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From the former New York Times Beijing bureau chief, a closely observed story of a struggling Chinese basketball team and its quixotic, often comical attempt to make the playoffs by copying the American stars of the NBA—a season of cultural misunderstanding that would transcend sports and reveal China's ambivalent relationship with the West.
When the worst professional basketball team in China, the Shanxi Brave Dragons, hired former NBA coach Bob Weiss to improve its fortunes, the team's owner, Boss Wang, promised that Weiss would be allowed to Americanize his players by teaching them "advanced basketball culture." That promise would be broken from the moment Weiss landed in China. Desperate for his team to play like Americans, Wang—a peasant turned steel tycoon—nevertheless refused to allow his players any freedom and individuality. As we follow this team of colorful oddballs on a fascinating road trip through modern China, we see Weiss learn firsthand what so many other foreigners in China have discovered: that changing China happens only when and how China wants to be changed.
New York Times journalist Yardley honed in on a fantastically implausible, ultimately cautionary tale of how the Chinese and American ways often mix like oil and water. On one hand, the enthusiastic Chinese steel entrepreneur Boss Wang, owner of the Shanxi Brave Dragons, wanted to incorporate American-style basketball so badly that in 2008 he hired former NBA player and coach Bob Weiss to come to China and turn around his losing team. On the other hand, Boss Wang ultimately hired a Chinese coach to run the daily practices because of deep-seated fears about discipline, thus undermining most of what Weiss was trying to instill in his young Chinese players. Weiss inherited a team with the worst record in the Chinese Basketball Association (CBA); they were convinced they were "defective." Working out of a bleak warehouse in Taiyuan, once ranked as the most polluted city in the world, Weiss had to use an interpreter to communicate with the players and with his assistant Chinese coach, Liu Tie, who strong-armed the team during practices and simply kept them going all the time—not Weiss' style. Indeed, the basketball players had been selected early on in elementary school, chosen from X-rays of their skeletal structure determining projections of tallness. It was a motley team made up of misfits, such as a shortish Taiwanese player, nicknamed Little Sun, mercilessly taunted by Coach Liu for playing "Taiwan independence defense"; and several foreign hirelings such as NBA bad boy Bonzi Wells, who played a few games then fizzled. The Dragons didn't end so shabbily, although the lessons in teaching American marketing and know-how only went so far.
An expert journalist compresses the culture class of nations into one palatable sports season.
JYKWA
Posted May 16, 2012
A study in managerial dysfunction, Chinese style. Mr. Yardley's 'Brave Dragons' was interesting for highlighting the cultural clashes but also reaffirming that bad managers exist in every country. Boss Wang seems to incorporate the worst traits of bad managers - a micromanager who thinks he's a big-picture thinker, a top-down commander who wants everyone to follow his orders but gets frustrated at the lack of "initiative" by his employees (in this case, the players). A man who does not realize that he is the at the heart of the problem but blames everyone else. Kudos to Mr. Weiss to surviving the cultural cross-signals, passive aggressiveness, and Boss Wang's crazy meddling.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.mike247worldwide
Posted March 28, 2012
Well written. Interesting look into A. The Chinese side of professional basketball, B. a fascinating look into the basketball side of fading (or marginal) American players and C. Chinese life and culture in the early 21st century.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.Anonymous
Posted March 26, 2012
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Overview
From the former New York Times Beijing bureau chief, a closely observed story of a struggling Chinese basketball team and its quixotic, often comical attempt to make the playoffs by copying the American stars of the NBA—a season of cultural misunderstanding that would transcend sports and reveal China's ambivalent relationship with the West.
When the worst professional basketball team in China, the Shanxi Brave Dragons, hired former NBA ...