Disclaimer: A little medical knowledge would help better understand Yao's situation First off, we need to look at Yao's injuries objectively. For a human being to carry 320lbs and a 7'6 frame and able to move as Yao can is already AMAZING (Let alone his basketball moves). Four years ago when he got done with the season for the first time, it was a toe INFECTION, which no matter who it is cannot be avoided. A year later, it was a freak collision accident that fractured Yao's thigh, with which any player would've been messed up just as bad if not worse. So the first 2 of Yao's injuries were purely accidental and SHOULD NOT go in his medical history to be used against him when talking about stress fractures. The last 2 have been stress fractures, which, although at 2 different spots, do not bid nearly as well for the future as the first two. But I remember reading a thread about comparison between Yao and Shaq's games played in their first 7 seasons, plus Ilgauskas' recovery story, so it is still hopeful that Yao may be able to straighten it out in the near future. But how? Adelman making Yao the focus of our ENTIRE offense puts tremendously more pressure (double, triple teams plus blatant hard fouls that aren't even called) from opposing players on his feet by constantly contending for post positions. To lessen such pressure, we DO need someone that can demand double teams so Yao will be able to operate more freely, move more easily on his feet and dominate down low more efficiently. And yes that someone on the Rox roster is Tracy McGrady. Now it's on him to stay healthy and work hard and mesh well with teammates. Or on Daryl Morey to find someone else. So yeah, I am not commenting on "IF Rockets are better without whoever," but it is clear that with T-Mac, the Rockets would probably have a healthier and more effective Yao Ming. P.S. I personally think Adelman should mix Yao's post play up with the small ball stuff he's had great success with in the past
ALSO, this summer he will able to rest his legs better than last season. Last season, i strongly felt that he was playing on a bad foot during the Olympics and care that over into the regualr season. this year will be different bc he is not playing
good post. was gonna start a thread myself. hope it makes a good thread. i was trying to read as much as i can to determine if yao is really injury prone. i've heard the sr610 guys say this time his injury was on the same bone that suffered the fracture last year, just a different spot. this makes me worry. the good news is that this time it doesn't take a surgery and yao has his first "duty-free" summer. i remember right before the regular season ended, yao missed a game due to a "bruised ankle" and it was an impact from the game before. i don't know if that was the same foot and same bone (i think it was, but correct me if i am wrong). so it's possible that yao playing the last couple of games of the regular season, plus the increased minutes in the playoffs with an impact/bruise which eventually caused his hairline fracture. but i haven't seen any confirmation. the thing is, no matter one likes it or not, next year is the year of yao's last year of his current contract before he can opt out. i think it's likely morey and les will continue their plan to build the team around yao for at least one more year and see what happens. if yao plays the entire season w/o major issues, then he's likely gonna sign his second max deal with houston; otherwise this team may need to go other directions. and i hope yao will use this summer to fine tune his skills, especially his mid-range jumpers. needs to better his butterfingers too. all in all, yao needs to evolve his game. it not uncommon that bigs add some elements to their games at this stage of their careers; and this summer can be the perfect time for yao.
Actually it's not the same bone either. This time it's on his left ankle, last time was almost in the middle of his foot's sole. This time it's hairline big and does not require any surgeries. Both happened in his left foot, which makes me wonder if that's got something to do with his customary spin moves. Perhaps he should consider adding the spin on the other foot/direction to his repertoire of moves to at least somewhat even out the stress on the left side. That'll leave his defenders guessing too, I'd PAY to watch Yao fake someone like Scola did with Gasol in Game 6, lol.
Maybe Yao should get better basketball shoes. For the past few years, I've used Nikes, Reeboks and Adidas shoes for basketball along with my Mizuno and Asics for volleyball. Since both sports involved repeated jumping action, I think I can compare the cushioning of all 5 brands. In my opinion, Asics Gel has the best cushioning and I even play basketball sometimes wearing them. Maybe Yao should get one of these: It's very hard to find it anywhere though...
