This series should have been over already This series should have been over already had it not for the blatantly biased officiating. Game 1 would have been a blow-out. Game 3 would have been won if not for the disallowed continuation by yao. And game 4 would be the final nail on the mav's coffin.
Now the rox are in danger of losing this series. It was clear from the beginning that the NBA had chosen the Mavs to win this series. That in itself is the greatest assault on the integrity of the NBA-- greater than anything that any coach could ever say to harm the league.
When I first saw a Rox pre-season game against San Antonio in which players were allowed to hang on Yao's arms with impunity (a game in which he was injured by Nesterovic), I knew he would have a rough season with the ref's. And I wondered, albeit prematurely, if the ref's had received a directive from the powers-that-be to officiate Yao differently.
During the season we see the bias play out by Yao's getting quick 2 fouls (many of them phantom) in the first 6 minutes of games to put him out of commission for the rest of the night. Certainly, we can fault Yao's lack of agressive, his sometimes ill-advised defensive tendencies, or whatever reasons we can think of to justify his foul troubles. But no matter how we slice it, we'd have to face the fact that he has not had a fair shake in the NBA.
We can only speculate the reasons for the bias against Yao. Is Yao too nice? Is he not complaining enough? Are the ref's and the league envious of the attention that he's received? Is the NBA not ready for a dominant Asian player? Certainly, Yao would have no doubt achieved better stats than Shaq and Tim Duncan if not for the 2 quick fouls that he frequently gets to start games.
I think this issue is more than about Yao or about basketball. In the past Yao has laughed off racial slurs made against him by media outlets and fellow players. It's interesting whether or not he will be able to laugh off his team's being denied to advance in the playoffs because of his race.
It took Jeff Van Gundy, a white man, to stand up for Yao's mistreatments, and now they're talking about banning JVG for life for speaking the truth (though he stopped short of bringing up the R-word). I think the ball is in Yao's court to return the favor to JVG. No, offering to pay 1/2 of the $100K fine is not enough, and it's not enough to pay all of the fine. What we need from him is to declare, "Enough is enough!"
As I've mentioned, this issue is larger than Yao or basketball. The actions of the NBA is an insult to all Asians, so it's the responsibility of all Asians, not just Yao, to stand up this revolting display of racial bias. | 
