I actually can't believe I am reading some of these posts: Brooks is horrible, better without him, Lowry is better, etc. Brooks is a highly skilled guard, very fast, great shooter. He is close to All Star status. I am stunned how many assess his performance. He and Martin can put up 50-60 any night. Lowry may be better at defense, but he can't hit the side of a red barn with a brickbat.
I'm surprised somebody still thinks AB is close to All Star status. Sure he can score and he can shoot, but he is sub-par at running the team offense as a starting PG and his defense is one of the worst among NBA starting PGs, if not the worst. Lowry may not be better than AB individually, but he is a better fit for the starting lineup since we have enough fire powers already, what we need in defense. This team went from the very worst defensive team when AB played to a solid defensive team after AB's injury, as you can see. Is that just a coincidence? I doubt it. AB/Martin can put up 50-60 any night, they can give up 50-60 any night too. And to be honest, Martin/Scola gives you 50-60 any night aready with better efficiency, we don't need another guy to take shots away from them but provides no defense and rebounding.
ideally yes the bounce pass should come up that high but Aaron is barely 6 foot (and thats being really generous he is closer to 5'9/5'10) having the shortest guy on the team bounce pass to the tallest isnt going to work right. Unless Brooks bounces it really hard by creating a different angle which would change the spacing on the court between him and Yao or brings the ball up higher than he is naturally used to which would result in losing accuracy of the pass. The goal of the bounce pass being that the ball come up to Yao's waist. The passes I have seen from Brooks this season to Yao that were bounce passes have not been that great, that haven't been absolutely terrible but there were quite a few were the ball was closer to Yao's knees/feet resulting in having to bend down to further to even be able to get the pass. There was one play against Denver I believe where Brooks got into the lane and bounce passed it to Yao who literally had to spend a good second or so trying to pick up the ball off the ground since it was right at his feet before laying it up. The idea was the right one but Brooks size made it difficult for him to try to throw it over the helping defender and resulted in a poor bounce pass. I realize this is just one example of course but the reasoning is still the same when it comes to Brooks ability to make a bounce pass. Brooks would be better served just throwing the ball into Yao into his chest but with his lack of size and strength it maybe a bit more difficult for him when a bigger PG is guarding him. His size and lack of strength certainly effects him when trying to pass the ball off when he gets inside. Problem is that Brooks has never been a distributing point guard at all in his college or pro career. He is a shooting guard just in a small body. Heck he had his best season at oregon when Tajuan Porter played point and he played the 2 guard (Porter being even smaller than Brooks). Right now Brooks is averaging 7 assists as DD likes to point out which is true a lot of these are just a simple pass to Martin/Chase on the curls for a jumper a lot of those are products of the system...Assists can be sometimes the most misleading stat in basketball of course thats why the Rockets track "good" and "bad" passes rather than assists. A good pass will yield in a higher % shot the majority of the time even if the player misses and a bad pass can lead to an assists (like the play i described above w/ AB and Yao) From the time I have seen Brooks at Oregon to the time he has played in the NBA he has never been asked to be a distributor because he is a natural scorer forcing him to play distributing PG is not good for him or the team. Last season with Hayes, Ariza, Battier he had to score and score in bunches even when Martin arrived he still had to score as Martin was new and still recovering from wrist surgery. With the way Luis has played and with Yao back and Martin back to 100% Brooks is at best the 3rd option though I would place him at the 4th option to get shots. Yao, Scola and Martin to me are the most efficient scorers on the team this year and should get the majority of the shots. When Brooks is in a bind he will try to score, even if its a bad shot because of his natural instincts, even if the coaching staff spend extra time with him the guy has spent his entire basketball career/life playing as a scorer its hard to change that. By the same token though: Lowry isnt much taller than Brooks but is a lot stronger but we have yet to see him really play with Yao this season with either him being out early and now Yao out for the next week. It will be interesting to see what sort of entry passes Lowry makes to Yao if Lowry tends to also throw bad entry passes into Yao as well hopefully the coach then instructs Lowry/Brooks/Smith to get the ball to Shane to make the entry pass to Yao. Lowry has not played with Yao really at all considering that he played about 1/2 season with Yao when he got traded here (but he never started so most of that time he wasnt on the floor with Yao) Right now if Yao is just out the week he should be back next Friday against Toronto or worst case the following Monday against the Suns. The last five games of the month should at least gives us a good suggestion of how well Lowry and Yao play together in the starting lineup as they face some decent teams in that stretch.
Yea, or he may face Derrick Fisher and score 40 while giving up 10. If you want to upgrade defensively do it at PF, where our true defensive liability is.
I can accept that AB won't become a good defender overnight, what I am annoyed about is that AB is lazy on D sometimes and leaves his man wide open, I don't want him to play shutdown D but getting a step or 2 closer and putting some perceived pressure on his man would go a long way.
Unless we get a clear upgrade at the pg, ala paul, it is not to the rox's benefit to trade either Brooks or Lowry. They are the perfect combo. Each players strengths and weaknesses complement the other's. It is foolish to argue that one will do well without the other.
