Cui nets dream opportunity

Undrafted, but undaunted — China's latest NBA prospect Cui Yongxi is taking a leap of faith as he vows to make the best out of a marginal role with the Brooklyn Nets to realize his NBA dream.

Six years since the NBA last saw a Chinese player in action, the world's No 1 league is likely to soon see another talent — the seventh so far — from its biggest overseas market shine on the big stage, after the Nets, owned by Joe Tsai, chairman of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba, signed Cui to a two-way contract as part of the franchise's preseason recruitment.

The signing, announced by the Nets on Friday, has left the majority of Chinese fans stoked about having another of their own to cheer for in the NBA, six years after Houston Rockets' 2016 second-round draft pick Zhou Qi played his final NBA game in October 2018.

Cui, a 21-year-old versatile swingman, went undrafted this summer, though, after training in the United States since completing his second season in the Chinese Basketball Association with Guangzhou Loong Lions in April.

Despite being given the cold shoulder at the 2024 NBA Draft, Cui chose to stay in the States to work out at trials with six different NBA teams, including Brooklyn, before he played in the Summer League, representing the Portland Trail Blazers on an Exhibit 10 contract.

A busy offseason has seen the CBA's Rookie of the Year (2022-23) grow stronger and sharper, eventually helping him get a foot in the door of the NBA.

Cui, known as "Jacky" abroad, remains humble, though, opting to focus on his evolution in the G League with the Long Island Nets first.

"First and foremost, I am looking forward to improving myself in the development league, hopefully I can turn some heads," Cui, a Chinese national team starter at last summer's FIBA World Cup, said during an online interview with Chinese media on Saturday.

"Then I will fight from there for a chance to earn a call-up to the NBA. I am excited, but I know the gap is there, and I have a lot of catching-up to do.

"I also expect that there will be more young players of my age in China coming out of the country to try to play at the next level overseas.

"This is the only way to raise the level of the national team collectively, so that we have a shot at returning to the Olympics through the next World Cup," said Cui, who made his international debut during Team China's disappointing FIBA World Cup campaign last summer in Manila.

With a two-way contract confirmed, Cui will split a full regular season between the G League and the NBA, should Brooklyn call him up from its Long Island affiliate on temporary basis. He is eligible to be active for up to 50 regular-season games in the NBA and will earn a modest wage in his first year, equal to half of the minimum annual salary in the NBA, which is estimated at about $578,000 before tax.

As one of the most sought-after rising stars in the CBA, Cui could have expected to land a max-salary contract worth 6 million yuan (over $850,000) a year if he chose to stay in the domestic league.

"That was never on my mind," Cui said.

"It's good enough for me to be able to play at such a high level. Money was never a concern for me. I only care about elevating my game to meet the requirement in the NBA, starting with the G League."

Standing 1.99-meters tall, with a long arm span and exceptional athleticism, the versatile forward/guard has proved he's got huge potential to be an all-rounder that adapts well to the modern game by making it into the CBA's first-team selection in just his second year. He averaged 15.8 points, 5.9 rebounds, 3.1 assists and 1.6 steals on 36.5 percent shooting from 3-point range in 56 games with the Loong Lions.

Before the draft, in May Cui was invited to the NBA G League Elite Camp in Chicago along with 44 other draft prospects, where he averaged 4.5 points and 1.5 assists in two scrimmages, and registered a max vertical of 35.5 inches in the strength and agility tests.

Later in the Summer League, Cui totaled nine points in nearly 22 minutes representing Portland across three appearances in Las Vegas, showing quite an impressive efficiency as a typical "3&D", a standard role player in the league who's good at shooting open threes and playing defense.

"He's very physical. He plays with such a great spirit. When he comes to the game, he lifts us up," Jonah Herscu, coach of Portland's Summer League team, said in a four-episode docuseries about Cui's summer produced by Tencent.

"As he continues to grow as a player, he will get more comfortable at many positions on the court. He's such a great kid, he's always about the team. He is a joy to coach."

Cui's arrival in the league has been welcomed by a group of NBA stars, including his national teammate Kyle Anderson, China's first naturalized basketball player courtesy of his maternal great-grandfather, and the Memphis Grizzlies star guard Ja Morant, who congratulated him on his signing on multiple social media platforms.

Golden State Warriors' forward Anderson, who now goes by the name "Li Kaier" in China, retweeted the Nets announcement on Friday and commented "hot pot on u Jacky Cui".

"I think he's good enough to play in our league," Anderson said during an earlier interview before the draft. "He has a real shot right now. The most important thing is for him to have fun. He's already put the work in, he works really hard. So just have fun and go do it. We all know he can do it."