Nicholas Platt, president of
the Asia Society, says the games present a unique
opportunity to promote closer ties between the
two countries. "Basketball is such a popular
sport in both countries and you have in Yao
Ming and the Rockets a connection there which
results in 200 million Chinese watching American
basketball every single week. So in people-to-people
terms this is the biggest single thing in our
relationship," he said.
Yao Ming's court skills have
helped generate publicity for the NBA in China,
so much so that that the Rockets' website even
has a special Chinese-language version. This
will be the first time the 2.50 meter-tall Chinese
Center will return to his native country as
a player for his NBA team.
More than 100 people, team owners,
sponsors and other major stakeholders of the
NBA, will accompany the athletes. NBA Vice President
Andrew Messick says China is a lucrative market
for the organization and its business partners.
"China is enormously important
to the NBA. Our brand of basketball is enormously
popular. And we think there is great opportunity
as china continues to grow and develop for basketball
in china to grow and develop," he said.
He adds that the basketball
league, which opened it's first office in Hong
Kong in 1992, has seen its business, including
selling NBA merchandise, in China double each
year for the last several years. The NBAA says
its basketball games are now beamed into more
than 300 million homes in China.
Besides Yao Ming, there are
three other Chinese basketball players in the
NBA.
With basketball's popularity
growing in China, Mr. Messick says he expects
more Chinese players to have hoop dreams. "As
players continue, as the sport continues to
grow, as there continues to be advances in the
selection and coaching and development of basketball
players in China, we do expect there will be
more Chinese players in the league and we'd
be very disappointed if there weren't,"
he said.
The promotional trip later this
year also marks the 25th anniversary of the
organization's first trip to China, when the
Washington Bullets, now known as the Washington
Wizards, played two exhibition games against
the Chinese National team.
-- Maura Fogarty - Voice of America
in New York
-- Reprinted with the permission of Voice of
America
