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This will be crucial in the Playoffs. Yao will not be able to be too aggressive, due to the flopping man, Pryzbilla. I really do not have a good way, but I think he we keep someone running baseline that it will free them up.

Any Ideas or Thoughts?

Maybe someone on staff will read this and try it?

There are 2 simple ways to beat a fronting defender.
1)Pass over the top of the fronter-either w/lobs or having the player being fronted quickly cut to basket. Unfortunately Yao doesn't jump very high so the lob option is out.
2)Rapid ball movement to the other side. Combine w/the offensive player quickly cutting across the lane should result in a scrambling defense and open shots/passing lanes. Rarely do the Rockets do this as collectively they are not good passers,they make way too many bounce passes which give defenders an extra slit second to recover,and all too often the player at top of key will stop the ball and force up a shot or make a rushed drive into lane.

Throw it over the defender where Yao could catch it, all Yao then has to do is turn around and put it in, it's not that Yao doesn't ask for it, it's that he's more vulnerable to double teams when fronting happens, and that's why it looks like the Rockets offense clearly doesn't go to him.

I don't think you guys understand. It's not that Yao technically cannot catch lobs, he can and he has. It's that a defender comes into the lane on the weakside to disrupt the lob.

The way that Adelman has approached this is to try to attack the weakside (most commonly the PF on the weakside baseline or at the elbow area). With the right personel and crisp passing this is effective, but if you think about it the whole purpose of fronting is to take away Yao's offense so they achieve that whether or not somebody else does take advantage of the front or not.

Also fronting caused problems for the team yesterday no doubt, but it was the lack of ball movement *cough* Artest *cough* more than anything. Artest should seriously get some PT at PF because he tries to do too much ball handling on the outside.

scola gotta kill altridge

flop

The guy with the ball needs to drive baseline, and then Yao can pop and receive since his fronting defender will have to shift over to block the driver. Yao then gets the pass and an open shot or face-up option. They did this in the 3rd last night when Artest drove and Yao popped out, and Yao knocked down the open jumper. I don't understand why they never did it again for the rest of the game.

Yao fake post up and signal the ballhandler to shoot it and he grabs the offensive rebound since he's closer to the basket than his defender.

There ain't no future in your frontin.

FoDrizzle wrote:The guy with the ball needs to drive baseline, and then Yao can pop and receive since his fronting defender will have to shift over to block the driver. Yao then gets the pass and an open shot or face-up option. They did this in the 3rd last night when Artest drove and Yao popped out, and Yao knocked down the open jumper. I don't understand why they never did it again for the rest of the game.

don't you find that's something thats not gonna last. lolol. not the yao popping out part, but artest passing the damn ball

I won't worry too much about it. Blazers are one of the few teams that like to play Yao straight up (Billa and Oden). What concerns me more is their depth and our tendency to fail on defense.

Another encouraging fact is that they're the slowest team in the league.

If yao is getting fronted, the guard or forward just drives to the basket and there will be no help defense coming because he will have been sealed off by Yao. We just need someone that can beat their man off the dribble from the perimeter. So far Lowry has really only been the guy that has been smart enough do this this.

Fronting defenses are very vulnerable to penetration. Unfortunately, our team has the worst penetration in the league.

jzmagik wrote:If yao is getting fronted, the guard or forward just drives to the basket and there will be no help defense coming because he will have been sealed off by Yao. We just need someone that can beat their man off the dribble from the perimeter. So far Lowry has really only been the guy that has been smart enough do this this.

Fronting defenses are very vulnerable to penetration. Unfortunately, our team has the worst penetration in the league.

the problem is... Brooks... gets the lions share of the minutes over Lowry...

and Brooks is almost as bad a knucklehead as Artest... his shooting sucks as bad...... and he too dosent pass the ball.... to the big stiff....

stockmarketgod wrote:

jzmagik wrote:If yao is getting fronted, the guard or forward just drives to the basket and there will be no help defense coming because he will have been sealed off by Yao. We just need someone that can beat their man off the dribble from the perimeter. So far Lowry has really only been the guy that has been smart enough do this this.

Fronting defenses are very vulnerable to penetration. Unfortunately, our team has the worst penetration in the league.

the problem is... Brooks... gets the lions share of the minutes over Lowry...

and Brooks is almost as bad a knucklehead as Artest... his shooting sucks as bad...... and he too dosent pass the ball.... to the big stiff....

cant agree more. i feel lowry needs to start in the playoffs, when hes on the court good things happen. brooks and artest on the same court is just disaster

The problem is that when they start frtonting Yao we just plant him in the low post and make his defender's job easy.

