to me right now , yao has a slight edge of being able to shoot midrange and playing smarter. DH has developed into a POWER player ,without working out low post and shooting skills .....and seemingly, the magics dont care about that.....well, u have to weigh like Shaq to play like shaq if u cant make shoots.... Yao forever
DH is considered one of if not the best center in the league - the fact that Yao can match/outplay him is a testimonial to Yao's hard work and commitment to the game. That said - I think Dwight Howard will be the center to beat in the upcoming years - his game is more "dominant" than Yao's. I still prefer Yao though - I admire his work ethic and "never say die" attitude - despite what others say, Yao never seems to give up.
That depends on the game. I'll never forget seeing Charles Barkley on the Tonight Show when he said Yao kicked Shaq's butt.
Yao is the da MAN. I still would like Yao to be more aggressive and try to shoot more when guarded 1-1 by DHoward, but that said, Yao played well.
Remember the one where he push Battier out of the way in front of the refs to get the board. And how about him using his shoulder on ppl chest to get open isn't that the clear charge. He got no back to the basket games so he always turn hit the defender on the chest with his shoulder the get open to get a layup. If Ref let Yao do this he will be scoring 30 PPG But if Yao use his shoulder it will be to players face because he is so big so, he will alway get call for a offensive foul. BTW DH is not 6-11 he is 6-9 DH 211 centimeters = 6.92257218 feet YAO 229 centimeters = 7.51312336 feet Shaq 216 centimeters = 7.08661417 feet
Well....managed to get a couple of quotes of Yao Ming from Houston Chronicles and the Chinese websites on Dwight Howard. http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/bk/bkn/5430181.html "I think it's a tough matchup for both of us. I have to say, he really, really works hard," Yao said. "I haven't seen his workouts, but I can feel it. He improved so much from last year. I need to catch up so I can play longer against him." http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/bk/bkn/5429656.html Yao had kept Howard off the boards all night, holding him to eight rebounds, seven fewer than his league-leading average, and outscoring the young Magic star 26-16. "I just threw my body to him," Yao said of his work keeping Howard off the boards. "I know why sometimes I have a hard time getting rebounds. I used the same idea on him. You have to hit on the body early and push him out." http://sports.sohu.com/20080105/n254477870.shtml Yao Ming said it is becoming very challenging now whenever he is pitched against Dwight Howard, as he can feel that there has been a qualitative change in terms of power, strength and techniques of the young Howard over the past seasons. When asked how he viewed Amare Stoudemire and Dwight Howard as his opponents, he said Amare Stoudemire is very athletic and speedy, more like a small forward than a centre. But Dwight Howard is more powerful....more a traditional power centre. 2 different types of animals. He also said he was glad and felt fortunate that he was not the one to be fouled out.....but instead Dwight Howard was fouled out. In an earlier interview, he said Dwight Howard plays more and more like Shaquille O'Neal but with slightly better free throws % !! Classy Big Yao to praise his opponents !!
I think the thread starter compares the two head-to-head games in THIS SEASON. All his stats is about the two games, not their career games.
ROFLMAO !!! Fix this for you. It's simple arithmatics !! DH12 = 6FT + 0.9225 x 12 = 6FT 11 YAO MING = 7FT + 0.51 x 12 = 7FT 6 SHAQ = 7 FT + 0.0866 X 12 = 7FT 1
I never see Yao wearing a hat, so probably not too many hatters around here. But this year Yao has the strong bowels of a monkey and the strength of Yak dung so finally he slams the orb with the authority of the warrior king even over Kevin Garnett and earns the much revered super karate monkey death car which now parks in his spot.
Look for both Yao and Howard to improve in next few years. Yao still hasn't reached his prime as center as he it is hard for him to run in high motion offense and with that he scores less points. Howard,meanwhile is developing through years and could be very dominant big man same as Yao, I'd love to see that, Howard is nice guy.
plz, everyone, it is not how yao play againt better center bother me it is how he played with suck, small center
Yao posterized Dwight Howard tonight! Take that, you Dwight Howard nuthuggers! Cry me a river! HAHAHA!
yet as a POWER center Howard isn't as strong as yao. yao can get beat on quickness by both guys like Howard, Boozer etc, but no one in the league is going to be able to power through yao. yao has 6 inches on howard and a much huger base. probably the only 2 guys in the HISTORY of the nba who could power through yao as he is today are a PRIME wilt and a prime shaq. and remember when yao played shaq yao was 75% of what he is now in terms of physical development. look... there's a lot of seasons to be had of yao v howard. but if you're talking about guys whose primary asset is POWER, yao has the advantage. guys who overwhelm other centers with strength and banging near the rim are going to struggle versus yao... you saw it years ago with amare and you see it with howard if the stars align it's possible that we'll see howard dominate yao in 3-4 years... it's also just as possible that we'll never see that. an athletic dude like howard is going to fall off a lot more than yao... who'll only get smarter as he gets older and retain much of his strength until late 30s. every 3-4 years we see the "next" amare "next" howard etc. it's actually more likely that we'll see a younger, faster, stronger version of Howard before we see Howard develop into the #1 center ESPN/NBA is hyping atm.
I agree. I don't understand these people that are hating on Dwight saying he sucks, blah blah. His stats are through the roof and more importantly, his team is winning. He is easily one of the best Centers in the league and is only 22! Dwight can only get better. Cool guy also. I still say Dwight is having the better season. Mainly because his team is doing better than Yao and the Rockets. All that can still change though.
And Yao will continue to give him trouble as long as that is the case. We know Dwight is a big, freaky athlete but at the end of the day he is still 6-7 inches shorter than Yao and about 40-50lbs lighter. How much he can bench or curl means very little when it comes to functional basketball strength so it is no surprise that Dwight's "chiseled" physique is neutralized by a bigger player. Until Dwight gets a midrange game he won't be able to dominate Yao. Shaq is the only guy capable of going "through" Yao. Everyone else needs a jump shot to get the better of The Great Wall.
Howard is a cool guy. It's also cool how he's proud to be an old school center who likes to take right to guys. But he's far from a complete player and it's to be seen whether he deserves to claim the title of #1 center Even Shaq who made a career of dunking around the rim realized early (thx to Dream) that dunking was not enough and worked on expanding his game (with arguable success obviously). At 22 with a couple years of NBA strength & conditioning under his belt Howard has already entered at his athletic prime... sure he'll continue to put on a few pounds around his shoulders and arms but it's not like his vertical or quickness is going to go up and he's still got a long way to go before he can move yao around like he needs to be effective. In any case Yao v Dwight is going to be awesome to watch for years to come and Dave_78 I agree that Howard would have to develop into a prime-era Shaq to be able to go through Yao but that day has passed even for 2008 Shaq. I'm not going to say Yao is stronger than Shaq but Yao can certainly hold his ground physically versus old Shaq. That game earlier this season was the game of the year for Shaq and honestly I was impressed that the old guy was able to use his will to supplement his declining physical skills. But in a full series, Shaq would be hard pressed to string 2 of those games together. I'm certainly willing to concede yao's many faults but I'm not going to deny his primary strengths either. The dude is frigging strong with a massive base. His ability to eat up space and stand his ground creates probably half his own rebounds and defensive rebounds for the team
