How is it that a professional basketball team has no clue how to correctly space the floor so that a fronting defense on a low-post player won't be effective?

How is it that a professional basketball team can remain in that predicament for an entire playoff series, despite being in desperate need of high-percentage offense?

I'm completely at a loss for words at this team's inability to make a basic post-entry pass.

I didn't see all the games but I heard all of them. And one thing I kept hearing is BBen fumbled the pass.

With his itty bitty hands, he excelled at fumbling the pass to him inside, missing the occassional alley-oop, and losing the rock on one of his pattented backdowns. At least he closed out the season hitting 75% of his free throws. I guess now that we have been eliminated, if we will see him still sitting in the locker room on cell phone telling his wife how much he loves her

Beacuse they are a jumpshooting team!!!!!!!

I wasn't talking about Ben. I was talking about Rasheed (and, to a lesser extent, McDyess) who was fronted every time he posted up by Haslem and Walker.

The weak side almost always had at least two players below the free throw line extended, which allowed the Miami defenders (in most of the games the 3 - standing shooter in the weak corner and 5 - standing around at the opposite mid-post - but never touching the ball for a hi-lo entry) to clutter up the lane against the lob pass, even in the unlikely event that Chauncey found the correct passing angle. So, basically, Rasheed was made completely useless even when he posted up on the low block against defenders that can't handle him one-on-one; the ball movement was stagnated; and eventually one of the guards would throw up a well-guarded, low-percentage shot late in the 24-second clock.

Yes, they are - by design - a jumpshooting team. But I'm having trouble with the concept that a very basic defense can be so successful for 6 games, without the coaching staff adjusting to it.

The only times Sheed was successful in the post during the Miami series were off of broken plays/switches and during the third quarter of Game 4? when he was posted on the weak side and got up some quick turnaround jumpers off ball reversal before the defense could react. That the offensive system itself allowed defenders to cheat so successfully on the team's only back-to-the-basket option when the team was having trouble making a jumpshot is a major problem to me, if not to Flip.

Because when we go to post ups it seems like the players involved never do it with a purpose. Nothing is a ever quick and precise. They slowly work the ball over to the corner. Then the post up player half-heartedly fights for post up position (and loses that fight). Then they stand there for 10 seconds deciding when they should pass.

It's all too predictable and easily defended.

Again they are a jumpshooting team. If your offense is based primarly on the perimter your post up game will be soft and ineffective. You don`t practice it, resulting in blown oppurtunities, turnovers and well, losses when it counts!

When was the last time any of our bigs showed us the washing machine?

Being a former PF I understand exactly what ahb is talking about... and agree whole heartedly....
Here's what I saw as flaws in the techniques...
First of all the Pistons seemed surprised by the fronting strategy that the Heat provided (the Cavs or Bucks didn't front much)...
What they did was tighten up the cushion available... in otherwords there was not a lot of spacing between the fronter and the inside help... the Heat fully understood who our only inside threats were... Ben could have helped more by stepping out weakside for a short skip pass... easier said than done when you're passing over 7'1" Shaq and Mr. wingspan Zo.
Add the fact that Sheed was having a difficult time holding position with the bad ankle... he was being bounced out further than his sweet spots... he was looking at mid range shots instead of low post position.

What they could have done is use the PF's off screens and movement before the D had a chance to set up... not Sheeds strength as he likes to get it and survey the help before making his move... Dice is similar in that he doesn't like to catch and shoot before making a couple moves.

If you watched closely Shaq was always putting a body and arms on Ben... he couldn't just shake loose for the lob pass (the refs never caught this blatant holding)... there was no easy lob available to keep them honest on cheating on Sheed & Dice.

A little better interior movement, screens and recognition by our bigs would have helped move them out of the fronting strategy.

It was hard to get an inside/out game going... they were sagging and helping aprx 40% of the time.
Also our perimiter cutters were almost non existent to keep their bigs home.... why? because we couldn't hit the outside shots for better inside spacing... it became an interior game in a phone booth (look at game 4 where we almost exclusively tried to get inside)...too many ops for the defense to intercept passes.

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With politicians the future lies ahead

We couldn't defeat fronting the post because Flip is like Mooch. He doesn't know anything but his system. What happened to making adjustments? Like going to a front court line up of McDyess, Wallace and Wallace late in games. Put Big Ben at the 3 spot with Tay at the point and Rip at the 2. Then after like 4 or 5 minutes sit Rip down and put Billups at the 2 so that he could focus more on just scoring. Tay could have backed down Jayson Williams all day long and there is no way he would have been able to get a shot off with Tay put a hand in his face. Shaq would be too tired to take advantage of McDyess or Sheed in the 4th qtr.