As a counter to the "I'm getting frustrated with Yao thread" and the knee-jerk anti-Yao sentiment, I was curious to see how many of you are satisfied with what Yao has given to this team so far. I, for one, didn't think he would ever succeed in this league. Obviously I turned out to be wrong. After his rookie season I remember thinking to myself...if this guy becomes another Ilgauskas, we could potentially have a strong team here. In my humble opinion, his skills have even exceeded those of Ilgauskas and he's blossomed into a borderline all-star player. I realize that a bunch of naysayers will come in and accuse me of "making excuses" or just flat out call me a blind idiot. Feel free to do so if you're not intelligent enough to come up with a logical argument. Frankly, I'm sick of reading all the idiocy about how he's getting a max contract and how he needs to magically step out of all his physical and mental limitations and be a better player than he can possibly be. To help debunk that particular mythos, I'll give you a list of people: Baron Davis Steve Francis Penny Hardaway Pau Gasol Allan Houston Antawn Jamison Joe Johnson Stephon Marbury Shawn Marion Michael Redd Jalen Rose Keith Van Horn What do they all have in common? They all command max money...AND none of them are team-carrying, make everyone better, franchise players. Even forgetting about all that "potential" talk and simply taking Yao at face value, I'd choose the 19/9 big man over any of them. If we didn't offer him the max contract, someone else would have. Would you rather have the 7'6" 19/9 center playing against you or for you? Bottom line is (and I stated this in another thread), a player is only disappointing if he fails to meet your expectations. If one day Yao proves me wrong yet again and becomes a dominant force, then I'll happily raise the bar. As of now, he's met my expectations already, and I still think we can win a championship with him. We may need to add another "almost all-star" to do so (a la Ginobili/Parker), but it's not a lost cause. Yao is no Hakeem or Shaq. Clearly, the only people who are truly "blind" were the ones who had such high expectations, they failed to see that he's only capable of so much. Those of you who've stubbornly harbored sky-high hopes for Yao are the ones who are getting the blinders ripped off for the first time.
Yep, the reason why he is failing in so many eyes goes back to UNREALISTIC EXPECTATION. most had this notion of yao carrying the tradition of ralph sampson and olajuwon. the Reality he is nowhere near as good as this guys. we made a mistake no drafting Amare, but we gotta get behind yao and pray he'll hopefully improve.
Amare is great and all but he is injury prone. He just had surgery and he may never be the same again [Let's hope he makes a full recovery]. If the surgery limits his game, we should count our blessings the rockets didn't draft him.
Sampson is definately not as good as Yao just because his injuries. An 10m asset that can only last 2 or 3 years is less valuable to another 8m asset which can last for 10 years. Same reason for Amare. Amare's athletism is a curse in disguise. He will be very injury prone simply because of that. Yao is just the opposite. He has very slim chance to have real bad injuries due to his style of playing. Choosing players like doing financial projects, so I would still take Yao over Amare now. Amare is a riskier asset which will be discounted by a higher rate.
I'm not satisfied with his progress. I never expected Yao to "breakout" this year or ever, just a steady improvement in his stats and shoring up some of his weaknesses. His stats are decent but what bothers me the most is his inconsistency. He disappeared a lot during games last year and I hoped that would stop this year. Oh well! Plus, his fouls and turnovers have actually increased vs. last year and his FG% is way down. 19/9 looks good on paper but there is more to consider. I fully expect Yao to play his best ball in the latter part of the season. And, of course, Tracy's return will help him a lot. I won't allow Yao's recent stinky games to make me forget he will snap out of it and play better.
That's true, but Yao DOES draw double teams from most defenses in the league. That in itself is enough for me to choose him over most (if not all) those players on the list in my first post. I'm just tired of the misconception that max money equates to a superstar player. Max money was simply a fixed percentage instated in the CBA years ago in conjunction with the salary cap. That's all.
If his teammates would get him the ball, the coaching staff would design a play for him other than back it in, and the refs would stop allowing defenders to break out wrestling moves on him, Yao would average 25+ a game. That's what's so frustrating about watching him play. This guy should be frickin dominating out there. His size and skills are being wasted right now.
Give me a break. even with his suppoed limitations, he'll be way more productive then yao ever will. he Avge 38 points and 16 rebounds against Duncan of all people. i doubt his supposed injuries will limit him to greatly.
I don't think he can average 25 points a game. His size is a double-edged sword. While it gives him the ability to shoot over people, it means he's slow and creates stamina problems. It also creates balancing issues which makes it harder for him to receive the ball while fighting for position. In the end, people just need to realize these limitations instead of expecting Yao to become the next Wilt. Do people expect Shaq to hit free throws? Nope, he just can't...despite working at it for years and years. Yao's strength and coordination just aren't finely honed enough to dominate night-in/night-out. Now...we can argue all night about whether he deserved the contract extension he got, but there's one thing of which we can be pretty certain. If we hadn't given him that contract, another team would have.
First of all, you and I both don't know how he will turn out that is why I said "if." Opinions should never be stated as facts unless you have some kind of psychic ability I don't know about. BTW, those numbers you just boasted were pre-surgery numbers against a defense designed to stop a potent three point offense.
The bottom line is people overrated yao greatly. had we taken our blinders off, we would have seen there were better prospects namely Amare were there. we should'nt anything more then were getting.
Amare played well in that series, but please do not exaggerate his stat. He averaged 9.8 rebounds, not 16. And he played 41.4 mins per game. I for one am worried about his injury since his game depends so much on his athletic ability. Let's hope for the best and wish him to have a full recovery. Good luck Amare.
You're the one claiming that amare will never be the same. you're the one trying to perdict the future.
I'm pretty sure i read it was 15.8 rebounds. anyhow, the 38 points i'm pretty sure was close to the mark. I am still willing to give yao the benefit of the doubt. i'm still not will to deal him for anything to equal value. fact is 7'6 skilled big man dont fall off trees.
Do you read or do you just respond out of pure emotion? How am I claiming Amare will never be the same when I am using words like "may", "if" that describe uncertainty and you are using words like "will" like it is fact?
Suns and Spurs series It's 9.8, not 15.8. Shawn Marion is usually the leading rebounder in the Suns team. And yes, the points are pretty close.
