On April 1, 2021, Chinese women's basketball player Zheng Haixia was inducted into the FIBA Basketball Hall of Fame.
In addition to the late legendary coach who was selected in 2019 and is also the first person in Chinese basketball,
Zheng Haixia is currently the only athlete in China to be inducted into the FIBA Hall of Fame.
Even Yao Ming was inducted into the NBA Hall of Fame.
At the same time, Zheng Haixia is also the first Asian to enter the WNBA.
She created a Zheng Haixia era,
How good has this athlete, who retired in 1998, been?
In 1967, Zheng Haixia was born into an ordinary family in Zhecheng County, Shangqiu, Henan.
Parents and siblings are normal in height, tall but not prominent,
Only Zheng Haixia was taller than her peers from childhood to adulthood.
At that time, the family was too poor to eat, and often did not have enough to eat,
Zheng Haixia often shared a steamed bun with her sister to eat, and then accompanied by a bowl of porridge,
After a while, she was hungry, and even her hunger did not affect her height development.
By the time she was 12 years old, she had grown to 172, the tallest child in the school.
And Zheng Haixia's voice is very thick, like a boy,
When she was a child, her parents often wondered if this was a genetic mutation or something.
Fortunately, Zheng Haixia has always been very healthy and likes sports, especially like balls,
And very lively, no different from other children.
In order to give a good way out for her tall daughter, her parents suggested that she enter the sports school.
In 1979, 12-year-old Zheng Haixia was admitted to Shangqiu Sports School with good physical conditions.
Became the youngest player on the basketball team.
At that time, Zheng Haixia's height was still growing, and at the same time, her feet were also growing.
It's hard to buy the right shoes, and one or two pairs of shoes that fit have to be worn during the race.
Usually, she often trains barefoot on the field and even hangs out barefoot.
There was an uncle at the sports school who looked at this barefoot girl very distressed,
He would order carpentry, so he made a pair of clogs for Zheng Haixia,
Since then, these clogs have become shoes for her to wear wherever she goes.
Zheng Haixia was the youngest in the team at that time, but the tallest,
She is also very strong, but her personality is a little girl,
I usually like to play with the sisters in the team.
Don't look at her body is particularly intimidating, but she is very afraid of itching,
As soon as she squeaked, the whole person immediately squatted on the ground and laughed.
At that time, Zheng Haixia's personality was very simple, and sometimes her sisters also liked to call her.
Let her go to the restaurant to help occupy the seat, and let her help mend the socks,
But in my heart, I like this tall sister.
Zheng Haixia was tall at that time, and her skeleton was also large, and she had to control her diet.
Otherwise, too much weight will affect the speed of running and jumping, so she can't eat snacks.
At that time, Zheng Haixia was still young when she was hungry,
The sisters often managed her, stopped her from eating, and helped her manage her diet together.
During this time in Shangqiu Sports School, Zheng Haixia was very happy,
I also made good girlfriends who talked about everything,
At that time, she liked to read Qiong Yao's novels and liked to sing Teresa Teng's songs.
He also often hummed songs while taking a bath.
At that time, the members of the sports school were bathing in the public bath, and the men's and women's bathhouses were next to each other.
Zheng Haixia's voice is very thick, and she sings in it,
People outside also thought that they had walked in the wrong bathhouse, and they did not dare to enter in an instant.
This incident became a joke in the team for a while.
The happy time of Shangqiu Sports School lasted only two years,
In 1982, Zheng Haixia was selected to join the Wuhan troops women's basketball team.
This year, she went out with the team to win the third year of the Asian Championship and the women's basketball Asian Youth Championship.
16-year-old Zheng Haixia is very prominent on the court,
It is a unique presence among the national women's basketball players,
After two major competitions, she was successfully selected for the national team.
She's still a small member of the team.
But after several years of physical training, she is no longer the little girl who was called by her sisters.
At this time, Zheng Haixia is the best in the team regardless of height, confrontation or technology.
Just a year later she became the main center, the team's top scorer,
At this time, her height has reached two meters and six meters, and she is also the tallest member of the team.
However, at the same time as the technological progress, Zheng Haixia's temper also rose,
Once, when playing in groups with teammates, one of the players played dirty.
Often use some foul small actions to block the attack,
Zheng Haixia couldn't look past it, and went up to give the other party a loud slap.
The coach immediately called Zheng Haixia aside to criticize education.
Think that she is good at her skills and has no one in sight.
But Zheng Haixia is resolute not to admit mistakes, she is very passionate about basketball,
Usually, poor character can be ignored, but you must play cleanly on the court.
The coach scolded her for being too angry and learning to solve the problem in a different way.