Great post. Yao is more injury-prone than those small size players. But I don't think he is as injury-prone as many fans here thought. The good things for Yao next season are 1) The injury he is having is not quite serious. 2) He is duty free this summer. 3) Next season I believe we will have a normal start. We had difficult times during the past two seasons caused by T-mac's injury and not playing hard on court. Next season if we can play as well as this season after the all star break, Yao should be able to play less minutes and with less burden. 4) The young players, Brooks, Lowry, Landry and Wafer (if we can keep hime) will grow up. The team will be better.
Do not mention the last Olympics any more, Olympics is not the point, the point is Miser Alexdaner is not willing to pay money for a backup center.
I thought you guy talk about the rockets future forgot the most important thing if we will keep yao or let him go. 1. The first choice- keep yao yao’s goal is championship, so you should buy the good player, and make him believe you have the possibility to get the championship .but the boss of rockets unwilling to pay more money. He doesn’t care the championship; he just cares about the commercial value of yao. I heard rockets want to sign Yao 2 times and Yao refused .Yao can wait, if next season no big change, Yao will be a free man and go anywhere, Chinese news guess he will cooperate with Kobe or lebron ,and rockets will get nothing. So rockets can’t let Yao negotiation next year, it must be decided this summer, Yao will go or remain. If the negotiation is prolonged to next year. I guess Yao will not too hard because he needs to keep his healthy. Yao is the best 2 or 3 center in the NBA and wise with skill, he needn’t worry about his big contract. He said he don’t want to be leader, that mean he need not to play 40minutes in a game. Now the ball is on rockets side. But if you want to keep yao ,it is bother too ,the coach adelman’s style is not fit yaoming as you know,yao’s data reduce rapidly. Don’t angry, but I saw some articles in china say that yao and adelman one will go. It is so serious, but I think it is realistic. 2 the anther choice is with out yaoming That mean tmac will back, the talk of content are different. sorry paste make a mistake.
Actually though...is it possible to develop a shoe just for Yao? To lessen the impact? We need to be careful with Yao though because he's 7'6" 300 lbs and Yao needs to tell the team whenever he has pain, and when he does we need to sit him for however long, this team is fine without him for awhile. The team's goal should be to get all these guys ready to go for the post-season AT ALL COST! This is what Popovic does, some nights he would just rest his main guys just for the rest. Forget about the seed we get and whatever, plus this team has proven that they can go awhile without their top guys.
Maybe we should create a shoe design contest amongts Rockets fan? The goal is to design basketball shoes, which can lessen the impact on the fragile bones of our gentle 7'6", 300+lbs giant. Fans can come up with i) design concepts and ii) for those who are more technically inclined can come up with the actual design including analysis and iii) perhaps a prototype as well. If there's no cost restriction, we could use any advanced, high tech, exotic materials and fabrication methods can be used - like composite, interlacing layers of tempurpedic memory foam (I've seen a TV program where a pitcher threw an egg towards a tempurpedic memory foam mattress and the egg didn't break) and Asics gel cushion perhaps and to make it light we can use carbon fiber moulds to protect his toes, ankle and heels. I am sure Rockets wouldn't mind paying more than $10k per pair of a custom made high tech shoes to protect Yao's foot and knees. Maybe he'll need at least 30 pairs of those per season if these shoes are designed to last only 2-3 matches.
i've been saying this for a while... and to lessen the impact, well to distribute the impact more evenly they need to even his body out, drops some weight in his lower body and add some in his upper body....right now you have most of his weight in his lower body so when he comes down it's like having dumbbells strapped to your legs...
Hmmmmmmmm Shaq AND Yao...... Ain't bad AT ALL! If there's really such an opportunity, it'll have to wait until Shaq comes off his $20m contract then maybe we can convince him to sign a veterans deal and bring back the Twin Towers and tell Blazers that theirs are a fake, lol.
