Daryl Morey, the Houston Rockets’ General Manager and Managing Director of Basketball Operations, is arguably the king of stats.
No one in the league crunches numbers like Morey and looking at his track record for finding obscure talent, no one has been as consistently good at reading those numbers quite like “the Wizard”.
The numbers on Yao Ming are not good… Yao has missed an average of 35 games a season over the past five seasons, including all 82 games last year and let’s not forget the most important number of all – 16.
Yao had 16 pins inserted in his foot to heal the spidery cracks of the navicular bone in his left foot.
For The Rockets, taking things slow with Yao is the only option.
“He is fully healed, and that is great news, of course,” Morey said to Sean Deveney of the Sporting News. “But the doctors are still evaluating everything. There is no question we are going to have to be very cautious with his playing time.”
“He is going to be more limited, it is just a matter of how you get to that point, how you limit him,” Morey said. “Obviously, you start with less minutes per game. He won’t be out there for 35, 40 minutes per game, we know that. But then, things like back-to-backs, you might see him not play in the second part of those or something. Practice time, he might be limited. There are different ways to keep his minutes down. No one knows exactly right now.”
Morey said tempering Yao’s desire to compete and to prove his doubters wrong will be tough to manage, especially with so much riding on his foot.
“He is such a competitor, there are going to be times when he absolutely won’t want to come out,” Morey said. “I know the first game that is close and he is playing well but his minutes are up, we will have to have (trainer) Keith Jones go on the floor and tackle him and drag him off. We have to look at the big picture here.”
The “big picture” Morey is referring to is that with Yao in the lineup the Rockets are likely a home court playoff team if all goes as planned. With Yao on the bench the road to the post season will be extremely tough.
The Rockets have amassed a lot of front court depth, so they do not need Yao to be a 35 minute per game guy, what they need is to get a solid 70 games out of him this year and a playoff berth.
Clearing The Air: Cavaliers’ guard Mo Williams was late arriving into Hopkins International Airport on Sunday, which coincidentally had him bumping into former Cavs’ teammate LeBron James.
The two have not really spoken since James’ infamous “Decision” and as Williams put it, it was a chance for the two to clear the air a bit.
“Part of me is still sour… but I wish him the best,” Williams said to Jason Lloyd of the Beacon Journal. “He’s got enough people rooting against him, he doesn’t need one more.”
Williams said he’d grown very close to James and the news of him leaving Cleveland really caught him off guard – he was hurt his friend was leaving him.
“You’ve got a guy of his caliber, it’s safe to say going into a season we’re playing for a championship just by him suiting up,” Williams said. “We’ve been playing for a championship the last couple years, and there’s no bone in my body that wants to go in another direction.”
Williams knows his future in Cleveland is now uncertain, mainly because the Cavs are going to look to rebuild and trading him and his $9.3 million contract is likely part of the plan.
Williams’ deal has an Early Termination year worth $8.5 million in 2011-2012 and an additional Player Option year in 2012-2013 worth $8.5 million could be one of the harder deals to move, which suits Williams.
“I want to look back at my legacy and say, ‘I had a great career in Cleveland.’ I don’t want to say I had a great career in Cleveland, Portland, Chicago and Dallas. You can’t have a legacy that way,” Williams said. “I love the city. I love the fans. They welcomed me and my family and I respect that.”
The Cavaliers as a team are optimistic they can still be a playoff team as constructed, however if things go badly and the playoffs look out of reach in January don’t be surprised to see the Cavs hold a fire sale and it sounds like Williams and Antawn Jamison are the first guys the team would like to move if they are not competitive.
International Drug Testing: For years there has been a lot of open criticism of FIBA, the international organizing body of international basketball, and their lack of a consistent drug testing program. This year FIBA is being far more aggressive and far more unilateral in its approach.
Patrick Baumann, FIBA’s secretary general, said two players from every team in the World Championships have been drug tested and several more random tests will be conducted during the tournament.
Baumann said to the Associated Press he hopes this can “banish the myth that some teams are not tested,” adding that “everybody is treated exactly the same and there are no exceptions.”
FIBA has been testing athletes since 1990, and uses the World Anti-Doping Agency code standards.
In most cases a first positive test could result in a one-year ban from competition. A second positive test typically receives a mandatory two-year ban and a third positive test for a banned substance typically results in a lifetime ban.
Fighting for the Last Spot: The Miami HEAT have 18 players under contract. The NBA will allow the HEAT to carry a maximum of 15 players into the regular season meaning at least three players are being cut regardless of how well they play.
