(1) Nos últimos oito jogos do Cleveland, LeBron James tem média de 2.3 pontos no terceiro período. O aproveitamento de arremessos é de 25%.
(2) Bruce Bowen saiu na frente de LeBron, não apenas no jogo 1, mas também na maternidade. Às 9h19 deste sábado, nasceu Ozmel, segundo filho do ala do San Antonio. A namorada de James continua grávida, com previsão de dar à luz no dia 17, data da possível quinta partida da série.
(3) Torcedores dos Cavs estão furiosos com a rede americana ABC. Alegam que a cobertura do jogo 1 na quinta-feira foi uma "festa pró-Spurs".
sábado, 9 de junho de 2007
Como deter Tony Parker?
Por Fábio Balassiano
Se Tim Duncan é a pedra fundamental do esquema do San Antonio, Tony Parker é o motor. Rápido, inteligente e sem cometer tantos erros como em suas três primeiras temporadas, o francês dita o ritmo do time, controla a velocidade da partida e, o mais lindo, infiltra no garrafão adversário com uma naturalidade incrível.
Colocar, como sugeriu o Rodrigo aqui embaixo, o ótimo defensor Eric Snow em doses mais generosas em quadra é uma das saídas. A outra é fazer exatamente como os Spurs fizeram contra LeBron: marcação mais "mole" nas extremidades do garrafão e o famoso colapso (quatro ou cinco jogadores juntos) na linha de lance-livre quando James partia para a infiltração. Por quê? Justamente para exigir do francês chutes de média e longa distância. No jogo 1, os arremessos de fora estavam descalibrados (1-7). Não é simples, nem fácil, mas é uma forma de retirá-lo de sua "zona de conforto", exigindo acertos da parte mais vulnerável de seu jogo.
Uma vez, conversando a respeito da marcação em Jason Kidd com Marcel de Souza, falei: "Poxa, mas não deve ser tão complicado marcá-lo. É só não deixar a bola cair em suas mãos no começo dos contra-ataques". No que ele riu e soltou: "Fábio, uma vez fomos jogar contra o Aleksandar Đorđević e o nosso técnico disse o mesmo que você sugere aí. Quando olhamos o placar, já estava 20-2 pro Real Madrid. Não é tão simples assim, acredite...". Acredito que deter Parker não é mole, mas o Cleveland precisa encontrar urgentemente alguma forma de reduzir a sua efetividade.
Pode parecer estranho, mas deu certo
Gustavo de Oliveira, o nosso Texano, manda esta foto que ilustra a marcação do San Antonio em cima de LeBron James, com direito a pose curiosa de Manu Ginóbili. Por mais estranho que pareça, funcionou.
Boobie no banco, e estamos conversados
Se você tinha alguma esperança de ver Daniel Gibson no quinteto titular do Cleveland para o jogo 2, pode esquecer. O técnico Mike Brown promete um time diferente no domingo, mas só no conceito, não na escalação.
"Foi só uma partida. Vamos dar uma olhada nas fitas para fazer alguns ajustes, mas não uma mudança no time titular".
Ok, Mike. A gente até aceita.
Mas pelo menos dê mais tempo de quadra ao garoto. Na quinta, ele jogou 27 minutos e acertou sete de nove arremessos (2-3 de longa distância). Terminou com 16 pontos, quatro assistências e quatro roubadas.
Se Brown não der uma atenção especial a Boobie, vai acabar permitindo que o rival Popovich dê um jeito de anular o moleque. Não tenham dúvidas que o nome de Gibson, a esta altura, está no caderninho do San Antonio.
Nem o carisma de LeBron salva
A audiência do jogo de quinta-feira na televisão americana foi a pior de todos os tempos para uma abertura de final da NBA. A marca de 6.3 pontos (7 milhões de domicílios) representa uma queda de 19% em relação a Miami x Dallas no ano passado. Que coisa, hein.
"Definitely", com certeza
Se você acha que os nossos jogadores de futebol repetem à exaustão expressões do tipo "com certeza", dê uma olhada nisso. Um leitor do blog True Hoop fez um levantamento e concluiu que LeBron James usa a versão em inglês ("definitely") quase como vírgula nas declarações.
