It’s a lost cause. The spin is pathetic.

He can’t play defense, he gets stripped way too often on putbacks and his very infrequent drives to the basket, and his shooting is far too inconsistent to offset his weaknesses.
Play him off the bench and decide whether or not to leave him in based on whether he’s making shots.
How hard is that to figure out?

You watch the game and you are asking yourself why he is still playing and them you look at the stat sheet and see a good game. That shows how deceiving a stat sheet can be.

He is afraid to dunk the ball when he gets a rebound around the rim. Don’t know when this experiment to finish.

I think a lot of people don’t realise that our forwards all suck. Here are our forwards, Yi, Hump, Hassel, Boon, and Simmons. Boon, Simmons, hassel are all going to leave after there contract is up. I can guarantee you there contract won’t be renew.

So basically we have here is Yi and Hump. I rather play Hump and Yi off the bench but if kiki want to play Yi there is nothing wrong with it. We have a nice shot at John Wall and there is not much difference between Yi and Hump.

We should sign a nice PF at the FA market next year.

Kiki has to justify their trade of RJ, we know Simmons is a bust and Yi was the center peace of that trade, if they give up on him that will make that trade a bust. The VC trade brought in C Lee, which can not fill VC’s shoes, Kidd’s trade brought in DH which I would say is the most succesfull one of the three trades not to say he is equal to JKidd by any means, but the better one of the 3 trades.

They never mentioned that his 12 offensive rebounds translated into 0 second chance points. That is impossible.

A junior high player can throw it off the backboard and rebound it.

3 things for Yi to learn, seriously:
-hold the ball afer a rebound, whatever it takes
-don’t drop the ball after receiving a pass under the basket
-JUMP!

I have to think Kiki still believes that Yi has potential to grow. I highly doubt he is trying to justify the trade for Yi.

Kiki is friends with Stern, so he doesn’t have to worry about getting another job in the NBA.

Why waste time on Yi if you are not going to be with the Nets after this year? Or is he???

At least they are trying…

haha they loooooooovvvve Yi… still

All of our PFs are mediocre to bad, and Lopez has problems with all of them. As for the RJ trade, we got more out of RJ than the Bucks did, that’s for sure.

The article said Yi rebounded well but need to improve on production after. Not sure why people get all “panties in bunches” mode from it. Kiki working on it as coach, but people see that as favoritism again.

The only thing I find funny about this article is why it takes 50+ games to start to work with a player on his game.

Don’t assistant coaches work with players and their weaknesses or is everybody to busy to bother?

I would have Yi working on his rebounding and holding on to the ball, before the game and at practice every day.

“You don’t get 12 offensive boards–the most by a Net since 1998–without being aggressive”

Wrong. How about your point guard going to the rim all day and missing 17 shots while your 7ft. and nobody respects your game. Want to know why? See Mr. Fox’s post.
Someone should tell Kiki you can’t make chopped liver into egg salad. A good coach will utilize the talent a player has rather than try to make him something he is not. Devin must be in stitches when Kiki tries to teach Yi how to play defense. Talk about the blind leading the blind.

VC trade also got rid of a pretty bad contract, VC is not worth the max for 2 more years.

That being said, someone should ask him if you give up 20+ points and 10 rebounds to every opposing pf in the league by being aggressive.

Why is yi not working with the big man coach? How is kiki gonna teach someone to rebound? That’s hilarious. If yi knew how to tip dunk and hold a rebound he would be a decent player. Still not a starter for a playoff team though.

Does anyone in the league have worse hands?

Not only is he not that good, but he’s not a good fit here. A seven footer who gets abused on the glass once the opposing teams puts in the effort and muscle to throw him aside like a rag doll. Not to mention I’ve seen guys just swoop in and grab countless offensive rebounds when Yi’s not even helping. Usually the boards open up when you go for blocked shots, but damn I use the word “useless” so many times when watching the Nets.

