Yao swining like a wild man is what JVG designs for the season. Yao couldnt play like Shaq getting position by over-powering. We've seen enough Yao turns the ball over while the quick double team comes. Guards staring at Yao and not passing him is what JVG calls for.
It depends on the head coach's style. Most of the assists are doing scouting, film preparation, track game time stats; some even draw the plays. Oh, you always need to have someone to hold the head coach back when he running towards the refs, plays his "I dare you give me a T" act. Of course, most teams have assists to prepare & run the practice.
Well, not enough are going to the games. The Rockets should be ashamed that Toyota Center looks like a ghost town!! You have Yao and T-Mac and no one goes to the games! Bring in Phil Jackson or some other good offensive coach and people will come to the games!!
Toyota Center is a new complex, and it rarely gets filled. This affects the bottomline which in turn affects future financial decisions such as signing players. This isn't monopoly like some people think it is. I think it may be worth it to dump JVG and his contract of $9 million. Some team will probably hire JVG after 1 season anyway. Les has a committment to Foxsports to provide a good product. It's one thing to have winning, boring basketball. It's quite another to have losing, boring basketball.
Dump JVG and hire who? You can forget about phil jackson, he would sooner coach the sacramento kings than coach this mess.
You have no idea what you are talking about. Phil Jackson wouldn't hesitate for a second to coach this team, period. PJ wants rings. He has 9 and just needs 1 or 2 more to be considered the "best" of all time. With PJ running things, imagine the things Yao/TMac could do. Just imagine Shaq/Kobe without the selfishness.
One thing I don't understand is why we don't live and die with Yao. For everyone who wants Yao to step up to the plate, get more aggressive and start dominating, well give him the rock. TMac can dominate and so can Yao. Yes he needs to be told over and over to dominate and BE aggressive. But he's shown enough that he can do it. Again, it's up to JVG to get the offense to run THROUGH Yao. That is what bothers me. Run it through Yao and TMac. That's all, let them get the other guys going. Let them pass it out once they are being double teamed and triple teamed. Hey I don't mind getting beat by 29% shooting when it is my stars messing things up. But why would any coach want to get beat because the role players are shooting 29% and trying to seal the game in the 4th qtr. I just think JVG needs to put the heat on whoever is on the court with TMac and Yao and make them understand the ball stops here. OK Detroit did it with defense and a team of pretty good players playing the right way together. But Houston did it riding one Hakeem Olujawon across the finish line, the same way LA rode Shaq and Kobe and SA rode Duncan. And Chicago road Jordan and Boston rode Bird etc. Just run the offense through Yao, especially in the 4th qtr. especially after he has torched the other team. If they front him then figure out a way to defeat the front defense. Believe it or not I think JVG is a good coach, but I don't like the way we are using Yao. I do believe that we can get him the ball in crunch time. And we have Tmac as an option also. I am just tired of watching Yao fight hard for position and our pg doesn't even look at him but dribbles away to the other side of the key, is that a set play to tire Yao out?
Hopefully something will change when Sura comes back. Lets hope he makes his shots though because if not then he might get benched..............
Yesterday, yahoo sports ran an article where the author came up with some sorta whacked out mathematical formula to determine the league's best coaches. I can try to find it again. But in the meantime, I recall they had Flip Saunders @ 1, I forget who was 2, Larry Brown @ 3 and Rick Carlisle (or however you spell it) at 4. I think JVG was in the 8-10 grouping and Rudy T was in the 11-14 group. Thought it was hogwash, personally, BUT it might be relevant to this discussion ...
http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/news;_ylc=X3oDMTBqam1ocWIyBF9TAzk1ODYxOTQ4BHNlYwNlY2w-?slug=cnnsi-whosontop&prov=cnnsi&type=lgns Wow, that was easy.
We brought in JVG to implement some discipline on last years team. This isn't a team that needs discipline. This is a team that just needs to be able to play basketball. They don't need to be worried about using 24 of 24 seconds on the shot clock or stuff like that. Yao/Tmac/Jackson and crew are smart enough to know how to play the game, they don't need to be told be a grumpy little man. The best coaches are ones who let their players play. They trust their players to play the game right. Look at all the coaches who have won championships the last 10 years. Rudy-Rockets Rudy-Rockets Phil Jackson-Bulls Greg Poppavich-Spurs Phil Jackson-Lakers Phil Jackson-Lakers Phil Jackson-Lakers Greg Poppavich-Spurs Larry Brown-Pistons All so-called "player's coaches." Brown might be the exception, but he is a student of the game and a future hall of famer. But most will still consider Larry Brown a player's coach.
neither popovich nor brown are players coaches. popovich is just as demanding in games as van gundy. if his players aren't doing what he wants them to do, they sit.
