Rockets also held Duncan to under 20 points a game in the regular season as well but you know what? We got swept. Yao did some help defending Duncan then as well. But we got swept 4-0. I honestly don't care how well Yao/Cato/Rockets/JVG Strats do on another team's star player like Shaq or Duncan unless we actually win. Shaq averaged 16 but his team still won. Duncan averaged under 20 points and struggled to grab 10 boards in all 4 games but still won. It's all meaningless unless the Rockets win and they didn't in both cases. It may pose for a positive outlook towards the future but it doesn't change the fact that we still lost in both cases.
I think all those SF fans were too busy watching their idol and ignoring how the other rockets played. It was so obvious that Shaq was Yao primary assignment UNTIL he got into foul trouble which was not really too often in that series. Whenever Yao or Cato guarded Shaq, there were a lot of double team that's why Malone was wide open most of the time. We did have some success to limit Shaq in the series but we paid the price by letting Malone wide open and he did capitalise it except game 1. Did we watch the same games?
It's 60% Yao's effort(on both defense and offense), 20% Cato's help, and 20% of coaching strategy. Malone didn't capitalize much off the Rockets double teaming Shaq except in game 4. Shaq often beats Cato one on one but was frustrated by Yao's bulk, length and increasingly effective defense. Shaq missing fts doesn't explain the huge discrepancy in performance between the two series, since the ft% in the two series are about the same. Nestovich (whatever his name is)<<<<<<< Yao against Shaq + Duncan >= Cato against Shaq = More points for Shaq against the Spurs To put it better, replacing Nestovich with Yao will boost Spurs' defense against Shaq tremendously, replacing Duncan with Cato wouldn't change things much. Yao is the only one in the league who has the advantage in height over Shaq while being the closest to Shaq's bulk. Yao is argubly the best Shaq defender in the league,not Kelvin Cato, nor JVG.
Yep, including 12 point in game 5 and another 17 point outing in game 4. I don't think that these are Shaq's customary numbers by a mile.
To put things into perspective, Shaq averaged 16 pts, 51 fg% and 11 rebs against the Rockets. Now Shaq is putting up 26 pts, 71 fg% and 14 rebs against the Spurs. Huge discrepancy. If it's Cato who's mainly responsible of limiting Shaq so well, Detroit will be trading Ben Wallace for him.
Not a very good way to say that Shaq's productivity has gone down... doesn't show that he splits averages now with a certain new Power Forward who throws elbows to get rebounds (whome we hate) and a certain little always-chewing-gum-looking-like-he's-upset point guard guy coming into the team? HUH? HUH? Besides... Jamie FOXx was interviewed, and he was right on the money about "...Feedin' the big-man" yesterday... HUH? HUH?
The Rockets as a team just guarded him better. It wasn’t just one particular player that shut him down. The Rockets were much more aggressive in their double teams and there was someone covering Shaq at all times. The Spurs really haven’t double or triple teamed him that often. It’s been mostly Nester fronting Shaq and doing a bad job at it. Very often the Spurs big men are leaving Shaq open to go contest a shot by Kobe or Malone allowing Shaq to get the offensive rebound or alley-oop. The Spurs just seem content on letting Shaq get his while trying to shut everyone else down.
You guys are so funny. Yeah, Yao is the second best center in the league, Yao is probably the only center could give Shaq some trouble on offense end. So what? We got swept by spurs in the regular season and 1-4 against Lakers with an embarrassing fifth game to end the season. What's the point to highlight the Shaq stats with/without Yao? With Yao, we were 1-4 agaisnt Lakers, without Yao, Spurs 2-1 leading and most likely winning the series against same teams. We just paid so much attention on Shaq in the series, we even double-teamed him without ball. The paint area was always crowded and when Shaq was under the basket, he was fouled immediately to prevent the basket. The price? Malone was left wide open in most occasion and he went nuts and killed us. Believe me, if Yao had the ability to single-handly limit Shaq to 16pts/per game in the series without help of double-team, we could do a lot better. I love to give player credits, but it is just annoying some fans were so eager to give most credits to one player and so mean to give other teammates credit.
