The Golden Age of Basketball-Chapter 1839 - 73: A Ray of Light

["Basketball owes me nothing, my whole life is owed to basketball."

"I am 37 years old, and my wealth has exceeded my wildest dreams."

"When I entered the League in 1984, I just wanted to make a million dollars for my grandmother, work here for ten years and then retire, and find a high school as a basketball coach."

"Now, I have material wealth, many people know me, I have been to many places around the world, and all of this is thanks to basketball."

"Now that I have a championship trophy, I think I can die without regrets."

On that night of celebration after Game 5 of the finals in June 2000, many people may have overlooked that it was not just Sunny Gan's retirement battle, but also Charles Barkley's last game.

Of course, Barkley didn't care, he enjoyed the championship, champagne, and beer in the locker room, drenched all over, hugging the trophy in front of the locker, and expressing his romance with basketball.

Unlike Gan's optimism and refusal of sadness, Barkley, the tough guy, was more sentimental, his usually loud voice now soft-spoken, with a contemplative, humble tone, putting aside all his former arrogance.

He said he never thought he would become one of the 50 greatest stars or be inducted into the Hall of Fame, but his achievements and stats speak for themselves.

Career 1125 games, averaging 22.1 points, 11.6 rebounds, and 4 assists, one of the best offensive rebounders in history.

11-time All-Star, 12-time NBA All-NBA Team, one-time regular-season MVP, and one NBA championship.

As of the publication of this book, he is the eighth player in the League history to score 20,000 points, 10,000 rebounds, and 4,000 assists, and he is the shortest one.

How did all this happen? He made too many mistakes, mistakes that could ruin a person's life if made once, yet he solved them one by one, eventually pushing his success and charm worldwide.

That night, the Portland Trail Blazers Team locker room was mixed with joy and sorrow, and such a situation may never occur again.

They won the championship, and almost half of the players were about to retire or consider retiring.

Apart from Ah Gan and Barkley, Sabonis, Dell Curry, AC Green, Chris Mullin, Terry Porter might leave the League.

Eventually, Sabonis left, Chris Mullin retired, Terry Porter decided to leave Portland after some entanglement with the management, to play in another city, wanting to enjoy a relatively easy basketball life (but fate later played a joke on him).

Dell Curry and AC Green continued to stay with the Trail Blazers, Curry cultivated his son here, while AC Green created a historical consecutive appearance record.

Charles Barkley finally said: "I'm finally leaving, actually the hardest part is, from now on, anything I do for the rest of my life will hardly come close to the achievements I made in basketball over the past 16 years. Such a life... may be very challenging."]

————Excerpt from Charles Barkley Biography, "Barkley," published in 2022, authored by Mote Bella.

Charles Barkley quickly faced a challenge after retiring.

Having completed his deeds with the championship in June, Barkley opened his own celebration.

The first thing he did was feast, on championship night he drank six bottles of champagne, then went to McDonald's and ordered 30 Big Macs to reward himself.

This season, to control his weight, he paid too much, he had long been famished, his desire for food was the same as his desire for the championship.

For some time afterward, Barkley didn't control his diet at all, he ate and drank freely, traveled around, his weight quickly soared back to 300 pounds.

Unlike Gan Guoyang, who was looking to the future with many things to do, Charles Barkley just wanted to enjoy, enjoy the beautiful retired life right now.

After earning a lot of money and gaining huge fame over the past 16 years, he temporarily didn't need to worry about work, he played, traveled, and participated in various talk shows.

Barkley planned, he would not touch basketball for 16 months, live over a year without basketball, never stepping into the training ground.

However, this plan was implemented for just over a month when Barkley received a call from Gan Guoyang, asking him to return to Oregon, to Mackenzie Valley in Eugene City, to the American Basketball Academy.

"What? American Basketball Academy? I already planned not to touch basketball for a year, what do you want me there for? I'm not going!"

"Plans can't keep up with changes, I originally planned to be President of America, change your plan and come to Eugene. I've already booked your plane ticket, everything is arranged. Also, you need to lose weight to under 300 pounds within a week, or you can't play well."

"What? I still have to play? I have to lose weight? Listen to you, Sunny? I won't go, absolutely not!"

"I found you a job at Turner Television, the salary is very high, the contract is very long, and there's a signing bonus. Once I'm done here, you can start working. The contract is here with me, are you coming or not?"

Barkley was silent on the phone for three seconds, and said: "Can you give me 10 days to drop to 300 pounds? A week is too short."

"Whatever you say, anyway, you need to lose it, when you get to Eugene, I don't want you to be mistaken for a grizzly bear. You should really control your weight, Charles, for your health and future work. Okay, consider me nosy, I'm getting old, anyway, hurry along, buddy."