http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/09/sports/basketball/09MING.html?pagewanted=print&position=top ------- February 9, 2003 The Little Giant's Rise Holds China's Interest By DAVID BARBOZA HANGHAI, Sunday, Feb. 9 — In this city where Yao Ming grew up, and first played the game of basketball, Yao Mania has clearly taken hold. There are often large gatherings here to watch Yao's televised National Basketball Association games. The local news media cover the Houston Rockets as much as they follow Yao's former pro basketball team, the Shanghai Sharks. And people here seem to think Yao's impressive rookie season and his selection as one of the starting centers in this afternoon's N.B.A. All-Star Game are more than just a source of local pride. This is a big national moment for Chinese sports. "It's like a dream come true," said Yan Xiao Xian, a sportswriter who covers the N.B.A. for The Xin Min Evening News, a daily newspaper in Shanghai. "A lot of young people here are crazy about him. He's like a national hero." Few here want to predict how Yao will perform in today's game, but many are proud of the 7-foot-6 Shanghai native who some call Xiao Ju Ren, the little giant. Of course, the marketing of Yao at home has not really begun. There are no giant Yao billboards here, as there are in Houston. And children do not wear Yao's N.B.A. jersey, mostly because they are not yet widely available in China. But Yao's image is ubiquitous. He is regularly featured on the cover of popular magazines in China, like San Lian Life Weekly. His Apple computer commercials can be seen here. And he recently agreed to promote China Unicom and Gatorade in two marketing deals that hope to capitalize on his popularity in Asia. "N.B.A. basketball in China has always been popular, but the Yao Ming phenomenon is something else," said Victor Koo, the chief executive of sohu.com, a Chinese Internet portal that is working with the N.B.A. Indeed, more than 100 million households in China are expected to tune in to today's game in Atlanta. Shanghai residents will watch the game tip off at 9:30 a.m. Monday. At a Nike basketball park near Nanjing Road, one of the city's popular shopping districts, dozens of Shanghai youths were playing basketball and debating Yao's skills on Saturday. "Yao is doing a great job, but he looks a little slim — he might gain some more weight," said Li Qin, 17. "I'm proud of him, but he can do better." Will he watch the All-Star Game? "Yes, definitely," he said. "Whenever Yao plays, I will watch it." Young people here, however, do not universally favor Yao. Allen Iverson and Kobe Bryant are also popular. Lu Zhihua, 25, was playing today wearing a Kobe Bryant jersey and Air Jordans. (He insisted that he owns all 18 styles in the Air Jordan collection.) His favorite player is Michael Jordan, but he admires Yao. "Yao has the capability," he said. "And if you have the capability, you should go to the N.B.A. Everyone knows the N.B.A. is the best." Yao's road to the N.B.A. began in the affluent Xuhui district, a former French neighborhood in old Shanghai. Yao was the only son of former Chinese national team basketball players. His father is 6-7; his mother is 6-3. Teachers, coaches and childhood friends said Yao was unusually tall at a young age, but also soft-spoken. When elementary schoolchildren noticed his height, about 6 feet tall when he was 12, they sometimes taunted him and ran up from behind, jumped and tried to tap the top of his head. Then they would dash off. Yao rarely got angry, friends say. Because of his height — and his basketball lineage — he was groomed to be China's Wilt Chamberlain. He had difficulty at first, friends and former coaches say. Some sports experts deemed him too slow. His coaches and his father drilled him, however, and his family received special stipends from the government to purchase extra food. As a teenager Yao received special training at an amateur sports school in Shanghai. By 16, he was nearly 7 feet and a dominant city basketball star. One year, Yao's team won the championship, said Zhu Jun Wei, 23, who grew up with Yao. "Bonuses were paid to all the team members," he said. "The coach thought Yao Ming was great, so he gave him an extra 20,000-yuan bonus" — about $2,400 in American dollars — "and Yao shared it with the others." That may be why people here consider Yao the perfect ambassador for China. One newspaper here even called Yao the most persuasive symbol of globalization. Some people here say he still has a long way to go to become a true N.B.A. superstar. But his former coach, Li Zhangmin, calls him the pride of Shanghai.
