As in his two previous workouts, Xu Ling completed the athletic testing and then the technical testing. The feedback he got was about the same as in Portland and Seattle.
But Jerry West didn't say much. He simply had Xu Ling rest a while, then moved on to the next stage of the testing. Just as West had said beforehand, a Grizzlies player was in the gym today, and West wanted Xu Ling to go up against him in a real matchup.
Normally, players rarely involve themselves in team business during the offseason. This was supposed to be their precious vacation—who would be willing to leave the beach and the sunshine to come do unpaid work for the team?
But there are always exceptions. Certain veterans—those with a strong professional ethic, or those already paving the way toward coaching or even the front office—actually treasure such opportunities. They don't mind trading a bit of their rare rest for more experience and a stronger say.
Eddie Jones was exactly that kind of person.
A veteran who had entered the league back in the 1990s, Jones was already in the twilight of his career. But he had long since mapped out his next step: after retiring, he would move into player development as a coach and go on shining his light and warmth inside the NBA—and, along the way, keep milking NBA teams for their coins.
So when Jerry West called him personally to ask him to come help with this workout, he agreed without a second thought. He arrived at the gym early, changed into his gear, and leaned against the wall, sizing up Xu Ling as he walked in. When their eyes met, Jones's mouth curled up, and he spoke in that tone peculiar to veterans—half teasing, straight to the point: "Hey, so you're the Chinese kid who threw in that half-court game-winner?"
He came forward as he spoke. There was none of West's cold scrutiny in his eyes; instead, there was the instinctive attention a battle-tested competitor pays to technical detail. He didn't extend a hand for pleasantries. Instead he casually scooped up a basketball and spun it twice on his fingertips.
"I've seen the clip of that shot. You got lucky," Jones said, raising an eyebrow. His tone sounded like a challenge, but there was a testing smile hidden in his eyes. "Though out here, luck alone won't get you very far. Let's see what you've actually got."
Without question, Eddie Jones counted among the shining stars in the long river of NBA history. Another proof of Jerry West's eye in the draft, he had arrived in Los Angeles as the tenth pick of the first round just as the afterglow of the Lakers' Showtime dynasty was fading. He quickly broke into the starting lineup and played at an All-Star level; for a while he was seen as the face of the next era in the City of Angels.
But fate took a turn in 1996. Shaquille O'Neal dropped out of the sky into LA, and that same year the Lakers traded All-Star center Vlade Divac for an unknown 13th-pick high school guard. In an instant, Jones seemed destined to live in O'Neal's shadow as the purple-and-gold's second option. Yet he soon found that the raw high schooler was growing at an astonishing, almost feral rate—not only completely taking over his place in the team's schemes, but eating away at his future in this city as well. He might not even hold the second seat securely; he had to step back to third. And in the end, the Lakers' front office decided he couldn't even fill the third-option role, and a single trade sent him to Charlotte in exchange for Glen Rice.
In Charlotte, Jones reached the peak of his individual numbers, but he also seemed to have touched the ceiling. His career would bring no greater team achievement; he drifted from team to team, though he did have moments of holding future superstars like Kobe Bryant and Dwyane Wade on the bench. In the twilight of his career, after circling all the way around, he returned to his old mentor West and gave off the last of his heat in Memphis. Halfway through last season, the championship-hungry Heat had wanted to trade for Jones to add bench depth, but after West came back from scouting in the NCAA, he halted every trade talk, as if a major change were about to come to the team.
Jones never went to Miami, and he also never expected to get a call from the Logo himself during the offseason—asking him to come work out Eli Xu, who had been on a hot streak lately.
Now, hearing a greeting as familiar as one traded between old friends, Xu Ling only raised an eyebrow slightly. His tone was calm, even faintly, purely puzzled: "Oh, you've seen my games? Sorry, I don't believe I caught your name. You are?"
The smile froze instantly on Jones's face. He had anticipated surprise, admiration, even defiance—but never once expected to run headlong into such frank and complete ignorance. The air seemed to pause for half a second.
