Yao was nearly unstopable inside last year righe before he injured his leg. Even then I was wondering hong long that kind of dominance would last. One reason is the heavy minutes he had to go through wristling the league bigs, he can be worn down quicker than many realize. Yao is big, but his body is not exactly built to that type like Shaq. The other thing is, the opponent can take Yao out relatively easily by fronting him or double teaming him. This is especially true when it comes to playoff and the teams are more concerned about the matchup. Yao lost some of his strength due to the injury. He is not as powerful as he was. But he seems have improved in all other aspects, especially in two things: 1)he regains his range of shooting. 2)his in game reaction is better, his body and mind are more synchronized. Before the injury,his play is more of a routine thing, now his is more "reactive" to the situiation he is in. The first may have something to do with the change of our team playing style. The second one comes from better reading at the game,more confidence and more experince and more confortable with his role. I am just curious which Yao you like more. The more powerful one dimensional Yao before the injury or the now more polished, harder to defend and last longer one?I know some of the change are due to the way we play. But this question is more about his change, not his fitness to the current way we play.
Personally, I don't really care. Winning is all that matters... Garnett has very well rounded games in Minny and we had a effective "low post" Yao in the JVG era, but both these situation didn't get teams a Championship...
This Yao seems more versatile and balanced. Not as many monster games but not as many embarrassing games either.
Yao wasnt 1 dimension last year (before injury) wtf are you talking about? Being aggressive, confident and strong around the basket is not 1 dimension... Yao even said it in an interview, hes still NOT as good as he was last year prior to the injury.
Yao is still putting up good numbers... with him playing high post half the time on the offensive sets... but I definately want him... low post... going for a high % dunk or shot... with 5 minutes to go in a playoff game...
I have been paying close attention to Yao's performance since his injury. I was worried that injury may cost him his career as a true NBA star, which is a disaster for him and the Rockets. I have seen the steady improvement over the past year and I think he is as good a player as he was before the injury, if not more. I was wondering how many guy here think the same. This was the reason I started this poll. I don't get it although I have heard this kind of things over and over again. I mean,If you do not care about how Yao plays, or how any Rocket key player plays, how can you care about Rockets get a W or not? I never understand this "true Rocket fan" thing. I know Yao said it sometime ago, I am curious if Yao still thinks so. BTW, discussions are welcome if some unnecessary word like "wtf" are not involved.
One dimensional Yao was easily countered by opponent using small team and fronting double or triple as used by the Suns and GSW. In fact, Yao has still not able to nail those 3pts and long range yet unlike when he was in CBA. He could probably regain those skills but he need some time as he has not used them for since JVG took over.
We don't want Yao to shoot 3s or long range jumpers. Part of the reason Yao and the team struggled early on because he was relying too much on those jump shots. We didn't start winning more games until Yao took less of those long jumpers and took more shots around the basket. The man is automatic in the paint. Why would we want our 7'6 dominant center to shoot 3s and long range jump shots?
We don't want him to shoot too many 3s or long range. However, we need him to nailed them when he had those chances when opponents are crowding him in the paint and he need to go out to the arc occasionally. There were times, Yao is just being sandwiched and wrestle in the paint, it would good to see him come out for a while to disrupt the zoning defense.
