Those types of things, especially pick-and-roll, worked very well when they had a star-level McGrady. But it doesn't really work well with any of the other Rockets. McGrady had the pull-up jumper that forced opposing teams to switch on the screen, and McGrady had the passing skills to get the ball to Yao on the move to the hoop. Artest, Brooks and Lowry haven't shown the ability to make that play dangerous. Teams just go under the screen and dare those players to shoot, and Yao remains defended by his man.
I've got a minor quibble to get out. I keep seeing the stat that the Blazers have something like a 2-11(or was it 13?) record against western conference playoff teams as evidence that they can't play well on the road against good teams. I think this is misleading because of the small sample size. After all they have a 4-4 record against eastern playoff teams. While it's unlikely we'll be playing any of them it's not like it's possible for us to play many of the western teams either. And the point of the statistic is to show our ability to beat good teams on the road is it not? When you increase the sample size by including the east our record looks more like 6-15. Not great, but still winning around 30% of our road games against good teams. That's about 1 in 3. Hey how many road games are possible for the Blazers in this series? Then factor in the reduced value of home court during the playoffs (more rest and prep time for the road team), and that our team is growing and improving game by game I think we've got a better shot than many analysts give us credit for. /end rant Also, I love smilie's.
I am not talking about that. What they need to think of doing is trying to run Yao off a screen without the ball and have someone else (say Brooks) lob him the ball as someone is setting a pick on whoever fronts Yao. Of course it means that someone like Landry or whoever will need to set a pick that will stop Joel or Greg - not a pleasant idea for most of these guys - but that might be the way they will have to play it if they want to free Yao to get the ball without a dominant on the ball player that can attack the rim like T-Mac.
The key problem is right there. Yao doesn't run. Executing that requires a little quickness by Yao. Nothing Yao does is fast. Any such move Joel or Oden or Aldridge will sniff out a mile away. They'll circle around the pick and still beat Yao to his spot a lot of the time. I think they'll do a better job of getting Yao the ball with traditional post ups, probably because our guys will be in foul trouble earlier. But what Portland did to Yao in game two wasn't an aberration. All season Yao's played worse against Portland than against almost any other team in the league. It was game 1 that was the real fluke. He hit a few pretty hard shots, and for whatever reason we just didn't front him. My hope is that we'll look back at the end of the year at game 1 as a real head-scratcher.
I guess the biggest question is whether this team is mature enough to keep their heads up for that long. I think they can.
I agree - it will require him to do something he is not happy with - but their alternative is what? never getting him the ball. Also - it is not just on him running - it can also be the other guy running into Yao's defender to set the pick and Yao spinning quickly (something he can do) to get the ball. Trust me - I would be delighted if the Rockets did nothing and he continued to get 6 shots a game - but I do not think RA or the Rockets are that stupid - they know they need to get him the ball somehow - and there are ways to do it. I am certain that Nate will look at this and try to figure a way to negate that as well - but I just can not believe that the Rockets will not make some kind of an adjustment and that this is as good as it got for them. They are too good a team and their coach is too good not to try some other ways to get the ball to Yao.