Then, as if he'd heard a priceless joke, Jones threw his head back and burst out laughing, the sound echoing through the empty gym, full of self-mockery and disbelief.
"Hahaha—nice, kid. You're starting to interest me." Jones stopped laughing and shook his head, but the amused interest in his eyes was far thicker than before.
He casually tossed the ball to Xu Ling, a little too hard, with a hint of provocation.
"No problem," Jones said, grinning wide enough to show a row of white teeth, a smile that had finally taken on real, undisguised fighting spirit. "After this one, I guarantee you won't forget the name Eddie Jones for the rest of your life."
Eddie Jones?
The name left no impression on Xu Ling whatsoever. Still, judging by the man's reaction, he supposed the guy must have been somebody in the NBA once. But so what?
Greatness is always only momentary.
After Westbrook completed the NBA's first season of averaging a triple-double, he had already carved his name into basketball history, even if he never did win a championship. All the more so because he went on to pull off the same feat in each of the next two seasons.
But that did nothing to stop his personal reputation from collapsing sharply after he joined the Lakers. Once the talent begins to ebb, the brilliance created at one's peak seems to lose all weight—either you exit with dignity, or you receive fan letters threatening your life; either you slide from a max contract all the way down to the minimum and still nobody wants you; or, on a fine, clear day, you go in a good mood and volunteer to help your team work out a rookie, and all you get in return is: "Who are you?"
Such is the world of sports, at once so devoted and so merciless. In a given generation, perhaps fewer than ten people manage to truly pass their influence on to the next. And even those who do see the traces of that influence gradually diluted with every generation that follows, until at last it scatters. In the end, no one escapes the fate of being forgotten.
The one-on-one workout was an old NBA staple that had been locked away for a long time.
The most famous one-on-one workout in NBA history belonged to Yao Ming back in the day. Under the gaze of all 28 teams in the league (there were no Bobcats yet, and the Lakers didn't send anyone), he showed his skills and his potential, and with an impeccable performance he locked himself firmly into the No. 1 pick slot.
But times have changed, and today's top prospects no longer take part in this kind of open workout. At most, they accept a brief, closed private workout with a handful of teams, wrapping themselves in mystery and expectation.
For Xu Ling, his willingness to accept a one-on-one live scrimmage today had two reasons. For one, this was the last team on his workout tour, so he no longer needed to hold anything back. For another, he had not yet fully transformed into that kind of favored child of heaven who had bathed in the spotlight since childhood, so confident it verged on arrogance—the typical star mentality that believes a slight display of talent is enough to make a team fall for him.
And so Xu Ling's one-on-one against Eddie Jones began under the eyes of the whole Grizzlies contingent.
Jones tossed the ball to Xu Ling, lowered his center of gravity slightly, and made a "go ahead" gesture, indicating that Xu Ling would attack first.
Xu Ling caught the ball without much hesitation. He meant to settle this quickly and build an advantage in the most direct way possible—overwhelm the man with the unstoppable explosiveness of youth and drive hard from the right! His right foot stomped down, his body shot out like an arrow off the string, and his first step was so fast it nearly pulled a gust of wind along with it.
But in that tiny window as his weight tipped forward and the ball bounced up off the floor, a veteran's hand, as if it had predicted every possible script, cut precisely into the path of his dribble!
Slap!
Fingertips grazed the edge of the ball. They didn't quite strip it, but that was enough to knock it off its course and instantly scramble every bit of Xu Ling's drive rhythm. Xu Ling stumbled a step and hurriedly scooped the ball back.
In the flash of an instant, Xu Ling put away any last trace of underestimation. He steadied himself, reset his stance on the perimeter, and his eyes were already different.
He realized that this veteran before him, seemingly in the twilight of his career, might be the finest, smartest—and possibly the most troublesome—defender he had encountered since he entered the world of basketball. Pure speed, against that unsolvable anticipation and those eyes that seemed to see through everything, lost much of its effect.
