China’s impact on CP3
Today is Chris Paul’s last day in Guangzhou, China where he’s been busy running basketball clinics, even finding time to dedicate a local court while he’s there. Paul’s gratefulness is what ultimately compelled him to be the same Good Samaritan to Guangzhou, China that he’s been to New Orleans. He’s not only been busy adding around 10 pounds of muscle to his frame and taking care of his new son, he’s all the while been trying to do around the world what he does best, be a leader.
He considers Team USA’s tour last year for the Beijing Olympics a blessing and an experience he will never forget. “It’s still something I can’t totally grasp” Paul said of the idea that people across the world know who he is and genuinely want to watch him play. He was so inspired that he decided to tweak the design on his Jordan CP3 IIs, creating a special China Edition of the shoe. Added on it are Chinese characters for numbers that have had great significance in Paul’s life. The number 106 is on the shoe to signify the league record for consecutive games with at least one steal. The year Paul was born, 1985, is also recorded on the shoe. It was the Chinese year of the Ox that year. It’s not the coolest animal, but parts of the description actually fit Paul’s character and work ethic quite well. Perhaps the most important character on the shoe represents the number 61. This was the amount of points Paul scored in his high school game after his 61-year-old grandfather, Nathaniel Jones, had been killed. After scoring 61 points, Paul purposely missed his next free throw and benched himself even though the high school state record for scoring was 66 points in a single game. Some things are just mo
re important.
Several China Editions of the Jordan CP3 II will be available in the United States, however Paul wanted to make sure plenty were available for the fans he never knew he had until the Beijing Olympics.
International approach to a preferred style of play can vary drastically between regions. “I’m excited about going back to see some of the top point guards over there…Everyone thinks we know all the tricks here in the NBA, but you can learn some different things when you travel because different players are doing different things” CP3 mentioned when asked about what he was looking forward to during his trip to China. If Paul can learn another move or two to put in his bag of tricks, we may be looking at an extremely productive 25 points and 12 assists per game season for the ever-improving Chris Paul.
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