If the jumper isn’t falling, what’s to look forward to? Multiple traveling violations, drives to the basket that result in offense fouls or turnovers. It’s getting old. At least with Hump we get more toughness

Yi’s got the ability to score. He’s best suited as a scorer with the second unit off the bench. Preferably beside a strong defensive big man. But problem is we don’t have anyone really better than him right now (and by that I mean with potential to develop, really what’s Boone’s ceiling? Or Hump’s? Both of them aren’t exactly defensive dynamos either. Boone’s got his moments but he’s equally lost at times. Hump’s bad defensively too. Yi, as much as you’d like to bash him has potential to at least be a scorer from all over the floor) So there’s not really much we can do at this point. Just wait it out

And yes, if you guys discredit Yi’s stats then you shouldn’t use anyone else’s stats to prove anything as well since you think stats are unreliable. It’s inconsistent to discredit the stats of one person and point to another’s value by his stats.

Hump’s bad defensively as well and so is Boone. Boone resorts to tapping the ball out a lot of times since he mistimes his jumps for them. Hump is equally in love with his jumper and takes ill advised ones.

It’s also hard to play defense when you always have to switch or help out since the opponent just blew past the perimeter defender

@ muwu

“Yi, as much as you’d like to bash him has potential to at least be a scorer from all over the floor) So there’s not really much we can do at this point.”

I don’t think he has the potential to score from in close. He’s too weak mentally and physically. What they can do is play Lopez, Boone and Yi up front and go with a quantity of bigs cuz we don’t have quality. That’s where the lack of coaching comes in. I’m not saying it will work but imo it’s the best we got. Yi is a big man with a small mans game. Keep him on the perimeter.

Funny that people love to knock kiki. Just because a beat writer sees kiki working with Yi its a story. Hump was also working in the drill. I’m sure these after practice drills are the norm. Few nba insiders will deny that s strength of kiki’s is player development. He should remain gm next season. Whether you or I feel Yi is worthless is besides the point. Kiki is trying to get most out of this team while seeing what pieces he has for next year. Andray blatche is a great example…..his first 4.5 years he was a bust/project etc. So why wouldn’t kiki work hard to see what his upside could potentially become.

He is maddening to watch at times, but I hope he is turning the corner. I also loved the pass he made up to Twill for the dunk off the rebound in the fourth.

Yi should be coming of the bench, it would be the best for him and the team, if you look at his career he is good in stretches but not consistently, coming of the bench would allow him to play against the other teams second stringers. We would be able to put either Boone or Hump in the starting lineup get some toughness in their with Lopez playing D and hitting the boards. There is no need to have a power forward next to Brook who is about scoring and can’t play D unless he is an allstar or close to it like Amare or D-Lee, Brook needs more touches.

Hey Kiki, what happened to developing Nikoloz Tskitishvili, your other pet project.

Kiki can continue playing with Yi next year, the year after, and after that.

Just not with the Nets.

Kiki needs to go nobody likes him, the players or Thorn. We need to move on he doesn’t move me either way, at least Thorn got Kidd and Michael Jordan,what has Kiki ever done, I just think there is a negative energy emanating of of Kiki onto the team, at least Frank kept things positive, kept people working hard and believing in him and the process.

Imagine Yi turned into an energy player, offensive rebounder and defender a la Anderson Varajao. That would be interesting.

This article says nothing proclaiming him a perennial all-star or MVP caliber player. It simply says he’s been rebounding the ball well, can stretch the floor when he’s on offensively, though he still has shortcomings hanging on to the ball under the basket and positioning himself. It’s a a fairly spot on assessment, is it not?

I’d like to see him shorten up his stroke a bit. His shot mechanics are robotic, overly calculated and he really seems to labor getting his shots up. It looks like the ball weighs 10 lbs when he shoots it.

Yi needs to go. That being said, i would like him to actually drift behind the three point line. It makes for better spacing. also yi can really need the extra step when penetrating , he gets to the basket more often when behind the three point line.

Yi..ikes! Yis…ucks!! Yi…ucch!!!

You guys will be sorry if kiki goes. When rod gets next antoine wright with fourth pick and mile ilic with Dallas pick. Rod made a few good trades. He has not identified talent well. We have more picks than anyone. We need a gm that can find talent. Kiki should be our guy.

I’d be more worried about Yi’s defensive rebounding. Most of the time he doesn’t even attempt to box out. The coaches should have been working with him on that from day one.

Please let someone else deal with this work in progress. Please find a better way to spend 4 million. Please find a power forward that brings the power forward! Please, don’t let us live with this work in progress as our future. We deserve a real PF next year not a work in progress. 10 minutes a night is more than enough for a work in progress. By Kiki. Maybe the next Gm/coach will be smarter about how to develop a work in progress – aka the next dirk!