We need to get Yao's defender to react to something.

For example let Yao set a screen for Artest , if Yao's defender won't react Artest is wide open and can also curl to the basket for a layup , if Yao's defender does react to the screen like he should Artest can get the ball and pass it quickly to Yao , or Artest can curl right away , Yao's defender will have to bump him and we get it to Yao.

F*king idiot, i didn't even read what you guys wrote and rewrote the same thing. Preach on guys

jzmagik wrote:If yao is getting fronted, the guard or forward just drives to the basket and there will be no help defense coming because he will have been sealed off by Yao. We just need someone that can beat their man off the dribble from the perimeter. So far Lowry has really only been the guy that has been smart enough do this this.

Fronting defenses are very vulnerable to penetration. Unfortunately, our team has the worst penetration in the league.

Blazers WILL front. Any team that doesn't front Yao in the playoff needs to fire their coach and their scouts. Fronting works against Yao. Its been proven time and time again. Traditionally the Magics doesn't front yao either. But when push comes to shove, teams will find some annoying 6'9 hustle guy making the minimum trying to deny Yao the ball.

I really dont know if there is a solution to the front defense. We can't lob pass because Yao has bad hands, poor mobility, not to mention the possbility of a 2nd defender lurking behind. Lobbing to Yao will result in far more turnovers than buckets.

Guy986 wrote:

jzmagik wrote:If yao is getting fronted, the guard or forward just drives to the basket and there will be no help defense coming because he will have been sealed off by Yao. We just need someone that can beat their man off the dribble from the perimeter. So far Lowry has really only been the guy that has been smart enough do this this.

Fronting defenses are very vulnerable to penetration. Unfortunately, our team has the worst penetration in the league.

Blazers WILL front. Any team that doesn't front Yao in the playoff needs to fire their coach and their scouts. Fronting works against Yao. Its been proven time and time again. Traditionally the Magics doesn't front yao either. But when push comes to shove, teams will find some annoying 6'9 hustle guy making the minimum trying to deny Yao the ball.

I really dont know if there is a solution to the front defense. We can't lob pass because Yao has bad hands, poor mobility, not to mention the possbility of a 2nd defender lurking behind. Lobbing to Yao will result in far more turnovers than buckets.

If your team fronts you're playing 4v5 on defense. Like I said, fronting can easily be beaten by penetration, a guy who can beat his man off the dribble and get to the rim. We only have 1 guy that can do that here, his name is Lowry. Any other team in the league can get around fronting except us.

jzmagik wrote:

Guy986 wrote:

jzmagik wrote:If yao is getting fronted, the guard or forward just drives to the basket and there will be no help defense coming because he will have been sealed off by Yao. We just need someone that can beat their man off the dribble from the perimeter. So far Lowry has really only been the guy that has been smart enough do this this.

Fronting defenses are very vulnerable to penetration. Unfortunately, our team has the worst penetration in the league.

Blazers WILL front. Any team that doesn't front Yao in the playoff needs to fire their coach and their scouts. Fronting works against Yao. Its been proven time and time again. Traditionally the Magics doesn't front yao either. But when push comes to shove, teams will find some annoying 6'9 hustle guy making the minimum trying to deny Yao the ball.

I really dont know if there is a solution to the front defense. We can't lob pass because Yao has bad hands, poor mobility, not to mention the possbility of a 2nd defender lurking behind. Lobbing to Yao will result in far more turnovers than buckets.

If your team fronts you're playing 4v5 on defense. Like I said, fronting can easily be beaten by penetration, a guy who can beat his man off the dribble and get to the rim. We only have 1 guy that can do that here, his name is Lowry. Any other team in the league can get around fronting except us.

No. If teams front Yao, we're playing 4vs4 because Yao is completely taken out of the ball game. Sure Lowry can try to penetrate off the dribble and attack the rim but Yao still doesn't get involved. The opposing team will let Lowry go 1 on 1 100% of the time over Yao catching the ball in the paint.

The problem with front defense is still not solved. It probably never will.

If you beat your man off the dribble and theres no help defense coming over, you have clearpath for a layup. Like I said, we're one of the worst penetrating and finishing around the rim teams in the league, which is why we're so exposed by fronting.

Team defense is 95% help defense. Good players cannot be stopped from slashing into the paint in 1v1, thats where help defense comes in. Fronting prevents the fronter from coming over to help.

Pick and Roll? Yao could pop out and shoot the jumper. He was hitting them earlier in the game vs the Mavs.