The more I read people's trade proposal, the more I realize most of these posts are made by people who do not watch or study the game that much. Yao is a very TALENTED, YOUNG, upcoming, CHEAP and rookie CENTER. You do not trade Yao for role players, expensive old all-star players. The downside of Yao is that he can not fully commit to the Rox to improve himself "under NBA training" during the off-season. But still, you don't trade him for Allan Houston and Kurt Thomas. GEEEEEZEE, I can't belive people want to trade for Allan Houston's 100 mil contract!!! Anyway, you want to trade Yao for an established relatively young Superstar (T-mac, Duncan, Kobe) or contract-friendly all-star (who???) plus a young stud or a talented, young, upcoming, superstar potential, cheap PF/C. Basically, this rules out many players. Plus teams with T-mac, Duncan, Kobe will not trade them for an unproven commodity. Also you don't want to trade big for small if the small is not a proven super-star. So which players can Rox really target and have a possibility to make the trade work? I would say, Curry + Crawford is a possibility. Curry has a very good offensive game, he still needs to work on his defense, but he is less than 20 years old and a center. Crawford is a 6'5" PG/SG combo, very good fit for Steve Francis. Chicago has to get rid of either J. Williams or Crawford. Curry and Yao could be interchangable for Chicago and they also have Chandler to anchor the PF position. Yao would also be more marketable for Chicago. The NBA surely would prefer Yao on a big-market team. I think there is a pretty good chance Chicago would bite on this trade. Other potential trades: 1. with Indiana for J. O'neal plus a young stud, but I don't know if Indiana would bite. 2. with Cleveland for their #1 pick (if it is #1 or #2) plus a young stud. Would Cleveland give Rox Lebron James or Darko? 3. with Denver for their #1 pick (if it is #1 or #2) plus Tiki. For players on other teams, I would not even ask because either we don't want them or they won't give theirs (T-mac, Duncan, Kobe).
Yao will not be traded, not even Duncan or Shaq. NBA is a business, Yao made Rockets 2nd worst profitable team to 2nd best in his rookie season, that alone makes him more valuable than any other player in the league if you are an owner. And Yao is not the kind of person who's going to demand a trade. As for Yao's development, he'll be fine as long as Larry Smith is not the head coach, IMHO. Rudy trusts Yao a lot more than Larry.
You made some valid points but you conveniently omitted a few too. 1) Yao avg 29 min/g for 80 games. 27 mins/g for 15 games under Smith. 29.5 mins/g for 65 games under Rudy. 31.8 mins /g for 56 games under Rudy (if you leave out the 1st 9 games where he avg 15 mins/g). That is a drop off of 4.8 mins/ g from recent days. 2) His play and numbers dropped off some but it was not as bad as you made it sound. Going from 13.5 pts, 8.2 rebs, 1.74 bs the whole season to the numbers you quote is not terrible. His pts dropped off partly because the drop in FG% but also because the few more touches (about same FG att avg. but less FT att, and again, season avg includes the 1st 9 games) He played well against Sea (4/12), Orl, LAC, Sea (3/18) but avg 24.5 minutes in those games. His stats would have been better if he'd gotten to play more in those games. 3) Yao's bad play according to you is 43% FG. Can you tell me what the Cat did during these games and how much playing time he had? 4) Cato is having a very good season but the few games when he had more minutes showed that he did not produce at the same rate. You could tell at the end of the 8 or 10 minute stretch Cato played, he dragged quite a bit and commited more fouls too. I am saying Yao did not play his best BB the last 15 games and Larry did not help either!
Rox need trade...........Yao is good...................trade francis and mobley. would make Rox good . i think good
Do you remember how many times Yao had a bad 1st quarter or bad 1st half and came back strong in 4th quarter to carray the team under Rudy T? Rudy will put Yao on the court at clutch time no matter what happened in 1st half. That gives Yao confidence and he doesn't worry too much about his stats. How about Smith? If Yao had a bad 1st quarter or bad 1st half, he'd hardly see the floor in 4th quarter unless Cato is playing a lot worse. That certainly will affect Yao sychlogically and makes Yao worry too much when he is on the court. I feel this is one of the reason Yao's performance going down like that under Smith.
Anyone who uses the word "we" or "us" when suggesting the Rockets trade Yao to a team that will better exploit his talents should automatically be sent to internet purgatory. IE: "We should trade Yao to a team where they know how to use a player like him. It is better for Yao and us." Not only is that complete horse crap, it is a total lie. What this should say is: "YOU should trade Yao to a team where they know how to use a player like him. It is better for Yao and YOUR TEAM." I've said this before. This is a forum for Rockets fans. If you are not a fan of the Rockets, please do us both a favor and find somewhere else to post.
Err... Are you a rocket fan? I admit that I am a Yao's fan and as today, I do not have problem of Yao being trade from the rocket since my loyalty to the team is not deep yet. However, your proporsal is horrible. How would it help the rocket at all?
EXACTLY!!! I actually like Yao Ming alot, but the Yao only fans frustrate me by saying that everyone else on the team is stupid and can't play and that Yao was perfect and derserved no blame for the season. I think part of the problem is that we put too much emphasis of the offense on a rookie. Yao should us some flashes of greatness, but he was still a rookie. The Rox were a lot better off when the didn't DEPEND on Yao to give them point and whatever Yao gave them was a bonus. When they switched to depend on Yao's contribution, they got uneven results as you will with any rookie. As great as Magic Johnson was, they still ran the offense through Kareem his rookie year. Hopefully the experience can be benefitial, and Yao will be more consistent next year, the coaches will have a better idea how to use him, and the other players will know how to better work with him on the court.
