ClutchFans Game Thread: Cavaliers @ Rockets 12/2/2006

This is on ESPN.com. Is it true? Yao Ming ejected?!



Flagrant Fouls: None
Technicals: 3 HOUSTON ( C Hayes 1, Y Ming 2 )
Officials: Joe Crawford , Leroy Richardson , Sean Corbin
Attendance: N/A
Time: 00:00



espn box score

 

not exaggerating at all. His rebound rating sucks and always has(generally in the 11-12 range, which is Mo Taylor/Padgett territory, by way of comparison, Yao is usually around 16 and Chuck Hayes is 19) as does his /40 minute rebounds. Sure..it's about as mediocre as it's always been, so its "stable", but........

 

defensive 3 second violations - can't get ejected for that.

 

Thanks for the clarification. I always thought those were "team technicals" and not assessed to any particular player

 

I think with his reduced role, Juwan can concentrate more on defense, hustle play, and rebounding. I see he's been doing those for several games, and remarkably well on rebounding.

 

I hope so. Even though he generally stinks, he's not a dumbass and maybe he has learned a thing or two about how he can be effective by watching Hayes go at it.

 

Interesting to see the Cavs almost unanimously gushing about how our defense is by far the best they've seen this season. All but LeBron -- who was trying to give the "tired legs" excuse. I guess better that than admit that he got owned on defense by Battier.

Mike Brown raised a good point -- the main reason why we keep outrebounding opponents is because we keep forcing them to throw up bricks. Our paint defense is basically second to none, so we force teams to jack up contested jump shots. Shooting percentages go down, and we grab rebounds.

 

THat's been the JVG plan for nearly a decade now. Remember this when people start to b**** about us giving up 3 pointers - it's a calculated risk and it's just going to happen regardless. In the end the tradeoff is worth it, at least thats what the numbers say.

 

That no one other than Yao could play post and draw fouls is not a good news for us.

We need 3rd player who could make his own play and own shots.....

That's why we need Bonzi to be our 3rd opition if we wanted to become a champion contender instead of a playoff team only.

 

I hope all the Tmac-haters could see the team played the best tonight when Tmac was on the court in the 1st quarter. This team needs Tmac. Face it.

 

he's supposed to know his jumpers aren't really high % shots compared to his layups and dunks.

 

No doubt about it, We need Tmac, but I will be really happy if he can take some minutes away from Alston. He is clearly a better play maker than Alston and let Head have some minutes as a SG. He is doing pretty well with 3s.

 

JVG is a good coach against a certain type of team: the type with one major scoring threat and poor perimeter shooting. Then his traps, fast doubles, and interior defence really lock in. See Miami, Minnesota, and now Cleveland.

JVG is not so great against a team with a more balanced attack. If the other team is also hitting 3s, it's game over. Phoenix was both, which is why JVG looked so clueless.

 

golden states will be a tough game, i expect a very close and entertaining game

 

too tired to read through everything but I did notice one thing during this game that I think will help Yao ... using the pump fake and then leaning in to get fouled.

He shouldn't use it that often but I think when teams are really swarming around him then using the pump fake and then getting fouled helps opposing centers pause the next time around just enough to let yao go through his motions (and we know that yao is best in a comfort zone and not when he has to improvise ala hakeem).

in fact I think a team like phoenix whose defense seems to bother yao a lot because they are very distracting both when yao shoots and even when he tries to pass it back out. getting a few of these "hyper" defenders to slow down a little would let yao get a better rhythm, IMHO.

 

As others have said, I'm not sure how much of this win is due to our good defense or the fact that Cleveland shot very poorly. Their center Ilgauskas seemed to put up a lot of mid-range jumpers against Yao, I suppose to try to draw him out, but missed most of them.

Battier gave us a much needed boost with his offensive boost in the second half, the post-ups and the 3-pointer. I'd really like to see a game where he takes a more offensive role through a whole game instead of these well-timed spurts of his.

That's interesting. Are there really teams that a JVG defense system is just ineffective against?

 

Phoenix is just one team with a balanced attack. Don't forget the games against Chicago, Spurs and the Pistons. Those teams are top 10 in 3pters made and have good perimeter shooting also. You know what happened in those games.

Golden State will be a tough game. They are #3 in 3pters made after the Rockets and Phoenix. The Spurs struggled with the Warriors for a loss. The defensive teams, Jazz, Spurs, Mavericks, and Detroit have lost to Golden State. I wouldn't be surprised if the Rockets follows San Antonio's and Detroit's lead.

 

I wouldn't be "terse" if I mentioned everything, would I?

Yep, we almost went 0-3. We avoided that by just barely beating the Bulls (by one point).

Another example: the playoff series in 05 against Dallas. As long as the Mavs' offence went through Dirk, we were fine. But we were sunk the moment Avery spread out his attack.

That seems likely, unfortunately.

 

I think I found George's Weapons of Mass Destruction!!!!DeeK's elbows!

 

Haha that was my immediate reaction also.