Acutally, Popovich is a player's coach. If you see how they let Parker/Manu/Duncan do their thing, Pop lets them use their abilities to make players. JVG expects the system to make plays, not the players.
One thing I don't understand is why our fans in Houston have such a lack of amount of faith. Nine games in the season and everyone's all bellyaching. Its the same thing that happened with the Astros. We get Beltran, we're four games below .500 and I'll be darned if they don't go 36-10 in their next 46 games. Not one person took credit for their harsh comments. NOT ONE! Instead, everyone wanted to jump on the bandwagon and then start cheering like they had been behind them all along. Now its people like Ced and DaDakota (whom in my opinion is the biggest whiner on this board less JediKnight) You two remember all this crap you're saying now. Jeff Van Gundy did more with less talent in New York than either of you could do in your wild imaginations. This is a forum to talk basketball, not to talk crap, curse, and disparage the coach every single chance you can get just because you don't agree with his assessments. Let me ask you this question. Where do you two coach? What are your teams? How have they done? Have you coached at the NBA Finals? Have you coached in New York and flourished? This is how I know you two don't know diddly crap about basketball. We have new players: Ryan Bowen, Charlie Ward, Tyronn Lue, Dikembe Mutombo, Tracy McGrady, Rece Gaines, Juwan Howard, Bob Sura, and Andre Barrett. Three of those are on the Injured List. Granted the main contributor on the injured list is Bob Sura, HOWEVER you show me one coach that came right in with nine new players and started the season 9-0 like you expect. Additionally, our two best players have played a grand total of 7 GAMES TOGETHER! Ican't make this more clear to you naysayers. You can't get CHEMISTRY until YOU PLAY TOGETHER FOR AN EXTENDED PERIOD OF TIME! Players do play basketball games. COACHES DRAW THE PLAYS UP. If these players aren't used to the SYSTEM yet, it means it's because there are NINE NEW PLAYERS ON THE TEAM AND THEY AREN'T COMPLETELY COMFORTABLE PLAYING IN JEFF VAN GUNDY' SYSTEM! You whiners either need to play your first real game of basketball or go get a pet to help you cease your whining. It's embarrassing to be a Houstonian and seeing all this. For all of you that have stayed positive and understand what is going on, I appreciate you more than you know. We'll have an outstanding season this year. You watch
Jack Hammer stikes again! I started a whole thread about this, and you were nowhere to be found. In fact, if i were to be elected Chief Moderator, you would have been annointed Head Master b****slapper. Once upon a time, i argued incessantly for patience and rationality, but alas my own patience for these naysayers have grown weary of late. I just let them chirp away into the silence, occacionally taking a dump on SamFisher, and sit back and look at some hamburger pics provied by tinman. Dark these days have become. As we await the arrival of Chief Moderator Durden.
because you have a player do what he is good at, doesnt mean you are a players coach. being a players coach, it means you cater to the players. that is not what pop is about. if a player isnt doing what he wants, he fixes the situation. - look at all the DNPs malick got last year. that was a disciplinary action by popivich...he felt malick wasnt hustling enough, trying to score to much, basically playing outside of his game. - look at what happened when tony parker wasnt trying in impose himself on the offensive end, or when he was turning the ball over. tony was benched. - when manu would try to do too much, turning the ball over. he would sit, and eventually lost his starting spot last year.
Why do you keep saying this? I'll ask again. Do think that the players we have have no freedom? What game are you watching? McGrady and team have plently of freedom to create on their own. The "system" is what gets all the player on the same page that allows them to play as a team. There has to be a "system." Those are known "plays" and they are a must. Pop has plenty of those system plays. The exception is that their players execute them. We are still rusty! You don't see Duncan going one on one everytime (freedom). He has assignments and pass options that allow him to create and get others to score if he's not open (or doubled). This is the same system that allows Yao and McGrady to operate. How many drives and dunks have we've seen McGrady do? Plenty! How many jump hooks have Yao made? Plenty! Those are pure one-on-one plays. But the "system" is what lets the other players know where they should be at all times (assignments). Our supporting cast is what is weak. We need a better PG and more athletic PF. We don't have a Parker to break down our point. He setups the offense and is more a threat thatn Ward is. It would open up the court if we had a Parker like PG. We don't.
