The Rockets at home beat 94-82 the worst team in the league, the 11-42 Sacramento Kings, which isn’t always a certainty these days, even against a team that has now lost 14 of its last 15 games. We all pretty much knew a victory was going to happen, especially when we learned before the game that Tracy McGrady would not be playing.

Yao Ming throws one down against Sacramento on the way to 24 points and 18 rebounds in a victory. Click here for more photos from the game.

The worst case scenario would have been for McGrady to pull out of mothballs a decent game, then lots of people feeling good headed into the All-Star break and the February 19th trading deadline looming that the Rockets might be able to make this thing work with him in the lineup. That could make them hesitant to do a trade with everyone hoping that maybe he can finally get it going after the All-Star break, and that trading him would be premature.

Lo and behold, though, that didn’t happen! More drama unfolded Wednesday when a Houston television station broke a story that McGrady may be out for the season after an MRI was done on his left knee.

But then later the Rockets announced that McGrady’s knee is still the same, which means according to previous reports over the past few months, it’s okay for him to play on it and that it would only get better if he used it.

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The Chronicle reports that the league is cracking down on NBA player charities benefiting financially from team events. Supposedly events like this can be considered a little bit like financial compensation, making it more difficult for other teams to woo players away from the teams when they become free agents.

It’s a shame that earthquake victims in China won’t be able to benefit from the Rockets’ Tux & Tennies gala on February 18th because of questionable rules like this that keep the big picture out of perspective. But at least hurricane victims on the Gulf Coast still will benefit.

On Tuesday, one day after the Rockets’ embarrassing loss to Milwaukee, Yao Ming was obviously still upset about it as seen in this photo that Raymond posted in the forum.

Meanwhile, Tracy McGrady exhibited some strange behavior as seen by him wearing Orlando Magic shorts (the rest of the team wore Rocket shorts)…

…and while Yao was in a serious and solemn mood (as every Rocket should be), McGrady was yucking it up with the press…

Click here for more photos showing the stark differences between Yao and McGrady’s mood and behavior.

It’s almost like McGrady knows his time is limited in Houston. Last night at the end of the game, I could just tell by his body language as he leaned forward on the bench watching the game as his team was being shellacked that he needed to soak it all in as his time with the Rockets winds down.

In a weird sense, I kind of feel sorry for him. No one likes to see a superstar fall so quickly, and to fall out of the fans’ and teammates’ favor with 3 straight teams in a row.

The game against the Bucks in Milwaukee was such a joke, I won’t even bother getting into many details other than to say the Rockets were outplayed again by a sub-.500 team, and played no defense as the Bucks racked up the most number of points against the Rockets this season. And they did it without their leading scorer (Michael Redd), rebounder (Andrew Bogut), and assist man (Luke Ridnour).

My oh my. How far we’ve come since last year’s 22-game winning streak. ABSOLUTELY PATHETIC.

It’s weird how all the players know they are sucking right now, but no one is doing anything about it.

Yao Ming’s psyche hurt more than his temporary arm pain
in an embarrassing 124-112 loss to Milwaukee Wednesday night.
Yao only scored 7 points on 2-of-8 shooting. Click here for
more photos.

After the game, Yao said, “Now is not early in the season. It’s not 20 games into the season. Now it’s 50 games into the season. We’re still stuck in here and talk about we still have time to fix it, from first game of the season and 10 games in the season and 50 games into the season. We still talk about we need to fix it.” Click here for Raymond’s full translation of the interview.

Luis Scola said of the Bucks, “They played with more energy, they ran faster, they played harder. I don’t know why it’s happening. I wish it doesn’t happen anymore. It’s really embarrassing.”

Rafer Alston summed up their matador defense after he himself played horrific D against Ramon Sessions: “We don’t try to play ‘D’. That’s just the bottom line. It’s coming to the point we’re not even trying. Then we have the audacity on offense to race the ball up the court. The mind-boggling thing is how do you race around on offense and walk around on defense. To me, that’s not even trying. It’s embarrassing.”

