Rockets to limit Yao's playing time - report

Houston's Chinese star Yao Ming will miss the rest of the NBA season with a stress fracture in his left ankle, the Rockets said.The announcement came a day after the injury was revealed by an MRI examination, dealing another serious setback to Yao's effort to revive his injury-disrupted NBA career.Rockets team doctor Walter Lowe on Friday said surgery is the usual treatment for such an injury, which has sidelined the towering 2.26m (7-foot-6) center since November 10.Yao is still consulting with doctors to determine how he will proceed.

Yao Ming, the Chinese giant who became the NBA's first superstar player from Asia, has told the US-based league and the Houston Rockets that he will retire, the Houston Chronicle reported Friday.The newspaper, citing unnamed sources told of the decision, reported that Yao had let the club and the league know this week that he would not be coming back to the club for which he played eight NBA seasons.

Chinese star center Yao Ming, limited by doctors to only 24 minutes a game for the NBA's Houston Rockets, is confident he might be freed from a ban on playing back-to-back nights by January.Medical experts placed the limits upon the 2.26-metre giant are aimed at keeping Yao's surgically repaired left foot from breaking as it has repeatedly in his NBA career, the latest such injury keeping him out all of last season.

Chinese star center Yao Ming of the NBA Houston Rockets underwent left ankle surgery on Thursday to repair the stress fracture that ended his season, television station KRIV reported.The internet report, citing unnamed league sources, said Yao will not be able to begin major rehabilitation work for three or four months and there is no timetable for him to return to basketball activities.Yao's contract with the Rockets expires after this season, which was cut short on November 10 at Washington when Yao suffered the injury in the first quarter of a loss to the Wizards.

In the wake of Yao Ming's season-ending ankle injury, the Houston Rockets have asked the NBA for a disabled player salary cap exception.Yao has been sidelined since November 10, and the Rockets said Friday that the Chinese star had a stress fracture in his left ankle.Yao, who missed all of last season after reconstructive foot surgery, played in just five games this season before he was hurt again.

Chinese basketball star Yao Ming has a stress fracture in his left ankle and the Houston Rockets said Thursday there is no timetable for his return to NBA action.The towering 2.26m (7-foot-6) center, whose NBA career has been derailed by a series of injuries, has been sidelined since November 10 with what the team had called a bone bruise in the same ankle.An MRI scan on Thursday showed the stress fracture.Yao, a seven-time All-Star, missed all of last season after surgery to repair his broken left foot.

Chinese basketball star Yao Ming has a stress fracture in his left ankle that will further delay the resumption of the Houston Rockets center's injury-plagued NBA career, his team said.The towering 2.26m (7-foot-6) center, whose NBA career has been derailed by a series of injuries, has been sidelined since November 10 with what the team had called a bone bruise in the same ankle.In a terse press release, the Rockets said his latest injury was related to a prior one, and was discovered during his rehabilitation.

Houston Rockets center Yao Ming is expected to miss at least two more weeks of NBA action with a bone bruise in his left ankle, the team said Friday.The towering superstar was injured with what was originally described as a mild ankle sprain in Houston's 98-91 loss at Washington on November 10.Team doctor Tom Clanton said Friday that Yao's latest injury has nothing to do with the broken left foot that cost him all of last season.Clanton said Yao's left foot is "completely healed and the structural integrity of the foot is intact."