OpinionTowering influence: basketball is merely one of the reasons for Yao Ming’s Hall of Fame induction
Multi-faceted Chinese legend inspires memorable moments as the first Asian player to make it to Springfield, Massachusetts
Yao Ming was always funny. Despite an obvious language barrier, interviews with an 18-year-old Yao revealed him to be charming, intuitive and affable in a way so many physical giants rarely are.
When you are at least a head or two above the crowd, you tend to duck to avoid the limelight. But not Yao. He embraced his height and because of that no one has ever stood taller.
Still, it was a quantum leap of faith for anyone to believe that this precocious teenager would not only be the first Asian player inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame some 17 years later, but that he would deliver a hilarious, touching and inspiring acceptance speech entirely in English.
Inducted along with fellow giant Shaquille O’Neal and mercurial guard Allen Iverson, Yao brought down the house with a dig at Iverson, who had once gone on a famous rant about practice being useless.
“When I heard that I was speaking first tonight, I thought that someone made a mistake,” said Yao. “The first speaker should be the great Allen Iverson. I need practice more than he does.”