I happened to be in Guangzhou in Jul 1 - 6. Luckily got to see Ming play (three on TV, one at the Dongguan Stadium...the tourney is about 40 Miles from Guangzhou city). Here are my observations..... Overall< I am glad that he will be a Rocket. (And for the record, Rocket is the ONLY NBA Team I support!!). I think I am priveldged to be one of the first Rockets fans to see him play live!!! Here are my comments - pleae read them with a pinch of salt. I am fan, not a talent evaluator! SO I might come Across more harsh than How I feel about him!! Postives Its nice to hear about a 7'6. Seeing on TV/photo kinda doesn't give the same feel. But seeing in real is believing. Ming was clearly head and shoulders above others in the stadia. Ming can play offense. Becasue he is so tall, he never really needed to get up in the air to shoot. Only time he jumped on offense was when he was dunking.....that too I think he needn't have!! ANd he generally does take a shot when he is comfortable. Hence he has such high FG%, but relatively low FGA. We certainly dont have to worry about a new Mobleyitis (jacking off!!) He likes high post offense (most of the plays run for him were high post). Lots of attemtpted PnR. The guards on his team suck. I mean really suck. I think Ming must be salivating playing with guards of Steve's calibre!! Ming moves well with ball in hand. Also saw him passing a few times......almost too unselfish.......and comfortable passing out to the free man. It wasn't that he was passing out because he is in trouble, but because that allows his team the best shot. On Defence, he will be interesting. Even if he doesn't move, he does block the lanes. People had to go out or around. Rarely did anyone succeed going over top. He did blocks a few shots...mostly I think on guys foolishly hoping to catch him wrong footed, more than he manuevering to jump or mvoe at the right time. Opportunitites FIrstly, I rarely saw him leave the ground (no jump!!!). maybe he doesn't need to. May be he can but doesn't want to shorten his playing career with some bone injury. OR he doesn't have the will to do it. Or cannot DO it!! Second, I was surprized by his relative lack of lateral movement. His defence and offence can realy be improved, if he can improve here. Antoine Carr may have had better lateral movement that Ming currently. Third, because of the above two issues (lack of jump, lateral movement) he doesn't create many shots for himself. He takes shots which come to him.....but the moment he is double teamed, he passes out. I think he will have to be more assertive on the court to truly become an high impact player in NBA. Fourth< I rarely saw him using any back to basket offence (Catoitis!! with MoT offence - dunk and straight up jumpers) Finally, the most important concern I have is - how well can he handle the pressure. MY firend took me along for the game - he is CHinese and must one of the rare China Basketball aficiando!- surprisingly the stadia was half - fuill the day I went.......and the capacity didn't seem more than 10,000! My friend indicated that Ming has nearly stopped smiling since the Draft. Maybe he is still recovering from his hip-injury..and hence not at his peak (that injury can impat his jumping as well as lateral movement too!!) I hope that is the case. Else he might really be anxious to get things going for him in the NBA. Maybe he is already under the microscope and feeling the heat. Happy to build if you guys want to know anything more ...
I think Ming is lucky that we have a C that we expected to start and improve too. Just as well, I'm sure he'll get minimal minutes for the first half of the season. There's not too much pressure. Everyone knows he needs time. He's already very mature, and his unselfish game compliments our guard oriented offense. One question though: Does he set a good pick?
Great post...I could read that kind of stuff all day. People used to say Shaq could only dunk. No, I'm not comparing Yao to Shaq. But he is still a young guy...he has good solid fundementals, a great base of knowledge. Once he gets here and starts fitting in I think and hope he will continue to add more to his game. Like you mentioned, the fact that he will be surrounded with better players can only enhance his game. I really don't think he has an idea of the media frenzy that will surround him, at least early on when he comes here. From what I understand the media is so government controlled over there that it is little in comparison to what he will encounter over here. I can't wait. os
If Yao dislikes all the attention he gets from the media and all the pressure he feels to do well, I think he is going to thank his maker that he was drafted by Houston and that Rudy T is his coach. New York would have been an entirely different story.
I'm not disheartened by the opportunities because no player is perfect and we can't expect that. It has been said most of his "weaknesses" are coachable and this is indeed a very good thing. I can't wait to see him in action and I know he will have heat thrown at him by those who expect too much, too soon...The great thing is that his mentioned positives are things that help and complement the team perfectly...
Awesome! It's hard enough to watch the Rockets with Mobley jacking off all of the time. It's good to know that when Yao Ming comes, he won't be jacking off.
I think the good thing is that the fact that Ming won't draw all of the attention. Rudy is great at protecting the players from the press, and Griffin, Mobes and Steve will take a lot of the attention since they're the original core of the team. Shouldn't be a problem easing Ming in, and eventually having him be a main cog in the team.
Thanks guys. Does he set a good pick? I think he will get better with time. ALmost all picks I saw were stiff 'picks'!! Basically other team members suck, hence they wer not finishing the job. I personally thought that he is starting to already feel a bit...though I am sure it will be much more stringent out there. On all game nites on TV they had a 15-20 minute pre-view or post game comments focussed on him. SO he is getting some of it.
You suck! That's probably "jacking up" as in "jacking up wild shots all over the place." Reminds me of that line from Better Off Dead... Girl: He keeps putting his testicals all over me. Lane: His what? Girl: His testicles. Uh, how you say, octopus... Lane: TENTicles. 'N-T.' Big difference.
ROTFLMAO just doesn't do justice to me literally laughing my ass off when I read ACHEBE's post. I knew he meant 'jacking up' but scrolled down anyway to see the response....still laughing as I write this!!
