The Rockets front office saw the future as a Rockets coach? The Rockets also saw Calvin's future and decided to retire his jersey for his broadcasting? Btw, tinman. Why aren't pissed off that Otis Thorpe doesn't have his number retired?
Getting injured every year in the playoffs doesn't matter? Yao Ming's legacy as an NBA player will be mister glass. Too bad, and I feel bad for the guy but that's how it is. He made a max contract but didn't do squat year after in the playoffs, he can't do anything about the situation but at the same time since he didn't do anything why should his jersey be retired? I really don't know if Yao's jersey will be retired, if he does then I hope they retire Tmac's jersey too since both those guys will be joined at the hip. My opinion is he doesn't deserve it since he's MR. Glass and all, but if they do retire the jersey I won't hold any grudges as he's one of my fav. players. P.S. First you talk about Yao's accolade being "individual" accomplishments, but then you go ahead and talk about Tmac's all nbas and all stars as not counting because he wasn't with the rockets at the time. If its all about individual achievements why should his team matter?
Dude why do we continue to have discussions about Yao........he ain't even a Rocket anymore. For all we know, he might grow a new foot, win a few championships with another team..... Despite his accomplishments cut short by injury, he will make it to the HOF, get his jersey retired not because of what he did (winning 1 playoff round), but who he was (ambassador for China, most dominant asian NBA player(maybe the only one for a long time) and....it didn't hurt during his time he pretty much averaged 20/10. I would be more pissed if he was a scrub averaging 10/5. As a Rocket Fan, he gave us hope for a better NBA team, he didn't whine, he didn't cry, he didn't care about his individual Stats, he showed up every day 100% committed to try bringing a championship to this City. Even when the guy is on his last foot, he still wants to be a Rocket (even knowing he might win a ring with another team as a 15-20 min backup center). Haters going to hate, but at least recognize Mr. Glass foot played his heart out for the Houston Rockets. My last memory of him, is this video and I will cheer when his Jersey hangs in our stadium. <iframe width="560" height="349" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/6jRXhj1PpFU" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Yao's not the first franchise/All-star quality center in team history. Otherwise he would be a shoo-in.
Yao was pretty physical, and got so much foul calls against him. In 90s, he'd be much less likey into foul trouble. Hakeem faced Sonic's defense and had trouble. If most teams would do that like they to it now, Hakeem would be less effective. Fortunately in 90s not many teams would do that. And refs was more likely to call illegal defense if that happened. Don't give me Yao was single covered crap. 1st, Okur spent all his energy on defensive end only except last game, and Yao had to do both ends, even guarding their best offensive player on one end. That put Yao in a great disadvantage thants to the weak supporting cast. 2nd, guys like Chuck and Alstons were left open quite many times, there was always a help defender roaming around to steal of block Yao from blind spot. And AK47 was one of the best at doing that. It's not real "single coverage". You can watch the game again. For much of Yao's career, he was the most double teammed player in NBA. That should tell you something. Both Shaq and TD's production immediately dropped after the new rules applied. There was a reason to that. The rules become much more favorable to outside players and against inside players, especially traditional centers. There is not much prove that Yao would do worse in 90s. More than likely, he'd do better.
Using T-mac's accomplishments as a Magic is like the Raptors claiming Hakeem as one of their own - or saying Shaq is an all-time Celtic great.
It's funny how these days people are using modern NBA metagame against Yao. Because when Yao was still playing well, everyone's lamenting at today's rules being biased against bigs. 1. Yao had always been better against bigger centers, as it's the smaller double teams combined with fronting that has been his bane. 2. He has always been on the bad end of officiating in the post, because officials will call fouls against him, yet won't call fouls on his defenders even when they draw blood. At least in the past, the officials swallow whistles both ways. 3. Yao would've never gotten those ticky-tacky fouls against guards in the 90s when they actually let centers protect the paint. 4. Yao's pick and roll defense would've been less of a problem in the past with more traditional centers. For example, Yao could've been guarding Greg Ostertag instead of Malone rather than having to choose between Boozer and Okur. Back in the 80s and 90s, teams usually put a tall stiff at center instead of a mobile PF when they lack a true quality center. Yao has always killed tall stiffs types.
LOL why don't you answer my questions instead of calling me names? Cuz you're just a YOF who doesn't care about logic at all, you'd say anything just to glorify Yao even if you end up contradicting yourself.
