doesn't matter, because there are at least 10 - 15 teams out there which currently have better teams. china will be very lucky if they win 2 games at the beijing olympics (probably vs. angola and whoever they face to play for places 9 - 12). china has the same problem germany has. they have one superstar surrounded by another co-star (at least on the international level) and more or less crappy roleplayers. the main difference is, though, that germany's superstar, co-star and roleplayers are one level above china's. dirk can create for himself and his teammates at fiba ball, yao just can't (not because he's so much worse, it's mainly because he's a center). but i wish china and especially yao good luck.
LOL, WTF kind of conversations could be possibly going on to make this thread 6 pages long? A simple NO should suffice.
I am Chinese,Of course I surport China.But i don't think there is any chance China win this game. The only thing i concern about is can Sun Yue(#10) block Kobe or Somebody else.
Dwight Howard is a poor man's Shaq in his prime. Yao Ming is a poor man's Hakeem in his prime that is 7'6 and chinese. Howard won't be able to just turn around and dunk when Yao is in the game. Yao will has moves that work on Howard... too bad it is not the other way around and unfortunately for Howard this is why he never outplays Yao consistently. Yao wins this matchup and Rockets beat Magic most of the time as well.
I don't think comparing Yao to Hakeem is a very wise point for argument. Dwight Howard can go for 20 and 20 any night, no matter who he is playing. He won't do it because he won't play that long, but he could.
Aus +8.7 on China in seven games over the last four years. I'd call that significantly better. Just the same way Boston was significantly better than Atlanta even though their series went seven games last year, because Boston blew Atlanta out all their wins and Atlanta barely eked by in its wins. The championships rectified all that crap about Boston being overrated no?
Well, not really. Hakeem's game was based on quickness and athleticism. he stole the ball from point guards. Yao's game is based on his height ,power and post position. <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/eSL5LAK9QyI&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/eSL5LAK9QyI&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>
dwight is kind of a poor man's shaq. but yao is def. not a poor man's hakeem. their style of play is completely different. hakeem has a lethal outside game where his quickness and athleticism can give him a lot, obviously yao has none of that. plus, the defense is obvioulsy on hakeem's side. dwight is still young and developing and yao is def. better offensively.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/5932029.html BEIJING — It’s bigger than Yao Ming. It’s bigger than the Great Wall. It’s bigger than all the tea in the Middle Kingdom. Every one of the participants has played in big games before, but nothing like this. When the NBA stars Kobe Bryant, LeBron James and Team USA square off against Yao Ming’s Chinese national team on Sunday, the event will create fireworks that could rival the display in the opening ceremony of the Olympics. “I think close to 3 billion people are gonna be watching that game,” said forward Carmelo Anthony. That’s what they say. That’s what I hear. That’s a lot of people. “The atmosphere is gonna be crazy. We’re playing against the home team to open up the Olympics and I’m pretty sure it’s gonna be crazy and energetic in there. Everybody in that building is gonna be jumping. It’s the biggest game on the biggest stage in the world.” The United States enters the Olympic tournament once more as the heavy favorite to win the gold medal, while China will be challenged to advance out of the preliminary round. So the game is expected to be a rout. But the basketball-mad host country playing its first game against the global superstars of the NBA, there is speculation that the world-wide television audience for the game (9:15 a.m. Houston time on NBC) could be the largest in Olympic history. President Bush (the first sitting U.S. president to attend an Olympics in a foreign country) will attend the game along with China’s president Hu Jintao and premier Wen Jiabao. “I will have to take a breath at the beginning of this game,” said Yao Ming. “It is the start of the first Olympic Games to be played in China. It is the event that my country and I have been looking to for seven years, since Beijing was awarded the Games. I am so happy that I have been able to recover from my (foot) injury to be ready. To play against the USA team will be great challenge and a great honor.” The cast of veteran NBA stars, all of whom have been in the playoffs is just as thrilled. It’s gonna be exciting,” said 35-year-old Jason Kidd. “You can take a Game 7 and times it by seven. It’s gonna be something that nobody’s experienced before. I don’t know if anybody’s had a president come to a game to watch them play before.” A huge grin spread across the face of Carlos Boozer as he anticipated the game. “I expect the crowd to be amazing, incredible,” he said. “If you can just imagine and try to wrap your minds around the opening tip with Dwight Howard and Yao Ming. As soon as that ball goes up, every camera in the building is gonna be flashing. “People are saying this is supposed to be the most watched event in basketball history. For us to be a part of that, for our kids, our grandkids, is something that will be something to look back on when we’re older. Honestly, that’s amazing.” Point guard Chris Paul nodded his head up and down. “Just thinking about this first game now, you get goosebumps,” he said. “It’s something we’ll be able to tell our kids and our grandkids that we took part in the largest sporting event ever. And, you know, there’s been a lot of sporting events.”
