From South China Tiger to NBA King

Chapter 122 Time Magazine Cover and Interview
After defeating the Lakers, the world became popular again on a large scale.

On December 12, Jianghu received a call from Schwartz.

Schwartz's tone was very excited, even more excited than the last time he received a call from Nike.

Edward Felsenthal, editor-in-chief of Time Magazine, called and invited Jianghu to be on the cover of December.

"Time" (Time), also known as "Time", was founded in 1923. It is one of the first weekly news magazines in nearly a century. It is a window for new and growing international readers to understand global news. "Time" is one of the three major current affairs weekly magazines in the United States, with a wide range of content, expressing opinions on international issues and tracking and reporting major international events.

Time has a main U.S. edition, international editions, and European, Asian, and Latin American editions.Time Europe (formerly Time Atlantic) is published in London and also covers events in the Middle East, Africa and Latin America, Time Asia is published in Hong Kong and the South Pacific edition is published in Sydney and covers Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific islands.

This time Jianghu was invited to appear on the covers of the main US edition and the Asian edition.

As a magazine, "Time" was once selected as one of the world's top 2016 brands in [-]. It is enough to prove how influential "Time" is in the industry.

Jianghu created a precedent for domestic basketball players. Before that, Yao Ming appeared on the cover of "Time Magazine" twice, but both were on the Asian edition, not the main American edition. Lin Crazy also appeared on the cover of the North American edition, but he was Asian. Not a serious Chinese player.

Jianghu is the second Chinese athlete to appear on the cover of the American edition of Time Magazine since the beginning of the new century, after Liu Xiang in 2004.

This is a great honor, which means that the status of Jianghu has been recognized internationally. The mainstream media in the United States have to agree that Jianghu represents the future of the NBA.

On December 12, the Celtics lost back-to-back away games to the Los Angeles Clippers.

Jianghu received two personal fouls in the first quarter, and got a third foul within 4 minutes of playing in the second quarter.

It seems that the referee was not satisfied with Jianghu's counterattack in the last game, and gave him a consecutive foul package.

The Celtics without Jianghu fell behind by 19 points in the first half.

In the second half, Jianghu almost gave up his defense and led the team to start a confrontation with the Clippers. He scored 15 points and 5 assists in a single quarter, leading the team to a 41-28 single quarter.

In the fourth quarter, the referee went offline, but the Clippers’ super sixth man, Louis Williams, went crazy again. He made 6 of 6 shots in a single quarter, 6 of 6 free throws, scored 21 points in a single quarter, and finally led the Clippers. Double-killed the Celtics this season.

115 to 121, the Celtics lost the matchup away.

Jianghu scored 27 points, 26 rebounds and 3 assists in 5 minutes of appearance.

Regarding the loss, Jianghu is very calm. In the long regular season, it is impossible to keep winning every game. Occasional losses are understandable, as long as you win the opponent you should win.

On December 12, the entire Celtics team returned to Boston. Jiang Hu accepted an exclusive interview with a Time magazine reporter at home, and took a cover photo at a photography agency in Boston.

On December 12, the latest issue of Time Magazine with Jianghu as its cover was released.

The cover photo of "Time Magazine" is very ordinary, without any dunk action, Jiang Hu is wearing a black suit, holding a basketball in his hand and looking towards the basket, which is exactly the same as the photo of Yao Ming's rookie season.

Cover Title - "True Basketball Genius, Jiang Hu"

01, the birth of a genius.

In today's NBA world, Jianghu is synonymous with "genius".

Since entering the NBA in June 2017, he has only been in the most competitive basketball league in the world for only 6 months, and he has played official NBA games in just 5 months and 2 games.

When asked "Who is the strongest new generation player in this league", a series of NBA legends including LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, Bill Russell, Larry Bird The stars all said the name "Jianghu" in unison.

In the past month, Jianghu broke many records and created many histories. In the first game of his career, he faced LeBron James, the strongest player today. He surpassed Chamberlain, who had 44 points, with 43 points and became the first scorer in history. tallest player.

Against Michael Jordan's Charlotte Hornets, he made 20 of 20 shots and became the first player in NBA history to shoot 100+ 50% of the time.

在12月1日湖人对阵凯尔特人的比赛中，江湖在前三节砍下33分9篮板9助攻的情况下，末节独自拿到28分，打破了威尔特·张伯伦维持了58年的新秀的新秀得分记录。

In addition, he also became the youngest Mr. 60+ in history and the first player in history to achieve a 60+ triple-double.

After entering the league for two months, Jianghu scored 3+ 50 times, and currently ranks first in the league, leading all players in the league.

