Well, a Chinese reporter sent a couple of questions thru e-mail to Yao Ming, and following were his response:-
Thank you very, very much for translating this, pryuen! You did a fantastic job and your effort is appreciated.
Hmmmm, Since Yao keeps track of the +/- numbers................I wonder what he would say about his buddy Juwan.
I love Yao Ming, he is a wonderful human being. What a great representative of the Peoples Republic of China. And I really like the way he has been playing recently. I have been frustrated with his play in the past. Too many silly fouls, not aggressive enough, too slow, poor reactions, lack of "fire," poor conditioning, and so on. Now, it appears he has addressed all these problems and is playing like I always knew he could.
I'm sure this is just an innocuous Chinese saying, but damn does that sound good. It's like a Van Damme movie or something. [Movie Trailer Voice] When Yao Ming was gone, the Houston Rockets owed too much debts. Now he's back, and it's time to repay those debts. THOSE BLOOD DEBTS!!! [/Movie Trailer Voice]
and Juwan's +/- is atrocious. at least stro outperforms the man he's guarding, unlike howard who gets beaten down.
I've always been very skeptical of +/- numbers. They screw the guys who tend to be put on the floor when McGrady (or sometimes Yao) is out. Give me numbers that compare +/- when McGrady's on the court (or off), and I'll believe them.
it's just too bad neither one of them are good looking. Now add either, Joey Yung, or Zhang Ziyi and u got the best representation of Chinese Culture.
Then look at McGrady's +/- numbers with each individual teammate. Then look at Howard's +/- numbers with each individual teammate. Findings: 1. Howard is the only teammate that Yao is negative with. 2. Howard is also negative with McGrady. 3. McGrady and Yao are net positive together. 4. Howard is negative with practically every teammate of any consequence who has played any significant minutes. 5. Swift is very positive teamed with Yao and has been negative teamed with McGrady. Conclusions using deductive reasoning: 1. Yao and McGrady are positive when on the floor together. But they are negative in combination with Howard. Howard drags them down. 2. Swift is wishy washy, but remember most of his minutes with McGrady have been without Yao being on the floor. He has been playing in place of Yao. In those cases, it should be obvious because of Juwan's basketball intelligence that Juwan is a better replacement for Yao than Swift. 3. Swift is extremely positive with Yao on the floor. He should be given minutes with Yao and McGrady on the floor together more often. You can ignore it if you want. But against the quicker, more athletic, playoff type teams, we struggle with Juwan and Yao on the floor together. It doesn't take a bunch of stats to show it. You can see it on the floor. Juwan cannot hang with quicker, more athletic PFs. He doesn't have a chance. Now, he has played his you know what off the last 2 games. Hopefully, he can carry it through the rest of the season. But, I seriously doubt it. He's just not athletically gifted enough, not quick enough, and can't move fast enough or jump high enough to be significantly effective against the better PFs in this league. The +/- statistics only verify what we already see on the floor. Sure, I agree, Stro is a knuckehead. But, the bottom line right now is, he is more effective working alongside Yao than Juwan, despite all his fumbling, bumbling idiocy out there. He has been more effective alongside Yao than Juwan. Maybe Juwan will keep playing over his head like he has been the last 2 games. That would be great. I'll gladly accept it. But...................if Juwan comes out tonight and starts clanging shots off the iron against Phoenix, and they run it the other way on us...........and Marion eats his lunch from the perimeter........then it would be in our best interest to bring in a replacement for him.......whether it be Stro or Hayes, who has some semblance of a chance of staying with a player like Marion, that is to say, a player that can jump like a kangaroo and run like a gazelle. If Marion's game is allowed to flow uninterrupted.........we're in trouble.
