I see how it can take away the offense ,but defense and rebounding I'm not sure bout that, we do need to help Yao out cus last night he played too much (put in chuck)
During Hayes time, Aldridge shot 6/6 and 3/4 free throws. Scola and Landry stopped Aldridge on some occasions too.
Main thing here is to figure out a way to get Yao the ball. GET YAO THE BALL! That's all I have to say.
Patience. There's no patience on offense when trying to find Yao. When Yao frees himself, the ball is already being reversed someone ends up dribbling and jacking up a low percentage shot. Adelman talked about patience after the game, we need to run our offense and Yao needs to do a better job of getting position, but we all saw those a-holes hooking his arm. Yao drew fouls and applied some veteran moves in hook his arm, but still, they made us go away from our guy. We still shot 50% from the field, but free throws killed us. Defensively, Aldridge shot lights out from outside, BRoy went off, he wanted that game. I really think we should play under screens, instead of running our guards on top of picks, they should go under and the big man should fall back into the paint and concede the outside shot. Yao isn't overplaying the pick, Scola tries to at times, but Roy splits it so easily. We need to protect the paint, but it's tough when LMA and Roy are hitting outside shots, it's when they're driving to the basket that kills me.
If Hayes fouls out that won't be a big loss to the Rockets offense. I'm saying use Hayes like a lot of teams used to play Hakeem as a body and 6 fouls to muscle and tire him out.
I don't understand where people are getting this idea that Chuck Hayes was on Aldridge... 85% of the time that Chuck was in the game, he was guarding the Center (Oden or Przybilla)... of the entire time, I only really saw Chuck guard LaMarcus for about 3-4 possessions.
Without Aldrige's contribution, the Rockets probably win game 2. Instead of trying to keep the ball out of Roy's hands, it might be better to try to keep it out of Aldrige's hands. Even if you give Roy more scoring opportunities, limiting his help from the 2 other highest scorers might be the best strategy. After all, Roy is probably going to be able to score no matter WHO is guarding him. Doubling him takes away a defender that might help shut down the "help". I would rotate to defend the next two highest scorers and not double Roy. He becomes a "facilitator" when you do that. At least for some portion of the game, let him "get his" and shut down everybody else as best as possible. There is no "no brainer" defense. Portland has talent. If Portland scores more than 100 points, 1)the Rockets defense isn't doing what it was able to do during the regular season and 2)the Rockets will likely lose. (And as other have noted, Artest needs to not be a ball stopper. No one should be.)
This is is a good point that I forgot about. Aldridge's bread-and-butter seems to be a back down hook, fadeway or turnaround. Scola did try to stand his ground but picked up a couple cheapies, as you mentioned. I still like that strategy, though. You gotta stand your ground regardless of whether the refs use you as an example.
