You're right. But, Robinson, Ewing, & Dream > than Yao. I didn't need some silly stat to tell me that, I actually watched all play.
I watched both of these guys play, and I'm not entirely certain you know what hyperbole means. I would say it's hyperbole to suggest Yao is or could have been one of the top 10 centers of all time.
Just saw this in the Shaq thread...if this is your position, then I'm bowing out of this conversation about Ewing.
Did he actually post that? I have an extremely short ignore list, but I might need to look into expanding it. Talking with someone that dense is simply a waste of time.
What does it say about the state of the league that the best active center for much of the 2000s isn't even a top 10 all time?
the state of the league is pretty damn good actually. tv ratings are on the uptake. people like guards
I know the stats might not be entirely on my side, but he did more for his team in my opinion then Yao did.
Can someone with Insider post this article please? It's asking the same thing, where Yao would have ranked if he could have stayed healthy. Thanks in advance. http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/story?id=6786250&_slug_=nba-measuring-yao-other-great-nba-centers&action=login&appRedirect=http%3a%2f%2finsider.espn.go.com%2fnba%2fstory%3fid%3d6786250%26_slug_%3dnba-measuring-yao-other-great-nba-centers
How does Yao stack up all time? Two weeks shy of a decade ago, the Houston Rockets traded away an aging Hakeem Olajuwon. The one-time No. 1 overall draft pick retired a year later and went on to become a Hall of Famer. In 2002, the Rockets drafted another towering foreign-born center, hoping for a similar success story. While Yao Ming, who retired in Shanghai earlier today, proved to be a tremendously talented NBA player, the story of his playing career will ultimately be one of unfulfilled potential. The quality of his play, when he was healthy, places him among the elite centers in modern NBA history, but frequent injuries have prevented him from accumulating Hall of Fame value. The simplest way to compare a player to those who came before him is to find an all-in-one stat that considers both offensive and defensive contributions, total up his career value, and see where he ranks all time. One convenient metric for that exercise is win shares, which are calculated on basketball-reference.com. Win shares are an estimate of the number of wins that a player created for his team, compared to what a replacement-level player (e.g. a rookie free agent or an end-of-the-bench scrub) would have done in his place. Using win shares, Yao looks like a solid player, but by no means one of the all-time greats. He ranks 35th all time among centers, sandwiched between Zydrunas Ilgauskas and Brad Daugherty. However, Yao ranks so low in large part because his body gave out on him and cut short his playing career. In his time on the court, he was very efficient, and during his peak years he played at an elite level. So perhaps the better question to ask is: What if Yao had managed to stay healthy? Where would he likely have ended up ranking among the all-time greats then? Admittedly, it may not be plausible to imagine an alternate universe in which Yao stays healthy while retaining his proven skill level. After all, Yao's tremendous stature most likely contributed to both his quality of play and his health issues; a smaller Yao Ming would have lasted longer but been less dominant. Still, we can humor ourselves and assume that Yao did get at least somewhat unlucky on the injury front, and explore what could have been. To do so, I've employed a technique often used in baseball Hall of Fame discussions, which is to look at a player's best seasons and create a comparison chart. I took Yao's seasons, ranked them from best to worst according to win shares per 48 minutes played (WS/48), and plotted them on a chart. For comparison purposes, I then took the top 20 NBA centers in all-time win shares, split them into three groups, and did the same thing. Each line in the chart represents an average career for the group or player (Yao) in question. The higher the line, the better the player(s) performed during that season. The longer the line, the longer the career(s) lasted. Career peaks are shown on the left side, while the worst years of a career are at the right. Viewing this chart, a couple of observations jump out. First, the top four centers (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Wilt Chamberlain, Shaquille O'Neal, and David Robinson) are head and shoulders above everyone else. This isn't a huge shock, but it's still striking to see the size of the gap between those four players and the rest of the NBA's other top centers, especially considering that there doesn't seem to be much difference at all between the next two groups of players. Second, there is no denying it -- at his peak, Yao Ming played at a Hall of Fame level, and if he had stayed healthy, he could have gone down as one of the top 10 centers in history. Even assuming his best seasons were behind him, Yao had already achieved the peak statistical milestones indicative of the top big men in the game. In fact, Yao's peak years are nearly indistinguishable from the top years of several all-time greats. Interestingly, among the 20 players I investigated, the most similar comparison to Yao's best years belongs to none other than the man whose giant sneakers Yao had to fill, Olajuwon. Yao vs. Hakeem Win shares per 48 minutes Year Yao Ming Hakeem Olajuwon Best 0.220 0.234 2nd-best 0.211 0.210 3rd-best 0.210 0.201 4th-best 0.202 0.197 5th-best 0.196 0.189 6th-best 0.196 0.186 7th-best 0.176 0.182 According to win shares per 48 minutes, Yao actually played more productively than Olajuwon in their respective second- through fifth-best years. It's a bit of an unfair comparison, though, since several of Yao's best years were shortened by injury. Brought in to the post-Hakeem Rockets under huge expectations, Yao more than succeeded at running a mile in another big man's shoes. Unfortunately, achieving a Hall of Fame career is a marathon, not a sprint, and Yao's body couldn't keep up the pace. His health prevented him from stringing together a sustained, dominant run and from anchoring a yearly NBA title contender, although his supporting cast (and occasional lack thereof) also played a role in the latter. Still, during his too-short career, Yao played at a level that few players ever reach, and in that sense he was great. As Yao's former coach Jeff Van Gundy has stated, "You could make the case he didn't do it for long enough to be considered an all-time great. But this guy was dominant when he played." The stats agree.
If yao lived in the era with bigman favorable rules, he'll be ridiculous. Some of the fronting and hacking he faced are totally illegal back in the old days. A lot of contact with gaurds in the paint caused yao's fouls, but those can be easily reversed in different rules. It's Shaq who changed the rules, and so he knows that better than anybody. That's why he respected yao so much. By the way, is wilt that great in weak competion of the past? Looking at those old clips, I can't help but think how overrated those stats are when there's no 3 seconds, mostly much shorter players to defend you and no hacking/early doubles are allowed.
