Fresh off my Intercultural Training, and being the newly culturally sensitive guy I am, let me be sure to start with a disclaimer that any references to Chinese people playing basketball are specific only to the people with which I have played to this point, and is in no way meant to be a blanket statement on the skill or playing style of all Chinese pick up basketball players... Legal disclaimer out of the way, here we go....
I have been a gym rat most of my life... After college, I played in city leagues, rec leagues, open gym at high schools. The year I traveled around the country working for my Fraternity I played on college campuses in rec games all over the country.
I found a group of expat guys to play with here in China. It was been a great time. The competition varies from week to week, and from night to night, depending on the fate of free throw shooting to determine teams. We play every Wednesday night at one of the International Schools, that luckily is only a few blocks from our apartment, so I can ride my bike over and back.
There are a few things that have been especially fun about playing with these guys. For one, they are all in a similar situation, from somewhere else, living in China. Some of them are on year 1 (like me), some of them have been here for 3 or more years. There are 2 guys that have lived in Asia for decades, but still hail from the USA.
Also, they are fundamentally a good group of guys. They are all fairly competative, but they also seem to put the pick up games in the right perspective - all of us are using this as a means to get into a little bit better shape. (Speaking of, I am glad to report that I am down to about 210 pounds - from my China arrival weight of roughly 230 pounds! The goal is to get down to sub-200, someplace I have not consistently been since high school).
We play full court, 5 on 5, on the main court, or play on the cross court (sightly smaller) floors, which allows 2 games at one time if we get enough guys. The competition is decent.
In addition to this Wednesday night game, one of the guys (who is the varsity boys basketball coach at the high school we play at) organized about 15 of us to play in a local league/tournament. He had a big roster (15) since so many of us travel, we needed to account for spotty attendance.
As it turns out, there are no other expat teams in this league. It's all local teams. Before I describe the league, I'll explain about the local pick up game I played with the Chinese guys tonight.
I had heard from one of the guys on the team that the gym I belong to has a pick up game on Tuesday nights. Since I am stull pushing towards my sub-200 goal, another night of pick up hoops could not hurt. I got the OK from Steph and headed off to the gym.
I assumed going in that basketball is basketball, and really didn't think my not speaking Chinese would be that big a deal. This was not entirely true. First I had to figure out how to actually get into the game. In most gyms in the US, or on playgrounds, you talk to the guys sitting out and determine 'who's got next' - meaning which of the players sitting out is going to challenge the winners. If they have their full team, you find 'who's got next after them' and if no one does, you announce 'I've got next' and as new players show up, or losing teams come off the floor, you pick up players.
Imagine trying to manage that in China with no language skills... Luckily these guys saw me show up in my gear and saw me sitting out and motioned me into the 2nd game after I arrived.
They were playing 5 on 5, so I felt comfortable with that - recognizing my team mates was a little hard since they don't go shirts or skins or lights and darks. Also, I was surprised to notice, that even though they had the full court, they were only playing half court. Also, the games were only to 5 points. Quick games, and only half court... I was concerned about potentially having to play until 10:00pm to get a good work out in!
As it turns out, they play lots of quick games, so if you go hard you can get a decent work out in - nothing like when you run full court, but better than sitting in front of the PC rambling on about basketball experiences from 10 years ago (sorry if you got caught up in that last post).
I also realized after the games why the half court and short games might be preferred. When I walked out of the gym, at least 1/2 of the guys involved were standing outside the gym smoking cigarettes. No wonder they are limiting their activity - they are probably struggling for breath!
It was decent fun, and a little interesting picking up on the quirks of the Chinese pick up game - some of them are listed below, and if you play pick up hoops you might notice some of the differences. It seems to be an interesting mix of 'real game rules' and 'pick up rules'.
1) half court, not full
2) games to 5 points - the previous shortest pick up games I have played in have been 7, but usually 11
3) fouls and balls out of bounds are inbounded from the baseline or sidelines, as opposed to checked in from the top of the key
The language barrier was a little more impact than I expected. I have always been coached to talk when you play - call out screens for team mates, let them know when people are cutting, call 'shot' when someone shoots, etc... I was doing these things, but not getting any expected reaction from my team mates... which could be that they don't understand the English words I am using, or they are just not good enough to know how to react. Could be either, but I am betting on 'no English'.
Some things that are the same everywhere is when a bunch of guys are out to have a good time and play a little hoops, with the right set of attitudes, the games can be pretty funny... when guys dribble off their feet (which included me once) everyone belly laughs... when one guy blocks another guys shot, everyone 'oohs' and teases the 'blockee'... when you lose a close one, everyone walks off the court dejected. That makes you feel like hoops is hoops, be it in China, or in Portland, OR.
So back to the local league we are playing in. Our Wednesday night games are more competitive than what I played in tonight. Some of the locals that were there tonight are in our league.
We learned after our first couple of games that the local guys are not in as good of shape as we are... which surprised us, since outside of a couple of guys, we don't think of ourselves as particularly 'in shape'. But we really take over in the second halves of these games. 5 of our 7 wins to this point have been by 25 or more points.
There are 8 teams in the league, and we have played 7 of them, running our record to 7-0. Our biggest problem to this point has been ourselves. We loaded the team with lots of bodies to insure against travel, but guys have not been traveling that much, so every game we have lots of bodies to try to get into the game, and that means short playing spurts, which means it's hard for guys to 'get a feel'. Just about the time you are warming up, you are getting subbed out!
There are 2 teams that kept it pretty close against us. One was about a 10 point game and last week's game was about 8. Last week we were actually down about 10 at half time - which surprised the heck out of us, but the smokers lung kicked in the second half, I had the guys cut down on the number of subs in the second half so players could get a little more comfortable on the floor and play a little better before coming out, and we pulled away.
We have 1 more league game after the holidays as a tune up to the championship game on the 19th of January. I expect that it will be a good championship game - either of the teams that played us close have a chance to beat us (we already clinched a spot in that game) if they shoot well, and get into any kind of shape between now and then... but the cigarettes won't help!
There was a funny thing with one team we played - the Yao Ming influence. Their team name was the Rockets - they commissioned Houston Rockets replica uniforms (jerseys and shorts). For those of you not familiar, the #1 export from China is not lead based paint toys, or electric appliances - it is the franchise known as Yao Ming, who plays in the NBA for the Houston Rockets. They love the guy over here. He played for the Shanghai Sharks and the Chinese National Team before being exported to Houston. These guys don't play like Ming, but they look like Ming... Reminds me of the Gatoraid commericals in the US when Jordan was popular 'If I could be like Mike'. They may not play like Yao, but they can look like him in their Rockets uniforms!
Cheers,
Joe
P.S. We beat the 'Jin Qiao Rockets' by 42... They could have used Yao! :)
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