Horrible 2nd halves for what seems to be every game this season except for the Mavs and Heat games. One of the biggest factors, as many posters hear already know, is Yao and Mac being fatigued and/or cold in the forth. JVG's managment of their 2nd half minutes is the biggest blame for this. Part of the reason we've been pretty good in the first half and first half of the 3rd quarter is because regardless of the score, we seem to rest Yao and Mac at consistent intervals. However , in the second half, JVG keeps either Mac of Yao in the game anytime the score seems to get a little tight, showing no faith in or role players. Many times Yao and/or Mac plays too many minutes in either the third and or the forth. Yao looks especially fatigued late in games (leading to most of his shots falling short, or way too long when he tries to compensate for losing his legs). Regardless of the score, Yao should come out at the 6:00 or 5:30. TMac should come out at about the 3:30 to 3:00 minute mark of the third regardless. For the last 3 minutes, we should definitly use our bench regardless. I think we should go with defensive unit of Vspan, Snyder, Battier, Hayes/Novak (in case not enough offense), Mutombo. The are there for energy, and hopefully get a lot of hustle points of turnovers of bad possesions for the other team. Then in the forth, Yao should start. He should play unit around the 9:00 minute mark and come out when T-Mac goes back in. Yao should come back in around the 6 minute mark. JVG should buy rest time with carefully placed time outs during the forth after Yao comes out for added rest time (Phil Jackson used to do it all the time with Shaq). Yao seems to need just a little bit of rest late in cames, and his effectiveness seems to go up a lot. To finish off games, we really should milk the Tmac Yao PnR b/c the opposing defense really focuses on shutting down our normal inside-out post offense and Tmac iso's. Any opinions?
Good point about the rest breakdown. Thing is, I can see where JVG is coming from. He wants to play his star players to their limit as best as possible. But what he isn't seeing now, is that the times when he chooses to rest them, is when teams generally make runs to close the score gap. He must adjust. Yao going out 4/5 into the first quarter is a good strategy, because it allows him to finish the half strong, when McGrady is more likely to be resting then. But this pattern cannot work in the 2nd half, because teams will ramp up the intensity then.
So in other words, JVG is testing and stretching his star player's stamina in real time purposefully? Not that itself is necessarily a bad idea, but I seriously doubt JVG is capable of implementing such "strategic" long-term plan. Besides, if he is bold enough to mess with key players, why can't he conduct some smaller experiments with the Novak, VSpan, and Bonzi?
The defense is sux. They can't stop anyone and yao kept to lose position. the opposite keep making easy shot.
I really believe that it doesnt have as much to do with Tmac and Yao being fatigued or going cold. It comes down to very good shut down defence, in particular against Detroit and the Spurs, and our inability to execute down the stretch. Against the Bulls and the Bucks when we gave up big leads it was because Yao and Tmac were forced to put up bad shots because our offense was not clicking, this doesnt mean that they were cold. You may want to put this down to coaches adjusting to our style of play, something that i think JVG lacks. He rarely changes lineups and "goes out of his comfort zone" to try and get us back in games that we are struggling. Vspan or Novak can do this for us, after all if your struggling you have nothign to lose. A perfect case of this was when Beno Udrih was given extended minutes when Ginobli and Parker were struglling against us. So our collapses at the end of games, in my opinion, can be put down to excellent defence, very poor offensive execution (leading to bad shots or turnovers) and the unwillingness of JVG to try new things when things arent going our way. Just my opinion
bench YAO the first half,TMAC time; bench TMAC the second half,YAO time. just kidding... this could be a serious problem to any coach in this planet.
yeah jvg never calls timeout to rest players. but anyone who ever played nba2k series knows you gotta use those timeouts to prevent fatigue!
don't bench mcgrady when he's on a roll. if you want to rest him wait until he's missed 3 straight jumpers.
u beat me to it.. I was going to start a new thread just for this issue.. I noticed that Tmac starts rolling towards towards the 2nd half of the 3rd quarter, then, JVG just takes him out and puts Luther in.. Luther starts running the PG, which is not his natural spot..and gives us turnovers, the defense collapses on Yao, the other team starts a run.. Tmac comes in cold in the 4th after getting his rhythm broken by sitting on the bench, Yao goes to the bench and Deke comes in.. we end up blowing a 21 point lead and losing or winning by 1... rest Tmac in the 1st half of the 3rd quarter.. put him around the 7 minutes mark, and let him go to work.. rest Yao in the first 4 minutes of the 4th, then bring him in.. let Tmac run point to give Rafer his rest in the end of 3rd, then bring back Rafer in the 4th.. let Head run the point in the 2nd quarter, if we get outscored bigtime, put Mac in and play Luther the 2, his natural spot.. it's pretty simple, JVG doesn't seem to make this adjustment and I've noticed that the game flow (from popcornmachine.net) is quite similar for the last 3 games...
Can you name a single team, ever, that rested their star player to begin the second half? And which is it. Is JVG playing the starters too much, or should he keep them in while "they're on a roll" and not worry about them being tired in the fourth?
Its time to see Bonzi get some time on the court. When and or if Yao & T-Mac get cold/tiered we have him to put the ball in the bucket.
maybe you are right, but it just pisses me off when Tmac goes out to get his rest in the end of 3rd when he is starting to roll just to have him come back cold in the 4th.. it just kills me.. I am sorry for the Typo.. I meant in the first half of the 4th, even though it's still not a good idea to rest your superstar in the 4th..
or how about when mcgrady is bench for 7 min at the beg of the 2nd qtr....after he put up 15 in the 1st qtr Thats why he got cold...he sat on the pine way too long...should have only rested maybe 3 or 4 min...let him come back for 5 to 7 min, then bench him the last minute of the half...
