Chapter 29: The Language Responsibility Of Public Figures
The next morning, Xu Ling was still asleep in bed, but the entire United States was already boiling over.
The headline in the college basketball world was not Texas Tech University winning the BIG 12 championship, nor was it a focal matchup from another bracket.
Instead—it was the General’s Curse: Bob Knight said he “hopes that bunch at Indiana University all die”
ESPN, CBS, NBC, New York Times, USA Today, even CNN all reported on this.
Some of Knight’s old friends from Indiana University expressed disappointment over this.
This was undoubtedly a huge storm, but for the battle-hardened Knight, it was nothing.
He was completely unaffected.
Texas Tech University’s official attitude toward the matter was “no comment.”
Therefore, the impact of this event was very split; outside of TTU, all media were discussing and analyzing it, and Knight once again became a hot topic on television news.
But on the TTU campus, the school was immersed in the joy of the school basketball team winning the BIG 12 championship.
Xu Ling went from a super rookie to a sports hero etched in school history; every move he made was watched, even overinterpreted.
For example, on the first day back after winning the championship, he carefully picked two pieces of chicken breast in the school cafeteria, and immediately, the alumnus who witnessed it posted it on the school’s Reddit page and commented: “Don’t you think this is a choice only professional players would make?”
Meanwhile, ESPN’s hot show Draft Insider was analyzing the latest draft trends.
“We can basically say this: after the Big 12 league championship battle, Eli’s draft market value has locked in the top ten. As long as he maintains this momentum in the national championship, he is extremely likely to become a top-five draft pick hot candidate in the 2007 draft.”
Another commentator said: “No, if Eli still performs like this in March Madness, then the question we should discuss is who between him and Kevin Durant should be the draft’s number two pick.”
“Moreover, there’s news: Isiah Thomas was fined by the league for illegally contacting a college player this morning, but Isiah’s attention is completely on the draft a few months from now.”
“Yes, according to the information I got, Isiah tried to use the Knicks’ future draft picks and any player on the team to trade for a 2007 lottery pick. As far as I know, the Bobcats have rejected his offer.”
“Oh my god, Isiah again!”
The analysts burst into laughter. Isiah Thomas’s crazy moves were spreading throughout the league, clearly not baseless rumors.
Then, a scout on ESPN’s show gave Xu Ling high praise: “Eli’s height, wingspan, athletic talent, and skill combination make him a player who can play three positions at once. His performance at TTU is simply a combination of Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen. If it were me, I absolutely wouldn’t pass on a player like this!”
Naturally, for every booster, there’s a detractor.
Jimmy King, currently an analyst at FOX Sports, was once a member of the “Fab Five” that dominated college basketball. However, though the Fab Five had a big reputation, the only ones who made it big in the NBA were Chris Webber, Jalen Rose, and Juwan Howard. Their success rate wasn’t low, but the gap was huge. Those three guys all earned over a hundred million dollars in their NBA careers, while King was just a passerby in the NBA, spending most of his professional career overseas, and only got into FOX Sports through Webber’s connections. Such a first half of life made King highly skeptical of all overhyped college students.
On FOX Sports’ show, he bluntly said: “I hope the hype about KD and Eli stops here. If I see anyone saying they’re the next MJ again, I’ll go crazy! Calm down, they’re just young players performing well in a phase. In my view, they’re not even as good as me during the ‘Fab Five’ era. This draft class has only one sure thing, and that’s Greg Oden—he’ll be this generation’s Bill Russell.”
Such comments were not few.
Some wanted to stir up a “Eli or KD” debate, while another group felt Xu Ling wasn’t qualified yet.
However, their consensus was absolute.
That was that Oden remained the unshakable number one draft pick candidate.
Meanwhile, Xu Ling had felt no small additional impact these days from Knight’s enemies whom Knight had trash-talked to reporters.
In class, classmates asked his views on Knight appearing on national television news, and a professor called him up to discuss “the language responsibility of public figures.”
All of this showed just how big the impact was from Knight’s statement hoping that bunch who got him fired from Indiana University would die.
But within the team, this impact was almost invisible.
Because they had less than five days to prepare for the March Madness championship.
Now, two days had already passed.
The national championship bracket had been announced.
As the BIG 12 league champions and also a top-five seed nationwide, TTU was placed in the Eastern Conference bracket.
For them, this was a good bracket.
Because the Eastern Conference bracket had no defending champion University of Florida, nor the momentum-heavy Ohio State University.
Whenever someone showed such thinking, Knight would sternly reprimand them.
He wanted the players to understand that a single-elimination March Madness held every possibility.
