Players who refuse to pass to Oden, as if on purpose

No he doesn't, Sergio misses him too. I will give you that he gets him passes more than other guards, but that is not saying a lot. If I had to pick a guard who actually looks for Oden and gets him the ball, his name is Rudy, not Rodriguez.

 

Sergio is the worst post-entry passer on the team. He is decent off of the pick and roll, but he is horrible at throwing the ball into the post for Oden.

LMA looks for Oden out of that high-low set where LMA sits at the elbow and Oden posts up in the key.

 

You haven't a clue at all.

 

Even though I don't agree with everything you say, you have a nice breakdown. I do want to clear up something because it's clear you missed what I said earlier.

1) You went back to comparing percentages again, which goes back to my original argument. We are debating if we should feed Greg that ball in the post more. If I could double Greg's offensive rebounds that lead to dunks, I would be all for him getting more field goal attempts. I used to have access to a program that would allow me to break this down a simplistic level (it wouldn't cover everything we would need to know), but since I don't, I'm going to have to guess here. I imagine that 1/3 of Greg shots and put back rebounds and layups where he shoots 70-80%, so I'd love those attempts to go up, but that doesn't have to do with people passing him the ball. I would also guess another 1/3 of his attempts come from penetration and passes to him on the low block, and he's shooting around 55-65%. That leave the rest of his shots being post ups were I would guess he is shooting 35-45%. This would roughly average out to 56%. So when we are talking about getting him the ball for more of those 35-45% attempts, it doesn't make much sense to me. As I've said over and over, this percentage argument doesn't tell the entire story and he wouldn't be given credit for fouls drawn, free throws made, and providing scoring opportunities for others (though he has the 2nd lowest ast/to ratio per 48 minutes on the team, but I would guess that's due to our offense and him being in the same role as Joel).

2) My citing of Nate, Roy, Blake, etc seemingly getting him the ball less than some of you think he should, is not the "proof" of my argument. Like I said, I don't have to stats to prove one way or the other, I'm just going off of my observation. The same holds true for the lack of double teams he sees. No coach would double team a guy in the post that he felt was going to only score less than half the time in a true post up situation. I was just simply pointing out that there is a chance all these experts know what they're doing and they're seeing something we don't. It's possible my reason for all this is totally wrong, but I would venture a guess that there is a good reason for the lack of attempts.

 

To say ANYONE on this team is intentionally preventing Greg from opportunities to posterize our opponents is patently absurd.

I'd love to hear what you think their motivation for doing so would be.

 

Care to elaborate?

[video=youtube;Do8tTxApcrI]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Do8tTxApcrI"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Do8tTxApcrI[/video]

1:30 of that video, LMA dumps it into Oden for the and 1. We saw that set a lot earlier in the year, but Portland has gone away from it recently.

 

I didn't notice Greg being shut out of the offense. I thought he played the role, more-or-less, that he has played most of the season. He and Brandon actually were the only players that kept with the roles that got them there.

 

So Oden only got 3 post up opportunities tonight, but that is also one for every four minutes he was on the floor. He went 0-2, and on the one post-up he pass it out, we didn't score either. Too small of a sample to make any determination off of, but it will be interesting to watch this going forward. He is going to have a 6" advantage on Chuck Hayes and if there were ever a time to feed him the ball, this situation is it!

 

The one major advantage that Greg has is his size. Most centers just aren't big enough to hold him. The problem, is that Greg doesn't have much of an offensive game outside of dunking. When he develops a decent hook, he'll be unstoppable.

 

I agree. A jump hook will make him difficult to defend. If he can add a counter move to that jump hook, forget about it!

 

I do wish we'd throw him more lobs though. Tyson Chandler gets half his points off lobs from CP3.

 

I think his knee impacts the explosiveness needed to get the lobs that Paul throws to Chandler. We are also missing a point guard with half the ability CP3 has.

I'm sure you and I both are thinking of a situation where Rudy could have throw an easily lob to GO from the sideline, but decided against it; that was a mistake.

 

I see that more often than not... and it's frustrating.

 

Oden does have a back to the basket game. He can back down anyone! If given the ball usually something good is going to happen. A foul or a score most of the time. Even if it's a put back by a teammate. He is a low post threat and we should use him more. I agree he's open a lot and doesn't get the ball. Sometimes I do think it's the angle, but sometimes it's just because the player doesn't look to him after a pick and roll. Have to place part of the blame on Nate. For one thing I think Nate didn't want to make Oden do to much at once, but now that he's more comfortable I believe Nate should start pushing the ball to him more. Oden has no problem with passing it if they double. Against Houston I think it's even more important because he can cause Yao to foul him. Now that Mutombo is gone it's even more important that we use him though he did have problems with smaller faster big men in the past I think he won't have as much of a problem now as long as he keeps the ball up.

 

I lost the post after game 3 where I added to his stats for the series (when getting posted up). Tonigh he got 2 post-ups:

0-1, 1 turnover, 0 points by the team on those 2 possessions, 0 fouls drawn.

His totals for the series is alarming low and would explain why we are not going to him more often. He will get a lot better in time though, I believe in GO!

 

Eh, this is normal with a young center whose offense is still somewhat raw. In Dwight's rookie season, the only way he got the ball was to grab an offensive rebound. He'll earn his touches eventually and his teammates will start trusting him more.

 

I said this in another thread, but I will repeat it in here....

Now is not the time to work on Oden's post up game...that should have been done during the regular season but for whatever reason wasn't...and that IMO lies on the coaching staff.....

Also, Yao's star power and HOU physical reputation (and probably Adelman's incessant whining to some extent) are effecting this series...The bottom line is HOU has spent all year creating this "physical style of play" of thier team, where POR has been more of a finesse team all year...So I do think that the refs are giving leeway to how HOU in playing, but when POR tries to respond in kind, we are getting called for fouls....


That being said, the fact that Oden or Przybilla cannot breathe on Yao without getting a foul called on them is ridiculous....I love how Yao comes down the court, bangs into Oden and Oden gets called for the foul.....That is an outright joke....

 

oden needs to get the ball in better position to score. they should run back picks for him with the pg like portland used to do with damon trying to get sabonis in better position. as it is now, oden gets teh ball and has to try to back down quite a distance and usually gets stripped

 

Ya, two attemps is to small of a sample. Get him the ball more and I think he'd do much better.