The Rockets attacked again, and sure enough, it was the same old again. Pen ~ fun ~ pavilion www.biquge.info

Howard was in the low post, ready to receive the ball, Harden held the ball and organized the attack at a 45° angle on the left side, and Beverley and Ariza, two three-point threats, stood at the 45° angle and the top of the arc on the weak side, respectively.

Capela repeated his old trick and ran to the bottom corner of the weak side to open up space for Howard's singles. Randle didn't follow too closely this time around, and he had to be ready to contain Howard when necessary.

Howard received a pass from Harden, observed the Lakers' defense, and prepared to play alone.

He found out that the Lakers didn't come to wrap him up anymore, and he just took the opportunity to eat Hibbert alone.

Howard started to play alone, and Harden ran to the weak side, leading defender Yi Feng away.

At this moment, Howard completely had no worries about being trapped, and let go and began to attack with his back.

After two or three hits, Hibbert was pushed back again and again, and then Howard suddenly turned around and made a layup. And Randle, who rushed over to wrap the clamp, was a step slower and could only watch Howard make a layup.

Yi Feng's method is really difficult. Randle didn't anticipate Howard's timing in time and was slow to wrap up.

Since then, the Lakers have tried several times according to Yi Feng's method, and the timing of the package is always not in place, either too slow or too early. If the bag is too slow, Howard will succeed in eating alone; The package was too fast, allowing Howard to take the opportunity to split the ball and play a wonderful combination of inside passes.

After four failures, the Lakers finally got the timing right and rushed over to trap Howard. But Howard was unmoved, and forced a layup in the bag, which finally caused a foul on the Lakers!

Looking at Howard, who was moving his hands and feet at the free throw line, Yi Feng knew that his method was not working.

Looks like we'll have to think of something else......

Howard missed the first free throw, and the Lakers called a timeout.

At this time, the score of the two sides was 63:72, and the Lakers still trailed by 9 points.

The remaining 29 teams in the league, when facing the Rockets, have to solve the problem of how to better limit Harden and Howard. As the two cores of the Rockets, they are the engines of the entire team, and as long as they are limited a little, the Rockets' performance will be compromised.

But it won't be easy to restrain these two. Whether it is Harden's "obscene" ability to cheat free throws, or Howard's "monster"-like strong body, it is not easy to get along.

But the good news is that Howard is now less and less of a "Warcraft" style, and his physical fitness is not as terrifying as when he was at his peak. But for the average interior player, Howard can still have the upper hand.

At the very least, the Lakers don't have an interior player who can compete with Howard. Hibbert was tall enough, but otherwise far behind; Randle may not suffer in terms of mobility and agility, but his frizziness and lack of experience are definitely a problem. The rest like Robert Thackeray, Ryan Kelly, and the like, not to mention.

Scott didn't come up with a good solution, and this timeout was at best a cool Rockets' hot hand.

If Howard is trapped, then it is exactly what the Rockets want. But if you don't wrap it, how can you restrain this "monster"?

Scott remembered Randle's energetic look in the dressing room at half-time, and he had an idea.

Just let him go around and defend Howard!

Forward defense is a defensive technique in basketball that interferes with the opponent's receiving of the ball near the penalty area in advance, and is mainly used to defend strong power forwards and centers with strong single ability.

Although Howard is not very strong in singles, he does have a big advantage over the Lakers' interior players.

The forward defense is suitable for defenders who are nimble, physically coordinated, and explosive, and it is also a devastating way to defend defenders who are slow-moving, have rough skills, and have a low basketball IQ.

Randle can be said to have the advantages of flexible footwork, physical coordination, and explosiveness, although Howard is not a player with slow movement and low basketball IQ, his skills are out of roughness but not superb, maybe the Lakers have a chance to defend around the front.

After receiving such a difficult task, although Randle was apprehensive, in order to be happy for the rest of December, he also fought hard, took the initiative to put down his son, and prepared to take a defensive defense against Howard.

However, he is also a sophomore, and he has no face to speak of in front of Howard, who has been famous for a long time. Perhaps this is one of the reasons why he was able to let go.

After the timeout, the game resumed, and Howard continued to make free throws.

Yi Feng noticed a detail at this time, Howard was standing at the free throw line, his hands kept rubbing on his clothes, and he also took two breaths in front of him from time to time.

