Results tagged “shanghaisharks”

Oh no, it looks like Yao Ming hasn’t bought the Shanghai Sharks after all. Instead, all they’ve signed on to be is an “entrusted investor” for the next five years. Despite agreeing in July to transfer stakes in the Sharks to Yao, it seems that those stakes will now be sold on the open market. But those who worry that this just means even more disappointments for Sharks fans needn’t: Yao has said that even though he’s not the owner, he’ll be doing everything he can to improve the team’s performance.

We guess even if Yao Ming's foot takes him away from playing the game, it doesn't mean he's out of basketball. The superstar athlete is becoming the new boss of his former team, the Shanghai Sharks. In what China Daily calls the highest profile deal in Chinese Basketball Association history, Yao Ming signed an agreement with all three of Shanghai Shark's current shareholders to buy their stakes. The 2.26m center said he is willing to “pay back his home team and Shanghai where he started his basketball career” and will “help Shanghai return to glory.” The last CBA championship the Sharks won was in the 2001-02 season with the help of Yao. Since he's left, the team's fallen into dire straits, placing second last most recently.

While we were wondering why neither ESPN Asia nor Star Sports on our satellite system was showing the Dallas Mavericks-Golden State Warriors game this morning, we noticed a clip on ESPN video that talked about NBA commissioner David Stern expressing interest in setting up a joint venture hoops league in China. We stopped going to Shanghai Sharks games a few years ago because the team didn't seem to care too much about its fans, so we think this has to be good news:

The Shanghai Sharks are not just a bad basketball team -- they haven't made the CBA playoffs since winning the league title in 2002 (Yao Ming's final season) -- they are cheaters, as well. Statisticians at Shanghai's final home game of the season credited Sharks guard Liu Wei with 16 assists, enough to assure Liu the regular season league assists crown. One problem: Liu only has seven assists in that game.

China may have found the oft-discussed "next Yao Ming." Of course he is only 13 years old, so we'll have to wait a while to find out. But according to the Wenhui Daily, Tian Yuchen is already 205 cm tall -- that's almost 6-foot-9. When Yao Ming was 13, he was "only" 197 cm. Tian is from Changchun in Jilin province and he's already a member of the Shanghai Sharks youth team, the same place Yao got his start. The paper said Tian is considered the "secret weapon" for the Sharks' much-needed CBA turnaround (they are currently 3-5 and dead last in the CBA South Division standings). Tian is actually being trained to play as a guard and he's already signed an endorsement deal with athletic apparel brand Li Ning.

Watch out! The Chinese Basketball Association (CBA) is moving toward "real professionaliztion." Their grand scheme, called the "Polarstar Project," launches this Sunday with the start of the 2005-2006 season, the league's tenth year of existence.

Shanghai's model worker Yao Ming has decided not to represent his hometown in the Chinese National Games, which begin this October in Jiangsu Province.