What does Gilbert Arenas, three-time NBA All-Star, do before CBA games in Shanghai?

Watch YouTube, of course. We know this thanks to Donald Mahoney of the video series Donnie Does.

“I watched you on YouTube before I got here,” Arenas tells Donnie in the tunnel before a Sharks home game. “You’re funny as shit.”

“How you liking Shanghai?”

“It’s fun.”

“Let’s grab a beer sometime.”

“Aight.”

Beijing’s Stephon Marbury also makes a cameo. 2:20 mark. Don’t miss it.

Less than a week after Tracy McGrady drilled a game-winner on the road against Liaoning, this season’s other big import from the NBA, Gilbert Arenas, showed everyone he has some clutch bones in him as well. With the clock winding down and the Shanghai Sharks down 94-93 in Nanjing, on the home court of the Jiangsu Dragons, Arenas made his move, which you can watch in the video above.

As described by Shark Fin Hoops:

Knowing that Arenas would undoubtably have the last play of the game, Jiangsu then attempted to double-team him on the perimeter after the restart. As Meng Da came across to force the Sharks’ player onto his left hand side, the plan was presumably for Yi Li to come right up the middle and get a hand up in Arenas’ face so as to make the shot harder. Instead, Yi seemed to try to take a charge and was duly dumped on his backside by the stronger American who was already driving to the basket as the Jiangsu player came towards him.

With an open look at the basket from the edge of the paint, Arenas was money and the game was done. The Sharks had got lucky at the best possible time and Yi, who had started the game with a cocksure breakaway dunk was left to walk off the court with egg very much on his face.

Arenas scored 25 points and grabbed 18 rebounds.

Game highlights:

Interview:

Jiangsu Dragons 94 – Shanghai Sharks 95: Arenas’ Snatches Victory For Sharks (Shark Fin Hoops)

On Tuesday, Gilbert Arenas played his first game since November 24 — when he pulled up lame after just six minutes in Beijing – and it was apparent he wasn’t completely healthy. He limped to the bench in the first half, fueling the same questions that reporters asked last month: is he physically fit to compete?

Arenas would come back in the second half, but his skills, sadly, remained conspicuously absent, as he recorded just five points and seven assists in a 103-96 loss at Guangdong. Yi Jianlian, playing for the Southern Tigers, scored 15 points and grabbed nine boards.

To be fair to Arenas and the Shanghai Sharks — currently sitting in second-to-last place, while Guangdong is at the top — they were never supposed to win this game, and staying within single digits on the road is probably an accomplishment in itself. We have to ask again though: what’s up with Agent Zero? Like Tracy McGrady, another aging former NBA Dream Teamer in China, Arenas is proving to be a dud. Only McGrady’s Qingdao Double Star Eagles, in fact, is worse than Arenas’s Shanghai.

Meanwhile, Stephon Marbury’s Beijing Ducks are tied for first place with Guangdong. The two teams meet next week Tuesday in Dongguan, Guangdong province — the Chinese Basketball Association’s version of a Christmas Day headliner.

Qu Shitao, a student at Donghua University of Science and Technology in Jiangxi province, lost his right leg when he was three years old, but that hasn’t stopped him from playing the sport he loves.

When fellow students first saw him hit the outdoor courts, they weren’t sure how to react. Go easy on him, right? But Qu, with his trademark spinning layup — pivoting on his crutch, which he upgraded to a metallic version for better handling — proved he could hang with his competition. No one plays defense in China’s pickup basketball scene, anyway.

Qu’s story was publicized on Sina Weibo last month, and it wasn’t long that the media came calling. (In the newscast above though, couldn’t they have shown him making just one jumpshot?) China Hush reports:

He met with Yao Ming recently and was surprised by his newfound fame. According to QQ Sports:

A few days ago, Qu Shitao told a reporter over the telephone that when he went to Shanghai and met with Yao Ming, people had come from thousands of miles a way to hear him speak. He had never imagined that his dream would become a reality like this.

…After two days had passed, Qu was still quite in awe of the whole experience. “Shanghai, walking around here, like I said earlier, today was an amazing day. Thank you to Big Yao for caring about me! Sad to say goodbye!!!” Those were his comments before leaving on Tencent Weibo. It was his first time to go to Shanghai and his first time to see a CBA competition.

Below, in Shanghai, that sure looks like Gilbert Arenas with a hand on his hip, watching Qu, probably wondering if he’ll ever put forth half the effort of this one-legged player.

Qu shows off more of his skills in the video below. The picture is via @TencentSports.

Saturday night’s CBA season opener brought out the stars. The world’s best badminton player, Lin Dan, and probably best female diver, Wu Minxia, were in attendance. Li Ning threw the ceremonial jump ball. Shanghai Sharks owner Yao Ming was in the stands. But the biggest attraction was on the floor, in the form of former Dream Teamers Stephon Marbury and Gilbert Arenas — two of only three Team USA Basketball players to compete in the CBA — who were expected to duel deep into the game.

That didn’t work out as planned. Arenas hobbled to the bench barely six minutes in — check out the entirety of the minutes he played in the video above (after the jump on Youku for those in China). He pulls up limp at the 8:22 mark, in what was originally diagnosed as a strained groin. The injury has since been described by Xinmin Evening News as an “intramuscular strain of the right thigh” (though “groin injury” still seems like the popular diagnosis).

The journalist who wrote the Xinmin piece also noticed that Arenas was very lackadaisical during pre-game warmups and the layup line. When he asked Shanghai head coach Dan Panaggio whether Arenas’s old injury made him ill-prepared to play, Panaggio seemed defensive: “Who thinks that?”

Arenas is out for at least a week, and past that — who knows? Judging by the gloom around the team, it seems likely he’ll be sitting for a lot longer.