Starting PGs of western conference teams: Curry Baron Davis* Fisher Nash* Uridh Kidd* Conley Paul* Parker* Billups* Ridnour Westbrook Deron Williams* Andre Miller PFs: David Lee* Blake Griffin Pau Gasol* Frye Landry Dirk* Duncan * Randolph* West* Harrington Love Aldridge Green Milsap *former all-star In the west there have been more all-stars at the PG spot than there have been at PF and also two of the west PFs have been one time selections (Lee, Randolph) while only Deron Williams is the one time selection at PG (though I would bet good money that by the time their career's end Williams will have played in more all-star games than Lee and Randolph combined) too me having a guy defend the ball better at point is more important there is more talent at the PG spot in the west right now and besides if you defend the point well then how is your PF gonna get the ball? being able to defend at the point will disrupt the other teams offense
Are seriously trying to suggest PG is more important defensively because there is more talent at the position? If random PG makes it past Brooks the bigs can cover if they are good defensively. If your big gets school or doesn't rotate there is no backup. Bigs > Smalls always. People need to wake up and realize how bad the Scola/Yao combo is defensively. Seriously, have the Rockets drawn a single charge this year?
I really don't get the debate. Lowry and Lee are good defenders. Brooks and Martin are awful defenders. Still, Brooks and Martin are two of our best players and you can mix the lineups all you want, they need to play big minutes for us to have a chance at a successful season. We know Rick Adelman can coach so, the losing is an issue of health and personnel.
Yao has drawed two already. Seriously, AB/Martin combo has a much bigger problem than Yao/Scola combo. Have you seen the games? I've pointed out even before AB was injured that every time AB went to bench opponents start scoring at a lower pace. The 4 games AB missed has just proved that point. We held oppoents below 100 points in each of those games. Something we couldn't do even once when AB started. Should I call this AB effect? Don't tell my Yao is the bigger problem. Rockets gave up the highest points so far in a game when Yao didn't play, gave up the fewest points so far in a game when Yao palyed.
Yup, no team has ever won a ring without an elite interior defender. Look at some of the best teams to have never got over the hump: Jazz and Sonics of the 90s, they had two of the best defensive PGs to ever play the game but no deterrent in the paint. Suns and Mavs of this decade, notoriously bad interior defense led by guys like Amare and Dirk. It's the one factor that all championship teams have always had in common.
How about we call it what it is instead of grasping for straws to support a stupid argument. We were playing crappier teams.
Its pretty obvious the one who hasnt played or know a lick about basketball. It doesnt matter unless its a bounce pass in traffic. Yao is 7'6, but you dont post up at 7'6 which is another thread for another day. I've given 7'1 guys a bounce pass and they had 0 trouble with it. Yeah, I'm 6'4, but that doesnt matter because the ball comes in waist high and into the middle of the body. The bounce pass also comes after a ball fake. Let me use simple math for all those that have trouble understanding. Just for the sake of argument, if yao is 7'6 and lets also assume his waist is some where around the 45" mark or 3'9 mark,whats so hard about the pass coming up to his waist if brooks is 6'0? Now, thats assume yao is standing straight up and down in the post and his arms cant extend below his waist. Its the same silly argument why drew brees fell to the 2nd rd and never gets passes batted down at 6'0 yet a 6'5 guy like chris simms led the league in batted down balls. Its about the angle. Now a guy like shane is 6'8 and mcgrady was one of the best passers in the league, so of course its easier for them.This same silly debate has been going on for years and the only common factor is the guy recieving the ball. From francis to brooks,its the same thing. There shouldnt be 1 or 2 guys who can get a pass to you. Scola and landry didnt have problems getting the ball. You never hear about jameer nelson or anyone else having trouble getting howard the ball. How gives the ball to zach randolph,al jefferson,and guys like that?
Now I've never played basketball to the extent you have, leeb, but as someone who did play center when he played, I'm not seeing the reason for this. Don't understand why you would not post a guy as tall and as skilled as Yao.
I think youmis read my post about the post,lol. What I said was, when you post up, you're not the actual height because you're suppose to bend your knees and squat. What I've said about yao being a terrible target is his stiffness and inability to get a squard base to prevent guys from coming around him. He doesn't give a good target because its a narrow opening combined with his slow feet.
Is this a joke? You forgot when you're fellow YOF's were calling SURA RACIST for supposedly not getting the ball to Yao enough?.....
Around the time we got Yao, maybe a year before or a year after the site seemed to have tons of knee jerk reaction threads to any player and situation. It may have even gotten worse. There were always some, but not as significant a percentage as there is now.
And that's b/c they're 7'1 and not 7'6. You've made this comparison before, so it seems like you just don't get it. No one cares about your prior basketball experience because while your theory may be right, your application is r****ded. And I'm not exaggerating. Your thought process clearly shows some sort of mental deficiency. If you look at various 7 footers in NBA history (Abdul-Jabbar, Mutombo, Chamberlain, Vlade, Shaq, Dirk, Duncan, Robinson, Ewing, Howard, both Gasols, Mourning, Chandler, Yi, Bogut, Kaman, etc...), you'll see that it's not uncommon to be mobile and agile. But if you look at giant like Yao (Muresan, Bradley), you'll see they have been slow, clumsy, and generally sloth-like. Basically, if Yao had the mobility/coordination/agility of the average NBA 7 footer, he'd be the undisputed GOAT (assuming he stayed healthy).
