Everyone is saying we should limit Yao's minutes, somewhat guide him back gently into the league and slowly resume his starting role. I personally am highly against this idea. Yao has been recovering for over a year now, he has declared himself at 100% multiple times within recent months. So why are we so concerned about babying Yao back into the lineup if the above is true. What is the point of even bringing Yao back if you are only going to let him play a limited role on the team. We don't need the team trying to adapt and changing styles every time Yao comes and leaves the lineup.We've been dealing with that inconsistency for the past 5 years with both Mcgrady and Yao. This is his final year of the contract let the man play at his full level, we need to see how healthy and ready he actually is. If we only play him 50% of the time and at a lower level on offense/defense how can we be sure of what we have to work with in the future and what his contract value is. I don't want to see Yao succeed in a 15 minute role this year only for us to convince ourselves that he is ready in two years for a 35minutes/Game gig, thus eventually leading him to going down to injury once again. This is his last year under contract, this whole debacle has gone to far. At some point you need to take off all the glamor and show us what were really working with, and giving Yao a limited role is not doing so. We have nothing to lose by letting him loose.
His body cannot physically handle that much play time, just let the guy rest and perform optimally. I do wanna see Yao dominate for many years to come...
assuming we can resign him which i think we will. and yes, yao's minutes should be limited, but done within reason.
You must be mistaking Yao for T-Mac. I don't think he's said any such thing. The hope is that he'll be 100% towards the end of the season.
There is no way he is 100% following that type of surgery. It will take at least a year for him to recover to what he was before the injury, assuming he does recover fully. Big Z is an example of what to expect from him in terms of comeback. Get over yourself. We have plenty to lose
25-30 minutes no more no less. If he is okay for the season then gradually increase before playoffs to get him closer to 30-34 since we will need him for the run.
you have to look at the issue in different way. i believe rox front office and coaching staff do not indicate they will limit his playing time during his rest of career. they just want to gradually bring his playing time up to his capability due to his extended layoff and his complicated surgery. their strategy is reasonable and correct. 1st, he had a long layoff. his left foot has been completely reshaped. he hasn't gone through any competitive and real game test since the playoff before the last playoff. you don't want to start him at high level. it's same as you just got a new car. you don't want to drive the new car on the first day at 200 mph for millions of hours w/o stop. you want all his body parts to be gelled before he can play at high level w/o any damage on any his body part. 2nd, he is BIG and a lot differences from all other players. he carries more weight than anyone else in the league. his playing time can't be compared to other players. you don't want to overuse him to surpass his limit. overusing anything will lead to an unrepairable damage. the common sense on those bigs is to play them less than 35 min per game. i have an impression that rox will eventually have yao play around 30 to 32 min for his rest of career.
we don't need Yao to be the primary scorer anymore, we mainly just need him to be big and rebound. So why not limit his minutes. Brad Miller is a more than competent backup anyway.
Yao's body cannot cannot handle the stress that comes along with 30+ per night. Simple as that. Proven Fact... Limit his minutes.
Totally agree with you on all counts........i have never agreed with everyone on all those yao threads and that's specifically why i hadnt voiced my opinion but yes i say we begin to use our players instead of the other way around. Yes he's a hardworker and awesome humanitarian but lets get some mileage out of him to see if he's worth resigning and to help us get somewhere even if it means this one year. GOOD POINT MY MAN/WOMAN
It's not like Yao's knees went out or he had a bad back or whatever... It's that damn left foot to shin area that is injured each and every time due to a malfunctioning high arched left foot. He had corrective surgery to prevent and correct the cause to that particular injury. The man can probably log in more minutes than ever in is basketball career.
I agree you shouldn't limit his minutes, it would make sense to see if he can make it through a full season without limitations or any major injury's before resigning him again. If he's not 100% he shouldn't even be playing until he's ready to play starter minutes, we've seen how T-mac only hurt the team by coming back to early from surgery playing limited minutes in/out of the line-up.
