As one player moved in, the Rockets offered the strongest indication yet that center Yao Ming will be out.
While Yao considers his treatment options, the NBA formally agreed with the Rockets that Yao is likely to miss all of the 2009-10 season. By granting the Rockets the disabled player exception, worth $5.854 million for the upcoming season, the NBA ruled the hairline fracture of the tarsal navicular bone in Yao’s left foot and the surgery he likely will undergo to treat it will keep him out all season.
The Rockets used the salary-cap exception Wednesday to sign free-agent guard/forward Trevor Ariza, saving the mid-level exception (worth the same amount) they had offered him for future moves.
Granting the injury exception indicates the NBA agrees with the Rockets’ contention that Yao’s injury will require season-ending surgery, rather than the more conservative option of immobilizing the injury again in the hope that his hairline fracture would heal without surgery.
Yao has been given several surgical options, including one that would use small plates, rather than the pins used last season, a bone graft and an alteration of the operation of his foot in an effort to treat the injury and avoid another recurrence. There have been discussions about a more experimental procedure that would increase blood flow to the area, though that seems a less likely option.
Center still optimistic
Yao’s agent, John Huizinga, said Wednesday that Yao has not come to a decision about the recommendations made by the specialists he has seen and has not ruled out trying a nonsurgical treatment.
“The Rockets have kept me informed of what they are doing and why,” Yao said in a statement. “I support them in their efforts to make our team as good as possible. My focus is on selecting the best treatment option for my injured foot and committing myself to do what I can to ensure a complete recovery.
“I am optimistic about the future, and I will return to playing basketball when my foot has fully healed.”
If Yao were to choose a surgery and recover quickly enough to play next season, it would not effect the disabled player exception the Rockets have received.
But at the very least, it looms as Yao’s fifth consecutive season to be interrupted, ended or missed because of a bone injury.
Rockets general manager Daryl Morey would not comment about the likelihood Yao will opt for surgery and miss the season.
“I don’t want to put a timetable on Yao,” he said. “I don’t want to comment on it. I want to be respectful of Yao. I want to be very careful in any of our Yao Ming announcements.”
Yao, 28, had pins placed in the same bone in February 2008. Yao recovered in time to resume workouts in less than five months and was able to play in the Olympics and in 77 regular-season games without problems.
The bone cracked again, however, on May 8 in Game 3 of the Rockets’ Western Conference semifinals series against the Los Angeles Lakers. Yao and the Rockets were shocked when a CT scan showed June 24 that it had not healed and had instead gotten worse.
Yao has two seasons remaining on his contract. Though he was expected to exercise his right to opt out after next season, missing all of the season likely would lead him to remain under his current Rockets contract through the 2010-11 season.
A string of injuries
Yao’s injury could end his injury-plagued, on-court partnership with Tracy McGrady, who is rehabilitating after season-ending microfracture surgery and is entering the final season of his contract.
A seven-time All-Star, Yao has averaged 19.1 points on 52.5 percent shooting in his career, adding 9.3 rebounds and 1.9 blocked shots per game. In the playoffs, he has averaged 19.8 points and 9.3 rebounds in 28 games, advancing past the first round for the first time in four playoff appearances with this past season’s victory over the Portland Trail Blazers.
Yao missed the previous postseason, also with a hairline fracture of his tarsal navicular bone in his left foot.
In the 2006-07 season, he suffered a hairline fracture on his right anterior medial tibial plateau (leg) in December 2006, missing 32 games before returning late in the season. He played in that season’s seven-game playoff series against the Utah Jazz, though he was not at full strength after coming back from the injury.
Yao missed the final four games of the 2005-06 season when he fractured the fifth metatarsal bone in his left foot.
The four consecutive seasons with injuries followed three seasons to begin his career in which he missed just two games.
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