I doubt you could ever find a video of the rim blocking Hakeem on a dunk. Of course he had his off nights but you could NEVER QUESTION his toughness, fire, or heart...if anything he would be guilty of trying to do too much.
Hakeem never had a defensive lapse like Yao and showed zero effort to grab a rebound. ever. don't talk about Hakeem in the same sentence as Yao after last night.
I'm not sure it's a lack of effort. I just don't think he has the quickness/ability to outhustle a team like the Celtics. It's the same kind of thing the Jazz did. The more you hustle/outquick Yao the better chance you have to win. He just can't handle the speed of the game in some situations. Now, having said that, this is a horrible thread with a one line OP that offers no actual discussion. Yao has brought a lot to this team and is still one of the better centers in the game. He is no Hakeem, but few are. If we are going to have Yao as one of our stars, you have to take the good with the bad and decide which is worth more.
some of it is human nature. some is the hatin'. nothing new. we have taken it for granted for yao's usually excellent play for over 2 years now.
you just proved that you know nothing about the Rockets. would a Laker fan throw Kareem under the bus if he's trying to defend Bynum's bad night?
tinman, are you in a mid-age crisis? i see no reason for a long time fan like yourself to overreact like you have been - after one game. yao is not worthy to be mentioned in the same setence of hakeem? you're entitled to your opinion, but hakeem himself doesn't appear to agree with you. the truth is hakeem himself took the court and showed yao some tricks. and this is from me, a fan of way over 2 decades, who also always said hakeem is the g.o.a.t. in basketball.
I don't think it is because Yao is afraid of offensive foul. It is because he just can't lean into the basket. Yao's biggest problem is his balance or lack thereof. Just like when fronted, he just can't catch a lob from the passer, because he is just not capable of leaning forward, backward or sideway. It was indeed very frustrating to watch his play last night. I also called him soft a few times in the course of that game. But I do trust true experts. If he is really as "bad" as some of you have called him, why does coach Adelman still want to play him 39 minutes? I don't think that is because the pressure from China. I also happen to think that coaches like JVG and Adelman know the game a lot better than most people on this board (especially those who based Yao so hard each time when he had a bad game).
He's obviously not a Rockets fan but another kind of fan. You know, the kind of fan that begins with a Y and ends with an OF.
yao played 39mins/game in the three games before the lose to celtics, he's used up his strength. he sucked in that game but that's not his false. Yao needs a backup who can enable him to rest temporarily.
Man, after one REGULAR SEASON game, people wanna bash the guy. I mean, I can give you a bad game that Dream had in Game 6 of the 1997 WCF. He let Greg Ostertag score 18 points on him. Greg Ostertag. Somehow that happened. It happens. I would much rather Kendrick Perkins beat us than KG. He just had it going on last night. As far as Yao's offensive production, he had a bad game, but he was being doubled and fronted throughout the game and was getting hammered. Just remember, there are 78 games to go. One loss isn't going to hurt. If anything it is good for us to realize that Yao is not superhuman and will not always have a great game. It addressed our glaring need for better rebounding. We aren't playing at our best, so its best to fix it early on so we will be ready by playoff time.
it's not just that guys. we all know yao is not going to play this bad that often. he's too good for that. the discouraging thing is that he has shot below 40% or worse in 3 of the 4 games. for a guy as skilled as yao and with a height advantage in every matchup, he usually just shoots at 50 or 51%. we have guys like duncan, amare, dwight shooting 55-60%. we can't have yao shooting 47-48% like he's a jumpshooting big man. hopefully his efficiency will return. he used to shoot 55%. we need him to return to that.
I do agree that Yao has regressed under Adelman. See the team now is built up with fast and small players. Maybe Adelman wants Yao to be the pivot inside making the team run, but Yao is not capable of that. He is better in JVG kind of system -- simple positioning downlow, inside-out plan. At times, I see the team more entertaining and more efficient when Yao's not there and they go small. Although a big is important in play-off, but I doubt Yao can contribute much in this system because of his bad rebounding, mobility and passing. And obviously, fans are getting more and more impatient. One question I wanna ask ( a direct question ): is there any example that a team built around one or two player for more than 6 years and finally won a championship? So yes, I think after this season it's time for Rockets and Yao to make a change. Les' stock could be hurt a bit, but it's good for the club in long term, good for the team -- basketball wise. And it'll surely make a lot of people on the board happy.
A game you didn't watch either. Ostertag and Dream are about the same height. Dream would never let a midget 2nd round draft pick player grab a rebound on him in the paint when Dream has the position. Never. Stop dragging Dream's name (the Greatest Player in Rockets history) to compare to the complete lack of effort and garbage that Yao put out on tuesday. Yeah it was one game, but it showed regression when facing adversity vs a strong team. your best player shouldn't look lost on the basketball floor. Yao didn't even put a hand in Perkin's face when he shot the ball. You happy with that? I'm not.
Apparently Dream should have shown him stuff like putting your hands up in a defenders face, how to grab the ball when you have position on a guy 2 feet shorter than you and couple lessons on what to do when a short players run at the basket. <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/F_-4_b7wXMw&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/F_-4_b7wXMw&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>
