yao likes houston and wants to stay here but the houston fans want to trade him ,they think yao is useless, rightnow no one like him anymore. oh ,no,yao needs champion not money oh ,yes,let yao go other team, wherever he goes, we chinese fans follow him not just he is chinese but also he has a great attitude for his team.
I think the nature of the injuries is important. Yao's injuries seem more related to his size, so it seems like something that's more likely to continue.
Agree with this ^ The Yao/Shaq injury comparisons aren't even remotely similar. Will Yao be in the league in his upper 30s? Highly doubtful. More importantly, Shaq in his prime was incredible in the playoffs. How many playoff games did Shaq miss due to injury? On the flip side, Yao was embarrassed against Utah a few years ago and was injured last year, and then got injured in the 2nd round this year.
The point is Shaq missed some regular season game, at the later stage of his career, he even purposely skipped games to take vacation during seasons. But during the playoffs, he always managed to shift gear and bring his A game and he won 4 tiltes with 3 Final MVPs. Yao, on the other hand, had season-ending injures 3 of the last 4 years. The latter two were more alarming because they were caused by stress. From now on, you never know when the bomb will be set off at his lower body, it could be the feet, the toe, or the knee. So how could you count on a player who may lay down with season-ending injures anytime at late stage of the season?
He took vacations in the decade of 2000. In the decade of the 90s, he was not that lazy. You really think he was taking a break and could play with a hyperextended knee? The thumb was probably playable, but those other ones looked pretty serious. All said and done, Shaq was injury prone in his younger years as well and they stuck with him, later the Lakers ended up bringing Kobe and ended up winning 3 Titles in a row. Not saying It's going to happen here, though I hope so. But some of you have to stop freaking out just because somebody's injury prone at the moment.
Who knows, if Yao skips some games to take vacation during the season, maybe he'd be fresh and be more dominant in the playoffs too.