Olha aí a coletânea:
You DEFINITELY give a lot of credit to the Spurs. They DEFINITELY played well tonight defensively, offensively. Some of it was me missing a lot of the shots that I usually make and some of it was the defense that they put on me and on our team in general. It's like a half and half thing. ... It was DEFINITELY crowded. They did a great job of shrinking the floor. If I went by one guy, another guy stepped up, something I'm going to have to make an adjustment for for Game 2. I'll DEFINITELY be ready to counter some of the things they did defensively. ... I didn't play extremely well, DEFINITELY. Not just shooting the ball, but the six turnovers was uncharacteristic of me in the postseason, tried to force a lot of passes in there that looked open at times but really wasn't. ... We did a better job last year in Game 5 and Game 6 of playing great basketball in the third quarter, but once again it caught up with us again. We don't know what it is but we did a great job of figuring it out. We're going to do it pretty soon. We DEFINITELY want to get a win on this floor before we go back home. ... It's not like I've never seen a double-team or triple-team before, I just have to play better, and I DEFINITELY have a better effort on Sunday. ... That's DEFINITELY a fair assessment and I have to do a better job of trying to recognize that, trying to attack north and south instead of east and west. ... We were DEFINITELY a much better team going into Detroit last year. We won the game just because we have more playoff experience. Last year was based on us making the playoffs; this year is based on us getting to the championships, and we have to approach it with the same mentality that we had. ... He DEFINITELY gave us a lift throughout the whole game of attacking and getting to the rim. You know, a lot of guys don't understand that Daniel is much better than shooting an outside shot, which I told you guys after Game 3. ... I've DEFINITELY stepped up with my free-throw percentage and it was something I had to get over with. ... This is DEFINITELY not an individual performance on my part, but without those other 14 guys, we would be down 3-2 instead of up 3-2. ... They're DEFINITELY a great defensive team, but at times I wanted to attack as much as possible and that's it. ... This is DEFINITELY a big win, one of the biggest wins in Cavaliers' franchise history, for me and my teammates, it's DEFINITELY the biggest win. But we have a goal, we can't dwell on this tonight when we have another game on Saturday. We have got to do our best to try to win that ballgame and get where we wanted to be all year. ... I just wanted to try to be aggressive and not allow them to make too much of a run, and give ourselves an opportunity to win down at the end of regulation. And it took two overtimes to do it, but as a team we DEFINITELY -- this is a gutted-out victory. ... We want to give Detroit a lot of credit because they DEFINITELY brought out the best in us, but we just believed and guides stepped up, no matter if it was the one guy all the way down to the 15th man on the roster, we believed. ... DEFINITELY, I ran to Z because when I was first drafted, Z was the first guy I seen.
Olha aí a coletânea:
You DEFINITELY give a lot of credit to the Spurs. They DEFINITELY played well tonight defensively, offensively. Some of it was me missing a lot of the shots that I usually make and some of it was the defense that they put on me and on our team in general. It's like a half and half thing. ... It was DEFINITELY crowded. They did a great job of shrinking the floor. If I went by one guy, another guy stepped up, something I'm going to have to make an adjustment for for Game 2. I'll DEFINITELY be ready to counter some of the things they did defensively. ... I didn't play extremely well, DEFINITELY. Not just shooting the ball, but the six turnovers was uncharacteristic of me in the postseason, tried to force a lot of passes in there that looked open at times but really wasn't. ... We did a better job last year in Game 5 and Game 6 of playing great basketball in the third quarter, but once again it caught up with us again. We don't know what it is but we did a great job of figuring it out. We're going to do it pretty soon. We DEFINITELY want to get a win on this floor before we go back home. ... It's not like I've never seen a double-team or triple-team before, I just have to play better, and I DEFINITELY have a better effort on Sunday. ... That's DEFINITELY a fair assessment and I have to do a better job of trying to recognize that, trying to attack north and south instead of east and west. ... We were DEFINITELY a much better team going into Detroit last year. We won the game just because we have more playoff experience. Last year was based on us making the playoffs; this year is based on us getting to the championships, and we have to approach it with the same mentality that we had. ... He DEFINITELY gave us a lift throughout the whole game of attacking and getting to the rim. You know, a lot of guys don't understand that Daniel is much better than shooting an outside shot, which I told you guys after Game 3. ... I've DEFINITELY stepped up with my free-throw percentage and it was something I had to get over with. ... This is DEFINITELY not an individual performance on my part, but without those other 14 guys, we would be down 3-2 instead of up 3-2. ... They're DEFINITELY a great defensive team, but at times I wanted to attack as much as possible and that's it. ... This is DEFINITELY a big win, one of the biggest wins in Cavaliers' franchise history, for me and my teammates, it's DEFINITELY the biggest win. But we have a goal, we can't dwell on this tonight when we have another game on Saturday. We have got to do our best to try to win that ballgame and get where we wanted to be all year. ... I just wanted to try to be aggressive and not allow them to make too much of a run, and give ourselves an opportunity to win down at the end of regulation. And it took two overtimes to do it, but as a team we DEFINITELY -- this is a gutted-out victory. ... We want to give Detroit a lot of credit because they DEFINITELY brought out the best in us, but we just believed and guides stepped up, no matter if it was the one guy all the way down to the 15th man on the roster, we believed. ... DEFINITELY, I ran to Z because when I was first drafted, Z was the first guy I seen.
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