How 'bout Yao now?

[From Stephen B. Snyde for Friday tidbits...]

This one goes out to all you who dumped on Yao Ming in the past. From Charles Barkley to Shaquille O'Neal to TrueHoop reader "Femzilla", who once wrote...

...there haven't been many Chinese players in the league, and going by the track record Yao has really been the only one to accomplish success--and he hasn't even lived up to the hype...

The upcoming NBA playoffs in a few weeks is probably going to be the more visible, noticeable turning point for Yao. To be accompanied by silence. From all those critics from before who will be shut up with nothing to say.

I give you The Evolution of Yao, by Chris Ballard for SportsIllustrated.

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Yao: Yi = Amare (what???)

Uhhhh, no Yao, no.

[From Stephen B. Snyde...]

Two things this past week on Yi Jianlian. Before we get to the atrocious, Wang Mang of Titan Sports was quoted in the Philadelphia Daily News by Phil Jasner as saying:

"People in China think he won't be as successful as Yao. They think he doesn't seem to have [the same] desire, that he's not as hungry as Yao...But Yi is really hungry, especially this year. When we got confirmation that he will come to the NBA, he's worked so hard."

Oh good, so the Chinese people are apparently aware that there are certain shortcomings of the Chinese basketball academies.

Btw, the article also said Yi will be endorsing McDonald's coming up.

Now, the atrocious. In the same story, Yao Ming says:

"[Yi] is very close to a player who is in the NBA like I would say Amare Stoudemire."

Duuuuude. Why'd ya hafta make such a PREPOSTEROUS comment in the midst of Poor Man's Commish's impassioned defense of Yi?

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dreamleaguer coincidentally adds web hoops fixes/recommendations

By pure coincidence, our new Bay Area dreamleague beat writer, Alec MacDonald, chimed in late Wednesday night with his weekly report. His timing was impeccable, as we were right in the midst of launching Poor Man's Commish's dreambLogue (which was an all-nighter up thru Thursday morning!). Here's his take on the hoops blogosphere, with a few comments of my own...

Read the rest of the story

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