Do you recall a C who was ever a good pick and roll partner? Yao can shoot, that's why he's an excellent pick and pop partner, but he doesn't have hands good enough to catch a ball in traffic and in one motion score like a Karl Malone.
Actually I see Sura as erratic and somewhat undisciplined. Like if you wrapped Mobley and Jason Williams in 1 player but took away their 3 point range. I am hoping Sura plays excellent defense and much within himself on offense. That means more carefull shot selection and making basic plays--not trying to make spetacular plays. I also see Sura getting more minutes in swing positions than the 1. If we can get anything from Ward, him and Lue should be able to provide excellent shooting, position defense, and basic point guard duties (setting up the offense for Tmac and Yao) for close to all the 1 minutes.
Both of you guys points are valid on involving Yao in the pick n' roll. Yao has a mass body, and he is a good middle range shooter for a center, so it's an advantage to set up the picks with those strengths, K. Malone come to mind. But he is also very slow, so that limits his "rolling" to the basket after the pick, that's why we rarely saw any "roll" to the basket from him. At times last season, Yao tried to compensate his slow foot by "rolling" early, which often caused incomplete picks. I think an offensive system is better than a bounch of static sets. But a good system requires a great offensive minded coach, and a team of committed players. I'm not sure we have got either. So may be the Rockets will designe many different sets, like most of the other teams do, use Yao in the post to initiate the offense, or isolate TMac on one side for 1on1, or use Yao to PnR with any other player for a 2-men game. There are numorous options out there, it's all about the execution. If the Rockets can execute their sets, then any set will be a good set!
If he's excellent why wasn't it used much? Why did most of Yao's picks end up in jump shots either from him or Jackson, Mobley, Francis? Why did his picks usually end up in plays being finished by someone other than him? Oh and poorly informed? You can't tell the difference between a pick and roll and pick and pop, yet I'm poorly informed? Yao is excellent at the pick and pop, but he's not excellent at the pick and roll.
I second to Scar's view on Sura. He was exactly the opposite of "a playmaker", "patient and heady" when he was with the Warriors. Did he change that dramatically after left GS? I didnt't follow his career since his Warriors's days. He was a high energy guy, gambled a lot on defense.
I guess I'm not so poorly informed, now just to add a bit to that, how many times did an attempt at a pick and roll lead to a Yao turnover? Not the passers turnover, but a turnover from Yao after getting the ball slapped away by a help defender, the pick and roll is one of the reasons why he led all centers in turnovers last season.
its a matter of semantics my prepubertal friend. this is like arguing that yao is horrible at driving cars, but great at driving a nissan sentra. regardless, the pnr is a matter of timing and its a play i see most professionals fail to execute properly. maybe 5 teams in the nba run it well consistently. when yao was involved in the pnr last year, his timing and instincts were flawless- he always managed to hold the screen long enough to create separation for the ballhandler, kept a good distance from the ballhandler and maintained a trajectory towards the basket or open spot that still allowed a pass. i pulled my hair out last year seeing a consistently well executed pnr by a 7-6 guy who hardly ever got the ball back (can you say "squandered mismatch"). bball being a game of angles, i dont see his lack of speed as an issue and his hands are excellent, a couple fumbles notwithstanding. (i suspect the few times he mishandled the ball was because he was so used to not getting it back, but thats just me). his perceived lack of pnr skill was due mainly to the lack of pnr skills of his teammates. and i am not a YOF...
I have to disagree with this point. Turnovers off pick and rolls made up a very small amount of Yao's TOs last year. By my estimate, his turnovers are attributed to the following in order of frequency: 1. Getting the ball stripped by guards coming from his blind side. 2. Making bad passes. 3. Getting the ball batted away as he was getting the entry pass while posting up. And Yao only led the league in number of TOs because he played 82 games. Shaq had more TOPG and per 48. While Duncan's TOBG was also higher and his per 48 was only slightly lower. The fact is that big men that touch the ball a lot in the post are going to have a bunch of TOs. And I'm not saying that Yao will be as good as Malone at the roll and finish, but I've seen him catch enough balls on the move, and finish enough times when moving towards the basket to conclude that he can be effective at it. Especially when he's paired with a guy that can get to into the lane and to the rim as quickly as T-Mac can.
