I argued many months ago that Yao is in his prime and is actually as dominant as his 2006/2007 season, despite his drop in points per game. The reason is, under Adelman's system, and especially with the addition of Artest this year, the offense is less focused on Yao as opposed to the JVG era. The basis for this reasoning is this: 2006/2007 Yao averaged 25.0 PPG but attempted an average of 17.06 FGA (Field Goal Attempts) per game under JVG 2008/2009 Yao averaged 19.7 PPG but attempted an average of 13.4 FGA per game under Adelman: http://www.nba.com/playerfile/yao_ming/career_stats.html From a PPG perspective, you can argue Yao this year is really the same player he was in 2006/2007 but he is simply making less FGAs because his other teammates are taking more shots in place of him (ie. Artest). Having seen Yao's play throughout this year, I really think this year may have been one of Yao's prime years - and that he is actually a better player this year than in 2006/2007 when he averaged 25.0 PPG, factoring in the playoffs. Why? I can cite 2 reasons: 1) Yao was a huge turnover machine against the Utah Jazz in the 2007 playoffs. In his worst game against the Jazz, he made up to 8 turnovers. Look at his turnovers stats in this year's playoff: 6 games against Portland: 1, 0, 3, 2, 2, 1 3 games against Lakers: 2, 3, 3 In other words, he averaged 1.89 turnovers in all 9 playoff games this year. Wow, just wow! That is a huge improvement over the Utah Jazz series in 2007. In a nutshell, Yao was much more decisive and smarter with the ball in this year's playoff, and he got stripped alot less. 2) One of the defining moments of Yao's play this year were the 2 clutch passes he made to Scola on March 22, 2009 to beat the Spurs: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZ4KLsY84AE&feature=related The second and game winning pass he made to Scola is something he would never have done in 2006/2007. That's a sign that his game and court awareness has reached another level. Watch that play closely - Yao is taking the shot and is even in his shooting motion, but passes to Scola in the last split second. I don't know why many of you just look at PPG (and even neglect his reduced FGAs) and think Yao has regressed since 2006/2007. Look more carefully - factoring in Yao's performance in this year's playoffs and his overall play in 2008/2009, this may have really been Yao's prime season. Let's just hope he can get a little better next year.
i believe he had his best ALL AROUND season ever. Never in any other season has he had as much of an impact on games as he did this year espcially on the defensive end of the floor. His blocks per game numbers were'nt huge but his pressence alone was alot stronger than in years past. he also has added a couple new moves and perfected his old ones. he also improved in rebounding, leadership and toughness. I think he will improve even more this year. so no telling if he has hit his prime yet.
Just a small point, his TOs I'm guessing were down in the playoffs cause of his limited touches due to fronting defenses. In the regular season his TOs were still up. What was impressive was what he was able to do with the limited touches that he did get in the post season.
he will be better next season, with the rest this summer, and he could improve his middle range shots
Yup, I took that into consideration. While he may have had more touches in the Jazz series, he had games where he had 7 and 8 turnovers in one game. My point being, he averaged less turnovers per touches in this years playoffs versus the 2007 playoffs (unfortunately, the NBA doesn't keep stats on the number of touches for each player).
If you only look at the first half of the 06-07 season, I think he was better. He was pretty damn mobile back then as well as better conditioned , course he bulked up after the injury and was pretty slow in the Utah series.
Yao has been playing very efficiently since Brooks had the starting job. I still prefer 2004-2005 Yao.
i think the best he ever played was the season where he did this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jss1xEzh5b4 he was getting like 30/15 very often for like 3 months.
Uhmm, no. He averaged more RPG this season than 2006/2007. Again, I mentioned his PPG in 2006/2007 were because of his higher FGA. I don't understand why people don't understand the concept of FGA
I have to say, despite not ever wanting to see him go down, his foot fracture could turn out to be the best blessing in disguise in years. Aside from seeing what our role players were made of without him in there, the fact that he gets a summer of rest, the first since who knows when since he's first started playing basketball, and no real playing commitment to the Chinese team, he'll come back refreshed and rejuvenated. My hope is that with China moving past the Olympics, Yao being the centerpiece of that show, that the demand on Yao won't be like year's past with the pressure of them hosting an Olympics. I see one more Olympics for Yao, but hopefully China will develop their talent so the focus isn't so much on Yao while Yao is on lease here, and that he'll be able to afford having a more normal off-season for NBA players, so that his feet can breathe a little. These are definitely the prime years for players when healthy, when the maturity and experience of going through a season coincide with maturity of developing raw talent into honed skills. Late 20's to early 30's are the prime years and the Rockets' nucleus need to take advantage of it before it's too late. This team is on the verge of the tipping point, they just need to hold the right pieces together long enough and it's bound to happen. This playoff run has some uncanny resemblance to that 93' run when the Sonics beat us in game 7 of OT. We all know what happened the year after.
I think Yao will grow next season and the season after that before he's reached his max, and after that it'll be a steady decline.
This is right on. I believe he has a growth spurt coming on this summer, too. He'll be 8'3" by Thanksgiving. BOOK IT!
Yao was faster and could score more points back then. But I feel he has much larger impact on the team now. During 06-07, when Yao played poorly I felt he really drag down the whole team. But now I seldom has that feeling even when Yao was taken out of the game by fronting. Yao is able to make the team better right now. In this sense he is better than before. In addition his defense is much better. His defensive moves are now much better.
In spite of MADMAX's stupid joke you are probably the closest. Yao has improved every year. he is playing with more confidence than ever. And expect him to improve even more next year. And maybe even a little more the year after and then I expect his athleticism will start to deter. The thing is Yao does not depend on his athleticism as much as an Hakeem or D howard do. So I expect you will not notice the decline as much
I think he has seen his best yrs, but he can keep the ball on a level plane for awhile if he works on it. He's going to always be slow, but if he got stronger in the upper bdy and core, he could improve his effectiveness. Watching a lot of film so he can understand the passing angles better when players cut would be very helpful. Also, just getting into better positioning on the floor and being more decisive would help.
if it weren't for all the double teams that Yao attracts, Yao would have astonishing stats... and would most likely lead the nba in scoring Yao is my daddy
Yao will be in his prime till the day he has to retire due to injuries. It's the injuries that will take him out of the NBA, not his age/ability. He relies on technique for his game, not a quick first step or jumping ability.
