Well, JVG doesn't have a lot of choices at this point. The choices are move Cato out of the starting lineup and bring in MOT, or keep Cato in the starting lineup and ask Yao and Cato to switch up on D with Yao taking the opponent's outside big man and Cato taking the low post. And offensively, the same thing, start playing Yao up high, facing the basket ala Brad Miller last night. I think definitely offensively and probably defensively, this is our preferred lineup. Comes down to this. When Cato is in, he has got to be down low. Don't run a postup for him, but let him play down low and bring Yao or MOT out high, whichever one of them is in the game. And when Cato is out of the game, and Yao is in with MOT, then Yao has to be down low and MOT at the top facing the bucket. Only run the postup when Yao is down low. Only throw the ball to Cato for the throw down. If he can't get the throwdown, he has to pass the ball back up top, or throw it crosscourt for an open 3 point shooter. Bring Boki into the starting lineup at the 3. He is shooting so much better than JJ right now. Cat at the top and Francis on the wing. I'll take Yao starting the game shooting 15 footers, and then when the opponents go to the bench, spell MoT for Cato and drop Yao down low to just clean up against the backup big man. I think Cato should be the big man substituted for when the opponent goes to the bench, not Yao. Then you've got JJ and Pike coming off the bench with MOT. Leave Cat in the starting lineup and let him play the point offensively. Cat was the only player that I saw last night that actually looked good. To me, he is a much better player when he has to play at the top offensively. It forces him to lay off the dribble drives or at least to have to pull up and hit the intermediate range jumper, which he is very proficient in doing. It's obvious that teams have figured out how to play us. We gotta change things up. By the way, what happened to all those people that kept saying, "What's the matter with you guys, after all we aren't gonna go 82-0, 81-1, 80-2, 79-3, 78-4, 77-5, 76-6................."? They've all disappeared. You could see all this coming even when the Rockets were winning games. You can just tell by watching the games, by how the Rockets play. The Rockets have serious problems. They need to do something to fix them or we are looking at 40-42 again.
I think there are games where it will work to have Cato get a lot of minutes and start as a forward and games where wit wont. We just need to choose the right ones.
i think everybody was impressed at how brad miller looked like a 6'10" unstoppable pg at the free throw line, and peja (boki please!!!...) or bibby(sf) got easy layups without dribbling. The best possible play i can think of is 1.) Yao hustles down to the paint and looks for a quick pass to get his hook or dunk on. 2.) If not open then steve/cat take the ball on the wing and yao comes up for a pick and roll w/ yao's back to the baseline. 3.) steve or cat can explode that way (down the baseline) while cato drops in for an ally oop if the d helps. 4.) if the D stays w/ sf/cat then they pass to yao on the high post and try to back door 5.) JJ comes to the corner yao passes to him then drops to the low post and goes one on one from there. __________________
I definitely think Yao should spend more time facing the basket, playing just like Brad Miller. Miller is just as skillful as Yao and has very similar weaknesses. Both are slow and cant jump. Miller isnt exactly a beast inside the paint either. He is good because he is smart, plays teamball, and CAN SHOOT. The only difference is Yao is about 1/2 foot taller. Yao is just too weak and slow to do those fadeaways. You need strong upper body strength and quick spin move to creat space between yourself and the defender. I just dont see Yao would be able to do that on a consistent basis.
I think you're right about the fadeaway. Yao isn't playing against a defender in China. He's got a guy who can benchpress 300lbs with an elbow in his back. Yao either needs to get into the weightroom and bulk up via an extensive strength training program or adapt his game to be more of a passer which I think he should be. Vlade isn't exactly Mr. Universe, but he can help his team by being an excellent distributer and being a competent post up player.
Cato needs to come off the bench. Thats what he is good at. He is killing the team when the oppenents have a PF that can shoot the ball especially from the outside. Furthermore he needs to go and practice his dunks or has it become a trend to miss 2-3 easy dunks each game now?
Very nice post. What bugs me on this BBS is that a player can play one position offensively and play a different position on D. That happens all the time. For example, Doug Christie often plays Steve on D. Is Christie a PG? No. He plays the 2 and 3 on offense. Defensively he plays 1, 2 or 3 depending on the matchup. I agree that JVG should more often put Cato at the 5 on offense and let Yao play 4 because Yao can hit the open 20 footers. Let him face up sometimes. I've only seen him take 2-3 open jumpers this season. Defensively, switch it around. Cato isn't our problem. I agree that our problem is EG. His loss kills our flexibility to throw different match-ups out there. With EG, we have our enforcer=Cato. We have our scorer=MoT. We have our mobile defender=EG. All three compliment Yao depending on the matchups. Without our mobile defender, we are straped on our flexibility to match-up with other teams at the 4.
