Return to 2002: Freestyle Superstar

Chapter 575 The significance of choosing journalism as a major

PS: The update is a bit late.

……

Why is it Chen Ran again!

It wasn't just Chang who was depressed. Kei Nishikori, who was determined to win his first Grand Slam main draw, was also very depressed.

With his current strength and competitive state, it is very likely that he will defeat players ranked around 100 in the world.

But when meeting Chen Ran, who is at the peak of his career, the chances are slim.

It's so hard!

Kei Nishikori was very depressed.

Zhang Depei could only pat his student on the shoulder in a comforting manner: "It's okay, just do your best. Besides, playing against him is also an opportunity for you to learn."

He really wanted to talk to Chen Ran in private, hoping that the other party would show mercy and not beat his disciple to the point where he lost confidence.

But Zhang Depei knew without thinking that the other party would not give him face.

At the age of 20, Chen Ran's historical status and honors have already far surpassed Zhang Depei.

The players on both sides are no longer on the same level.

If Chen Ran wins the US Open again this time, his number of Grand Slam titles will reach double digits.

Zhang Depei seemed to have thought of something and looked from afar at his other former disciple, Zheng Jie.

Although Zheng Jie has never won a second Grand Slam title since he left, her results are relatively stable and she has remained consistently among the top ten in the world.

"If Kei Nishikori's future achievements in ATP can reach Zheng Jie's achievements in WTA, I will be satisfied." Zhang Depei said to himself.

His disciple is still too reserved and cannot integrate into the ATP circle for the time being.

In fact, Zhang Depei also vaguely guessed that perhaps due to historical reasons, Chen Ran would not take care of Kei Nishikori just because they were both East Asian players.

But Chen Ran would not deliberately make a move to prevent Kei Nishikori from integrating into this circle.

Zhang Depei roughly guessed Chen Ran's mentality. At most, he would beat Kei Nishikori to death every time he met him, but he would not deliberately make things difficult for the opponent off the court.

……

On the other side, Chen Ran took the women's competition sign-in sheet from Zheng Jie, and shouted, "Let me see your sign-in sheet."

Li Na, however, looked like she saw through everything and teased, "You are just concerned about our luck in the draw, is it someone else?"

How could this guy really care about their sign-in list?

Although there are as many as four Chinese golden flowers participating in the US Open this time, it has set a new record.

But it is estimated that the focus in the country is on Chen Ran. After all, with the current strength and competitive state of female players, entering the semi-finals is already a huge success.

To be precise, because of Chen Ran, the Chinese media's attention to Ivanovich is almost as much as Zheng Jie.

"Sister Na, haven't you decided to go solo yet?" Chen Ran seemed to have thought of something and asked with a raised eyebrow.

Li Na was slightly stunned, then shook her head firmly: "I don't have such a plan for now. Unless... at least... I can reach the semi-finals of a Grand Slam, which is too difficult."

"Uh..." Chen Ran nodded after hearing this.

Currently, there are only two tennis players in China who are truly solo players: him and Zheng Jie.

After all, after going solo, the costs that players have to bear will increase in vain, and no one dares to take risks easily.

In addition, because of the butterfly effect caused by Chen Ran, the amount of sponsorship from sponsors to the Chinese national tennis team has increased much more than in the previous life.

With sufficient funds and a superstar like Chen Ran at the forefront to protect them, there would be fewer conflicts and contradictions between Li Na and the Tennis Sports Administration Center. Chen Ran sometimes had to admire the media's ability to confuse right and wrong.

In her previous life, because of her impulsive and hot temper, Li Na became a pioneer in the media's portrayal of athletes fighting against the system.

In order to attract attention, all kinds of exaggerated descriptions were used to portray Li Na as a representative of anti-establishment, even though the truth of the matter was not so.

This has to verify what Zhang Xuefeng said, that many people working in the news industry really have no bottom line.

In fact, the conflict between Li Na and the Tennis Association is the inconsistency in the distribution of economic benefits.

In this era, tennis, like badminton and table tennis, has the state uniformly managing athletes' participation and prize money distribution.

The bonus will be paid in one lump sum at the end of each year, but the various expenses incurred by the players in participating in competitions will also be borne by the state.

But the prize money in tennis is so high that players want to be able to control this considerable prize money themselves.

The prize money for table tennis and badminton competitions is so small that it may not even cover the cost of participating in the competition, round-trip fare and hotel accommodation.

Athletes simply have no incentive to go solo.

More importantly, China has the best table tennis and badminton training and coaching resources in the world.

If you go solo and form your own team, the training and coaching resources you can get will not even be as good as when you were in the national team. Moreover, you will need to spend money to recruit all these teams yourself. This is simply nonsense.

But tennis is different. China's training and coaching resources are very backward, and the prize money for competitions is very high. The mainstream model in the world is that you form your own team, and of course all the risks will be borne by yourself.

Therefore, if you play tennis solo, you will go from low to high, while if you play table tennis or badminton solo, you will go from high to low, which is actually a downward trend.

Especially since China is a traditional powerhouse in table tennis and badminton, Olympic champions or World Championships champions can earn a lot of advertising endorsement income, and occasionally they can also earn a lot of commercial income from performing for other purposes.

But tennis is different. It is too difficult to win the world championship, and even to perform well in the Grand Slam tournaments is not an easy thing, so the players rely on the prize money from tennis matches to make a living.

This is the contradiction.

What's the point of fighting against the system? It's just shameless media sensationalism.

For example, Zheng Jie received subsidies and sponsorship from the Sichuan Sports Bureau before she went solo, so the prize money she earned was divided according to the previous contract agreement, and the National Tennis Association did not participate in the distribution.

It depends on how you talked about it.

In her previous life, when Li Na just started to go solo, she even had thoughts of regret, because the country no longer helped her, she was under tremendous pressure, encountered financial difficulties, and was even prepared to spend all her previous savings.

At that time, she even thought about returning to the national team. She didn't seek to become rich, but just to avoid bankruptcy.

If this was the level of competition in men's tennis, Li Na might have compromised, but after all, the competition in the WTA is far less than that in the ATP, and she gritted her teeth and finally got through it.

A year after she went solo, she reached the semi-finals at the Australian Open, which strengthened her determination to continue her solo career.

Let's look at Zheng Jie of the same period. She had reached the Wimbledon semi-finals once before going solo, but her performance after going solo did not exceed that before.

Therefore, you cannot assert that a player's performance will improve dramatically after going solo. This depends on the individual, but the media will not care about these and will only seize isolated cases for crazy hype.

So, when Chen Ran asked Li Na whether she was ready to go solo just now, he also had an ulterior motive, which was to test her thoughts.

In this time and space, because of him, the media have not yet discovered the eye-catching topic of athletes' unyielding resistance to the system.

"That's why I chose journalism as my major in college. I won't let those unscrupulous journalists stir up trouble!"

Chen Ran thought of this with great pride.

In the future, he plans to gradually reinvest in those online news media to increase his voice and control, and interview Li Na and Zheng Jie to analyze the pros and cons of tennis players going solo.

Don't keep shouting about fighting the system or something like that. Those unscrupulous journalists just like to sensationalize.

Question LeBron, understand LeBron, be LeBron!
……

(End of this chapter)