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Yao vs. Nuggets - 1/11/03

The Nuggets' Nene Hilario and Yao collide Saturday night in Houston. Yao slid over to try to draw a charge, but no foul was called. The Rockets held on to beat the Nuggets 87-85.
On Saturday night against the woeful Denver Nuggets (9-26), the Rockets at times looked like they didn't learn anything from the embarrassing loss against Atlanta the previous night by the way they relied too much on one-on-one play. Fortunately for the Rockets, the Nuggets struggled from the field by shooting 19-for-60 through the first three quarters. In the fourth quarter, the Nugs shot a much better 13-for-21 and went on a 28-13 run to reduce an 18-point deficit to make it much closer than it should have been. But former Nugget and current Rocket James Posey hit two clutch three-pointers to keep some distance between the Rockets and Denver, and Houston held on to win 87-85.

Yao plays hard during the first quarter, plays it safe the rest of the way

Yao had a wonderful first quarter, scoring 6 points and racking up 6 rebounds. But he went to the locker room between the first and second quarters because of a sprained knee and didn't return. We're not sure when it happened because he wasn't limping at all, even when he walked to the locker room. We also checked the videotape to see where one newspaper says he might have been injured, but we determined that no such play occured. We also didn't see any other occasion where he landed wrong or banged knees with another player. Even fellow rookie Nene Hilario of the Nuggets said, "I was playing the game and I didn't even realize that he was injured." However, the Rockets don't seem to think it's serious, so we're not too worried about it. Even though he only played one quarter, check out our Detailed Yao Analysis below to see how Yao still wowed the crowd.

'Posed' to start soon?

We said a couple of weeks ago when the Rockets traded for Posey that he would turn out to be a very valuable acquisition for the Rockets, and it looks like that's going to be the case. After Glen Rice left the game in the third quarter with a strained left shoulder, Posey replaced him and went on to score 15 of his 18 points (Rocket season high) after Rice's departure. J.P. also went 4-for-4 from three-point land, but what's surprising is that Posey was only 1-for-11 from behind the arc as a Rocket before this game. For the Rockets' sake, we can only hope Rudy T. doesn't try to avoid bruising Rice's ego, and instead puts Posey in the starting lineup. Posey is so much more explosive than Glen Rice, and is a better defender, too. It's also much tougher to guard Cuttino, Francis and Posey when they are all in the lineup.

Other guys' comments about the offense

As much as we like the athleticism of the Rockets, we still strongly believe they rely too much on their one-on-one skills and they need to pass more. It's pretty sad when other teams' TV analysts are wondering aloud why the Rockets deploy such a one-dimensional, often-flawed offensive set. Mychal Thompson of the Minnesota television critiqued it last week when the Rockets played the Timberwolves, and this week Denver announcers Drew Goodman and former NBA player Bill Hanzlik did the same. Here are some of their comments during different times of Saturday's game:

Goodman: "Watch how few times Houston passes the ball in the half-court. One pass..shot." [Appropriately, Glen Rice proceeds to not pass and shoot up an air ball]

Hanzlik: "They do a lot of isolation plays. And that can bode well for you if you're making shots, but when you're missing them, it really bogs down your offense."

Goodman: "The great one-on-one players…like Francis and Mobley, when they don't play well that one-on-one play seems to be really exaggerated."

Hanzlik: "You can see the problems that Houston runs into with their offense. If that first option on a penetration one-on-one isn't there, they really struggle on what to do."

Hanzlik: "Gotta make some passes out there!"

We're just wondering if it's so obvious to you, me, and the other teams' announcers, then why isn't it obvious ot the coaches and making changes? If they did, maybe the Rockets would be better than 10-7 against teams under .500! Obviously, Rudy feels that it's worth the gamble to rely more on the individual skills of his players than playing a more team-oriented offense where everybody is getting involved. The Lakers of last season are perhaps a testament to the former argument, but even the Lakers have realized this season they have got to get everyone else involved to win.

In addition, we point to the elite teams in the West like Sacramento and Dallas and you can see they have been successful in combining great players and efficient offensive schemes. It's not like all of the Rocket players are new and haven't had the chance to learn a different system: Francis, Mobley and Moochie have been around for several years.

A suggestion for this year

We've got a compromise proposal: Just run the offense through Yao, let him get everyone else involved through his passing, and if other players aren't open for a shot, let him take the shot since he is 2nd IN THE NBA IN FIELD GOAL PERCENTAGE. We've seen glimpses of the Rockets doing that this year with great results, but they seem to get away from it. So if they go with that strategy, then in the off-season Rudy can continue working on that 'motion offense' (or whatever he wants to call it) we were expecting to see this season.

There's one thing I have to mention about the shot chart below. You'll notice that I moved the YaoMingMania.com graphic a little higher up in the chart. The reason is because it has come to my attention that other sites are using that graphic without giving this site any credit (they were stripping out the Web site name from the graphic). They are also using the Detailed Yao Analysis. If you know of any sites that are doing this, or are interested in doing this, let me know or have them email me so we can work something out.

cYAO,

John

Detailed Yao Analysis
vs. Denver Nuggets 1/11/03

1st quarter - Yao starts the game.
10:53 Yao gets the ball in his favorite spot on the left side guarded by Nene Hilario, dribbles toward the baseline and stops because he's cut off, reverse pivots and puts up a right-handed hook shot about 4 feet from the basket. Count it! Nice graceful, fluid motion throughout the whole shot. The score is tied 2-2.
9:19 From the right side of the edge of the paint, Yao dribbles twice and moves methodically into the lane with Hilario guarding him, then picks up his dribble and goes right up for a little baby hook shot with his left hand, and it goes in! This looked quite easy for Yao as he physically overmatches Hilario on the block. Yao has the first four points for Houston.
6:35 Free Throws Cuttino Mobley is pushing the ball up the left side of the court and Yao is running along with him down the middle. Mobley sees that no Nugget defender is running with Yao or impeding his progress, so Mobley throws a pinpoint pass to Yao just beyond the outstretched arm of Ryan Bowen. After getting the pass in the middle of the lane, Yao immediately puts up a running layup attempt, but is fouled by Bowen. Great job by Cuttino of rewarding Yao for hustling up the court, and excellent hands shown by Yao in catching the pass on the run. Many centers with 'hands of stone' would have fumbled that same pass while on the run. Yao makes both free throws and has 6 of the Rockets 7 points.
4:40 Assist On a perfect give-and-go play, Cuttino passes the ball to Yao, who is stationed at the right side of the paint. Cuttino cuts into the lane, and Yao bounces a perfect pass to Cat who slams it home!
3:19 Free Throws Yao gets the ball at the top of the key, makes an incredible pump fake to put his man out of position, then drives aggressively to the hole and puts up a layup attempt that he misses because he's fouled. The incredible thing about this play is that Yao only had to dribble ONCE and just take two steps to get to the hole! When you're 7'6" AND mobile like Yao, I guess you can do that type of thing. Yao misses both free throws. He's now 2-for-4 from the free throw line and 2-for-3 from the field.
:49.7   Kelvin Cato checks into the game for Yao. The Rockets lead 17-12. Yao has 6 points, 6 rebounds and 1 assist. During the break between the first and second quarter, Yao goes into the locker room with trainer Keith Jones. We soon find out Yao will sit out the rest of the game because of a sprained knee, which isn't considered serious.



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