His performance is undoubtedly a super talent that the entire NBA has never seen before.

Same with Michael Jordan and Tim Duncan, once they entered the league, they started to dominate the league, dominate the game.

Just like he dominated the CBA Finals at the age of 18, he dominated the NBA.

02, Reversal kid.

Jiang Hu was born in GD Province, China in 1998. His childhood dream was to become an astronaut or a scientist.

His growth trajectory is very ordinary. Like all Chinese teenagers, he carries a heavy schoolbag every day, goes to and from school with the school bell, returns home to complete the homework assigned by the teacher, and works hard for better academic performance. From childhood to adulthood, Jianghu's biggest advantages may be handsome looks, excellent academic performance, and good at basketball.

At the age of 16, Jianghu, who was studying in high school in China, awakened his athletic talent. His height exploded from an ordinary person's 181cm to 203cm within a year, and he maintained good athletic ability. My high school won the provincial high school championship.

Du Feng, the head coach of the Guangdong professional team, happened to be watching the game because his son happened to be playing for the team opposite the river and lake. Although his son eventually lost this ordinary high school basketball game, he discovered the extraordinary His basketball talent, that is - Jianghu.

He resolutely used a two-year contract of 2 million yuan to bring Jianghu to the Guangdong South China Tigers, the highest-level league champion in China. At the age of 100, Jianghu transformed from a high school student to a professional basketball player.

"When I went to report to the Guangdong team, the team already had 4 insiders." Jianghu recalled, "Now I must be better than them, but it was not the case at the time, but I have always maintained a kind of unyielding momentum, I know As long as you work hard, your dreams will come true.”

When he first entered the CBA, he was very uncomfortable. The physical confrontation of adults is not something an 18-year-old young man can bear, even if it is a Chinese league.In the first season after signing, he played as a substitute for the Guangdong team. He played 6 minutes in the first game of his career, scored 0 points, 0 rebounds, 0 assists and 2 fouls, and only scored 1 point in the second game. .

For the professional league, the 18-year-old Jianghu looked quite at a loss, but Jianghu was not knocked down by difficulties, but continued to train hard.

Regardless of whether there is a game every day, his training time has never been less than 7 hours. His love for basketball has allowed him to persevere in the most difficult times.

All persistence will eventually pay off, and all sweat will eventually turn into achievements.

Day after day of training, Jianghu has grown tremendously quickly. He is in the age group with the fastest growth in his sports career. He is like a hungry sponge absorbing nutrients from everyone.

Jiang Hu smiled and recalled: "Everyone in the team is better than me. I keep learning various skills from them, and I feel that I have new gains every day."

His strength is improving almost every day, and he is beginning to get familiar with the CBA and the adult league style of play.

Opportunities are always reserved for those who are prepared. On April 2017, 4, an opportunity belonging to the world came.

At this time, the CBA has reached the stage of the finals. The Guangdong team's main power forward Su Wei was injured, and the second insider Zeng Fanri came off the bench and performed poorly.

This may be the luckiest injury in the history of sports. Without this injury, it may take some time for Jianghu to come into people's field of vision.

Facing the traditional strong team of the CBA, the XJ team, they first fell behind 0 to 3 in the big score, and then fell behind 42 to 51 by 9 points in the small score.
Jianghu made his debut before halftime, scored 33 points, led the team to victory, and kept Guangdong's hope of competing for the championship.

The rivers and lakes became famous in one fell swoop, and the titles of <Guangdong Magic Boy><Reversal Boy> are well known to Chinese fans.

In the subsequent game, he scored 47 points, 62 points, 13 three-pointers, 48 ​​points and 15 assists.

Leading the team from a 0:3 desperation to a successful comeback in a row, completing an unprecedented miracle in the history of sports.

Recalling that round of the series, Jianghu's Guangdong teammate Yi Jianlian directly used "unheard of, he dominated the game" to evaluate the performance of the former
The head coach Du Feng even said bluntly, "When I was coaching the Guangdong team, Jianghu was the best player in the team's history, and Jianghu's performance in the round against the Guangdong team was also the strongest in history."

03, draft.

However, even with his unprecedented performance, he failed to get a good start for Jianghu's career prospects.

Recalling the first moment of the draft, Jiang Hu showed a helpless expression on his face: "Scouts in the American sports world do not recognize the performance of the Chinese league. Even though I ruled the highest hall of the CBA and won the highest honor, I remember I was only 10th to 15th on the draft board."

"Of course I want to be the No. [-] pick. There's no doubt about it. Every player in the draft is aiming for that position, and I'm no exception."