Only 17 years old so big temper, after 18 years old, 20 years old how to get.
As a result, Zheng Haixia replied,
I was naïve when I was 18 and matured when I was 20.
The tall and mighty Zheng Haixia is still a little girl in her heart,
But she soon ushered in the highlight of her career.
In 1984, Zheng Haixia participated in the Los Angeles Olympic Games with the national team as a center.
She hit 59 percent of her shots and helped the Chinese women's basketball team win olympic bronze medals.
In 1986, the Chinese women's basketball team won the fifth place in the World Championships.
In the same year, he won the Asian Games championship in Hancheng, and Zheng Haixia was both MVP.
After the women's basketball team won the championship, it once held a celebration at the Peace Hotel in Shanghai.
The new and old women's basketball teams are all gathered together, and Yao Ming's mother is an old women's basketball team member.
He also brought his son to the banquet.
At that time, Yao Ming was only a few years old, and his height was already very prominent,
But in front of Zheng Haixia, she was just a little friend, and she also squatted on the ground to play with Yao Ming.
Later, Yao Ming's height continued to grow wildly, and he was also facing the dilemma of not having shoes to wear.
Yao Ming also asked Zheng Haixia to borrow shoes to wear.
Before Yao Ming, Zheng Haixia was the most high-profile basketball star in the country.
She is like Zhu Ting of the women's volleyball team today, and she is the hope of the whole team to score,
The entire women's basketball team is very dependent on the offense of this big center,
She was praised by foreign journalists as the 'Great Wall of China'.
In 1992, Li Yaguang, the new coach of the Chinese women's basketball team, took office.
Began to advocate the whole team to play, change the dependence on Zheng Haixia,
The strength of the Chinese women's basketball team has been further improved.
At the 1992 Barcelona Olympic Games, the Chinese women's basketball team won the silver medal.
Under the leadership of Zheng Haixia, the women's basketball team reached the highest level in history.
In the 1980s and 1990s, the enthusiasm of the people of the whole country for sports was ignited by the women's volleyball team and women's basketball team.
Zheng Haixia's career is like a day in the sky, the most shining sports star,
She regularly receives letters from fans across the country.
Some expressed their admiration to her, some made criticisms and suggestions,
More people will express their admiration in the letter and want to get to know her.
Zheng Haixia read more romance novels and felt that love should have the accumulation of time.
For the fans' confession has always felt unreliable,
But a friend introduced her to a reliable boy.
At that time, Zheng Haixia was in her early twenties, which was the age full of fantasy,
Like many girls, the requirements for boyfriends are higher than their own,
More mature than himself, gentle and considerate, he is the girlfriend of a bird.
There are not many boys taller than Zheng Haixia, but her first love boyfriend is really taller than her.
She is also quite handsome, a college student studying in Wuhan and also a fan of hers.
The two can talk very well after getting to know each other, but Zheng Haixia mainly trains in Beijing.
Can only start a long-distance relationship, daily contact by letters,
Boyfriend will come to Beijing to see her in winter and summer, and Zheng Haixia will also visit her boyfriend when she goes to Wuhan to play games.
Although the gathering is less and more, both are very romantic.
However, when the boyfriend graduated, the two had a disagreement.
But Zheng Haixia wants her boyfriend to come to Beijing to work, after all, her career is in Beijing.
However, the boyfriend wants to work his own and does not want to be called Zheng Haixia's boyfriend.
The two began to quarrel and had a cold war for a while.
After both sides were calm for a while, Zheng Haixia asked her boyfriend again what she thought.
At this time, the boyfriend drew a picture for her, and there was a small grass under a big tree,
Zheng Haixia is the big tree, and her boyfriend is Xiaocao, and he doesn't want to live under the shade of Zheng Haixia anymore.
The two romantically broke up, although Zheng Haixia once regretted it,
But she couldn't give up her career, and her boyfriend soon got married and had children.
However, the two are still very good friends, and the boy is also facing the dilemma of having big feet and no shoes to wear.
As an athlete, Zheng Haixia is fully equipped, and she sends at least eight pairs of shoes to her ex-boyfriend every year.
Zheng Haixia, who lost love, killed all sides on the field, but as she grew older, injuries have found her.
At the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta, she could not support the fierce confrontation due to physical reasons.
The Chinese team failed to reach the top eight at the Olympics.
However, this year at the WNBA draft in the United States,
Zheng Haixia was selected by the Los Angeles Sparks with the 16th pick in the second round.
She became the first Asian athlete to land in the WNBA.
In 28 games in a season, she made 21 starts,
The shooting percentage is as high as 61.8%, which is probably only comparable to Yao Ming.