@Ryan243

I like that your not jumping on Kiki. It’s hard to jump on a guy who was thrown into a situation he had no interest in. Kiki’s expertise is player development, just how Isiah Thomas has a very good track record from the draft that NOBODY talks about.

Sure, there is potential with Yi but we are starting to see a big enough sample size. Ultimately, I think it has a lot to do with Yi’s mental make-up in regards to having the constant aggression on the basketball court.

For the sake of the Team. Get Rid of this guy along with kiki. Trade him to the Rockets for Carl Landry..or for a bunch of Haier AC’s!

@inimeg

It might be nice if you knew which team Carl Landry plays for.

PROTIP: It’s not the Rockets.

Shoot I forgot he was traded to the kings:) thanks for the reminder lol! Trade him for something just get rid of this guy already.

I watch the same games and I see a young player who needs to keep working hard. Needs to keep working out and getting stronger. I haven’t read or heard ANYTHING about Yi not working hard in practice trying to improve, a lot of comments here about it but NOT A SINGLE SUBSTANTIATED REPORT. I see PLENTY of stretches where is playing really well but gets into foul trouble and confidence drops. BUT there IS noticeable improvement. The notion that he got 12 offensive boards ALL BY ACCIDENT is laughable in its absurdity and got ZERO points is disingenuous at best, a lot of those plays he GOT FOULED and he makes his free throws at a good percentage, I too would like to see him finish better at the rim. This summer should be another offseason working on his stregnth so he can finish better at the rim. I have noticed that since he came back from his injury early on HE WAS REALLY AGGRESSIVE going to the basket and dunking BUT when he got that SECOND technical in a 2-3 game stretch for “hanging on the rim” he has been less aggressive, I would like to hear the coaches encourage him to attack the rim and worry about getting hit with a technical when he gets to about 5 of them. Reading comments about how players “don’t seem to like Yi” I ask based on what? I see PLENTY of times in games when Yi does make good plays and I have seen Brook and other players pat him on the ass for a job well done and offering encouragement. If he was disliked those things WOULD NOT HAPPEN!
If it is so easy for a 7 footer to get those boards why hasn’t Brook don’t it yet? Because Yi is “hogging” the paint? How can that be when I read he gets pushed out easily by opponents by some of you critics, IT CAN’T BE BOTH.
The kid NEEDS minutes and NEEDS to make mistakes to learn. This is AND always was going to be a “down” year as far as winning games goes. It was about DEVELOPING the young guys who are going to still be around in future.

As far as I can see the “core” for 2010
pg: harris (depends on who is drafted), dooling
sg: lee, cdr, twill
f: hayes
pf: Yi, hump
c: Brook

“untouchable”: Lopez
“would need to be blown away with the offer”: Harris, Yi, Lee, CDR

Hayes and Dooling are 2 quality vets who bring leadership these kids need and should get reworked deals once the draft and free agency dust settles some.
Anyone else notice how much the team missed Dooling’s leadership?

@ superb “who in the league has worse hands?” you don’t have to look very far down the Nets bench, he wears # 2

Al’s term “maddening” says it all!

People…..

Isn’t Brook a work in progress too? He has the tendency to chuck up shots without thinking to pass it back out first. He also loses lots of rebounds through his hands. What Brook brings is motivation and tenacity.

I am not stating that Yi is the perfect player, yet if he continues to work hard, he deserves every chance to achieve success here.

For those that would still like RJ with the team…most likely you could have had him for Simmons and Boone at the deadline……

How about we keep our goals a bit more realistic, like not giving up more than 70 in the first half?

yi is no starter and he isn’t the toughest player in the world but for people to start saying “19 rebounds fell on Yi’s lap” is absurd…

kiki is using a different standard on yi bec of the gignormous potential chinese market…
but then again, while yi is being crapped on win/lose good/bad game by “fans” a different standard was used on SWat (where is he now?).

Until you can get somebody better then Yi you play Yi.

If we get David Lee over the summer of course Yi will come off the bench.

Kiki kind of admitted that Humphries is probably as good or better then Yi, but he likes Hump coming in and boosting the energy level during the game.

If we had Lee or Bosh or anybody better, we wouldn’t even be talking about Yi.