You people who think Cato or JVG's defense are the primary reasons Shaq was held down have been smoking it again. The only reason why people argue this is out of spite with the 'Yao only fans' who are in Yao's defense unconditionally. Give credit where credit is due folks. Just watch the game and see how much we have to sag and worry about Shaq when Cato was on him. Then compare that when Yao's holding him. Yao's combination of size and strength really bothered Shaq throughout the series. I agree with Panda's percentages (60% Yao - 20% Cato - 20% JVG D). EDIT: I forgot about Shaq's foul troubles and how it limited his aggression. 50 - Yao 20 - Shaq's foul trouble 15- Cato 15 - JVG's system
I hope you'll extend the same logic to Francis and any other Rockets player since with them the Rockets lost 1-4, and without them the Spurs won over the Lakers 2-1. What's the point for the SOFs highlighting Francis' performance? What's the freaking point in downplaying Yao's performance by bringing up the fact the Spurs as the defending Champions are better than the Rockets? There's plenty of times Shaq wasn't double teamed and Yao played him one on one. One more time, Malone didn't go nuts except in game 4. Malone shot 49% for the whole series, better let Malone beat you than Shaq. Double teaming on Shaq isn't the main factor in Shaq's performance, Shaq's assists per game only dropped by one in this series. Shaq has avearged only 2.7 shots more per game against the Spurs. Shaq is scoring 10 more points per game mainly because he is shooting better for 20% - his fg% skyrocketed from 51% to 71% against Nestovich(spelling). Besides, no double teaming has ever held Shaq to 7 points in the playoffs, and double teaming seldom limits Shaq to 12 points, it mainly has to do with Yao. What's your point? Believe me, if Yao goes to the Spurs they would do a lot better containing Shaq. Like giving the most credits to your all star pf Kelvin Cato?
Oh I get it, Francis should get credits for stepping up his game against a washed up and slow 36-year-old Gary Payton, and giving Yao credits for neutralizing the most dominant player (although a little declining) in the league is really funny. Yao actually made Shaq play defense and missed some shots on offense. Is that so hard to understand and give credits for?
U r right that the bottom line still is whether we win or lose ... but if u stop there then there is no need for this BBS! What is the point for anyone of us ... or u ... to be discussing anything at all?
Good points, ivanny. I don't understand why you guys who are criticizing him felt the need to inject Francis into the situation; that is a classic Juugie tactic, but in reverse; though it's equally irrelevant. .
ok... thats fine.. our big men together played well to guard shaq, but what about the helping D from the guards. If you watch the games again... either francis, mobley, or JJ collapsed onto Shaq forcing him to pass it out again. I think everyone played really well defensively. If we were just more consistent in shooting, the sky is the limit for this team that we have right now. Yao really has to get more consistent with the open jumpers he has. Hopefully Steve and Mobley can come back as solid guards next year. I think they made incredible adjustments for this season. The team has heart, you can never replace that. This summer, I say we try to get either Jauquin Hawkins, Oscar Torres or Tierre Brown back!!!! How about that guy we had in the Summer League and Preseason.. the guy shot absolutely llghts outs.. i want him as a backup gaurd!!!! Someone tell me his name...
Shaq has played 2 monster games againts SA. Sunday, the Lakers really changed their offense. They put Karl Malone in the pick n roll a lot more, and they lobbed the ball to Shaq against the fronting defense. Against the Rockets, I'd say Shaq played very well. In games 1, 3, 4 he averaged 20.6 pts, and over 13 rebounds. He didn't have great stats in game 2, but he was in foul trouble and Kobe took over scoring 36. In game 5, Kobe had 31 and the game was over after the third quarter. Shaq is stepping up his play against the Spurs, because the Spurs are the defending champs, and the leagues hottest team. Shaq is clearly playing better in the Spur series, but I think he played pretty well against the Rockets. He defended the leagues second best center, and held him to under 46% from the field. This series he is going against a guy that averaged less than 9 pts/gm, so he doesn't work as hard on defense, until he plays Duncan.
I just love it how some people here use the season series to prove how well Yao did or didn't do against Shaq. Last time I checked basketball was still a team sport involving 5 players. The Lakers plain had more talent than us and at least equal us in terms of chemistry. WE WERE EXPECTED TO LOSE. But now that we lost, it's suddenly Yao's fault (instead of the "we have less talent" reason). Seriously, if Yao is to be blamed for getting swept by the Spurs, what about the rest of the team? For the SOF's, what about Steve, who got torched by Tony Parker? Yao + Cato at least plained even with Rasho and TD while outplaying Shaq during the regular season (oh yeah that's right, he outplayed Shaq).
