Posted on Oct. 15, 2004 at 10:33 a.m. ET Kings-Rockets thoughts ... Hello, Beijing After being in Shanghai for a couple of days, you really felt the excitement about the NBA leading up to Thursday’s night’s game between the Kings and the Rockets. The fans who packed Shanghai Stadium were obviously excited. It isn’t an every day occurrence to get this caliber of players over here and then at the same time, you have two of your homegrown products inside of that mix in Yao Ming and Liu Wei and it’s obviously something special. The NBA pulled out all of the stops. It felt like I could have been at the Staples Center, Madison Square Garden, the Toyota Center or even in Sacramento. You had all of the elements from the dancers, the dunkers at halftime, everything that the NBA game offers. Some of the questions I have for the Rockets ... They have to find a point guard or settle in on one. I think that’s going to be important. The Rockets began the game with T-Mac starting at point, which negates a lot of the great things he can do on the wings and it also slows up the offense a lot. As for the Kings, Sacramento looks like Sacramento. Throw a healthy Doug Christie into that mix when he returns, and add Bobby Jackson, and Sacramento is tough. I thought C-Webb is coming around. He looks a lot better than he did at the end of last season when he came back. He’s still not as fluid and doesn’t have all of the things that we are accustomed to. Last season, I would say he was 50 percent when he came back. Right now I would say he’s about 80 or 85 percent and that’s a big jump for him. After the game, we hopped on a plane to Beijing and arrived early morning. Immediately, you got a sense that Beijing is a different world from Shanghai, which is more cosmopolitan and Western influenced. Beijing does offer the great architecture and you still have the new buildings, but you see more of a Chinese flare to it instead of a Western flare. When I come here and visit, I want to feel like I’m away from home. This to me will be the most fun of the trip. One of the first places we visited on Friday morning was Tiananmen Square and the Chairman Mao Memorial Hall where Chairman Mao is buried and embalmed. To visit that site is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. To be a part of and seeing history is what this trip is all about for me and my daughter. Next stop: The Forbidden City. Posted on Oct. 12, 2004 at 12:53 p.m. ET
