battier needs to grow half a foot, then. lol. i hate to compare individual players with no perimeters set in the discussion. that's one. and two, a healthy yao with a supporting cast of battier, ron, rafer/ab can make their team one game shy of the sw division title and has actually won the first round. a healthy pau with the same quality of support was winless in the postseason. i know that. someone please tell me why we should trade yao for someone who can be contained to a large degree by chuck hayes ALONE? you can give me health concerns and i will consider (but pau has broken his leg in the fiba tournament before and so it can happen in the nba too). anything else? one more thing - i am not sure if gasol is soft; but i know for sure yao is not soft.
one soft 7 footer for another one?? Na im good I rather keep Yao. McGrady and Yao at least have the chemistry and knows how 2 play with one another.
I agree. Gasol is more durable and more well-rounded. I don't think the Yao-centric offense is even capable of winning a title unless we had other all-stars surrounding him. In other words, those all-stars would have to bail Yao out when the opposing defense takes him out with such ease. Gasol can play well and be effective against any team, any style. In this era of basketball, you need all your players to have a reasonable amount of speed, and Gasol has it for a center. But these Yao trade ideas are just ridiculous. As reasonable as a Yao for Gasol trade is, it's just not going to happen because Yao is a cash cow. It's not all about basketball. NBA is a business too.
name me one star player who can lead a team to title contention without help from a couple of allstars or allstar-caliber players. just one. leborn? kobe? wade? dh12? who?
Boozer already said he wants to come play here next year. He's a free agent. Of course, dude is only 6 ft 9 in or so, and honestly, I'd rather have Scolandry and Hayes.
No, because of leadership intangibles. Yao is a leader, a guy who plays tough (tho slow) and like Scola says, "Yao is the best teammate he's ever had." Everybody who's played with Yao loves him as a teammate. Nobody says that for Gasol. Yao is a big reason why we have such great chemistry- because the best player on the team is unselfish and loves to see his teammates succeed. Put a whiny b**** like Gasol on this team and he would be an anchor weighing down team chemistry like T-mac did.
I honestly believe the fronting issue with Yao isn't that huge of a problem. Theoretically, the Rockets team consisting of healthy Tmac and Yao shouldn't have that problem. Fronting Yao opens many pathways to the rim; assuming Tmac is in drive-mode and not chucking-mode. There's also defensive 3 second that opponents need to worry about when double teaming Yao. The only issue with Yao is health. I've watched Pau alot since I live in LA at the moment, and he is not confident with his mid range jumpers at all. He can hit it once in awhile but the team can't really rely on it. Yao on the other hand is a pretty efficient mid range shooter. If you play the health card, then anyone that can stay on the court is better than Yao. For example, Brian Cook gave us 5 minutes while Yao wasn't even on the bench. I'm pretty sure Yao isn't going to be traded so for those people that don't want Yao, your only hope is that he comes off the books at 2010.
What does that have to do with my post? Do LeBron, Kobe, Wade, and Dwight get taken out of games by opposing defenses, forcing their other all-star teammates to step up for their absence in production?
You really think fronting of a big deal? How many Non Rocket games have you watched in the past years? Shaq has been fronted before so has Tim Duncan. With Tim Duncan losing a lot of mobility and athletic ability due to declining. He gets fronted as well and the spurs solve it is much different than the way the Rockets solve it. Spurs have Manu and Parker penetrate, while the Rockets beat it by passing. All said and done, each superstar player has a different problem and Yao's problem is being fronted.
How often were Shaq/Duncan in their primes getting completely neutralized by a fronting defense? Awful comparison.
Considering the fact that back in their prime, sandwiching in the front wasn't even allowed. I don't know and I can't answer that question. Maybe if we had a time machine, we could figure it out. And despite that, When Hakeem was fronted in his days in Houston they would end up giving Horry an easy shot himself. Do your basketball homework before bringing that weak stuff in here.
well, you said a yao-centric can't lead to a title contention. i was just asking you which star player can single-handedly lead his team to a title contention w/o significant amount of help. a simple fronting is not the defense yao faced. most other star players either enjoy the current rule changes or don't play under the same defensive pressure yao has had. fronting only became an issue after we lost a premier wing player in mcgrady. ain't that tell you something?
rule changes. has that ever been in your mind? shaq was taken out by his own coach because of hack-a-shaq strategies. and since when yao has "completely" taken out a game by fronting? even when he's not scoring in the portland series, the defensive attention he drew allowed other rockets to score. and his rebounding has always been good, averaging double figures in the series.
