Chinese hoop loop nets mixed reviews
Rich basketball experience not just for aging stars and NBA journeymen
This weekend, when the defending champion Beijing Ducks take on the Liaoning Flying Leopards for the Chinese Basketball Association championship, there will be at least one name very familiar to NBA fans.
Leading the charge for the perennial powerhouse Ducks? None other than Stephon Marbury. Yes, that Stephon Marbury: ex-Celtic, ex-Sun, ex-Knick, once described as “the most reviled athlete in New York.”
With the Ducks, Marbury earns roughly $2 million per season, a fraction of what he once made plying his trade in North America, and likely less than what he could earn in Europe’s top leagues.
The move to China is one which no fewer than 26 former NBA players have made. Former Raptor Tracy McGrady played a season in the CBA towards the end of his career, as did former Atlanta Hawk Solomon Jones.
But it’s no longer just aging former stars and players who’ve had a cup of coffee in the big leagues who are playing in China. The team Marbury’s Ducks beat to reach the final? The Guangdong Southern Tigers, led by 19-year-old point guard Emmanuel Mudiay. He was born in Zaire, but moved to the U.S. as a 5-year-old and is seen by many scouts as a potential No. 1 pick in this summer’s NBA draft.
Miami Heat centre Hassan Whiteside, currently the revelation of the NBA season, spent two seasons in the NBL, China’s second-tier league.
“It was a tough experience, but it was good and bad. I won a championship there and I got MVP of the league both years I played there, so it was a good experience for me,” said Whiteside, whose Heat teammate Michael Beasley also spent a season in China, playing for the CBA’s Shanghai Sharks.
Beasley played 37 games for Shanghai this season before joining the Heat after the Sharks’ season. It was an eye-opening experience, one which Beasley says he enjoyed. With his NBA and European options closing and the season about to start, Beasley wanted to keep his career going. A roster spot in Shanghai opened up.
The quality of the basketball surprised Beasley, who at first compared it to NCAA Division I, then changed his mind.
“The raw talent isn’t as great, but the work ethic is there, the team concept is there. And those guys are competitors. I’d give them above (Division I),” said Beasley.
The biggest adjustment, he added, wasn’t on the court. It was cultural. While in a large, cosmopolitan city such as Shanghai he was able to find food to his liking, the language barrier can be tough.
“Some guys, definitely (have a tougher time). Me, I adjust pretty well. . . . Don’t get me wrong, it was hard. There were times when I was calling my agent and saying ‘Man, I don’t think I can do this, get me home,’ ” said Beasley. He stuck it out, though, and the Heat eventually came calling.
Australian national team stalwart Patty Mills is now playing for the defending champion San Antonio Spurs after part of one season with the CBA’s Xinjiang Flying Tigers. Players who aren’t prepared for life in China will have a tough time, said Mills, no matter how talented they are.
“I think it’s got to be a personal preference. Stephon Marbury’s been over there for how long and he was a big-time player in the NBA. It’s got to be a preference, because it is a big culture shock for what Americans and Australians or whoever are used to,” said Mills, whose time in China ended in acrimony — released by the club, which claimed he was faking a hamstring injury. On Twitter, Mills lashed out at the team and Chinese media, saying the allegation simply wasn’t true. Former NBA journeyman Kenyon Martin’s time in China was also cut short. After signing a one-year contract for a then-record $2.7 million (U.S.) in 2011, Martin bought out his contract with Xinjiang just 12 games into the season, saying he needed to take care of family business. Two months later, he signed with the L.A. Clippers. He was vilified in China, labelled a highly-paid mercenary.
But if there’s some resentment about players who fail to stay committed to the Chinese league, it’s misplaced, says New York Knicks assistant coach Jim Cleamons, who spent a season coaching the CBA’s Zhejiang Guangsha. Former NBA players add as much to the development of the Chinese game as they get out of it, he argues.
“When you . . . go abroad to play, you’re going to do that for two purposes. One, economically and careerwise, you still think you’ve got something in the tank. And if you think as a player you still have something in the tank, you don’t feel as threatened,” says Cleamons.
Players who feel confident about their status, adds Cleamons, are more likely to be role models, or at least share some pearls of wisdom gleaned from years in the big leagues. “And you now become a mentor. Now you start teaching your teammates how to do this. You become a coach,” the Knicks assistant says.
That mentoring can, in turn, lead to another career option back in North America.
“If it stays in your blood, then you take it and become an assistant coach, work your way up, because you see what your coaches have been trying to tell you over the years,” says Cleamons.