David Stern and Yao Ming join forces

NBA Commissioner David Stern and retired Chinese basketball star Yao Ming addressed the media on Sunday before the second exhibition of NBA pre-season games in Shanghai, featuring Miami Heat and Los Angeles Clippers. David Stern, NBA Commissioner: "With our partnership with Yao and our previous partnership with the CBA to extend that for three more years to develop coaches and players, we believe the future of basketball in China is very very bright." "Anything we can learn from Yao about China is important for us because this is a market that is very important because it has so many people who have played our game for so long that we believe it has an enormous potential." Yao Ming: "Now we already have very modern facilities and an excellent organizing team. More importantly, over the past eight years we have established a vey good friendship and a long term relationship between the NBA and China."