McGrady: “We can sit here and pretty much talk about what we talked about a couple days ago after the game — defense. We don’t know how to play. We don’t execute defensively. We’re just right now a team that doesn’t know how to play defense. The first quarter, second quarter, third quarter — they got whatever they wanted. You’re not going to win that way.

“The offense is not fluid. There’s too much one-on-one, no ball movement. We’re just a team that doesn’t have an identity. We don’t know who we are. We’ve been talking about this for so long.”

Ironic that he would say there is no ball movement.

To me, the players shoulder a big responsibility, but the coach must receive a big part of the blame, too.

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I was really looking forward to seeing Minnesota’s Al Jefferson play the Rockets Saturday night in Houston. I’ve remembered in recent seasons how he has been pretty good, but this season we’ve all heard how he’s stepped up his game to an even higher level, so let’s see what he’s got.

No doubt, Big Al delivered and was incredible. He torched the Rockets with 17 points on 8-of-12 shots and 8 rebounds in the first quarter alone, hitting several jumpers that pulled Yao out of the paint trying to defend him.

Seeing Yao outside of the paint having to defend against Jefferson’s J’s was a bit precarious since it seemed Al could blow by Yao with relative ease, but he didn’t have to because his jumper was falling just fine.

With the way it was playing out, it looked like Yao — who started the game missing his first 4 shots — was going to have to start thinking about getting some real competition for the Western Conference’s best center the rest of his career. Jefferson would finish Saturday with 36 points on 16-of-30 shots, and 22 boards.

Well, Jefferson might be one of the rising centers in the West who will give Yao a run for his money, but through his own play, Yao made a statement Saturday night that no one should forget about him just yet.

Yao throws one down against the entire Timberwolves team. Click here for more photos from the game.

Yao would hit 12 of his last 14 shots and just about neutralize Jefferson with 30 points of his own to lead Houston to a 107-90 victory. It was a classic duel that reminded me of great Rocket center matchups from years’ past: like Moses vs. Parish, Hakeem vs. Shaq. Now Yao vs. Al.

It was a physical game for Yao. Jefferson banged Yao’s left arm which made Yao feel like his arm was “burning.” Check out the photo>sHere are photos of Yao trying to stop the bleeding.

On this night, though, Rocket fans had more to worry about than who would win the physical bout between Yao and Al. They had to be concerned about winning a game against a team they should beat, which they should have done against Memphis Wednesday night.

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Note: I just changed the headline to the above for my post from last night. It’s so appropriate considering O.J. Mayo went off on them, the loss was pathetic, and both Aaron Brooks and Yao Ming had a stomach flu…

Let’s face it. Everyone is sick of the inconsistency of the Rockets. All the fans, the players, the coach, the front office, the media, you name it. After the Rockets lost their second game this season to the woeful Memphis Grizzlies, one of the worst teams in the league, the Rockets have reached a new low with a 104-93 loss Wednesday night.

Houston has now lost 7 games this season to teams that have had some of the worst records in the league: Memphis (2), Indiana, the Clippers, Washington, and Philadelphia (2).

They are also only a pathetic 14-13 against teams with losing records, and 14-7 with winning records.


Yao Ming tries to defend against O.J. Mayo who constantly blew by Rocket defenders on his way to scoring 32 points. Click here for more photos from the game.

Entering Wednesday night, The Grizzlies were a 12-35 team that had lost 7 consecutive HOME games, and had lost 12 in a row before winning Monday night on the road against a terrible Washington team. They are so bad, hardly anyone in Memphis is showing up for their games. There were tons of empty seats in the lower bowl the whole game, drawing only about 10,000 fans.

The radio talk show lines are burning up in Houston, and the natives are restless. I’ve seen it before, and I can just about guarantee that “change is coming,” to borrow a phrase used often over the past few months.

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You knew it was going to be a good night for Yao and the Rockets when Yao started off his game against Chicago by blocking 2 shots in the Bulls’ first two possessions. Then 2 minutes into the game, Yao was able to send Joakim Noah to the bench with his 2nd foul.

But Yao would get into foul trouble himself by picking up his second foul with 7:06 in the first quarter, and went to the bench because of a gash he suffered on his arm during that play.

