Bonzi's role maybe not be so obvious (numbers and skills)

Somethng wrong here....We have a shooting forward and a power guard here instead of PF and SG??

 

Great points.

Statistically, Bonzi hasn't been an efficient scorer since 2002 in Portland. Even last year's bounceback season didn't see him improve his scoring efficiency (in terms of TS%). Part of that has to do with motivation and being out of shape for a couple of seasons, part of it may have to do with his role (he's more efficient as a garbage player sneaking around getting putbacks and stuff like that than as a primary scoring option). However, it may just be that Bonzi at age 30 isn't going to score like he did at age 25. We'll see if living off the garbage points with Yao and/or McGrady will help him become more efficient.

However, we do know the man can rebound the basketball (particularly on the offensive end, where he averaged 2.7 per game) and plays at least solid opportunistic D judging by the steals he got last season. Maybe crashing the boards and cashing in on interior passing is what he should do on offense.

Nothing wrong with that. Having a shooting forward and a power guard takes the opposing 4s and 2s out of their elements.

Imagine Rockets vs. Spurs... I imagine they'll stick Elson/Butler instead of Duncan on Yao to protect Timmy from foul trouble. So, what does Timmy, their best defensive rebounder, have to do? He's not guarding McGrady, Wells, or Alston (or any of the other guards since they'd drive by him. Timmy gets to chill by the corner 3 pt line with Shane.

That probably leaves Manu to block out Bonzi crashing the offensive board. I doubt Manu, or most other SGs in the league, enjoys that task or has as much success at the defensive rebound job as the PF who will now chill with Shane on the perimeter.

My guess is the Rockets are gonna be a b**** of a team to deal with on the offensive boards.

 

I have no problem using Yao in the high post with Bonzi in the low post when the matchup is in our favor which should be the case quite often. There are not a lot of guards that can handle Bonzi in the post and no centers that can handle Yao so in either case the opposing defense will double or foul/get scored on. Yao in the high post should also draw one of the opponents best rebounders away from the basket and allow Bonzi to do what all the stats being posted in this thread say is one of Bonzi's strongest abilities, get offensive rebounds and putbacks.

This statement completely baffles me. I don't care what all these sensationalistic journalists have to say about Yao. Yao will kick a$$ and there is nothing some article about Yao being soft can do about that.