Houston Rockets: Is Yao Ming A First Ballot Hall Of Famer?

It’s about that time Houston Rockets fans.

It’s the NBA All-Star Break and the majority of our team is taking some time off from the normal grind of the pro basketball schedule.

I’m not going to necessarily say that’s it’s time well-deserved but it’s needed so this team can make fine-tune and make adjustments to finish the second half of this season strong.

We’re all frustrated with how inconsistent the Rockets have been all season.

I’m sure all of our emotions have been on a sort of a roller coaster with a lot more depressions than inclines.

But you know what?

I’m not going to talk about this current Rockets team because it’s going to pull us all down.

Let’s talk about some awesome news that was recently announced.

What’s that news?

In his first year of eligibility, Yao Ming is on the ballot for the Basketball Hall of Fame!

Yes, Springfield, Mass. is calling the Great Wall and it’s clearly obvious that he is poised to accept one of the greatest honors in professional basketball.

It’s feeling of validation — knowing that one’s name is among the greatest to ever touch that orange, round-thingie that has “Spalding” printed in bold, black letters!

We all knew this time was coming but here’s an interesting question.

Although Yao career was cut short because of chronic foot injuries but in that short span of just eight seasons, does that warrant him getting the nod?

In short, ABSOLUTELY!

Let’s rewind back to late June 2002.

I was still in college and had settled in with friends — I believe it was the Hooters on Kirby Drive just down the way from Compaq Center — tuning into TNT to anxiously await who the Rockets were going to pick after a disastrous but somewhat entertaining 2001-02 campaign.

I recall Moochie Norris had to carry the load as it was a revolving door with Steve Francis and Cuttino Mobley suffering from various injuries.

When David Stern made the announcement that Yao was selected, I exclaimed “who?”

I then started to wonder what the hell was Carroll Dawson thinking as guys like Carlos Boozer, Caron Butler and Amar’e Stoudemire were all available — and they were all were exciting picks!

Lest we not forget that the Rockets had a 28-54 record the season previous, with our chances even slimmer that it would be the No. 1 pick.

The Chicago Bulls (21-61), Golden State Warriors (21-61), Memphis Grizzlies (23-59) and Denver Nuggets (27-55) all had worse records than us and we jumped them all!

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But as we usually do, the Rockets were able to buck trends and let that coveted pick fall in their lap.

But anyway, I had heard of Yao but I wasn’t convinced that the 7’6″ big fella would be guy to take us to promised land.

There wasn’t much tape on him and what made it more excruciating was that TNT kept playing this really bad-quality loop of him dunking on opponents that were two feet shorter than he was when he was with the Shanghai Sharks.

But boy was I wrong.

Yao started out raw but as time progressed he came into his own as one of the elite centers in the NBA.

His workouts with Hakeem Olajuwon were intense and Yao definitely soaked up all he could to desire to be the best.

He even developed his own derivative of Olajuwon’s patented move — the Dream Shake — and came up with his own, appropriately dubbed the “Shanghai Shake!”

In similar fashion like the Dream, it was finesse, a work of art and nobody could defend it once he got into position and rhythm.

But after his first three seasons playing close to a full 82 games — Yao started to break down, likely because of excruciating schedule with he still being committed to the Sharks.