Says the person who uses TMac-as-Magic performance as a basis for comparing two players AS ROCKETS. In that case, Calvin Murphy's number should get unretired and we retire Quitten and Barkley instead.
Maybe its just me but when a person's number is retired I'd like to think he was retired for the totality of his accomplishments as a player. When people remember players they don't really differentiate between teams, do people look at MJ and divide his stay between chicago and washington? What about Shaq, do they call Shaq Lakers Shaq, Miami Shaq and Cleveland Shaq? If you're so keen on separating people based on the team why were so many people on the RA bandwagon? Why did people always talk about his track record and what a HOF coach he is if the stuff he did on other teams don't matter?
As an unbiased bystander humoring myself on the idiotic banter between the both of you, you my friend, are the one who is being illogical. One of the funniest things in the world is seeing a person who is doing exactly what he blames the most. Ever see the comedic sketch of Clayton Bigsby, the white supremacist who was actually black, by the great Dave Chappelle? You're Mr. Bigsby.
Totally irrelevant, I was stating the fact Yao will get his jersey retired because of all the fans he brought in. You were saying that bringing fans isnt considered contributing to the franchise. Now tinman, explain to me, why bringing fans to the franchise isnt contributing. Thank you
Maybe it's just me, but it seems by your own method of judging, neither Murph nor Rudy should have their numbers retired. And before you parrot tinman, their numbers were retired BEFORE they became announcer and coach. So those didn't factor into things. Also consider how Elvin Hayes, a much better player than either Murphy or Rudy, did not get his number retired. I can't speak for others, but I put the totality of RA's accomplishment when judging him as a coach. But judging him in terms of Rockets history, only his 4 years here count. That's why if we're comparing T-Mac vs Yao in terms of players, I'd put T-Mac ahead. But as Rockets, Yao beats T-Mac handily.
Retire his number, who cares? The guy has been good for Les, and if he comes back, great.....what does it matter? DD
I was too young to follow the Rockets back in the day but I think the reason Rudy T and Murphy had their jerseys retired b/c they were part of the ORIGINAL SD Rockets, and they REMAINED Rockets for the rest of their careers. Due to the lack of history for the Rockets in terms of winning then, I assume their jerseys were retired to pay tribute for them being one of the "original" Rockets. And you can argue Clyde Drexler's retired jersey as a tribute also, due to his college days. And he was part of the 2nd championship, and played a huge role. Elvin Hayes only played for the Rockets 4 years (do you really count his last 3 years where when he was out of his prime, and had just spent basically a decade for Washington?). It's hard to retire a jersey for a player who spent basically 80% of his prime for another team. But again, let's put things in perspective. Let's talk about legacy. Those guys I mentioned, for various reasons, had a legacy that allowed their jerseys to be retired (the "originals," Houston's son, and the best Rocket ever--Hakeem). What is Yao's legacy? Like I said, 20 years from now, all we would remember from Yao is a guy who was injured all the time. And we would have ZERO memories of what he did for us in the playoffs. So 20 years from now, fans would justify Yao's retired jersey as: hey, the guy was Chinese, and he was pretty good. Sucks he was injured all the time though. Really? I guess the fans must have had extremely low expectations under the Yao era. And understandably so. Personally to me, it does matter whose jersey an organization chooses to retire the jersey. It usually exemplifies what type of organization you run or types of success the team has had. I laugh when Miami retired Jordan's jersey, but then I understand that they have had pretty much nothing in terms of basketball achivement prior to their 06 championship.
Please don't butt in with random stuff. Seriously, tinman. I get that you're old school and all that. But seriously stop talking as if the Rockets only exist pre-1997. You are basically saying that Rudy and Murphy can get in because they're original lifers, and that Yao the non-original lifer is worth crap even if he was the face of the Rockets for the past decade. I know you think the past decade is a piece of crap. I get it. But you know what? I and many other fans think otherwise. There are some of us who rooted for the Rockets over this last decade and suffered through all its playoff disappointment. And for this whole decade, Yao was the face of the franchise. And to us, Yao deserves to have his number retired because of this. Even if he was surrounded by Juwan Howard and Rafer Alston and had 3 teammates who scored in a playoff game. I don't care for that. Because Yao himself played well and played for the Rockets. Maybe not the cool Rockets back in the day, but players don't get to choose their teammates... unless they whine about it. And furthermore, none of the above isn't even what's being discussed. roslolian is talking about Yao's argument as a basketball player, which is entirely irrelevant to how Rudy/Murphy got in. /rant
