http://www.basketball-reference.com/play-index/h2h_finder.cgi?request=1&p1=mingya01&p2=howardw01 Iinteresting look at EVERY head-to-head game w/ box scores Yao completely devoured dwight in any way possible. Further emphasising Yao's status as top player in his prime era. Dam 'what ifs' :\
Dwight is hitting his offensive peak now so this doesn't make sense. It sucks that Dwight is gonna be the best center now with no competition. Wish Yao was there.
Yao matchups well against Dwight. There is no way Dwight can dominate Yao simply he cant overpower and outmuscle Yao whereas he could do it to 90% of Centers today. Just like Okur matchups well against Yao!
From Woj's article: Van Gundy was emotional on the phone, subdued, because Yao is probably the man he admires the most in the sport. “People forget that when Dwight Howard(notes) and he were young, that was a mismatch. An utter mismatch. Yao scored on him at will. Give Howard credit, because he’s gotten a lot better, but there’s no doubt if Yao had remained healthy, he’d still be the best center in basketball.”
according to this: http://bbs.clutchfans.net/showthread.php?t=206730 'Nor was there any trickery involved in Yao’s offense – no drop-steps, switching hands, no hipper-dipper delights. Just straight-on turn-around jumpers, layups, and flat-footed jump hooks, with only an occasional duck-in and baseline spin from the right box. The big fellow was profoundly unathletic' 'his moves were robotic and entirely predictable' :\
It's debatable how much more Dwight is going to develop offensively. by 2007-2008 Dwight was a 21/14 player and over the past 4 seasons he's stayed in that area each year statistically. Howard is probably never going to average significantly more (for example 25 ppg) and end his career in the 20/13 range when all is said and done including his declining years. Yao pwned Dwight for example during his 2009 season, which might well turn out to be his most decorated year in his entire career (DPOY, 1st team all star, NBA Finals, EC Champs). I post this because I really dont think it's in any way a condition of Dwight's lack of development. It's simply that Dwight has matchup problems with Yao. Dwight can't even grab offensive rebounds when Yao's around. The league's best rebounder averaged less than 2 ORB per game against Yao. It's not just an undeveloped offensive or a young Dwight. Physically he can't do **** against Yao. Every aspect of his game suffers, not just his anemic offensive contribution but blocks, rebounds, turnovers etc are all affected. For example against Yao, Dwight had 50% more turnovers than average. He had half his assists. He had 30-40% fewer boards.
To simply take his stats is an issue, Dwight's offensive game was far better this year than any previous year, as for their matchups, Dwight's physique is very similar to Hakeem's, and also has his specific weakness, big lumbering unathletic big men who are too slow to react to fakes so don't even try.
The stats are telling, of course. But watching the games was just as telling. Yao was the REASON the Rockets won the games, 7 of 9 of them. He was the focal point of the offense and he made Dwight irrelevant on the defensive side. It doesn't make Yao the better player, but head-to-head there's no question.
I agree with your point that stats dont tell the whole story. I still dont think Dwight has that much higher a ceiling. He might have another few seasons of averaging 22-23 IMO. I guess we'll see how much further he can go. Dwight is not similar to Hakeem, Dream was much more nimble. Dwight jumps high but he's not similar to Hakeem. Dream had much faster hands as well and better timing. For example, Dwight averages about 2 blocks with a high of almost 3 blocks. Dream averaged 3 blocks and had seasons where he was 4, 4.6 blocks per. Offensively it's plain insult to say Dwight is even on the same planet as Dream. They're not at all alike they're more like opposites. Dwight's problem with Yao was primarily the fact that Yao was much stronger than Dwight. Not only did that severely limit Dwight's offense and rebounding but it tired Dwight in the 2nd half of their matchups. Yao on the other hand, as you state, didn't rely on his athleticism and as he was handling a smaller and weaker player it didn't impact him as much. Dont agree on the part about the fakes. For Hakeem, yes he had a utility belt full of fakes but he also used his speed and footwork to go around a lot of players... both bigger and smaller than he was. Dwight, even this past year isn't really about making moves, he pretty much overpowers guys, which actually was his main problem with Yao. Not that he couldn't "fake" Yao but that he couldn't go around Yao, through Yao or over Yao.
It doesn't matter how predictable his moves are if you can't stop them. That's what separates the best of the rest. You know what they are going to do and you can't do a thing about it.
I love Yao but please stop claiming that Yao dominated Dwight Howard. It makes you look like a fool to the rest of the league fans who aren't biased. Yao Ming had like a 5 year age advantage over Dwight, and the years he "dominated" DH was just in his early teens, meaning he was just a thin pogo stick and Yao just pushed him around. Now DH has grown up as well and while its quite probable a healthy Yao Ming would have still made him his b****, you can't really claim that Yao can dominate DH when he can't even step on the court due to his injuries.
Dh this year displayed amazing midcourt shooting, that's exactly how Okur kept punking Yao in the playoffs when they matched up. DH would have forced Yao to keep lumbering towards him on offense, and by the 2nd quarter Yao will be gassed and holding his shorts every time out. If we're talking about the injured Yao Ming who played here the past few years and the an alternate reality "never got injured ever" Yao Ming, DH would have owned him easily.
You can't compare the blocks, not only can he not camp the key, but the fouls are called much more often, there's no way the same Hakeem today could average the blocks Hakeem in the 80's/90's did, would he average more than Dwight? maybe slightly, of course Dwight is 25 too. As for DH just overpowering people, you really didn't watch him this year did you? he overpowers the weak ass centres, but the ones bigger than him he beat with athleticism. Hakeem himself said the centers who just stood there and knew they weren't athletic enough to stop anything so didn't even try were his issues. Statistically they're pretty similar players in that their defense is more likely to win games than their offense, Dwight's free throw % is pretty terrible in comparison though, even though Hakeem's shooting form wasn't much better than the Chuckwagon's, lol
