Supposedly, as one grows older, one's beliefs should calcify. You should become more set in your ways, more attuned to the comforts of familiarity and less willing to take on risks. After all, you're growing older and supposedly wiser. That, and my experience has given me a right to become dead set in my ways. It's with great surprise then, and more than a little embarrassment, that I've begun to like Kobe Brya... We interrupt this self-indulgent post to bring you breaking news and a completely different self-indulgent post. Houston Rockets center Yao Ming will miss the rest of the 2007-08 season with a stress fracture in his left foot. First, I'd like to give Rockets fans my heartiest condolences. You lose Tracy McGrady for 17 games, weather that annual storm and then run off 12 consecutive wins to move into seventh place in the Western Conference, three games within the conference-leading Lakers and then ... Yao goes down for the rest of the season. I can't even imagine. I'd also like to apologize for picking Yao as my 2007-08 MVP. Here's what I wrote just before the season tipped off: "I like my Coach of the Year pick Rick Adelman's style of offense and I believe my MVP pick, Yao Ming, will play a full 82 this season." As I look back on it, not only was the first clause of that sentence poorly worded, the second part was poorly reasoned. After playing 244 of the 246 possible games in his first three seasons, Yao has played 160 games in the past three seasons. That's not even two full seasons in the last three. In 2005-06, he missed a total of 25 games with an infection in his left big toe and a broken left pinky toe. In 2006-07, he broke his right leg and missed 34 games. And now this. Yet, before a season starts, optimism reigns. Also, as you may have learned by now, I am the anti-Midas when it comes to predictions. Everything I touch turns to Fool's Gold. Last season, I publicly proclaimed Detroit was the team to beat in the East. That turned out well. I have picked the Wizards to win the Southeast two years straight. So much for that. If you see me making a choice, you would be wise to go in the opposite direction. Still, Yao's injury doesn't necessarily mean doom in the deep, talented and competitive West? Does it? Henry Abbott over at TrueHoop has a lot of the same questions I have about the Rockets' immediate future. You have two 6-9 rookies, Luis Scola and Carl Landry, who can pick up some of the slack on the boards, but at a combined 16.2 points per game they can't match Yao's team-leading 22.0 ppg. Can they make up that extra six points per game? Third-year man Chuck Hayes will also need to step up. That, and the only other center on the Rockets' roster is Dikembe Mutombo, who's in his last season and who has seen better days as a player. Then again, the sub-headline on Houston Chronicle.com speaks volumes: "The Rockets have won 12 consecutive games since losing the one game Yao has missed this season." (Bold emphasis mine) And on his blog, the Chronicle's Rockets beat writer, Jonathan Feigen writes: "At a time the Rockets were going better than they have in a decade, not just winning games by the dozen but improving with more room to grow evident, the life was drained from the winning streak and the Rockets' prospects. "This feels worse, though, than even that. No one so large has ever been asked to do what Yao has done for the Rockets. The previous giants were specialists. Those close in size that came close to his role - Arvydas Sabonis, Zydruynas Ilgauskas and Rik Smits - had foot and ankle problems that derailed their careers, but were able to eventually succeed. Bill Walton never was the same. " Houston went from truly scary on the court to truly scared off it. We can only hope Yao, a magnanimous and effervescent superstar, can be back on his feet soon. Now, back to our original self-indulgent blog post, already in progress. ... he's always filled boxscores. Now, Kobe could be winning hearts and minds with his incredible fortitude and heart -- those magical, mystical intangibles you can't see in black-and-white, but you can definitely see for yourself. Feb 26, 2008 Posted by Rob Peterson http://my.nba.com/thread.jspa?threadID=400028368
I had a hard time following that as well. Maybe my attention span is crappy but I had to stop and start again a few times because I couldn't understand what you were trying to say. Again, maybe the issue is mine and not yours.
Beautifully written...and depressing at the same time. The sad part of this great article is that Peterson has copped to the exact same "Rockets season over" gloom that everyone else in the media has taken up on. Have they even been watching the Rockets? Really, they should just watch our games. See how good Adleman's offense is. See how the Rockets are getting better and better at it. See how our defense is still up there with the very best in the league. Then again, the mass media is all about what makes them money, what gets them the most response We will miss Yao, but we will not stop fighting..and winning.
Gotcha. Sorry. In that case, that was horrible and made absolutely no sense. The person who wrote that has some serious issues with continuity.
I think that writer is trying to say how Yao goes down and Kobe rises up or something, like he showes ways of Kobe and Yao, one goes down with injury and "leaves" Rockets and other carries his team all the way. I picked it up on NBA.COM, I tought it might be interesting so...
