http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/column...ric&id=2404746
Here's an excerpt from the article by Ric Bucher.
"And, two, because since he's been in the NBA, playing with pain in his left foot is more familiar than playing without it.
Thanks to the primitive level of sports medicine in the People's Republic of China, and Yao's selflessness in trying to answer every demand placed upon him by the Shanghai Sharks, the Chinese national team and the Rockets, Yao played nearly four years with a big toe whose nail resembled Freddy Krueger's grill, which made it really hard to tell when it became infected.
He couldn't give in to the pain when he first hurt it during his last season for the Sharks, because he had a championship to win to assure team officials would allow him to come to the NBA. Then he had to carry Team China on his shoulders at the 2002 World Championships, what with fellow star Wang Zhi Zhi persona non grata after opting to play summer league rather than train with the national team.
Then, of course, he had his No. 1 selection by the Rockets to make good on. Followed by more national-team play, followed by answering the bell for hard-driving coach Jeff Van Gundy. Basketball feet are never a pretty sight, but Yao's big toe was particularly unsightly after Danny Fortson stepped on it, at which point the infection was discovered. The subsequent surgery was so invasive that Yao's left foot is now a size 17, a full size smaller than his right.
As of last week, though, the absence of that constant pain had him as relaxed as I've ever seen him. Which means going back to the first time we met, the night after his last regular-season game with the Sharks in March of 2002.
"You wouldn't believe the difference," he said of having two good big toes. "Imagine playing with a rock in your shoe and not on the bottom, but on the top. Every game, every day. I got used to it, and sometimes it was worse than other times. But it feels so good now I thought about having something taken off my right foot."
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