yao ming

BEIJING (AFP): Fresh from winning a ticket to the 2004 Olympic Games, NBA sensation Yao Ming said his next challenge was to fit into the system of his new coach Jeff Van Gundy and help the Houston Rockets make next year's playoffs.

Yao left his hometown Shanghai for Houston only days after leading the Chinese team to the Asian Basketball Championships and bagging the region's only berth to the Athens Olympic Games.

My main goal for the upcoming (NBA) season is to get to the playoffs and try to improve myself under the tutelage of coach Van Gundy," Yao told AFP.

"I'm not going to worry about statistics, I just want to play within myself and try my hardest to improve."

The 2.25 meter (seven-foot, six inch) center also said he hoped that by the end of the 82 game NBA season he would be fluent in English, despite an obvious improvement from a year ago when he entered his rookie season in the world's top basketball league.

Yao and his manager Eric Zhang refused to discuss a reported 100 million dollar contract with shoe-maker Reebok, but sources close to the talks said lawyers were going over the final details of a seven- to 10-year pact that would be one of the most lucrative endorsement contracts in sports history.

"We don't discuss details of our commercial contracts," Zhang said.

During the Asian Championships, Yao, who turned 23 on September 9, wore Reeboks as he dominated the field averaging over 22 points a game and 13 rebounds.

China played eight games in the championships but in the early rounds Yao split playing time with Toronto Raptor center Menk Batere. However, in Wednesday night's final Yao played the entire 40 minutes, scoring 30 points and snaring 15 rebounds in a hotly contested 106-96 win over South Korea.

In previous years the offense of the Chinese national team was geared toward getting the ball to the forwards, but this year it was obviously Yao's team as the first option was to let both Yao and Batere do the scoring.

The situation is likely to be the same in Houston, where new coach Van Gundy has also brought legendary NBA center Patrick Ewing in as an assistant coach in charge of tutoring Yao.

Although sources close to the Chinese national team said Yao complained of being tired during the championships and four months of training and warm up games before the tournament, he denied he would be suffering from fatigue when he arrives to Houston.

"Obviously, I will have a lot of work to do when I get back, but I'm looking forward to the challenge."

As for his rookie year in the NBA, Yao said one of the most amusing aspects for him was to see so many NBA players with tattoos of Chinese characters on their bodies.

The favorite character for a lot of players is "li" or power. All Star guard Allen Iverson has the word "zhong" or loyalty, stamped to his neck.

"Some of the Chinese on some of the players arms is a new language to me, the characters don't make sense," Yao said.

"But for me it is a lot of fun, it shows the international aspect of the game and it also shows the individuality of the player. It made me happy to see so much Chinese in the league."