Even with former Charlotte Bobcats forward DJ White, Shanghai will have a tough time without its premiere offseason signee. This is the very epitome of small sample size, but let it be symbolic: during the Beijing game, on their very first possession, the Sharks didn’t get Arenas the ball; in the first possession after a timeout, only he got the ball. The latter worked out much better for the Sharks, as Arenas drained a three-pointer (forward to the 6:30 mark).

Savor it, Agent Zero fans. It could be the only shot he makes all season.

Before Beijing and Shanghai tipped off the 2012-13 Chinese Basketball Association season last night, there was a 30-minute pre-game ceremony in which players and coaches from last year’s championship-winning team — that would be the Beijing Ducks, if you’re just joining in — received medals, awards, and a championship banner. All that was normal. Then there was music in the form of Chinese folk rock, half-rapped, half-sung in Old Beijing dialect, with electric guitars, a pipa, and erhu. As background, there were caged birds, a costumed Peking Opera player, and candied hawthorns. Following that, a man and woman took center court and sang amid a flag team, with more Peking Opera players. Near the end, the man and woman began screaming like Fergie at the Super Bowl while CCTV-5′s commentators talked over them, reminiscing over last season. The crowd sat on their hands. Yes, it was weird.

To give you an idea of how the game went — a 94-78 victory for Beijing that didn’t feel that close — let me recap for you Shanghai’s first five possessions after winning the tip:

• Passes ball around to everyone except Gilbert Arenas. Result: miss (massive brick)
• Shot blocked, shot blocked
• Airball from wide open shooter
• Agent Zero throws it away
• Dribbles out of bounds

Coming out of a timeout with his team down 10-2, Arenas decided to do something. The first shot of his CBA career, naturally, would be a fallaway three-pointer, and of course he’d nail it.

That would be the last shot he’d take all game.

Just after six minutes had elapsed, Arenas would come up limp on the offensive end. He’d try to play defense, but the announcers immediately noticed something was wrong. He then exited the game, and eventually left the bench area. When he returned to the bench in the second half, he gave no indication of being able to play again, and he didn’t. No one was sadder for his departure, we’re sure, than his backcourt mate, National Teamer Liu Wei, who finished with a crummy line of 13 points, 2 assists, 5 turnovers.

It turns out Arenas strained his groin. The extent of the injury is unknown at the moment, but as mentioned, he played one possession on that injury, then took a seat and made no indication that he wanted to play more. We should note again that, as mentioned, the game was pretty much over within three minutes. (UPDATE, 11/26, 10:54 am: Here’s video of all 6 minutes, 10 seconds that Gilbert Arenas was on the court.)

The Ducks were on fire from long range in the early-going. They would shoot 7 for 11 from behind the arc in the first quarter to build a 29-13 lead. After the 3rd quarter, they led 81-56. Only after they stopped caring did Shanghai make it respectable, eventually losing by only 16.

Forward Li Gen, Beijing’s big offseason addition who’s expected to be a scoring threat, got a big cheer when he came off the bench midway through the first, but he didn’t get a bucket until midway through the third.

Stephon Marbury didn’t show any lingering effects from his offseason ankle surgery. He didn’t penetrate as much as we’re used to seeing, but then again, his team was leading comfortably the entire game. He played 32 minutes and scored 16 with 8 assists, a number that would surely be higher if some of his teammates only knew how to finish at the basket. The Ducks’ biggest weakness last year — converting layups — was definitely a problem in the season opener, but it didn’t matter as much because they made 12 three-pointers on 26 attempts.

Randolph Morris led Beijing with 23 points in 26 minutes, while Shanghai’s DJ White led all scorers with 24 points.

We’ll keep an eye on Arenas news for you. It’d be a shame if he missed any extended time considering how much more fun the league is with him competing.

Meanwhile, Tracy McGrady makes his CBA debut later today at 4 pm when his Qingdao Double Star Eagles take on Fujian.

Ref watch:

Only two egregiously bad calls:

1. When a ball was knocked out of bounds at midcourt and the ref, staring at the play, thought Beijing’s player simply threw the rock five feet wide of his target for no reason at all.

2. An and-1 that was given in the third when, after the foul, which occurred on a pass, Shanghai’s player brought the ball down, turned, and then dunked. That’s about as lenient an interpretation of “continuation” as I’ve seen.

After a series of false starts, three-time NBA All-Star Gilbert Arenas finally signed with the CBA’s Shanghai Sharks. Even though he’s been practicing with the team for a week, he was only officially unveiled on Monday.

Reports NiuBBall’s Jon Pastuszek, he has a one-year deal worth about $700,000 with an option for a second year if both team and player desires.

Though the deal was expected to go through since he arrived in Shanghai at the beginning of the month, the Yao Ming-owned Sharks’ decision to delay making it official came down to two major points, a source told NiuBBall.com. First was that both team management and the coaching staff wanted to see Arenas in action before making a commitment, a request that Arenas interestingly enough turned down when he was in negotiations with another Chinese team, the Guangdong Southern Tigers, in October.

…The Sharks also wanted to do due diligence on something else: Arenas’ surgically repaired knee. The team did a serious of examinations and tests to figure out exactly what they would be getting health-wise from the former Arizona standout, and came away with enough belief to go forward.

Arenas is the third former Dream Teamer to play in the Chinese Basketball Association, following Stephon Marbury and Tracy McGrady, both of whom are still in the league. In fact, Marbury’s Beijing Ducks, the defending champs, will open the season against Arenas’s Sharks on Saturday in Beijing.

Agent Zero will continue wearing No. 0 in China. While we’re all excited to see what Arenas can do, nobody’s as excited as national team guard Liu Wei, who posted this photo of him and his new backcourt mate (via City Weekend):

(Top image via CCTV)