Saddled with foul trouble, Yao had 11 points in the first half, and really got it going in the fourth quarter with 11 more points, scoring 9 points during a 4 1/2 minute stretch that gave the Rockets the cushion they needed to squeeze out a 107-100 win.

Yao would finish with 28 points on an outstanding 9-of-12 shooting from the field and 10-of-10 from the line. He would also grab 8 boards and 4 blocks. And he fouled out Noah in just 18 minutes, leaving the pony-tailed one with only 2 points and 1 rebound. Yao pretty much dominated.

Yao Ming shoots a hook shot over Tyrus Thomas on his way to 28 points.
Click here for more photos from the game.

After the game, Yao’s words were reminiscent of Dream’s from yesteryear…

“They don’t have any guy that really matches up against us inside. They always come with those double teams. They always come with those smalls. I just work on my game. I have the confidence. It’s very simple. When I came back into the game, it’s the fourth quarter. We know how important it is. We did this a lot before, early in this game, early in this season. I just want to have the ball deep and draw the defense, the double team and see if I can do something in there or kick it out.

“It’s working. It’s always working.”

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Despite a fronting defense by Golden State’s Rony Turiaf and Andres Biedrins that usually works against Yao Ming, the Big Guy got back to the level we expected before his clunker of a game Wednesday night against the 76ers.

Yao got Turiaf and Biedrins in early foul trouble, with both players picking up 4 fouls each by halftime while Yao racked up 10 points in the first two quarters on 5-of-8 shooting.

Yao Ming blocks the shot of Rony Turiaf in Saturday’s win over Golden State. Click here for more game photos.

Yao used his size difference, and their foul troubles, to his advantage by hitting 4-of-6 shots in the second half to finish with 25 points on 9-of-14 shooting overall to lead Houston to a 110-93 victory over the Warriors. Tack on 11 boards, and all is right with the world when Yao gets back to numbers like that where he belongs.

Yao did have 4 turnovers, with one coming off a charge that was a bogus call by the refs. Still, 3 TOs coming off mishandling the ball is three too many, but I can live with one of those per game from Yao.

People may think that Golden State is a pushover team, but they’re still dangerous with explosive scorers like Stephen Jackson, Monta Ellis, Corey Maggette, and this year’s surprise for them, C.J. Watson.

They shocked the Hornets on Friday night in New Orleans with an unlikely road victory, and it looked for a little while on Saturday night that they might be able to pull off another upset, but the Rockets finally got it going in the second half keyed by Yao’s 25 and Ron Artest’s 27.

Without Tracy McGrady in the lineup because of a Yao-induced ankle injury, Rick Adelman decided to start Artest over Von Wafer. Like I knew he would (unlike McGrady), Artest bounced back and played a much better Saturday in comparison to his 7-of-29 shooting over his past two games. Artest took over in the 3rd quarter, scoring 12 points, and finished with 27 points on 10-of-17 shooting, 4-of-6 from 3-point land, 7 assists, and 7 rebounds.

Anyone who thinks Artest is more disposable than McGrady, like I’ve seen some Houston columnists write lately, is off their rocker. But that’s a different topic for another day.

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With all the news about the Rockets’ struggles this week blowing a late lead to the Knicks, then to the 76ers a couple of days later, it’s easy to forget about some of the great things Yao does during the season off the court that goes unreported.

This past Monday in New York he met up with some of the representatives of Chinese students from Sichuan who are currently students at New York State University.

Click here for more photos from the gathering that Raymond posted in the forum.

The New York Times even wrote up a story about the gathering, which is at the bottom of the photos that Raymond posted.

To some, the idea of McGrady not playing because of injury would not be bad news for the Rockets. Here’s the excerpt from the Houston Chronicle about another injury to McGrady…

The Rockets’ run of relatively good health could be over after one game.

“It’s painful,” McGrady said. “It’s hard to walk on it, put a lot of pressure on it. I never had a high ankle sprain. I started feeling good with my knee and going to practice and I got an ankle sprain. I’ll be all right.”