I would say yes. Yao was playing MVP-like right before he started getting those injuries. I know Yao's stats dont look so impressive when compared to those elite centers, but having watch some of the great centers in the 90s i dont think Yao was treated the same by the officiating compared to those other centers. Some will criticize Yao for his unselfish play, but most of the times he made the right play by passing to the open shooter when he was being double and triple team. Sadly, we all know how that went most of the times with our weak ass wings.
Were talking abou a healthy Yao and if that's the case hes Got a case for top 10 all time. All he has todo is win a ring an he's better than Ewing and IMO he was the best center of this era and would have got atleast 1 ring in his career with a bunch of playoff runs going deep. I also think just with yaos size and skill he would have been fine in any era so I think he does crack the top 10.
Okay you said Yao healthy... Yao healthy at his best is better than David Robinson at his best and probably Patrick Ewing... Moses Malone was such an amazing rebounder that would be tough. How can I say that. Yao played Shaq at his best when he wasn't at his best and played him even. Yao schooled Dwight Howard both of those guys are easily top ten centers. Imagine David Robinson playing against them. That is a joke. Shaq laughed at DRob all the time.
Easily a top 10 center of all time if he stayed healthy. No way he would pass up Hakeem, people (casual NBA fans) tend to forget about Hakeem on the top of the list which is sad. McGrady if he stayed healthy, would be a top 15 player of all time, was well on his way to 30,000 points, 5,000+ AST, 5,000+ REB. That's why this team had so many expectations with these 2 as our stars, injuries derailed both.
I know Hakeem abused Robinson and that is all anyone remembers,but at no point in his career has Yao ever been as good as David Robinson. The Admiral scored 71 points in a game. He put a PER of 30 in a season. At his peak he was 29-30Per guy for multiple seasons. The only guys to do that are MJ, Wilt, Shaq, lebron. Yao might belong at the bottom of TOp10, but Robinson was a great player.
How many layups and dunks robinson would've had with yao gaurding him? Yao wasn't better thab robinson at his peak and I'm no robinson fan. Yao at his best is a notch below mourning or even. Unless we think mourning is top 10, how can yao be top 10. In regards to shaq being played even by yao, ge real. Yao should've been dominating shaq by his 3rd or 4th yr in the league like shaq was dominating dream,robinson,and ewing. Shaq came into the league in 92 and yao came into the league in 02, that's 10 yrs. Dream came into the league in 84,that's 8yr gap. By 96, it was pretty clear who the best center was in the league because shaq played dream to a close draw in 95, but after that, it was over. In 98, it was holmes vs ali. In 08 or when shaq was in phoenix, he was still playing a 10 yr younger yao to a draw.
I love Van gundy, I love both the brothers. I think they are great basketball minds, but I just don't like their personell decisions. Both of them bring in the same people to train their big men, they both used patrick ewing who after he came I noticed Yao going from a very unique talent, skillset to more of a rick smiths/patrick ewing fadeaway scorer. He was still effective and a 20/10 great for sure, but I remember flashes in yao mings rookie year of behind the back passing, spin moves, pump fakes, he even threw in some of dream moves. he had something "special" about his game and I think the fact that in his personality he is so submissive and coachable he adjusted to the personnell and I always felt that took away from the greatness of what could've been. Yao very well could've been a top 10 center save health issues. He had the skills and impact on the game, if he was on the court, we were a winner too. ITs ashame, but he handeled it all well and we had probably a great role model who had unparallel humility, humble approach, and work ethic that I couldn't ask for more in a star. Infact, we had 2 in the last couple decades in him and HAkeem. We are pretty blessed to have witnessed and been apart of that.
I don't know what Yao branded crack people are smoking. Better than Robinson? Robinson won the MVP over Dream during one of Dream's best seasons ever. 30 points, 11 rebounds, 5 assists, 3 blocks for an entire season. People were getting giddy when Yao did that for two games in a row. Do you know how many games Yao has had with that type of stat line? Zero. Even without the assists, Yao has only had 5 games, his entire career where he scored over 29 points, and had 10 rebounds and 3 blocks.