This series of actions shows that Howard, who is preparing to make free throws at this time, is very nervous.

Why is he nervous?

Aren't free throws the easiest way to score?

Perhaps free throws are the easiest and easiest way for the average player to score points, but for Howard, it is the most tormenting way to score.

The big man repeatedly stuck in the inner line, grabbed rebounds, etc., all of which were very violent hand-to-hand collisions, and after repeated confrontations, the muscles would remember that tense state. Shooting requires muscles to be in a soft state, so the difficulty of free throws is higher for big men than for small ones.

Especially players like Howard, whose physicality is top-notch throughout the league, and their super-developed muscle groups make it more difficult for them to control the subtle shots when they make free throws.

Howard shot just 57.3 percent from the free-throw line in his career, and his best season was 67.1 percent, and this season turned out to be his rookie season! Then the remaining 11 seasons, including this one, have not shot more than 60% from the free-throw line, and there are even two seasons where it has been below 50%!

Obviously, from these data, it can be seen that Howard when he first entered the NBA felt much softer. Because at that time, he had not yet trained his body to the current appearance, and his control of shooting power was the best.

And this season, his free throw shooting percentage actually set a new career low of only 48.1%! It's even lower than some shooters' shooting averages per game.

It's not without reason, Howard is not in the same shape as before due to a back injury, and it will naturally be affected when he makes free throws.

One of the biggest reasons is that in the playoffs last season, for some reason, the "slashing tactic" became the most common tactic in the league for a while. If you have a key player on your team who doesn't make free throws, congratulations, the enemy is eyeing you with machetes.

Howard's free throws are terrible, and the league is famous. Therefore, the way to deal with Team Rocket is indispensable "chopping tactics". And the "rising star" DeAndre Jordan, the free throw is not inferior to Howard, when the playoffs last season, when the Clippers and the Rockets met in the Western Conference finals, the scene of the two "slashing each other" is really moving......

suddenly realized that Howard had such a fatal weakness, and Yi Feng's heart suddenly brightened.

If Randle's strategy of going around the front defense fails, then the head coach may wish to adopt a "slashing tactic" against Howard!

Howard struggled at the free throw line for a long time, and finally got the ball out, but the basketball bounced off in a bad way.

Howard made one of two free throws to keep the score at 63-72 and the Lakers trailing by nine points.

Hibbert made a block with a long arm to protect the backcourt rebound and hand it over to Clarkson to dribble the ball.

The Lakers attacked, and Hibbert mentioned the high post as a cover and tried to take Howard away from the restricted area, because he was too dangerous if he guarded the basket.

Clarkson broke through with cover and shook off Beverley's defense, but Ariza defended quickly, and Clarkson's direct scoring chances were not good.

So Clarkson chose to divide the ball, and the object of the ball was naturally Yi Feng, who was released by Ariza.

While Ariza chose to help defend Clarkson, Yi Feng also retreated outside the three-point line, further widening the distance between him and the defender.

After Clarkson's pass came over, he went straight to the knife and hit a three-pointer with his hand raised.

At 66:72, the Lakers closed the gap.

The Rockets attacked, and Howard went deep into the box to settle down, only to suddenly find himself being bypassed.

Randall seems to be incarnated as a "little monster" at the moment, desperately wrestling with Howard, the genuine "monster".

While Howard wrestled with Randle, he also found that Hibbert was wandering behind him, and the Lakers' defensive strategy cut off his idea of receiving a pass from his teammates and directly receiving an empty dunk.

Harden saw that Howard didn't have a good chance, so he singled himself.

However, because Howard did not evacuate the interior in time and made the basket congested, Harden was too eager to attack, did not get a good opportunity under the basket, and wanted to make a foul but was also avoided by Yi Feng.

Randle has been wrestling with Howard, which also left him with no energy to grab the rebounds in the frontcourt, and Hibbert protected the rebounds.

The Lakers' defense around the front was a success.

Howard rarely encounters being circumvented in front of him, because he is very mobile and can easily break down the opponent's forward defense. But just now Randall and Hibbert worked together, which made him a little unable to show it.

The Lakers attacked, the strong side was empty, and Kobe Bryant singled Harden. Bryant lived up to expectations and scored a goal to narrow the gap to four points.

At 68:72, the Rockets' lead looked like it was in jeopardy.