Kobe Bryant was a newcomer in the NBA at the time, and O'Neal always missed the free throw.
Zheng Haixia's playing style was once an example for them to learn.
And Zheng Haixia, who has a simple personality, quickly integrated into foreign players.
She was fierce and fast on the pitch, while off the pitch she was smiling brightly.
But at this time, Zheng Haixia's injury was already very serious,
Her knee joints were badly worn, and her lumbar disc was protruding,
Many times she could only rest on her stomach.
After the end of the WNBA trip, Zheng Haixia is 32 years old,
Her physical condition has not allowed her to play again,
In 1998, Zheng Haixia officially announced her retirement.
Ended the Era of Zheng Haixia in the Chinese women's basketball team.
After retiring from the army, Zheng Haixia entered the Bayi women's basketball team to become a team leader, assisting the head coach to do a good job in teaching and training.
At the same time, she also underwent meniscus surgery on both knees, and both meniscuses were removed.
That meant she could barely run, couldn't jump.
But as long as Zheng Haixia stands on the court, she always forgets her own injuries.
As the team leader, she often needs to teach the players to play by hand.
Inevitably, she had to demonstrate in person, and at this time she always forgot about the knee injury,
Every full throw in was a huge loss to her body.
Family and friends, while feeling sorry for her, hope that someone can take care of her,
Zheng Haixia, who is over 30 years old, has also undergone some changes in her mate selection criteria.
When participating in the talk show "Lu Yu Has a Date",
Zheng Haixia has lowered her height requirements, as long as it is more than one meter and eight, it is acceptable.
But her heart is still full of imagination for love, thinking that people who like herself must stand the test of time.
Must be relentless pursuit of her, long-term like her, is the love she wants.
When Zheng Haixia said the criteria for choosing a mate, Xu Qinghua in front of the TV set was moved.
He used to be a basketball player, and he and his mother were fans of Zheng Haixia.
Xu's mother also encouraged her son to pursue Zheng Haixia.
But at that time, Zheng Haixia was too brilliant, making Xu Qinghua ashamed of himself.
Always silently paying attention to her, but never taking a step.
When he saw "Lu Yu has a date", he suddenly felt that he had hope,
He is one meter nine tall, fully qualified,
After much deliberation, he wrote his first confessional letter,
And left his contact information at the end of the article.
Zheng Haixia did reply to him, replying to a text message,
But she politely rejected Xu Qinghua's admiration and felt that it was not realistic for the two to fall in love.
However, Xu Qinghua was not frustrated, and he began to text Zheng Haixia every day.
Edit text messages every day when you can't sleep.
After a period of sms bombardment, Zheng Haixia was finally moved,
This time it is still a long-distance relationship, Zheng Haixia is in Beijing, Xu Qinghua is in Shenzhen,
But Xu Qinghua is willing to transfer to Beijing to work and live for love,
After a year of love, 43-year-old Zheng Haixia and 47-year-old Xu Qinghua officially entered the marriage hall.
The wedding of Zheng Haixia and Xu Qinghua can be called a major event in the sports world.
In order to take care of the relatives, friends and colleagues of both parties, a total of four wedding banquets were held.
After marriage, Zheng Haixia often takes her husband to the interview program to show love,
In life, she is still a little girl, and even embroidery and knitting sweaters are all in hand,
And Xu Qinghua also pampered her like a little girl.
But because of Zheng Haixia's physical reasons, the two can't have their own children.
This has also become their biggest regret.
In her career, zheng haixia, a former sports star, still has a place in the sports world.
She has been serving in the Bayi team and has now received the rank of colonel.
In contrast, Xu Qinghua's work is slightly shabby, he is just a sports officer of a street cultural station.
In the beginning, the two were often inseparable after marriage, attending various events together.
But in recent years, Zheng Haixia has always appeared alone,
Even she was the only one who posted videos of exercising at home.
I don't know if the couple's feelings have changed.
Today, Zheng Haixia is 54 years old, and the knee injury has deformed her legs.
The whole person began to hunch over a little, and every time the group photo could not stand straight, it was painful.
This year, the Chinese women's basketball team qualified for the Olympic Games and reached the quarterfinals.
Zhang Ziyu, who is only 14 years old, is 2.27 meters tall and is known as Zheng Haixia's second.
Although Zheng Haixia's era has come to an end, fans will not forget her contribution to the Chinese women's basketball team.
Being inducted into the Hall of Fame shows that World Basketball has not forgotten her.
May this tall, burly, thick-voiced meritorious athlete,
Still able to live like a little girl, healthy and happy.
| Nancy
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