David Robinson's best: 29.8ppg, 10.7rpg, 4.8apg, 3.3bpg, 1.7spg Patrick Ewing's best: 28.6ppg, 10.9rpg, 4.0bpg, 1spg You're telling me Yao healthy at his best is better than that? Or even Dwight Howard? I know you're old, but c'mon. http://www.basketball-reference.com/play-index/h2h_finder.cgi?request=1&p1=mingya01&p2=onealsh01 And Yao only started playing near even with Shaq in 04, when Shaq had a drastic decline (went from 28ppg to 21ppg). And Dwight Howard is NOT a top 10 center unless he continues to do what he did last year for 10 more years. The guy was a joke offensively before last year. David Robinson would put Dwight Howard to shame.
http://www.basketball-reference.com...at=&c5comp=gt&c6mult=1.0&c6stat=&order_by=per Not that hard to see how he matches up with Ewing. Much more efficient scorer, better rebounder, slightly worse shot blocker. Easily top 10.
There are two major problems in your assumption. First being PER as an indicator of how good someone is. Based on that, Robinson was better than everyone outside of Shaq. Secondly, Ewings PER rating included 4 seasons, where Ewing was playing with a 2 inch vertical.
As to your first point, I wasn't comparing them directly by PER I just used it as my search criteria. Every comparison I made was true. As to your second point, really? Do you know who this thread is about? How many of Yao's seasons were top-form Yao? 3?
Except Yao never had any prime seasons due to injury. That's the point of this thread. The three seasons I referenced were his first 3.
http://probasketballtalk.nbcsports....07-and-the-night-yao-stood-too-tall-for-kobe/ Found this link. 2007 season Yao dropped 39 points (on 18 shots), 11 rebounds, and 4 blocks in this game against the Lakers.
People forget Yao was not about his stats, this man accomplished 20/10 career by playing an unselfish team game. When Rafer Alston was averaging 10FGA per game, 3-5 less than Yao......... Just look at FGA, Yao was the most effective center at scoring with out having a high FGA. Just because another top 10 center scored more, it means that center had more FGA and he was the #1 option. With Francis and Tmac, he was rarely the #1 scoring option. Until 2007, when Tmac was hurt in the beginning (I recall). We saw him dominate other teams with his scoring.........what if again
David Robinson never had a Tmac on his team to hog the ball. And my response is probably wrong because stats matter but I just want to hear anyone tell me when DRob could have played Shaq or Dwight Howard even. Never! David Robinson would gotten schooled by Yao. He could never stop him defensively and all his size would be wortless against Yao. Even Hakeem would have been challenged by Yao. Mark Eaton use to always stop Hakeem and Yao is twice the defensive player. Yao was capable of putting Hakeem numbers up but he was never ask too. The biggest reason Yao did not succeed as much as he could have besides his injuries was Les Alexander. When Les fired Rudy and hired JVG Yao's career was destined to take a different direction. Les is a stupid owner. He thinks he has a clue about basketball but he doesn't. He actually said to to the Media that Rockets one of the best teams of all time the last year Rudy was here. It was the stupidest comment I ever heard out of any Houston owner. Don't let the points fool you. Remember how Yao played against the other greats of his era. He played Shaq even. And mostly schooled Dwight Howard. Yao could have easily been the high scoring center that Drob and ewing were. Easily. But he wasn't ask to and didn't demand it even though any coach with any brain would have made Yao the focal point and gave him 100% greenlight. That above all was his biggest downfall. You always hear BUllard say he wanted to shoot the technical free throws. Even Hakeem in all of his humility was thinking about his points.
Yao played against a young Dwight and an old Shaq... What was Yao about? Not getting any rebounds or getting shut down by people like Memo Okur? Or not being able to get him the ball for half of the game?
