The Golden Age of Basketball

Chapter 40 Visualization
Thanks to Nate Thurmond's connections, Gan Guoyang became a familiar face to the Warriors.

In early November, the Warriors' games were mainly held in their home arena in Oakland and surrounding cities, giving them ample time for training.

If it happens to be a Saturday or Sunday, Gan Guoyang will get up early to help Gan Youwei with some odd jobs in the shop.

Then, in the morning, Gan Youwei would prepare more than a dozen exquisite Chinese lunch boxes, which Gan Guoyang would pack in large lunchboxes and take by bus to the Warriors' training center as the Warriors players' lunch.

The bento boxes use fresh and high-quality ingredients, and the dishes are all carefully prepared by Gan Youwei. Everyone in the Warriors team who has eaten them has praised them highly.

These lunch boxes were like "tuition fees" for Gan Guoyang's training with the Warriors, allowing him to absorb the nutrients needed for professional-level training.

For Gan Family Restaurant, their reputation will grow stronger because of basketball, making it a must-visit destination for many fans and tourists.

It seems that playing basketball is more effective at boosting restaurant business than being a chef, something Gan Youwei and Gan Bingguang never expected.

Because of his reputation in San Francisco and his frequent appearances at the Warriors' training camp, Gan Guoyang got to know the Warriors' owner, Frank Miorley.

This boss is a maverick among sports businessmen. He has an eccentric personality and a unique way of dressing. Despite his burly physique, he never wears a suit. He usually wears a jacket, leather jacket or striped shirt, plus a plaid deerstalker hat that never changes, along with his full beard, making him look like an Italian director from Hollywood.

Miorly is a sports enthusiast. He used to be a beer sales manager, and due to his work, he had business dealings with the 49ers, which led him to start producing sports programs at a radio station.

This opened up connections for him in San Francisco's sports scene, and he later became a minority owner of the 49ers.

In 1962, he and more than 30 partners pooled together just $86 to buy the Warriors.

Later, due to poor team management and Chamberlain's departure, attendance dropped significantly, and other minority shareholders withdrew one after another. He then bought all the shares and became the major owner of the Warriors.

Under his management, the Warriors had a fairly successful 70s, winning an NBA championship trophy, and now the team has entered a rebuilding phase.

After watching Gan Guoyang train a few times, Miolli really developed a strong interest in Gan Guoyang. He privately approached Gan Guoyang and asked him if he wanted to go straight into the league to play in the NBA.

If the Golden State Warriors can recruit such a talented Chinese player, their popularity in San Francisco will definitely skyrocket, which will help solve the current crisis of attendance and viewership that the Warriors and even the entire NBA are experiencing.

However, Gan Guoyang rationally rejected Miolli's temptation, saying that he was too young and wanted to go to university instead of plunging headfirst into the murky world of professional sports.

During his time auditing Warriors training sessions, Gan Guoyang personally experienced firsthand that beneath the glamorous facade of the NBA, there were all sorts of lice crawling around.

Bernard King made no secret of telling Gan Guoyang that he had been troubled by alcoholism and scandals, but he has now come out of it. However, he did not recommend that Gan Guoyang enter the league too early.

He also said that more than half of the players in the league may have a history of using banned substances, more than two-thirds of them are alcoholics or gamblers, and more than 90% of them are womanizers and dissolute.

"If you haven't built a strong foundation for yourself, it's best not to enter this melting pot. Many things need to be washed away, and it's not so easy."

Bernard King gave Gan Guoyang earnest advice, and after coming to the Bay Area, he has completely changed and become a new person.

However, Gan Guoyang was not in a hurry to join the league, not because he was afraid of being corrupted by the league's atmosphere, but because he was confident in his willpower.

His concerns still stemmed from basketball skills and experience; he knew that once he joined a professional team, the opportunities to improve his skills would be fewer.

A professional team coach can't provide the same level of meticulous guidance on fundamental skills and tactical foundation as a high school or college coach.