When are we going to see these flawless pick and roll skills? When have you ever seen Yao do better on a pick and roll than he does on a pick and pop? With the CNT? Nope, he became a great pick and pop player in China, he showed that on the Rockets too. Do we have to bring back John Stockton so he can maximize his flawless pick and roll skills? Mark Jackson can make the pass on a pick and roll fine, seen him do that with Karl Malone, why not with Yao? The truth is that his pick and roll skills are about as flawless as his rebounding and shot blocking skills. Again, the pick and roll caused him to be the most turnover prone center in the league, no wait, that must of been his teammates' fault too!
Yao led C's in TO because...jeez how many C's can actually score in a set offense? Score with their backs to the board? Shaq didnt play alot of games...but he had more TO per game like another poster said. Miller never worked for his shots. Besides when you got Mobes and Francis as your major pnr partners you're not gonna be very consistent anyway. Those two guys are poor decision makers and overrated passers.
While he did get plenty of turnovers off of those 3 reasons, plenty of them came off attempted pick and rolls, the way I saw it there was more turnovers than baskets when running the pick and roll. Shaq also plays around 6 more minutes than Yao, I'm not so sure on the exact numbers but if Yao played Shaq's minutes wouldn't he average more TO's? Yes, BIGS that touch the ball a lot are going to have a bunch of TO's, that exuse is fine with Yao. Just noticed how convenient it is to say that Yao averaged a lot of TOs because he touched the ball a lot, and yet he didn't touch the ball enough. So why can't ya'll see that PG's that make plays are going to have a lot of TO's too, especially if that PG is the only playmaker on the team? Hmmm... Effective? We'll see, everyone says we have better passers this season (which I agree on BTW), so we'll see if that happens...
So what? Leading C's in TO is leading C's in turnovers no matter how sorry the state of center is in the NBA now-a-days. If Yao played Shaq's minutes would he still have less TOs per game? Well say what you will about those two dudes, we'll see how much of an improvement we'll see from that play this coming season.
My mistake, now he doesn't lead C's in turnovers, he's in second place, just like Francis was last season in PG TO's.
Good thread but I must disagree that Bob Sura is the antithesis of "patient and heady." He's very erratic, high energy, and characterized by poor decision making. He's like Steve Francis without the endless athleticism. He's very athletic in his own right, but nowhere near approaching the league of Francis whom the league probably has never seen anything like. It's this erratic play which will keep Sura from being the starter and may allow him to thrive off the bench. After all, all of our other players are pretty conservative in their style, so Sura's wildness could provide a spark. As far as the offense, I'de keep it simple. Look to Yao every time, and keep the ball in TMac's hands at all times. Big things are in store for this bunch.
I was going to write the same thing. I like the signing of Sura, but patient and heady he isn't. And anyone who would write that obviously hasn't seen him play much.
so um what are you trying to prove by putting francis' name in there? I don't how this whole debate of his TOs relate to Francis at all. If you are trying to defend francis, let me tell noone was trying to bash him in the first place. Calm down, there's a time and place to defend him JumpMan; that wasn't.
Yao will have his share of turnovers. Many big men do. Shaq, Duncan, Karl Malone, Dream, David Robinson, Ewing, Kareem; they've all averaged 3+ turnovers at a time in their respective careers. Simply put, if you have the ball in your hands a lot, you'll rack upsome turnovers.
Nice thread! I'm not sure what will be the most effective offense. I just hope that we don't limit ourselves to being a one dimensional team. I think on certain nights due to match ups, the pnr may be our best option, iso's on the wing w/tmac some nights, iso w/yao (ala akeem days), perhpas a triangle set some nights. I think this team has may strengths and I hope that we find the way to use them all iso setting into the same conventional offensive set every time down the floor. This being said I loved this quote: Not defending him but..... he (Steve) did receive his share of bashing for the same thing we are standing up defending ym for. Bottom line is if the guy is counted on to dominate the ball, doing both the scoring and passing, it only stands to reason his TO's are gonna be higher than other player's at that position who are limited to just one role.
