I think Yao finally had it! Kind of like guys get frustrated and just commit a dumb foul after a call or some other injustice by the ref.
My problem is he got called a lot while he was in the air. This is wrong. He doesnt need to jump and bite the fakes. Just put up hands and slide your foot. This gotta be habit. On the other hand, he doesnt jump when he needs to, like grabbing rebounds.
good point. actually - a safe strategy would be to just never jump. poor guy can't get 2 inches off the ground anyways. I'm not serious. I think last nite's game illustrated his biggest problem - FOULS. it's not aggressiveness or assertiveness or not demanding the ball (even though those areas can be improved). I thought he actually played quite well in the limited minutes he had - was scoring on Shaq pretty easily. at least 2 of those fouls from last night could have been easily avoided. The last one really comes to mind.
foul #6 where he slapped shaq on the head was legit. That was just a dumb play by Yao. foul #5 where shaq initiated the contact and yao just had his arms up was ticky-tack. the one where yao gave wade a charliehorse I thought was controversial but I didnt bother watching the replays so I could be wrong. I thought the other foul where yao jumped into wade was a good play by wade - he pulled a tmac.
Accroding to Yao, the game is so fast that sometimes he just didn't have time to think of foul or not. He'll develop better instinct eventually.
Reaching in fouls usually happen because of poor footwork. It may become a habit or you just may still have slow footwork. Yao definitely has slow footwork, that is pretty much agreed around here. But, maybe he will quit reaching in anyway and just let the other guys blow past him.
I actually enjoyed that last foul. I laughed for ten minutes about the way he just slapped Shaq on top of the head.
Poor footwork or slowness is one problem Yao has, that is what caused the foul when Wade was driving by. Yao can't do much about those. A guy can not become so much quicker if it's not in his nature. I am talking about the problem where Yao reached in and slapped Shaq on the head when he had 5 fouls or those fouls where Yao was in good position but he reached beyond vertical and touched the shooter. He should be able to control those. Just keep his arm straight. Yao reached over simply because he is used to be able to block the shots of lesser players. It is not quite that easy in the NBA. I also think Yao is not used to NBA players who jump into defenders to create contacts or those who show the ball to bait defenders into reaching in then double pump before putting the shot. Not a lot of international players know those tricks, partly because international refs do not bail out offensive players the way NBA refs do.
I am sadly reminded of these careless fouls... http://bbs.clutchcity.net/showthread.php?s=&threadid=91290 †
