I’m delighted to hear the idea of Hakeem Olajuwon teaching Yao a few things is finally going to happen today at Toyota Center. Fans of both players have wanted this to happen for quite some time. The idea came up again when Hakeem paid a visit to the Rockets’ locker room after Houston’s disappointing loss to the Jazz in Game 7.

Is it a coincidence that this is happening while there is a void in the Rockets’ head coaching situation? Perhaps Jeff Van Gundy wasn’t too keen on anyone other than “his guys” (e.g., Patrick Ewing, Tom Thibodeau) teaching Yao anything that didn’t fit what he wanted Yao to do.

Now with JVG out as head coach, perhaps the Rockets’ front office wanted to pull this together before Rick Adelman is named head coach tomorrow and before Yao flies back to China in mid-June. Also, Hakeem spends most of his time in Jordan, so he’s probably headed back there soon.

Give kudos to the Rockets for finally making this workout session happen, despite the naysayers who think the Rockets’ front office is full of a bunch of bunglers. I hope more sessions like these are scheduled in the future.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 22nd, 2007 at 10:48 am and is filed under Rockets' off-season. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.