If speed wouldn't do, then slow it down.
Xu Ling drew a deep breath, and his rhythm shifted abruptly. He no longer sought to beat his man with one step; instead, he began probing for a weakness with dribbling whose tempo kept changing.
Jones stuck to him like a shadow and didn't lose position, but Xu Ling keenly caught the almost imperceptible shift of Jones's weight backward. Using that fleeting sliver of space, Xu Ling rose from the floor for a textbook mid-range pull-up jumper. The ball carved an extremely high arc, clearing the fingertips of Jones's last-ditch block, and dropped through the net without touching the rim.
Bucket.
Xu Ling held his follow-through, looking at the veteran before him, whose career was full of stories. The corner of his mouth lifted, and he said lightly, in a tone that mixed respect with provocation, "Looks like just knowing your name isn't enough. I need to know where your defense is going to go next."
Jones picked up the ball. Nothing showed on his face, but his mouth was busy enough: "Lucky shot, kid. A slow-as-molasses jumper like that—how many chances do you think you'd get in a real game?"
Xu Ling just smiled and didn't answer.
The next few possessions became a condensed exhibition of Xu Ling's individual offense.
On the next one, Xu Ling exploded off the dribble straight into a hard drive, winning position with his first step, then stopped on a dime after the contact and rose right up to shoot. Jones leapt with everything he had, but his fingertips always came up a length short of the ball. It went in again.
The next possession, Xu Ling backed into him and, catching the instant Jones threw his full weight into the chest-up, spun swiftly and took the baseline, sliding past in a single step. Jones's feet were as if nailed to the floor; he could only turn his head and watch Xu Ling reach the basket for the dunk.
After that, Xu Ling used a jab step to lift Jones's weight onto his heels, then immediately accelerated at full power, simply eating him alive on pure explosiveness and slicing into the paint to score.
Those few possessions went by in a flash. Jones's judgment was still there, his instincts still elite, and each time he seemed to have read Xu Ling's intent in advance. But his legs had utterly betrayed his brain, and that half-step of delay was an uncrossable chasm at the highest level of competition.
Once more, Jones's defense got shaken off, and Xu Ling scored on a stop-and-pop jumper.
When Xu Ling used a left feint into a pump fake to lift the lunging Jones off the ground, then smoothly slid a step to his right and rose unhurriedly beyond the three-point line to knock the shot down, Jerry West raised a hand on the sideline and said calmly, "That's enough."
Everything had been settled by the end of the very first possession.
Xu Ling's seemingly sluggish first attack had in fact been a series of delicate probes that mapped out the final limit of Jones's defense. That was why, in the possessions that followed, each one was cut cleanly through within three dribbles.
What Xu Ling displayed was a maturity far beyond that of a 19-year-old: elite explosiveness and shooting touch, a sharp read of the defense, precise command of spacing and rhythm. West had assessed countless talents in his life, but scenes that made him this certain—certain that a player was worth betting everything on, worth staking his whole reputation to get—had happened only twice in his life.
The last time was in 1996, with a young man named Kobe Bryant. And today, the draft comparison for the young man standing in front of him was precisely Kobe.
A familiar, almost shudder-inducing certainty seized him. He saw the possibility of repeating history, even surpassing it.
Yet at the very moment that hot rush surged up in him, a deeper chill invaded as well. A sharp question—not about Xu Ling, but about himself, about Memphis:
Did they deserve it?
More precisely—did he deserve it?
Was he worthy of taking up the dice of fate once more, of bringing this nearly perfect talent into the team he was trying to rebuild?
Jerry West thought with a self-destructive, almost crazed intensity.
Then he heard his female assistant, Laura Granick, say excitedly, "Jerry, we can't let this kid get away!"
"Yes," West said quietly. "We have to get him."
And so a rational judgment doused all that speculation about who did or didn't deserve it.
Chapter 51