Yao hanging up International play after Beijing Olympics?

Yao is likely to put in the same amount of work playing for the international team or not, and its better that he play in extremely structured competition then random pickup games

 

32/33 years old for a 7'6 basketball player is old as dirt, if Yao makes it to that age and is still productive he'll be like the first giant to ever do it. Frankly I think he only has a couple more years left of prime and then he going to decline very fast.

 

legs are worse, esp. for a giant like yao. stress fractures are no joke. u can see you can't really tell from the injury during the season and bam, season-ending surgery.

 

I hope he does take time to rest and heal. I doubt his country would let him skip the tournaments though.

 

The national team will probably ask him for 2010 world tournament and 2012 Olympic. Other than that he probably won't have to play for the national team.

I can understand Yao wants to gradually stop playing for the national team after this Olympic. I as a Chinese hope he still play in 2010 and 2012. If he doesn't. I am fine with that too. He has done his share.

 

dirk and gasol still play for their countries and they are older than yao. i don't see yao stopping but i hope he will. and if he decides to quit, there's not much the national team can do.

 

Even a slim injury can be exaggerated by many times on a big man.the only way for yao to stay healthy is just to retire from national team.The Chinese team is only aimed at the matches,they have never paied any attention to the rosters' health.Yao's injuries are all from his national games,even though they are discovered in nba.


Yao'd better learn to say NO to his natoinal team,yao is a international star now rather than a CHINESE star only.To be honest, yao should pay more to his nation as nirk does for Germany,if his nation treats him in the way Germany do with dirk.Dirk earns 20m from nba ,and dirk can either use the money or store them into the bank after paying the tax.However,even though yao earns 15m from rockets,man,aftering paying the tax,yao has to pay further more to his nation.As a result,even though yao's salary is 15m,together with his ad rewards,he makes more than 30m per year.But,after paying the tax and the bills from his homecountry,the money he remains is incredibly just 2m.man,Yao is a superstar,man.is it believable that yao earns less than rafer earns,and even luis scola is richer than yao.i don't think his country stores the money grabed from yao in the bank in yao's name.Instead ,they may waste them in ***and ***.man.please leave more for yao,don't sqeeze the poor guy too excessivly.besides ,please give yao more rest time as long as you have taken most of his incomes.

i beg for yao :"please don't take away everything i own,if you must take my wealth ,please leave the health to me."

 

dirk never get injuries (and he's a fast-healer anyways). gasol only got 1 major injury in his career so far.

yao's injuries have gotten worse each yr, or the severity of them anyways.

 

well, i doubt yao will be leading the team in the next olympics. younger players are coming up. china without yao went to final 8 before. so i don't see how he is required to go next time. if he has to, that just shows bad player development. they are doing an ok job. we'll see.

 

dirk nowitzki-----where CHOKE happens.

 

Where have all the classic big men gone?

 

Zydrunas Ilgauskas has been something of an iron man the past 5 seasons after having 3 straight horribly injury plagued seasons, with various foot problems and similar type injuries to Yao. He's averaged about 78 games a season since getting fixed up
http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/players/3121/career;_ylt=AgkwgXQMafZm721PEfIsMD.kvLYF

The noticeable part is he averages around 30 minutes a game. I know it'll be unpopular to have Yao sit on the sidelines more and make his big numbers smaller. But to extend his career, my opinion is his minutes got to get decreased by around 5 less a game. 300 less minutes on the court for the season, or 30 less GAMES?

 

The CBA is like the goverment organization rather than a sports association. So Yao doesn't have any choices, he has to play for CNT in 2012.

Or, did you hear Wang Zz's story?

 

I understand national pride and all but is the Chinese National Team really worth sacrificing your health for? How much pride is there in getting stomped on by Australia? Our first round exits are nothing compared to the mediocrity that the Chinese National Team has had to put up with since...well since forever.

A healthy NBA career on an elite team in the Western Conference

vs

Injury plagued NBA career and international play on an extremely mediocre team

The cycle recently has been:

1. MVP like play
2. Injury
3. Rehab
4. CNT
5. Slow start

Repeat. I'd like to break that cycle, and I'm sure he would too.

 

He'll be age 32... that's a prime year in the career of a center. Seems odd not to play for your country in your prime.

 

He sent the message out now so that everybody have enough time to prepare for his leaving CNT. I think he might want to be more focused on the Rockets after this summer. But since he is the most important piece in CNT, he must not leave without a notice. If he demands to retire right before the 2010 world championship or the next Olympics, he won't get what he wants. So I think he is doing this in a smart way. And I think there's great chance they let him go after this Olympics.

 

Other than maybe Hakeem, for what great center was 32 a prime year?

Right now needs to be Yao's prime.

 

Kareem Abdul Jabbar!

 

KAJ was not injury prone like Yao... 30 30 season-ending ??

 

The pressure from his country is "Okay, Yao. It's time for you to start making a dozen 8 ft tall babies for the country."