NBA Houston's Yao rockets to stardom

The 22-year-old Chinese basketball player has overcome his shaky start in America.
SCRIPPS HOWARD NEWS SERVICE
Yao Ming has been in America almost two months, and already the Houston Rockets rookie center from China has:
UMade TNT basketball analyst Charles Barkley kiss a donkey's rear end after losing a bet.
UThrown down 27 points and grabbed 18 rebounds against San Antonio's front line, featuring past NBA MVPs Tim Duncan and David Robinson.
UStarred in his own ESPN photo shoot for an ad promoting the network's new contract with the league.
UEarned compliments from Shaquille O'Neal to Bill Walton to Michael Jordan to Grizzlies coach Hubie Brown. They all readily admit the 7-5, 296-pound Yao is the league's primetime center of the future.
UAveraged 12.8 points and 7.9 rebounds, and leads the league in field goal percentage at .577.
"Anybody who criticized him his first couple of weeks in the league has egg on their face now," said Brown recently. "He's gotten nothing but better, and he's going to keep getting better."
Top pick
Yao, 22, the first overall pick in June's draft, had a shaky beginning. He missed most of training camp while playing for the Chinese National team in the Asian Games.
About 78 hours after arriving in Houston on Oct. 20, he played 13 minutes in an exhibition game against the Spurs. He scored six points, had four rebounds and was dunked on by 6-8 Stephen Jackson.
In another early game, he fell down trying to defend Phoenix point guard Stephon Marbury on the perimeter, drawing laughter from the opposing bench.
Barkley promptly said that if the center scored 20 points in a game he'd kiss co-host Kenny Smith's rear end. He paid off by kissing the donkey.
But those players who have stood next to Yao, saw his soft hands, his sweet shooting touch, his deft passing skills and his 90-plus-inch reach didn't write him off.
"It seemed like people were trying to embarrass him, trying to make him look bad," Phoenix Suns guard Penny Hardaway said. "Every time you saw an ESPN highlight, it wasn't positive. But the guy can play."
Most pressure
"This is the most pressure I've ever faced, but I feel more comfortable with each game that I play," Yao said through his interpreter, Collin Pine. "Basketball is not something you talk about it. It is an action through which you can show people. I just need to show them on the court."
Yao's game is polished in many areas, raw in other areas such as aggressiveness. Early on, his teammates had to implore him to dunk instead dropping the ball off the backboard.
But almost every other game, he makes a play to let everyone know he's special, such as the highlight special when he slapped a no-look pass to a cutting Steve Francis for a baseline layup against Sacramento.
"The NBA has brought in stiffs like Shawn Bradley and Michael Olowokandi and has tried to make them legitimate centers," said Walton, chosen as one of the 50 greatest players in NBA history. "Yao is a legitimate center with all the tools."
Far-reaching impact
The impact of Yao extends far beyond the basketball court. He is the NBA's link to the untapped Asian market, the largest in the world.
The league already has new agreements with 12 regional and national TV markets in China. His regular-season debut against Indiana was available to 287 million Chinese households. The United States has just 106.6 million TV households.
The NBA opened an office in Beijing and has a Web site in Mandarin Chinese. Reebok is cranking out Yao merchandise, including jerseys.
In the midst of the Yao fever, Yao has remained relatively calm, focused and has handled the compliments with aplomb.
In that sense, he reminds Rockets coach Rudy Tomjanovich of former Houston center Hakeem Olajawon.
"Yao has a feel for the game, and I knew that after two practices," Tomjanovich said. "He has a similar personality to Hakeem. Both have inner confidence, a fire, but both are modest and humble."
The biggest transition for Yao may simply be finding his niche in the trash-talking, chest-bumping, aggressive American basketball culture.
You won't find him seeking out a camera after a big play. Or whining to officials about no-calls. He was taught to play for his team.
"I feel I have only done my job if my team wins," he said. "That is my only goal. I do have to learn more of the culture in the United States."
For NBA centers who have to line up next to him, he's a major point of interest.
"I've been checking him out, and he's biiiiiiiig," Grizzlies center Lorenzen Wright said. "You've got to do your best to keep him out of the post. All he has to do is hold up his hands and dunk."