BEIJING. Faced with the failure of its “One-Child” policy to curb overcrowding in urban areas, the People’s Republic of China is considering a wholesale expansion of televised sports in order to slow the growth of its population, already the world’s largest at 1.3 billion.
“Uh, actually I was going to stay up and watch Game 3 of the Chengu Dragons-Tianjin Bulldogs Divisional Championship Series.”
“Human fertility can be managed by robust bi-coastal rivalries such as the New York Knicks-Los Angeles Lakers from the late 60’s to the early 70’s,” noted Li Changchun, Senior Population Officer of the Communist Party of China. “When teams play on the western border, guys in the east stay up too late to have sex. When teams play on the eastern border, it ruins dinner in the west and the little woman gets all pissy and goes out for rice wine with her girl friends.”
Willis Reed: Responsible for decline in New York birth rate, 1969-1973.
While a link between late-night sports and declining birth rates has been suggested for many years, the evidence was largely anecdotal until a longitudinal study of the Boston Celtics-Los Angeles Lakers rivalry in the mid-80’s was completed. “Eighteen years after the last Celtics championship you had high school graduating classes in Massachusetts with like four kids,” noted demographer Walter Casner of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “Too many guys told their wives ‘Hold that thought, there’s only two minutes left,’ without mentioning that it takes an hour to play the last two minutes of an NBA playoff game.’”
Bird: “If it’s a boy, we’ll name him Larry Joe, right?”
China’s One-Child policy is enforced by monetary fines on urban couples who have a second child without a valid excuse, notes Pro Basketball Insider columnist Ernie Povich. “You have to approach it like the salary cap,” he says. “Do I want to use my rookie exception on little Xiang-Jiang, or wait a couple of years and give up Ling-Ling for adoption?”
“You guys had better start blocking out on rebounds, or Shanghai’s gonna hit 18 million by the fourth quarter.”
Skeptics say the program is unlikely to succeed until the quality of play in the Chinese Basketball Association improves. “You’ve got teams who can’t hit the Great Wall from three-point range,” says long-time pro scout Mitch Ross. “Most guys will eventually come to bed if a game is lousy enough, unless they’ve got money riding on it.”
Copyright 2007, Con Chapman