Having coached for over forty years, Knight had seen too many Cinderella upsets that were impossible to replicate.
Today, training continued as usual.
The one organizing the training was Chris Beard, Knight’s right-hand man.
In many people’s eyes, Beard was the team’s “assistant coach.”
Because Knight’s temper was volatile and he could easily explode over players’ mistakes in training, he often delegated the training organization duties to the assistant coach.
Beard basically handled all the on-court training duties and was also the team’s offense coach.
He was considered the elite assistant coach in Knight’s coaching staff most likely to succeed in the future.
Xu Ling had the most exchanges with Beard during training.
He vaguely felt that Beard might be more suited to be the team’s head coach than Knight.
“Eli, do you know where your post-up problem is?”
Beard asked like a Zen master.
Xu Ling looked at him, full of confusion.
“You rarely proactively use your physique to sense the opponent’s defensive intentions like Kobe does.” Beard imitated Kobe’s movements vividly. “You must know how the opponent is defending to respond effectively; otherwise, your post-up won’t consistently work.”
Then, Xu Ling joked: “You make sense, but Coach won’t let me watch Kobe’s game videos.”
Beard said helplessly: “Watching MJ’s game videos would be the same; these skills all lead to the same end.”
At that moment, a team manager assistant responsible for daily affairs ran over, panting, and said to Xu Ling: “Eli, Coach wants you in his office.”
Xu Ling nodded and said to Beard last: “I guess he’s going to criticize me again.”
Beard just smiled and said nothing more.
In the coach’s office at United Spirit Arena, the Western Conference March Madness bracket was already nailed to the wall.
A few days later, TTU would face its first March Madness game.
On the office TV, ESPN was playing an interview, with the voice intermittently drifting out: “.overhyped by the media. We all know those stats were padded against weak teams.”
Knight didn’t take Niagara University seriously. Though he kept instilling in players that “no game in the championship is easy,” the Purple Eagles were a “very easy” team. If they flipped against the Purple Eagles, Knight really should consider retirement. That would be a failure he couldn’t bear; such a humiliating upset would destroy his coaching soul.
What truly concerned Knight was the team listed below them in their matchup—Duke University.
According to the schedule, if TTU and Duke both won on the first game day, they would meet in the second round.
Duke,
Mike Krzyzewski.
“Coach.” Little Knight looked at his father with awe. “This is a good opportunity. We can prove to the world that a team like TTU—disciplined, legally recruited, fair, clean, with no violation records—can still achieve Indiana University-level success under your leadership, especially proving it to those media who think Mike has surpassed you.”
“Pat.”
Knight looked at his son with a gloomy face: “I have nothing to prove.”
Little Knight knew he’d said the wrong thing and was about to backtrack when the office door was knocked on.
“Come in.”
The door opened, and Xu Ling walked in. He immediately noticed the TV in the office facing him, playing an ESPN show. At Knight’s signal, Little Knight picked up the remote control and pressed rewind, and the screen went back to the start of the interview.
On the screen, University of North Carolina’s new star—Brandon Wright—was facing the camera, his tone arrogant and disdainful: “I know Eli; his performance in the Big 12 league was pretty good, but I think he’s overhyped by the media. We all know most of his stats were padded against weak teams. He has unlimited green light at TTU. That’s nothing special. Hope they last long in the championship so I get a chance to beat him myself!”
Knight pressed pause, and the TV froze on Brandon Wright’s disdainful face.
“Coach, did you call me here just to hear this?” Xu Ling asked curiously.
“Aren’t you angry?” Knight stared at him, his voice low like he was suppressing rage. “If it were Michael Jordan, he’d play a game Brandon Wright would never forget!”
“Is North Carolina in the Western Conference too?” Xu Ling asked with a smile.
“Yes, if you can lead us to the fourth game day of ‘March Madness,’ we’ll have a chance against them.”
“That’s it?” Xu Ling tilted his head, his tone carrying a hint of provocation.
“What else do you think there is?” Knight asked discontentedly.
“I thought it was that someone felt guilty for trash-talking on the night we won the Big 12 championship, causing the team to be criticized by national media, and specially called me to the office to apologize. Is that not it?”
Knight was about to erupt when Xu Ling continued: “Thanks to you, professors have been telling me these days how important the language responsibility of public figures is.”
At this moment, Knight was like a hunting dog emitting a low growl, ready to go berserk at any time.
“Looks like besides you needing a lesson.” Xu Ling’s smile grew brighter. “Someone needs to teach Brandon Wright a lesson too.”
Xu Ling walked to the door and added before leaving: “I’d be happy to be his teacher.”