The Rockets attacked, Howard encountered the front defense again, this time Harden risked hanging the ball, and after Howard wrestled with Randle, he didn't jump enough, but he didn't catch the ball and was stealed by Hibbert.

The Rockets made a mistake once, and the Lakers seized the opportunity to score another goal to reduce the gap to just two points.

At 70:72, the Rockets called a timeout.

Head coach Kevin McHale saw the Lakers' intentions through these few rounds.

When Yao Ming was still on the Rockets, because of his lethality on the inside, one of the main defensive methods of the opponent was to defend around the front to prevent Yao Ming from receiving the ball. In addition, there are other defensive methods, such as deliberately keeping Yao Ming away from the basket to catch the ball, dribbling, and then making steals.

The Rockets came up with a lot of pre-break tactics at the time, and after Kevin McHale took over as head coach, he naturally knew about it. The predecessors planted trees, and the descendants enjoyed the shade. There are ready-made goodies, how can he not use them?

During the pause, McHale laid out two ways to break the front -

The Rockets quickly moved the ball from the outside, and Howard turned from one side of the line to the other side to receive the ball; Or another interior player goes around to the perimeter and takes the defender away to create space for Howard to catch the ball.

After the timeout, the game resumed.

The Rockets replaced Capela with Donatas Motaiyunas. Because Capela doesn't have the ability to shoot, there's no way to open up space for Howard to catch the ball. But Motai Yunas is different, he has some shooting ability.

The Rockets attacked, and Motai Yunas did not fall into the restricted area, but stood directly in the high post. Hibbert didn't dare to let him go, leaving Randle alone to defend Howard.

After Howard was bypassed, Harden decisively hung the ball into the inside, and Howard got the ball and attacked the basket directly, and dunked it with both hands!

The Rockets replaced Motai Yunas, and the Lakers' defensive strategy around the front basically failed.

After that, Howard received a pass from his teammates and dunked directly, 70:76, and the Lakers fell behind by 6 points again.

Then Yi Feng decisively asked for a timeout.

After returning to the bench, Yi Feng suggested to Scott that he implement a "slashing tactic" against Howard.

"Cut him?"

"Cut him!"

Scott's mind came up with information about "slashing tactics" -

"Slashing tactics" is a sinister and obscene tactic, sometimes despicable.

Deliberately foul a player with a low percentage of free throws to get them to the free throw line. The opponent has a high chance of not scoring free throws, and there is a high probability that your side will get offensive opportunities and sufficient offensive time.

The more famous ones are "Hack Shark" (O'Neal), "Hack Ben" (Ben Wallace), "Hack Huo", "Hack Jordan Jr" and so on, and most of the "cuts" are interior players who are not allowed to shoot free throws.

In fact, today's "slashing tactics" evolved from the earliest "slashing shark tactics".

Hack-a-shaq was invented by former Mavericks head coach Don Nelson to use foul tactics against O'Neal to reduce the chances of the "shark" shooting and shooting. Because the free throw is O'Neal's "dead hole", after "cutting the shark", although he got the opportunity to make free throws, the possibility of hitting it is very small.

Don Nelson is known as the "mad scientist", and it's not unusual to think of such a strange trick. But the "shark hacking tactic" he created was not despised by others, and it is fundamentally different from today's despicable "shark cutting tactics".

Shaquille O'Neal, the "big shark" at his peak, is indeed unstoppable. After he gets the ball, even if he fouls him, it is easy to be played 2+1. And the old Nelson's "shark cutting tactic" is to foul O'Neal in advance before he gets the ball. Only in this way can the unstoppable O'Neal be basketed.

The birth of the "shark cutting tactic" is because of O'Neill's unstoppability, and those who use the "shark cutting tactic" are forced to be helpless.

But today's "slashing tactic" is different, it is not aimed at the opponent's strong lethal players, but for players with poor free throw ability, the purpose is to use two low-hit free throws to offset the opponent's attack with a high success rate.

In this way, the opponent's offensive rhythm, tactical arrangement, morale, etc., will be greatly disturbed.

The opponent grabs a rebound or steals and then plays a fast break, which is already a proper two-point score, but if the opponent suddenly fouls the player with poor free throws, then the opponent's fast break will be aborted. The fouled player has poor free throw ability, and the probability of hitting both free throws is very small, so the effect of "slashing tactics" in this case is very objective. (To be continued.) )