams like Utah. You use Yao as a pinball bumper. Then when the defense starts to stand around when the ball goes into the post, Yao gets his shot off 2 or 3 times. Then they start collapsing inward again and you go back to yoyo. Yao is our best player. He is our most efficient, potent offensive weapon. He's got to touch the ball many, many times during a game for us to be at our best. I said he's got to TOUCH IT. That doesn't mean he shoots it every time. It may mean he only shoots once every 5 to 6 touches. That's fine. As long as the ball continues to move around the court. Because eventually the defense is going to get tired and they're going to not trigger when that ball bumps into the post. And then you wind up with the ball in the post, in the hands of your tallest, most efficient, most potent offensive weapon, without the defense reacting to him as much because he is touching so many times and getting rid of the basketball. Adelman's offense is simple. It's all about moving the basketball, player spacing, and player movement. They throw the ball to Yao in the high post, he looks for a cutter, no cutter, back to the perimeter, reset, do it again, except from deeper in the post, no cutter, defense collapsing, throw it to the perimeter for the OPEN SPOT UP 3. And the defensive chase is on. Do it again, except this time, he is doubled as soon as he receives the ball and the defender whose man doubles off goes to the rim, Yao finds him, layup. Do it again, they yoyo it in again on the 2nd post up and the defense doesn't respond because they are anticipating the throw out, boom, hook shot. Yao is a center more in the mold of Kareem than any other top center. Kareem never took more than about 3 dribbles and he only took that many very few times, only in a one on match with no double coming. That did not happen too many times. Probably upwards of 85% of Kareems baskets from the field came with 2 or less dribbles. Yao creates turnovers when he starts dribbling too much or he is holding the ball too much. He's got to throw it around quickly and move from high to low post and the perimeter guys have to throw it to him, then throw it back to him multiple times, quick passes, no dribbles, making the defenders move and get out of position. Then when the defense is back on it's heals and out of position, a FEW dribbles may be appropriate to finish out an effective shot attempt. We have 3 guys on this team that should be dribbling the basketball more than 4 times a touch once it gets over half court. That is Aaron Brooks, Kyle Lowry, and Brent Barry. Everybody else on the perimeter should be limited to 4 dribbles max once they get over halfcourt. And it should be paramount to those 3 guys that can dribble it, that they should be looking to get rid of it a lot sooner. I would love to see some statistical data regarding possessions and number of dribbles and scoring effectiveness. I would also love to see possessions, number of passes, and scoring effectiveness, specifically tied to the half court game. It would be interesting to see the plays broke out into half court and fast breaks and see the effectiveness of dribbbling and passing in the half court sets alone. It would also be interesting to track the effectiveness of our fast break. In the Utah game, for example, our 2nd unit created a lot of fast breaks, but they were clearly very inefficient with them. Some of this is their player mentality that they have to come in and speed the game up. But some of it is caused by the urgency of being behind because the first group, the half court group, couldn't get it together, so the 2nd unit wants to come in and slash the deficit. That works if you are playing a team that is shallow, doesn't have a deep bench. But it didn't work against Utah. And it was exasperated by the ineffective dribbblemania of the first unit. My point is very basic. Your best player has to touch the ball the most. We will never win a championship until we learn that Yao has to touch the ball the most. And that won't happen unless dribbbleahria is stopped.
QFT. but every star has that mentality. artest thinks he's the best overall player now on this team so i don't fault him for trying to carry the team when the going gets tough. it just sucks that he's not good enough. he's more of a secondary player and with tmac out, he's trying to be a primary player. hopefully he'll see these tapes and knows his shortcomings and defer a little bit more.
If you are not good enough, then pass the ball. If you are not willing to pass the ball, the coach should have pull him out to calm him down. When things are not going your way, you should always go back to basic, and not do the fancy, twisting, jump shot with a defender on your face. Run a simple pick and roll, or post up a player. I cant understand why rox did not pass the ball to yao when he is being guarded by boozer. If its only 1 player that did not pass, or it happens for a couple possession, i kinda understand. But the whole team did not see it?
In general I agree but I am starting to think we've given him a pass by simply relegating everthing to competitiveness or having the team's best interest at heart. Enough is enough ... he goes out of the offense even when things aren't going bad. That to me is selfish. Don't think his contract situation isn't on his mind.
I agree with this. We need to stop giving him a free pass. All that hustle and competitiveness won't mean anything if he keeps straying away from the offense like he does. . There at least 4 or 5 times where Yao got perfect position down low but his teammates failed to give him the ball. With the way teams are playing Yao now, he needs all the easy touches he can get.
If you can shoot more than 50%, shoot whatever you want. If everybody shoots more than 50% we are unbeatable. But, you can't do it, then pass the ball to the one who can do. So simple, easy, But nobody understand. Conclusion: No brain...
There is also a direct correlation between the amount of time we put the ball in the basket and scoring. It is just that simple! I had to draw from a Drexlerism and say something extremely profound. I do agree about ball movement creating better shots. It does seem like the drive and kick to the 3 point shooters was more effective than the feed the post and kick out. I think the offense get too predicable when we force feed Yao every play. I know this topic hasn't been discussed before, but in conjunction with the dribbling, I would like to see Yao involved in more pick and rolls and pick and pops rather than just post moves.
i don't see much difference between making them double yao and then kicking out to open shooters vs. penetrating to the hoop and kicking out. last night they didn't force feed yao. in fact they went trigger-happy a lot and didn't feed yao the ball nearly enough. and yao was involved in a lot of p&r's. he even had a couple of pick-n-pops.
The difference is how predictable it becomes to feed Yao in the post and then kick it out. All defenses know that is coming. The drive and kicks seemed to be more effective last night. I thought that the team was most effective when they mixed it up with Yao in the p&rs and pick and pops. Obviously, Yao in the post is damn effective, we just need to mix it up.