http://sports.yahoo.com/olympics/beijing/basketball/news?slug=ap-bko-us-china&prov=ap&type=lgns Yao plays, Bush watches: US set for hyped opener By BRIAN MAHONEY, AP Basketball Writer 48 minutes ago Buzz Up Print BEIJING (AP)—Between Yao Ming’s return and President Bush’s arrival, this might be the only Olympic basketball game in which the guys wearing red, white and blue have to cede the spotlight. The United States begins the tournament Sunday night against host China, a game that figures to have a lopsided result but should feature an atmosphere that rivals a Super Bowl or any other championship match. Kobe Bryant and LeBron James are the headline names on the gold medal favorites, but the star power this time goes well beyond them. Yao is back from a foot injury to play before his frenzied home fans, who will be joined by Bush, as he becomes the first U.S. president to attend an Olympic Games on foreign soil. “I think that is going to be one of the most-watched games in sports history,” U.S. forward Carmelo Anthony said. “It’s going to be exciting.” ADVERTISEMENT USA basketball managing director Jerry Colangelo said the Americans have been told more than a billion viewers are expected, potentially making it the largest audience ever for a sporting event. Coach Mike Krzyzewski has won three NCAA championships, led teams to 10 Final Fours and was an assistant on the Dream Team in the 1992 Olympics, but knows he’s about to take part in something he’s never experienced before. “How cool, how good is it that we’re going to play in a game that might be the most-viewed game in the history of sport? Come on,” Krzyzewski said. “I remember growing up, inner city of Chicago, shooting at a basket in a schoolyard hoping that one person would watch me. And now I’m going to have a chance to coach my country’s team in front of a billion people? Are you kidding?” It probably won’t be close. A sampling of recent U.S.-China games includes scores such as 121-90 in the 2006 world championships, and 119-72 in the 2000 Olympics. This time the Chinese are home, and after some early anxiety they’ve got Yao, the Houston Rockets center who is China’s greatest athletic superstar. So don’t tell anybody here it’ll be a blowout, least of all the American players who are bracing for a fired-up opponent. Asked the challenge of facing China in its home country, Bryant said, “The energy. The one thing about these games is that they are shorter games than NBA games. Teams can get hot and stay hot and all of a sudden you find yourselves in a dogfight. I think that’s a danger you face.” The U.S. playing China in Beijing is like a No. 1 vs. No. 16 game in the NCAA tournament with the underdogs playing in their arena with thousands of their fans cheering them on. This is likely the lone game in which the Americans aren’t the crowd favorites. Most of them are wildly popular in China, where the NBA estimates 300 million people play basketball, and the U.S. team enjoyed great support in exhibition games in Macau in Shanghai. Center Dwight Howard, one of the best-known players after his Orlando Magic played exhibition games in China last fall, now becomes the villain for a night as the guy responsible for covering Yao. “I love the Chinese people and I love the fans here, so hopefully they won’t hate us too long,” Howard said. Yao was hurt in February and had surgery in March to repair a stress fracture in his left foot. His absence would have been devastating to the Chinese team, and there was some immediate concern he would have to sit out because he has been injury prone in recent seasons. Instead, he worked hard to get himself back into shape to play in these games and said the Chinese goal should be a quarterfinal berth, but they need him to be at his best for any chance to survive pool play. “When he got hurt I was more concerned with him being healthy than anything, because I know how big and how important playing in front of his country is to him,” Howard said. With Yao and fellow NBA player Yi Jianlian up front, the Chinese have a strong frontcourt. They lack the perimeter play, though, to match Bryant, Dwyane Wade, and the rest of the U.S. guards. “He’s not going to score 100 points, and we hope to come close to scoring 100 points,” Krzyzewski said of Yao. “I think you have to make sure that he doesn’t dominate the game.” Krzyzewski said he expected Jason Kidd, who wasn’t feeling well and missed a workout Thursday, to be ready. Kidd is still the starter at point guard, though backups Chris Paul and Deron Williams played longer and better during the Americans’ five-game exhibition tour. The Americans want to get off to a strong start, remembering their 92-73 loss to Puerto Rico four years ago that threw their Olympics into disarray on the day they began. Their games get much harder as they move deeper into pool play, with Greece, world champion Spain and Dirk Nowitzki-led Germany in their final three contests. And they’d like to put on a good show for Bush, who Wade had a chance to meet when the Miami Heat were invited to the White House after winning the 2006 NBA title. He remembers the president being a funny guy—but Wade is serious about this tournament. “We get support of our president, that means a lot. That means a lot of people … back home want us to succeed,” Wade said. “That means that we’re watched by a lot of people. “So we should have a lot of pride in it,” he said. “Winning this thing or losing this thing is going to mean a lot to a lot of people. So we have to go out there and play like we’re representing the US of A. If we do that … we’ll win it.”
Just read from chron.com, the game will be NBC at 9.15 AM (Sunday?). Should not miss it, 3 billion people will watch it according to the media. Of course USA will win the game by 30 points. Do not miss Opening Ceremony on the NBC, it was the best from the news reports. I watched some photos on the computer, they are very impressive.
I'm surprised that so many people here are so disinterested. Sure, the game will be a blowout, but I just want to see where Yao is healthwise and with him going all-out. I expect the US team will probably will want (at some point) to give Yao some space too. It's the off-season and watching Yao & Scola will be more interesting to me until the US hits the medal round.
Yao is a very very poor man's Hakeem... he didn't do everything Hakeem did just some of the things he is doing is similiar to Hakeem even when you look at this... <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/5pctMowuZik&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/5pctMowuZik&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>
i think you need to watch more of hakeem my friend, not just highlights. they're not even the same player.
