Cavs @ Rockets Preview
Look for the Rockets to get Yao Ming going early. It should be a good matchup between him and Zydrunas Ilguaskas. Both of them are extremely slow but solid post presences. Z does have more range to his jump shot but it will be interesting to see how this matchup goes. With McGrady out for the season and Alston traded to Orlando, I’m curious to see who will step up for Houston.
On the Cavs side, look for LeBron to go off. That’s all he does anymore. I’m not sure that there is any method to his madness. He just goes out there and shoots from wherever he wants, whenever he wants. If any other coach was running that team then I imagine things would be different but with the spineless Mike Brown at the healm LeBron is allowed to do whatever he wants. What’s even more confusing is that his teammates seem to enjoy running up and down the floor watching him play. And these aren’t just role guys, who just stand in their spot and wait. These are motion players, guys who can get their own shots and be scorers on their own. I guess when you’re winning it doesn’t matter how involved you feel. One feeling they are destined to have is that of emptiness from when their postseason ends prematurely.
No love for the rest of the league – The rest of the league gets caught watching LeBron just like his teammates do. I still go back to the last time the Bulls and Cavs met to reference one of the best efforts against LeBron that I’ve seen all season. They did something no other teams seem to want to do against him. They played defense. They contested his layups. They altered shots. They made him think he was a jump shooter, which he wasn’t that game. Just recently, he went off in Milwaukee and rightly so. They didn’t play any defense on him. They chased him around the floor without any clue on how to slow him down.
Here is how you stop LeBron. Force him to take it to the hoop early on. Single coverage mostly but help off of Wallace. The chances that James dishes it off to him in the paint are slim. The chances that he scores, whether it be a dunk or layup, are slimmer. So contest his shots and don’t leave a wide open shooter standing on the 3 point line on the rare shot that he would give the ball up early in the game. If Bronny is not contained early then he won’t stop. If he is, then he’ll resort to the jump shot. And if he isn’t seeing those layups fall and not getting ‘bron slams then his jumper is a lot more likely to be flat.
An idiots guide to guarding LeBron written by an idiot who enjoys watching and writing about basketball.
February 27th, 2009 at 5:21 pm
[...] better than he played but rarely, as of late, does he play this poorly. Now would be a good time to read my idiots guide to guarding LeBron. It would appear that it worked out well for Houston. The numbers in this game were just poor [...]
March 11th, 2009 at 11:47 pm
[...] defense. How can you possibly be MVP with that many holes in your game? As Jeff has already stated, LeBron can be shut down on the defensive end. How can you be MVP if you can be [...]