Hopefully things will change in a couple of months.

Imagine if we somehow beat Cleveland tonight.

It’s not impossible. Lets go Nets…

Why is every one ignoring the obvious? Yi is just not that smart. He will never develop, because he is not able to learn quickly. He’s been in the NBA long enough to show he has a clue… but, he hasn’t shown it. He is just not smart enough.

make yi watch tim duncan and pau gasol tapes over and over under he gets nightmares about them that what i say…

yi is smarter than SWat that’s for sure…his problem is more josh boone-ish…boone is smart but he gets down on himself and doesn’t believe in himself…

Yi gets more touches = Nets lose

I would be fine with Kiki’s explanation except for the fact that he’s still getting over 10 minutes a night more than Humphries. If he thinks Humphries might be a little better then at worst they should be getting equal playing time. I also have a hard time believing Yi’s ceiling is that much higher than Boones or Humphries just because of the uncertainty surrounding his actual age. Even if Yi is exactly as old as he says he is he’s only 2 years younger, and if he’s closer to his alleged age he might actual be older. So even though Humphries isn’t a huge upgrade he is at least a slight upgrade and I don’t think his ceilings is really much lower.

I agree with @Randy why doesn’t Yi shoot threes anymore??? I think it would help spacing a lot more when he plays with Lopez, especially in the zone if he is going to continue to do that.

The difference between Boone and Humphries more than anything, is the physicality level. It is key because when people are driving the lane and they si YI standing there they seem to get overly aggressive, like the Boston game, but when Humphries was in he was diving on the floor hitting people, pushing Garnett out the way. They knew when they went for a rebound they were going to get hit.

“Statistical anomaly”

anyone ever heard of it? Yi has never come close to 12 offensive boards. The Nets had a great rebounder in Jayson Williams and he didn’t grab 12.

I will castrate myself if Yi pulls another 12 offensive boards in another NBA game. Ever.

Agree with Mr. Big and geo about Yi. @Gina – Hump should be several months younger than Yi, in reality. I’m sure everyone already assumes such, even if they will never admit it.

More important, Colin, in Nets Blast, while discussing LeBron said “if he chooses to opt out”. He referred to June 1 as the date to decide. I thought it was July 1, with July 8 as first day to sign a free agent??

Could we please have a list of Key Dates:
Please fill in the blanks:

Draft Lottery: ?
7th game of finals: ?
Draft Day: ?
Last day to announce for Free Agency/accept player option:??
First day to talk with free agents and sign free agents?

my bad, I see Jayson Williams pull 12+ regularly

@JohnY
Maybe someone who watched whole game closely could tell us how many were his own misses, which he should have coverted on first try?

All I know is that he Stunk in last 2 minutes and only hit 2/4 free throws when it counted.

no way is yi better than brook but for people complaining that most of the offensive boards yi got were his own misses (10 misses)…how many did brook get off his misses? (12 misses)

Yi seems to be playing alot harder…..I’m not sure what happened to him but he is playing with a vengeance….I’m looking forward to watching him tonight….

Offensive rebounding cannot really be taught. It’s more of a passion and a will than it is a step by step thing.

JohnY

don’t make such a statement about castrating yourself. Kiki might just play him 48 minutes tonight just to get his stats up. And we shoot so horribly that it is possible.

4K

Wow. You’d have to be blown away to trade Harris or Lee or Yi or CDR? What do you think they are? Harris maybe, but I’d trade the rest for anything. anything. Why would anyone want any of them anyway? Have you been watching them play?

Brook better play his butt off tonight. I don’t expect Yi to save the day for us.

They say Cavs usually have Lebron guarding the worst scorer on the team for 3 quarters. Keeping him fresh and letting help on steals, blocks, etc.

Ok Ok please get Yi off the court right now…Please he’s lost out there getting pushed around slapping at balls smh.

Rediculous
Yi gets offensive rebounds!
Wooohoo
That because he only focuses on offense
When yi is on D he’s nowhere to be found so he can’t rebound….
Yi needs to go play in China where he will be loved

Trade Yi for a 10th round pick and a box of Cracker Jax!

