Bayarea article on Warrior game

http://www.bayarea.com/mld/bayarea/sports/basketball/nba/golden_state_warriors/4625141.htm


Posted on Thu, Nov. 28, 2002

Warriors step back
Cato, not Yao, keeps the Rockets on top of struggling Golden State
By Matt Steinmetz
CONTRA COSTA TIMES

OAKLAND - Houston's Yao Ming, making his first appearance as a professional in the Bay Area, created a palpable buzz on Wednesday night at the Arena. Then the Warriors took the floor and sucked the life and energy out of the crowd of 18,401, largest of the season thus far.

The Warriors' 91-84 loss to the Rockets can only be considered a step backward for a team that -- through the season's first month -- had seemed to put forth a conscientious effort. But that effort appeared to be lacking against the Rockets, who won despite being without their second-leading scorer, Cuttino Mobley, and with leading scorer Steve Francis being held well below his average.

As far as Yao goes, he had a nice little game, scoring 14 points on 6-of-8 shooting in 16 foul-plagued minutes. But he really wasn't the story, sitting out the game's final 15:32 with five fouls.

The Warriors (4-11), who have lost three of their past four games -- all at home -- followed up their discouraging loss to Milwaukee on Friday with a truly lousy one Wednesday. You could pick several aspects of the game that cost the Warriors, but one of the most glaring was the play of their supposed two best players -- Antawn Jamison and Jason Richardson.

Jamison had 15 points on 4-for-15 from the field, time and time again taking shots that weren't good ones. Richardson, who entered the game shooting 34.9 percent, had 17 points on 7-of-21 from the floor. You could draw a safe conclusion that his field goal percentage won't increase much if he continues to try to force stuff on offense.

The Rockets (8-6) were led by Kelvin Cato, who scored 22 points (9-for-11 from the field) and filled in more than admirably when Yao went to the bench at various times with foul trouble. Francis, who entered the game averaging 25.5 points per game, scored only 14 points on 4-of-13 from the field.

Golden State shot 33.8 percent from the floor, which considering its shot selection seemed about right. Over the past few games the Warriors have perfected the art of trying to take the easy way, meaning they settle for quick jumpers that are contested and refuse to swing the ball to try to play from the weakside.

Warriors coach Eric Musselman told his staff to put together a film clip that included every shot Yao had taken this season -- all 69 of them. Musselman then distributed those tapes to centers Erick Dampier and Adonal Foyle, so each could get a look at how Yao had compiled a .681 field goal percentage in 13 games.

"That was instructed by me," Musselman said before the game. "I wanted every shot taken by Yao to go to both centers. Hopefully they won't let the film take us out of our game."

Yao had nine points -- on 4-of-5 from the field -- in fewer than eight first-quarter minutes. He was replaced by Cato after picking up his second foul with 4:06 remaining.

Perhaps Musselman should have shown his centers a film clip of Cato, too. Cato, considered one of the league's chronic underachievers, scored 15 points in the first half, giving Houston 24 points from the center spot.

Considering what Cato was giving the Rockets, it was no wonder that Houston coach Rudy Tomjanovich kept Yao on the bench for all of the second and fourth quarters.

Frankly, the Warriors looked utterly uninspired throughout. Richardson was downright awful, appearing completely out of sync for all but a few moments. Even his 7-for-21 was helped by two late 3-pointers that were basically meaningless.

 

Another one from SF gate. I love the Anna Kournikova comparison!


http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/chronicle/archive/2002/11/28/SP102483.DTL


Yao's appeal transcends basketball

Gwen Knapp Thursday, November 28, 2002


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YAO MING proved himself early on Wednesday night, and not with his nine points in the first quarter. He held a news conference before the game, and he was adorable. There really is no other word for it. The kid is absolutely adorable.

Ten years ago, that wouldn't have been enough. That nagging question But can he play? would have loomed over his career. Today, we can skip the legitimacy test. It barely matters.

If Yao isn't the next Wilt, he can be the new Anna Kournikova. If female fans can expand the NBA market, Yao is the answer. He has sex appeal, which might be more useful to the league than an inspiring turnaround jumper.

Of course, the NBA's power mongers won't admit this. Officially, they wanted Yao here because he is 7-foot-5, and he can play, and the league wants the best employees it can get. A little less officially, they wanted him because he can help the NBA go global.

The Warriors were ecstatic to have him come to Oakland with the Houston Rockets on Wednesday night. He gave them a marketing tool, a hook for the huge Chinese American population in the Bay Area. They hyped his arrival by sending their mascot to San Francisco's Chinatown and by printing up fliers in both English and Mandarin.

They should have targeted women of all ethnicities just as aggressively. They could have done a swing through the Castro, too, but I'd guess that Yao's leading demographic would be straight females, teenagers, twentysomethings, middle-aged women, old women.

Because Yao is only 22, a little discretion might be in order. After all, we can't have grown women openly lusting after a youngster as if they were, for example, the grown men who openly lusted after Kournikova when she was still jail bait.

So for now, let's stick with the safe teeny-bopper description of Yao's charm. He's soooo cute.

Consider his take on Arvydas Sabonis, who recently blocked one of Yao's shots: "I think I need to eat more, because he is very strong."

Or his answer to a question about his new understanding of America: "The most important word I've learned is traffic."

Or the way he explained what he will give thanks for on his first American Thanksgiving. He understood the question as it was posed in English, before it went through his interpreter, 28-year-old Colin Pine. With a playful smile, he pointed to Pine, who lives with Yao in Houston. Pine posed the question to him in Mandarin, and again, Yao smiled and pointed to the translator.

There are some misconceptions about Yao. One, despite the need for a translator, he does speak some English. He can even pull off colloquialisms.

"I'm a student, all right?" he said before he ventured a few sentences in his second language, at the request of a TV reporter.

Also, he is not as skinny as he appears on TV. The camera is supposed to add 10 pounds to an average person, but the process works in reverse for Yao. In person, he has some ripple in his biceps and sturdier legs than Shawn Bradley or Allen Iverson.

Even the traffic comment requires further explanation. Yao doesn't actually drive, not yet. In Shanghai, according to his translator, he didn't need a car.

A bicycle and cabs sufficed. In Houston, where everything is still strange, Pine drives him around.

Imagine that: a No. 1 draft choice in a men's professional sports league who doesn't own a car. It's just one more thing that makes him different, and that's what the NBA needs, because the league has gone terribly stale.

There is no one with the charisma of a Michael Jordan, the elan of a Julius Erving, the exuberance of a Magic Johnson. Kevin Garnett is appealing, but the rest of the NBA alternates between dull and irritating. Kobe Bryant should steal hearts, but his whole act is a Jordan knockoff, and sequels are never as good as the originals.

The sport itself -- minus the Sacramento Kings on a good night -- does nothing to compensate. In the modern era, the NBA is drab and tedious. By comparison, Anna Kournikova's got game.

So does it really matter if Yao can become a dominant center? Well, there's no doubt that he has to be more than a cultural force.

It's nice that some of his teammates, particularly Steve Francis, have tried to learn a few Mandarin phrases. It's noteworthy that, according to Pine,

one of those phrases is: Be more aggressive.

But on his one-night visit to Oakland, Yao couldn't prove whether he can really soar. He could provide just a snapshot, not the big picture. What he could prove was that he has something to offer the charm-depleted NBA, where the highest drama this season was a studio show in which Charles Barkley, Yao's chief doubter, kissed a donkey on the backside.

E-mail Gwen Knapp at gknapp@sfchronicle.com.