Too thin, lacking in strength, not flexible enough, poor impact ability, relying on the team's overall tactical arrangement, poor creativity, easy to be restricted, and probably unable to adapt to the NBA's confrontational intensity and the NBA's three-point line.

These are the contents that appeared in the scouting report before the Jianghu draft, and this also made him almost buried.

"I saw the performance of the players who were drafted at the same time as me. I think I am no worse than anyone else. I am the strongest player in the same class. So I decided to go to the Chicago Combine to try out and show everyone who I am."

Jianghu made a decision to go to Chicago United, which has the most rookies in the same class, for trial training.

In the training camp, Jianghu shocked all the team management, Lakers president Magician and Celtics president were shocked by Jianghu's performance.

Recalling the training camp that day, Angie said: "I went to observe Jayson Tatum at the time. We followed him for three years. We planned to choose him as the cornerstone of our team."

"Jianghu seemed to appear out of nowhere. He ranked first in the physical fitness and shooting tests, and he was crushing. There were stars all around him. Jianghu was like the sun that suddenly appeared in the sky, illuminating him all of a sudden. All, he turned night into day."

Angie had a happy look on his face, and recalled: "I made the most correct decision in my life that day. No matter how many people in the management objected, I must bring him to our team. We missed Michael. , missed Tim, missed Kobe, missed LeBron, missed Kevin, missed Stephen, I swear, I will never allow us to miss Jiang."

Magic Johnson recalled: "I pretended not to see Jiang's performance. When we returned to the team, we also made a decision to get the No. [-] pick at all costs, even if we traded everyone on the team."

The magician sighed regretfully: "But unfortunately, the Celtics kept a good eye this time, and our plan failed."

In the draft on June 6, the Celtics finally chose Jianghu against all opinions. At that time, many fans could not understand the team's decision, and many people even wrote to the team management to criticize the management's choice.

Regarding the results of the draft, Jianghu's performance was very calm.

"It's exactly what I expected, that's my draft plan, and I've done it well."

"I won the matchup with Butler in the training camp. At that time, I knew that the first pick belonged to me. Unless the management present is blind, they will not have the second No. [-] option except me."

Angie said with a smile: "At that time, we received at least 300 letters from season ticket holders to the team, about as many as a sack, all of which were complaint letters, and most of them asked me to resign voluntarily."

"They thought I made a huge mistake and wasted a precious No. [-] lottery."

"I don't feel pressured, I keep all my letters in my office, I have a lot of them in my cabinet, and every time I'm in a good mood, I open them up and read them all over again. , I feel more comfortable."

"After the first week of the season, I got more than 100 letters from season ticket holders, all of whom praised me. They thought I was the best front office in the history of the franchise. The team worked until they were 80."

"I looked at it, and there are quite a few letters from the same address as the letter after the draft, from the same member of ours."

When recalling this incident, Angie showed an exaggerated smile on his face. He even slapped the table vigorously, and the whole office was full of his laughter.

"Haha, that's so interesting, it's one of the funniest things I've ever experienced in my life."

04, the legendary road.

When asked by a reporter if he felt the pressure as a yellow-skinned player who is extremely rare in the league, Jianghu said calmly:
"I'm not stressed, why should I be stressed?"

"My predecessors have done well in the NBA. If Yao Ming hadn't suffered from injuries, he would have become one of the strongest centers in history. He has proved that the Chinese can play basketball well. I There is no need to prove anything."

"What I need to prove is myself, whether I can achieve greatness myself."

In the end, he did just fine.

It's hard to say how long his performance can last.

But at least so far, his performance is not inferior to rookie Jordan, not inferior to Tim Duncan, not inferior to the rookie performance of any superstar in history.

Two months into the NBA, all fans who follow the NBA know his name.

他与世界著名球鞋公司签下了5年1.4亿美元的史上最高新秀合约，年纪轻轻的他代言合同总金额已经超过了3亿美元，每年都可以在商业代言收获6000~7000万美元？
Because of Jiang's existence, the attention of the NBA has reached a new high in Asia this year.

In many countries and regions including his home country China, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, and the Philippines, NBA ratings have reached new highs in the past 15 years.

After he became Yao Ming and Liu Xiang, China has become another exquisite world name card. Many fans hope to travel to his homeland and see what kind of environment he grew up in.

His jerseys were snapped up wildly in these countries, and some stores even lined up to buy Jianghu jerseys.

When asked about his future goals in the NBA, Jianghu showed a rare shyness on his face. He thought for a moment and then said to the reporter:
"It's not clear yet..."

"Probably kicking the bald man in the No. 23 jersey off the throne."

(End of this chapter)