I was at the Blazers game Monday night and thought I would post a few interesting things I noticed. 1. Concerning Yao: people know. People no longer look at him as the next great center. The future is now. I heard a lot of comments that normally are attributed to the likes of MJ or Shaquille. Things like, "There's nothing you can do about that." and "Why aren't we triple teaming that guy?" They realize how dominant he is now and kept cheering everytime we put up a shot without Yao getting a touch. 2. Concerning Yao #2: the dunk followed by the yell. Yao was treated very differently than I expected. When he was introduced he was greeted with that cheer that although your not supposed to cheer for him you know you are in the presence of greatness. However, during the game he was taunted anytime anyone blocked his shot or dunked on him. So needless to say, after being hammered and tuanted all night it was awesome to see him throw it down and then yell out all of his frustration. 3. Kelvin Cato. Although a lot of times I just yell at him for dropping the ball or missing a dunk, I have to say that I sorely missed his defense tonight. Whenever Mo or Spoon where in there was absolutely no backside help other than Yao and it got Mo some quick fouls. The role of defender and rebounder was not really played tonight, and all of this to say our defense is a lot better when he is there. And finally, I actually overheard someone discussing Clutchfans a couple of rows behind me. Some guys were discussing Francis and the whole Superbowl thing, and one of the guys said that he had read on "one of their websites" that we are looking to trade him this offseason. He even quoted an idea that I think was brought up by Memphis X about the idea of Francis for JWill, Battier, and Stro. So there you go, your famous dude.
I was also at the Blazers game and there were a lot of people taunting Yao the whole game (I'm sure this goes on everywhere). It was that much sweeter when he took it to them at the end of regulation and OT. And JVG was right, he was just getting hammered all night, especially by Ratliff.
