Talking Balls: Ducks Win, Slopes Open & Chinese Crowds Chant

Beijing's biggest sports story of the last week is undoubtedly the Ducks beating Shanghai in the CBA season opener. Marbury and the boys dominated 94-78 to start their championship retention in style. Check out NiuBBall's five talking points on the game. Here's the pick of them:

"18,000 people shouting Su Wei sha bi at the top of their lungs was deemed too vulgar by the powers-that-be at the CBA, so much so that the league threatened to move their home court for Game 5 to some third-tier city if it continued. Ducks fans got the message and thus changed their ways from calling the Southern Tiger center a “stupid c*nt” to a more fan friendly huan Su Wei, which means “substitute Su Wei.” (It sounds better in Chinese.)

Now that’s caught on as an accepted in Beijing pop culture as an everyday saying, Ducks fans are keeping it going this season. And it’s not just being reserved for Su Wei. Last night shouts of huan Liu Wei could be heard during the National Team point guard’s free-throw routines. In a league that generally lacks creativity from in-arena fans, all of whom go with the all too familiar jia you, it’s nice to see the people change it up once in a while."

It's nice to see a bit of wit in its appropriate home and it's nice to see that snowsports are getting back to theirs. Nanshan Ski Village officially opened for the season today. Mellowparks opens next Sunday. There's more details on their website (which seems to be down at the time of writing).

Snowboarders should have also been excited to see that the slope for next Saturday's Oakley Shaun White Air & Style event is going up at the Bird's Nest. We're trying to track down more details on tickets and the itinerary; we'll have them on the site as soon as we know.

Chinese football's finest player, Zheng Zhi, was in the three-man shortlist for this year's AFC Player of the Year alongside the 2004 winner, Iran's Mohammad Ali Karimi, and South Korean striker Lee Keun-ho. ZZ said, "It's an honor for me to be nominated as the AFC Player of the Year together with two of the best footballers in Asia." He was right about one of them, as the Korean took the award when it was announced on Thursday.

Talking Balls has evidence of the first Li-Ning Adventure, the brand's outdoorwear offshoot, being opened in Beijing. The problem is that the real adventure is in finding the shop as the press release lists no address. Blue Hawaii Surf, on the other hand, is newly opened and has the very real address of Sanlitun Village.

Photo: ISPO.com.cn