No, I'm no basketball coach. My basketball resume consists of junior high starter and high school starter/back-up, numerous games watched on tv and attendence at our very own Houston Rockets home games. That said, I know at least some ways to attack a zone. Here's what you don't do: - Don't keep running your man-to-man offensive plays, ESPECIALLY if they involve a lot of picks. - Don't try and have one man break down the defense through dribble drives. Here's what you can do: - Do fill your line-up with good spot-up shooters - Do run the offense through the high post - Do find pass the ball quicker and sharper, forcing the zone to constantly shift and weaken. Now, I know JVG is no offensive genius, but surely he knows how to attack a zone. How many times do we have to try and watch them run a pick-n-roll against a zone defense? This should be easy, run Yao to the high post EVERY time, feed him the ball, let him turn and make either (1) Pass to PF now open down low, (2) pass back out to the wing to keep the ball moving or (3) Relatively easy FT-type shot. This team seems to be a better than average passing team (at least compared to the last 5 years), so attacking the zone shouldn't be a problem, but damn it's painful the way they are doing it.
Movement away from the ball and effective passing...that's it...and, as a matter of fact, those two things will also attack one-on-one defensive schemes. And as we've all been seeing, the Rockets are lethargic on offense and do not pass the ball well.
Good offensive fundamentals all around break down any defense. good passing lots of movement. cutting / slashing good shooting we dont have any of that right now.. dribble penetration is underrated on this board and I dont mean dribbling the ball around the perimeter. I mean TParker / SNash drive and kick. J
I'm not sure how a board as a whole can underrate something like "dribble penetration". Anyway, the team is getting a lot more than it ever has between Lue (when healthy), Sura, Barrett, and once-per-half Tmac. Realize Parker/Nash etc. have guys that can finish around the hoop. Athletic guys. We don't really have that so the other teams can mostly concentrate on the penetrator and the shooters.
Get better outside shooters. Unfortunately, JVG will not play outside shooters if they can't play his brand of defense. This means JVG's half-court offense which is dictated by good 3 point shooting looks like death. If JVG is going to pick a defensively fundamental player over a good jumpshooting fundamental player, he needs to go uptempo bigtime. He's doing the exact opposite as the Nets did when they went to the Finals. Once a zone defense gets set in the half-court, the Rockets are toast. Yao gets fronted with a weakside defender already near his back. TMac doesn't know how to attack a zone, so he shoots jumpers which brick like Steve did last year.
Ok, maybe its just me. I have noticed that last season and this season (more this season) the Rockets don't pass to Yao unless he is in a certain spot when he is posting up. When he is posting up on one side and the ball swings to his side, if he is not in a definite spot, the guard (whoever it is) looks and passes back to the top of the key and ball swings to the other side in which Yao Ming reverses and starts posting up on the other side. Sometimes, he still doesn't get the ball. Now, we all know the ball moves faster than a person can so what is the deal? Another situation, sometimes the play is called at the top of the key, so he sets a pick on one side of the floor (sometimes nobody uses it), then goes all the way to the other side to start posting up, the problem is, the guard already has the ball on that side and is waiting for Yao to post up, giving the defense time to set up. What is all this wasted movement by Yao and wasted time on the shot clock?
as i have said before Screens can be used against zones, it at the right time and place they can be very successful, ie post player screening on a skip pass from one side to the other can be a get way to get a wide open jumper Spacing is really important, if you can split the zone such that the two defender have decide who to guard, ie make them move making the zone move is really important, passing and dribble penetration is really important getting the ball is inside is ultra important, either thru posting up, passing to cutters or dribble penetration crashing the board is also really important as rebounding/boxing out is a big weakness of zones find the gaps and take what they give you, all zones have their limitations and weak spots
As they complain that zone defenses are ruining the league, McGrady and Iverson should take a good look around. The games are lively and high-scoring when the Lakers, Kings, Pacers, Mavericks, Nuggets and several other teams are involved. Nobody has a single complaint about anything, because raw talent and sensible coaching have taken over. Only the terrible teams have a legitimate problem, because opposing coaches -- generally against their better judgment -- show them zone defenses for the full 48 minutes. The response is confusion, frustration and a ton of 3-point shots that are not going in. "Because teams don't know how to attack a zone," Newell said. "It would be interesting to see if any of them attended clinics, like Boeheim's, where you can really learn something. I doubt it. I mean, there's a lot more ball movement now than before (when zones were banned), but it's just guys passing it laterally around the perimeter. That's the easiest thing in the world to defend. "To really attack a zone, you need a lot of movement: back-cutting, running guys diagonally through the zone and especially kicking the ball in to the center, forcing guys to collapse on him, then getting it back out to someone for an open shot -- and I don't mean a 3-pointer, but a nice mid- range shot. The Lakers are dominant because they do exactly that, with Shaq (O'Neal). I know the talent level is down at the center position, but that's no excuse for taking the center completely out of the offense, which a lot of teams have done. "We're not developing centers that have the skills," Newell said. "OK, so maybe he's not a great scorer. He should still be able to throw the bounce pass, the drop pass, the flare pass when he gets double-teamed, the over-the- head pass with two hands to start a fast break. Outside of Shaq, how many passes do you see any of these guys use? The center is just screening for somebody all the time. Hell, no wonder the zones are working. There's no movement or spacing." Solutions? Aside from smarter coaching, teams might consider having one or two players such as Steve Kerr, who made a nice living in the NBA, or Tom Coverdale, the outside-shooting specialist from Indiana University. There aren't enough Rip Hamiltons in the league, guys who simply can't be left open for mid-range shots. If young American kids don't get the message, a lot of Europeans and South Americans are ready for the assignment right now. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/artic...e/a/2003/12/16/SPG0B3O4CF1.DTL&type=printable
It's a shame the Rockets didn't get Ray Allen. If the Rockets had pursued Ray Allen in a 3 way deal with the Magic, TMac could have gone to Seattle. Juwan Howard would have went to Seattle also. Vladimir Radmanovic would come back to the Rockets along with Ray Allen. Sura (garbage jumpshooter) Ray Allen (great jumpshooter) JJ (good jumpshooter) Vladimir Radmanovic (very good jumpshooter) Mo (average jumpshooter) Yao (used to be good, now a garbage jumpshooter) Forget zone defenses. Ray Allen (who is shooting 44% from 3 point land) and Vladimir Radmanovic would be killing the zone defenses if teams dared to used them against the Rockets. The Sixers and Hornets with their garbage teams used the zone defense which TMac is famous for having problems with. The end result is TMac shoots a poor percentage.
Your right, it is a shame. I don't understand why a couple of shooters would want to come to this team. They would get so many open looks and could increase their percentage. Heck if we could get two decent shooters, we would really upgrade. I think eddie House would be okay, along with Radmonavic. It would be great.
At the risk of ruining some potentially great coaching careers, I feel obligated to mention that the Rockets' worst scoring quarter vs NO was 16 points in Q3. The Hornets played man-to-man exclusively in Q3 except for one brief sequence at the 6:16 mark.
On a related note, according to this Chinese interview that the Rockets started to practice the zone defense which they had never practiced last season. They were running the 1-3-1 zone.
