One Year Left to Play-Chapter 85 - 27: I Want Them to Regret!

With the performance in two high school games as a foundation, at least in terms of athletic talent and shooting talent, he’s got a decent draft outlook, and most of the doubts and negative feedback stem from skipping college. Zhang Hao’s mindset is tending towards stability.

Back in China, the media reported about a high school student studying in the U.S. skipping college to enter the NBA draft, with multiple teams showing interest in him. Coupled with previous reports of Zhang Hao’s performance in the McDonald’s Slam Dunk Contest and Adidas Training Camp, it caused a huge stir in the domestic sports circle!

Previously, Xinhuanet reported that Zhang Hao won the dunk contest, but the headline was the McDonald’s High School Dunk Contest Champion, and not many people paid attention. In those days, in the eyes of domestic fans, how impressive could a high school player be?

The subsequent Adidas Training Camp was similar, but having second-round prospects in the NBA draft is a whole different story!

In 1992, the Three Giants of the Dream Team brought the NBA to the world, sparking a basketball craze domestically, coinciding with the golden era of Chinese outside players. Asian top player Song Tao was even selected in the third round of the 1986 NBA draft by the Atlanta Hawks, but unfortunately, he faded from the basketball scene due to injuries in 1988. Domestic fans have been eagerly expecting a Chinese player to enter the NBA.

Over the years, some Chinese players have gone to the NBA for tryouts, but the feedback wasn’t good, and ultimately no one attempted to enter the draft. The national team dominated in Asia, but the gap was significant against strong European and American teams. After a few years, domestic fans were beginning to doubt whether Chinese players could make it to the NBA.

Hence, when Wang Zhizhi was later "sanctioned" by the Basketball Association, despite the criticism, many still voiced support; hence the real sensation caused by Yao Ming becoming the number one pick and truly igniting a basketball craze.

No one expected that eight years later, a Chinese player would suddenly appear in the NBA draft. Not only was the outlook good, but he was also an 18-year-old high school student!

For international matters, the channels for Chinese people to obtain information are quite limited, allowing certain so-called public intellectuals to propagate some bizarre stories.

This time, it also led some public intellectuals to come out and start making strange arguments.

In short, Zhang Hao suddenly became a sensation in the domestic sports circle!

Many people wanted to know what was going on with this matter and wanted to know information about Zhang Hao. However, ordinary people and even professionals in the domestic sports industry had little knowledge of Zhang Hao’s information and had to look it up.

At this time, the NBA actively provided Zhang Hao’s information to domestic media...

Was it that the domestic media didn’t want to quickly obtain detailed information about Zhang Hao?

Of course not, it’s just that in the eyes of the domestic sports world, Zhang Hao seemed to have popped out of nowhere and was about to make his way into the world’s top basketball league in the United States. There really wasn’t much information to be obtained.

Despite the Basketball Association, for some unknown reason, having a group of people roaming around trying both overtly and covertly to convince media not to report on Zhang Hao, some agreed but some didn’t, and as long as one did not agree, this matter could not be suppressed.

Many young media personnel did not understand what the Basketball Association was thinking and why they wanted to "suppress the news," while the older media personnel could easily guess the mysterious mindset of domestic officials.

However, they indeed had nothing substantial to report at the moment.

Moreover, there weren’t many media outlets in China with overseas news channels; most of the overseas news was based on reposting. There were only a few media outlets with permanent overseas offices, countable on two hands.

Among these media outlets not bowing to the Basketball Association, there was a superpower — the Sports News Department of Xinhuanet.

Would they care about the Basketball Association? Besides being a state-owned media institution, they were also a legal news regulatory body.

However, they could no longer contact Zhang Hao!

Initially, after the dunk contest, some young members of Xinhuanet’s sports news department wanted to use Zhang Hao as an opportunity to conduct an in-depth report on the foundational aspects of the American basketball industry, exploring American basketball. But a group of 30-somethings had no say, so the matter was left unsettled.

Who would have known, Zhang Hao continued making waves, participating in the Adidas Training Camp and making waves there too, and before he could select a college, he was making waves again... The senior figures at Xinhuanet finally began to take Zhang Hao seriously and planned to report in-depth, but just like when Xu Jicheng couldn’t find Zhang Hao, they too couldn’t find him.

Ultimately, the NBA delivered the information to their headquarters...

After repeatedly confirming the information was accurate and there wouldn’t be any blunders, Xinhuanet held a special session for Zhang Hao! Xinhuanet’s "Global" Weekly featured a cover shot of Zhang Hao from his previous slam dunk contest!

The big brother started reporting on Zhang Hao’s story, and the Imperial Sports Channel followed suit.

There wasn’t much footage available for news broadcasts, so domestic sports fans learned that there was a Chinese genius high school basketball player in the U.S., whose hobbies included singing, dancing, rapping, and basketball, who had trained for two and a half years and was heading to the NBA...

While the main focus was on Zhang Hao attending the NBA draft, with this limited information, the domestic media only knew about Zhang Hao entering the draft, his age, school, and other basic information, but nothing else.

However, compared to the previously completely lacking channels for in-depth understanding, top domestic media now had a window for deeper understanding — the NBA.