I'm not being oversensitive. I said multiple times that I might be reading too much into his statements. I, personally, would have used a different choice of words. At first, the implication to me was that he was trying to say Brooks was the 4th best when healthy or that Yao Ming, in the midst of his recovery, was the 4th best. You're probably right that he meant top 4 "go to" guys or scorers, but that's unfortunately not what he said. He said top two players. As someone pointed out earlier, it might give some insight into his mindset that scoring makes one a top player (not exactly an earth-shattering revelation). Even if he wasn't ranking Brooks or Yao against himself or Scola, the apparent snub to Shane Battier seems rather insensitive.
Rose colored glasses. If you hate someone, than a neutral statement gets downgraded to negative, a positive gets turned to neutral.
He listed 4 players. He just considers Scola and Martin equal at 2, thus the next person is listed at 4th.
you're not reading too much into it, you're reading something that's not there. It's clear battier isnt in the top 4, meaning Yao, AB, scola, and martin are the 4. This means 2 of the top 4 could be: yao/AB AB/Scola Martin/Scola Scola/Yao AB/Martin Martin/Yao In this case it happens to be AB/Yao. There's no order specified or implied, no matter how much you read into it.
It really doesn't matter, because Scola and Martin are both quality enough that being #4 on the team is no insult.
Ranking the top 4 players requires some conditional statements on this Rockets team. If Yao is healthy and up to speed, he is the top player by far, until Scola, Martin, and AB can learn to mark a man on D: 1) Yao 2) Scola 3) Martin 4) AB If Yao is healthy, but not up to speed yet (i.e. before the sprain): 1) Scola 2) Martin 3) Yao 4) AB (The dude makes it 5 on 4 on defense) If Yao is unhealthy: 1) Scola 2) Martin 3) AB 4) Lowry
At this point, I don't think I can rank these players in a meaningful way. Brooks, Martin, Scola, and Yao are definitely the top 4 players, but each have their merits and flaws that make it difficult to say outright one is clearly more valuable on the court than the other. (Trade value is of course a different matter.) Like everything else on this team, being the alpha dog has become a team effort.
When Yao is healthy he is #1 and it's not close. 20 and 10 with elite defense and good percentages. remember?
Well，if neither Yao or Ab falls to #4, he could have said 2 of top 3. OK, I'm kidding. I agree the OP read too much into it.
