You have to consider the fact the Rockets were playing the 2nd game of back-to-back on the road while the Suns had two full day's rest at home. When you don't have the physical condition to compete with an up-tempo team like the Suns, you naturally fall short on both ends of the court. Well, Yao isn't entirely innocent in this regard and he is more and more like TMac. Comments like he was only playing at 30% level in the Orlando game don't sound very humbling.
He is not trying to be arrogant or humble in saying that he is only playing at 30%. And don't be fooled by Yao Ming's 37 points over the head of Dwight Howard !! If you have watched that game against Orlando Magic, you'll notice all Yao Ming's point scored were seldom one-on-one, but either point blank layups, dunks or hook shots from assists distributed fron the guards doing the penetration into the the paint, or Yao Ming's own effort in grabbing offensive rebounds for putbacks. The Orlando Magic did not even bother to double or triple team him. Yao Ming paid tributes to his team mates after the game, and said he considered himself 30% back to his old self, and that was also the reason WHY even after a 20 some points lead, after clearing the full bench, JVG still let Yao Ming stayed on court to play in order to improve on his stamina and conditioning. As to the game with Phoenix Suns, other than completely shutting Yao Ming down early by double-teams or triple-teams, the Suns also played great defense, cutting off the lane, pushing the Rockets' guards off their comfort zone, and never let them cut into the lane, and limit their ammunition supply from outside to inside. And Tracy McGrady and the rest of the guards were happy to oblige and started launching those rushed and panicked bricks from outside, instead of trying to do more penetration or reposting Yao Ming. And on defense, Yao Ming was always one to two steps late in help defense on those breathtakingly quick picks and rolls led by Barbosa, and he was fully exposed as the biggest hole in Rockets defense due to the mere fact that he still had yet to get back to full shape, strength, speed and stamina.