Everyone plays for a professional team to work. Coaches are under a lot of pressure to achieve results. It's not about learning or improving. The goal of playing is to win, so whoever is the best plays.

After facing off against professional players from the Warriors, Gan Guoyang's confidence has been boosted. He believes that he can now play as a secondary offensive player and an excellent defender in a professional team.

But his goals go far beyond that, so how could he possibly step into the professional arena rashly for short-term gains and fleeting fame?

Moreover, there's simply no place for him on the Warriors' current roster, and he has no intention of being a backup for Joe Barry Carroll—that guy's average training time at the Warriors' gym might not even be as long as Gan Guoyang's.

Gan Guoyang's skills continued to improve steadily, and the gap between him and his teammates was widening.

However, he didn't tell anyone about his training with the Warriors, so the Water Bell team members were unaware that their leader's skill level had improved again. Gan Guohui only knew that Gan Guoyang had disappeared when he woke up on weekend afternoons these past few weeks, assuming he had also gone on a date.

Even Berman didn't know that the team's training fanatic didn't rest on his rest days, but instead went to a professional team for extra training.

Back then, sports media wasn't as developed, and the NBA was largely ignored. Unless you were paying close attention to related news, it would be hard for anyone to notice that in a corner of a newspaper's sports section, a reporter had recorded "Gan, the Chinese center for the Waterbell team, training with the Warriors' players at the training facility" as an interesting anecdote.

On November 13th, the regular season of the CIF San Francisco Conference High School Basketball Tournament for boys officially kicked off at Kaizar Gymnasium.

The games will run from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM, with two matches in the morning and two in the afternoon, proceeding in sequence.

It was clearly a wise decision for Beiqiao Middle School to rent Keizar for a warm-up match with Lihua in August.

Since October, various league sports competitions have been coming one after another, and Keizar's schedule has been fully booked.

In addition to men's and women's basketball competitions for all age groups, the CIF League also hosts volleyball, badminton, boxing, and indoor track and field events, all of which are held in this old stadium, and everyone has to queue up.

The Water Clock team's game was scheduled for 2:00 PM to 3:30 PM, against the mediocre Balboa High School.

Balboa High School is a historic public school in San Francisco, but its athletic strengths are in football and volleyball, while its basketball team is only average.

As the first touchstone on the Water Bell team's path to advancement, Gan Guoyang did not hold back in the game, dominating both offense and defense from the very first minute.

In high school basketball games, if there's a large skill gap, the point difference can be quite outrageous, since student teams are often very weak.

The men are slightly better off, but the women are even more terrifying, with the score difference sometimes reaching 60, 70, or even over 100.

Balboa High School is slightly better than Lihua High School, but in Gan Guoyang's eyes they are the same; they are too short and too slow.

When he guards the paint, it becomes very difficult for the opponent to score.

However, what surprised Berman was Gan Guoyang's attack.

In a low post attack, he surprisingly managed to score two points with a quick turnaround jump shot after receiving the ball, even against a defender who was shorter than him.

Berman had never seen this technique used in matches or training before.

Previously, Gan Guoyang's offensive strategy when receiving the ball in the low post mainly involved driving into the basket and then laying it off or dunking.

This kind of skillful and quick turnaround jump shot was something that Bellman and his teammates had never seen before.

The point difference was widened to 20 points in the first half, and Bellman called a timeout to substitute Gan Guoyang.

He asked, "You just used a turnaround jump shot? When did you learn that?"

Gan Guoyang said, "It's been recently."

"Recently? I haven't seen you practicing at all."

"I used visualization techniques."

"Visual...what? What the hell are you talking about?"

"This is a way professional players improve their skills. Uh... it's about imagining it in your head."

Behrman looked puzzled and cursed, "Gan, if you keep spouting nonsense and trying to fool me, I'll hang myself in front of your restaurant."

(End of this chapter)