Unfortunately in China NBA is less important than Olympics/World Championship games. Yao carrying Chinese national team to the top8 of those games is more significant/glorious than the Rockets making playoffs. I know it's hard to understand here.
Umm... of course Yao was obligated to play for the national team. The national team paid for training him growing up in their academy. He didn't play ball at some prep school and then play college ball in China. He was trained by the national team. So with that in mind, the Rockets can either 1. Not draft him knowing his baggage(this happens all the time so not a big deal) 2. Play him less games and/or usage rate in order to possibly prolong his career 3. Play him normally and run him out of gas knowing he'll succumb to double duty They chose #3. Understandable choice. I'm not saying they are wrong. As you said, they are paying him millions. They do call the shot. But in the end, was it the most beneficiary move for the Rockets?
Even disregarding whether you are correct about his rebounding decrease, I'll take Yao at 7-8 rebounds over Chuck Hayes, Jordan Hill, Dalembert, or even Camby.
It's not from playing when he was healthy but taking the time out after he got hurt. Bones are still setting months after it is ok to play again. The worst part from these international was that he had to play through injuries as they were mostly tournaments and couldn't win without him. Other nations rest their stars, China didn't.
Heck, past time. Yao was a freak of nature. No one knows "what might have been" if things had been done differently. If he had had summers off to recover from the season. If he hadn't put on some pounds. Who the hell knows? No one, that's who. While we all wish he could still play for the Rockets, that chapter of his life, and ours, is gone.
actually, he cut his weight under jvg...got down below 300 pounds where in his rookie year he played at over 310...hate for facts to get in the way
Did Yao Ming ruin Jeff Van Gundy's career? If he wasn't injured so much from 05 to 07 Jeff's teams would have done better.
Ha, a dumb post on its own merits, but man has anybody seen Yao lately? Not exactly a hard weight gainer it appears, looks like he's at least 350:
I know this is an old thread, I'm not going to sift through to see if it was posted, but... The Rockets knew about Yao and his feet from day one; they just chose to roll the dice. It was well worth it in my opinion.
That's not correct. Yao's injury problems started long before he bulked up and even before he was drafted. Yao broke his left ankle in 1997 while playing for the Shanghai Sharks junior team and then broke the same ankle again in 1999.
Nothing about the OP is correct, I just figured Yao looking like the Stay Puft Marshmellow man in pictures last week belonged here rather than a new thread.
He played year round, that is what ruined his career... 2001: FIBA Asia Championships 2002: NBA Draft 2002: Busan Asian Games 2003: FIBA Asia Championships 2004: NBA Playoffs 2004: Athens Olympics 2005: NBA Playoffs 2005: FIBA Asia Championships 2006: FIBA World Championships 2007: NBA Playoffs 2008: Beijing Olympics 2009: NBA Playoffs
I've actually wondered this myself. I always thought he'd be a better pick and pop player and high post passer. Oh well. I got to see it for one season and that was friggin' awesome. Props to Rudy T for letting Yao play his game. JVG didn't do Yao wrong, no one guesses injury based on playing style, but there's no way that banging with the biggest players in the world was good for him.
Yao would just have been a guy if he didn't get in the post. The only chance Yao had to be an all star was to play in the post. No way he averages 18 and 9 as a perimeter oriented player.