Yi passes the ball to Lebron

Hope u guys taking note of twill on the floor. He’s going to be real good. I think many of u have been listing him as a kiki bust. Twill is going to be a very very good player

And Lebron has definitely taken notice of twill. You can tell when Lebron went coast to coast trying to up twill’s coast to coast jam. Don’t be shocked when he’s our starting pg next year. Been saying this all year but mow hopefully everyone is starting to see this.

TWill looks awesome.

Why doesn’t Kiki develop TWill like he does Yi??

TWill could be a SF starter next year if he had the same minutes and time spent this year.

Yi is being prepared to be a Sub.

Yi is so terrible, 8 points and 4 rebounds fell on his lap at the half. Please get rid of this guy!

Imagine for a second a starting lineup of twill, wall or turner, Lebron, Yi and lopez with Harris, lee, cdr and hump off bench. Not sure there’s a better or deeper squad in east. And that’s without improving the pf position.

Guaranteed Lebron has to think of that along with prokys money, jay-z and Brooklyn.

Why doesn’t Kiki develop Twill? Actually, he needs to be awake during practice first. lolz

You act like doing some rebound drills with Kiki real development?

I LOVE the A-Team theme song every time Terrence dunks the ball! Brings back childhood memories.

I want an “Ask the Announcers T-shirt!”

This game would be close if we dis not lay an egg in the 1st quarter!

I like that they are giving touches to cdr to start second half. I’d sub twill for Harris

Why is YI out there still?? Are we the only ones that can see he should not be playing?????

Again, ride the hot player! Where is Terrence?

Well, sometimes when I say Yi suck, I mean Lopez, but I want to you guys to love me. haha

No. YI SUCKS!

Finally, Humphries is in the game!

Yeah, Yi sucks! Lopez

By the way, Yi does not even give us offense anymore. SO WHY IS HE OUT THERE?

AH, now that is more like it. A banger down low! Humphries!

Yi’s not taking 15 shots, and shooting 33% like Lopez. Lopez also missed every shot outside 2 foot from the paint tonight.

But this is Yi’s team, so the blame is on Yi.

NO, it is not Yi’s team. You have to be a player, in order for it to be your team!

Yi owns Kiki who runs the show. it’s Yi’s team. I thought we agreed to this. We are all Yi’s puppets.

Yi’s shot is BRICK, BRICK, BRICK! Yi’s hands include fumble, turnover, missed rebound, and dribble off his leg.

That is why he must go for us to be successful!

Again, Yi equals no rebound and no box out! Keys to playing DEFENSE! Result= Cavs score.

Hickson is killing the Nets, so no matter Shaq is out or not.

TWill is trying to show off to LeBron and I think he is succeeding.

Why couldn’t Kiki develop TWill instead ????

Lebron took notice of twill tonite.

@ryan243

how do you know lebron took notice of twill?

sorry i didn’t watch the game.

Terrence played very good defense. Lebron went into pass mode when Terrence was guarding him. Terrence is a keeper and should be starting. Why not have him continue to improve by playing more minutes?

Twill got his career high tonight, that = Kiki developing Twill. Or you want photos with and Kiki doing drills?

Terrence should be starting at the sf.

Devin
Courtney Lee
Terrence
Humphries
Brook

Bench: Keyon, CDR, Jarvis, Hassell, Boone.

@malorkayel
Why don’t you post TWill’s minutes vs. Yi’s minutes this year, if you think Kiki is trying hard to develop TWill.

All Kiki will accomplish is conclude at end of year that Nets need a starting PF. He could have developed TWill to be an adequate starting SF for the time being.

Terrence is the one player in the league with the natural athleticism to keep up with Lebron. We played well for three quarters.

Our young core is very good. Twill is going to be a very good player. I’ve been a big fan since pre draft. Glad people are starting to see his potential. And yes he was a kiki pick and he’s developed him very well. Not just on court but as a professional as well.

21 5 7 for twill tonite. Yeah Lebron noticed

great game by twill but he has to limit his turnovers…5 TOs! that’s ricky davis territory…

r we trying to convince ourselves lebron “noticed” twill? when? lebron probably doesn’t even know his name…

@jerry25

Twill is improving. Usually, I think he plays well when he plays under control and hit his spot ups.

You talk about minutes, Twill has a lot better competition for minutes than Yi does at the PF position. You can’t compare apples and oranges.

Don’t try so hard for the Yi favoritism angle.