One billion. That’s the number of people who tuned in to watch the USA-China Olympic basketball game on Sunday. One seventh of all the people on the planet. We can talk about opening ceremonies, Super Bowls and World Cups, but basketball has never found itself under as bright of a spotlight as the scene on Sunday.
The score in the United States’ 101-70 victory cannot overshadow the perfect storm of basketball’s past, present and future coming together for one massive coming-out party for two distinctive spheres of the sport.
Located inside the eye of this storm is Yao Ming, unquestionably the most important basketball player in the world. Lebron James may be richer, and Kobe Bryant more successful, but Yao’s outstretched frame marks the dividing line between the NBA and commissioner David Stern’s attempt to market basketball to the 300 million Chinese basketball fans who have been voting Yao into every All-Star game since he entered the NBA.
And on Sunday, you could tell the Americans were well aware of the importance of marketing their product. Kobe Bryant and Lebron James, the two best players on what is unofficially referred to as the “redeem team”, put on a show of high flying dunks and glitzy passes, much to the amusement of the riotous crowd.
“Look, I had five dunks in one game. Last time I had five dunks in the game, I was like, 17,” Kobe Bryant said. “That’s all because of the energy in the crowd. I think they knew that history was being made. It was amazing. It was a proud moment for their country as it was for ours. You could feel the electricity.”
Five dunks in a game for the first time in 13 years for Kobe Bryant? Please try to tell me with a straight face that is a coincidence. Lebron James also had a few dunks of his own, but as the only member of the team to have a working knowledge of Mandarin Chinese, something tells me Lebron has been preparing for this game for quite some time.
The USA basketball team has taken a lot of heat ever since it stumbled to a bronze finish in Athens four years ago. And although it’s easy to criticize the US players for failing to dominate a sport invented by their home country, the outpouring of Chinese fans who came to witness Kobe and Lebron battle Yao Ming is proof that basketball is a microcosm of globalization in general, and any stumbles can be more related to birth pains, than a sign that the sport is in trouble of any kind.
Sixteen years ago, the Dream Team led by Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, and Larry Bird waved an American flag in one hand, and the steering wheel of a steamroller in the other, as the US cruised over an unprepared international field. It took only ten years from that date before the US relinquished the gold medal podium to Yugoslavia, and the Americans haven’t won the gold since. I’m sure if you asked the hyper-competitive Jordan in 1992 whether the USA basketball would lose its place as the best team in the world within his lifetime, he would have laughed in your face.
But global expansion is clearly a good thing, as evidenced by increased tv viewers and international sales. And if David Stern could find a way to get 30 NBA-quality arenas built, I wouldn’t rule out the chance that he’s consider moving the entire league over to China. A billion television viewers and 300 million Chinese fans will at least keep that idea in the back of his head.
A clever reminder of US-Chinese diplomatic relations took place during a Coke commercial that displayed an animated Lebron James and Yao Ming facing off against each other in a show of cultural containment, while cowboys, dragons, pandas and eagles each pick sides against one another. Not surprisingly (this being a Coke commercial and all), they each pull out their secret weapon: a Coke bottle, which is deemed sufficient enough to call off the seeming inevitability of a violent military exchange. I’m sure viewers everywhere are thanking their lucky stars for Coca-Cola, and its ability to prevent World War III.
But enough about Coca-Cola being the perfect vaccination for a unbridled bloodbath, because Coke is just one company out of many that wants a piece of China’s basketball-viewing audience. And since it’s likely that Sunday’s game featured a larger viewing audience and greater display of Chinese and American talent than any game scheduled to take place in the distant future, getting in on the ground floor on Sunday could resonate in the minds of Chinese basketball fans for years to come.
