The Center Of Attention

Tony Ronzone is basketball's premier frequent flyer. He has coached in Saudi Arabia, searched for a point guard in Montenegro, evaded Yugoslav border police to scout a power forward and twice visited North Korea to peek at a 7ft. 9-in. center. One September day in 1998, Ronzone was conducting a hoops clinic in Shanghai when he received an invitation to an 18th-birthday party. The birthday boy was quick, graceful--and 7 ft. 3 in. tall. Ronzone accepted. "The parents were there, maybe a few Chinese officials," Ronzone recalls. "We're all stuffed into this apartment the size of a room at the Courtyard Marriott--couldn't have been more than 400 square feet. There are cold foods and Shanghai duck, a very nice party. But I'm sitting there, and I can't stop myself from looking at this kid and thinking, 'He could be making millions of dollars a year, and he has no idea.'"

Yao Ming still has no idea how many millions are in his future. As the No. 1 pick in last year's National Basketball Association draft, Yao signed a four-year contract with the Houston Rockets for $17.8 million. A few rival NBA executives predicted the contract would run out before the Rockets saw a return on their investment. But after a rocky start, Yao--now 22 and 7 ft. 5 in.--has shown flashes of dominance. He has scored 20 points against the defending-champion Lakers, 27 against the Spurs and league MVP Tim Duncan, and 30 against the Western Conference--leading Dallas Mavericks. And most of Yao's points have been earned not on brutish, outta-my-way rampages to the hoop but rather with light-footed, elegant moves rarely seen from a man of his size. "He's special," says Philadelphia 76ers star Allen Iverson. "He's a gift from God."

The NBA bows to a different God than the rest of us do, but as Michael Jordan, 39, limps toward retirement (he swears he means it this time), Yao appears to be the answer to the league's prayers. You see, in addition to his vast potential as a player, Yao Ming has a personality--and an appealing one at that. Despite his temporary reliance on an interpreter, Yao's English already reveals a sly, self-deprecating sense of humor. He loves Starbucks, computer games, action movies and SUVs, and when his Great Wall of a face cracks a smile, arenas light up. Some 1.3 million NBA fans have already fallen for Yao--selecting him, in the balloting for this Sunday's All-Star game, over the Lakers' Shaquille O'Neal as the Western Conference's starting center. Yao isn't O'Neal's equal on the court, but he has surpassed Shaq in the estimation of blue-chip companies like Apple and Visa, which see Yao as the pitchman messiah who might finally open the wallets of China's 1.3 billion consumers. "Yao Ming is Tiger Woods," says Adam Silver, president of NBA Entertainment, the league's marketing, Internet, television and merchandising arm. "He's a much more sophisticated marketer than people give him credit for."