<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">He should be able to lead his team with his size and power. Look at shaq *waits for someone to say shaq is fat* Yao doesnt look big, but he is 300+ pounds while shaq is max 350 while listed at 320 yet he still uses his body to dominate opponents. Yao could do the same he has the talent.</div>Hell, size and power doesn't apply to Yao. Sure, he may be 310lbs, but most of that weight is concentrated in his lower body. His upper body is still weak, despite the tag that his weight implies on him. So while Yao's strong legs will not cause him to lose position in the post, his lack of upper body strength doesn't give him any leverage to back defenders too; for example, Yao even struggled with Brian Grant. Yao has the height, but the only way he can play that to his advantage is to shoot over smaller defenders, but doesn't have to bang and tumble through the defense with pure weight to dunk on him. And don't even try to knock Yao for not trying to gain upper body strength, because he is.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting Pure Skillz:</div><div class="quote_post">He should be able to lead his team with his size and power. Look at shaq *waits for someone to say shaq is fat* Yao doesnt look big, but he is 300+ pounds while shaq is max 350 while listed at 320 yet he still uses his body to dominate opponents. Yao could do the same he has the talent.</div> I'm with Trip here. Comparing Shaq to Yao is like comparing apples to oranges. Shaq can overpower opponents because he's big, wide, strong and agile. He's got upper body strength as well as lower body. Yao is about 70% lower body 30% upper body when it comes to strength - he can't push guys around the way Shaq can. He can't hold off other players when boxing out for rebounds. It will take a while for him to build up that strength, and maybe he'll never develop his upper body strong enough to be dominant. He's also not as quick on his feet, especially moving laterally, and timing his blocks. As bad as Yao played in the Spain game, his teammates played much worse. Even if he has 30 points 15 boards in that game, they still would have lost. And if he's always got to cover for his teammates' blown assignments, he'll foul out of every game in the tournament.
