By Mike Finger, Staff writer | San Antonio Express-News (SAEN), 2024-12-28 15:39:16
由生成式人工智能翻译，译文内容可能不准确或不完整，以原文为准。
马刺队的当家球星有着书呆子气的一面，这让他喜欢上了那些身高优势毫无用武之地的竞技形式。
他喜欢需要动脑筋的游戏。一种迫使他记住对手之前做过什么，并预测对手将来可能做什么的游戏。一种奖励耐心、观察和适时进攻的游戏。
他认真对待它。他钻研策略，勤加练习。当他准备好的时候，他并没有与其他百万富翁或世界级运动员较量，而是与那些他认为和自己一样热爱这项运动的普通人对弈。
然后，十多年前的一个夏夜，一位体育记者走进了蒂姆·邓肯正在玩扑克的房间。
与周六早上维克托·文班亚马(Victor Wembanyama)欣然让全世界看到他在华盛顿广场公园与纽约人进行友好象棋比赛不同，这是一场危机。
棋逢对手的一天
https://t.co/kdlYt9Nwgm pic.twitter.com/NY1f4HJcCy
— San Antonio Spurs (@ spurs) December 28, 2024
邓肯几乎立刻就给主办方发了短信，质问为什么邀请了媒体。这位最终入选名人堂的球员，身穿一件超大号卡通T恤和宽松的牛仔短裤，来这里可不是为了被人看到，他当然也不想让公众知道他休赛期的休闲时光是如何度过的。
即使这位历史上最伟大的大前锋只是为了微不足道的赌注而玩牌，面对10美元的加注就弃牌，偶尔用21美元的虚张声势偷走底池，这也没什么关系。即使大多数球迷会觉得这很迷人，甚至可能会让他们更加爱他，这也没什么关系。
邓肯认为没有理由透露任何NBA没有要求他透露的关于他是什么样的人，或者他喜欢什么的信息。他刻意保持低调，出了名的不善言辞，他保护自己私生活的方式比他防守内线还要严密。
因为他所处的时代，像科比·布莱恩特(Kobe Bryant)、沙奎尔·奥尼尔(Shaquille O’Neal)和勒布朗·詹姆斯(LeBron James)这样个性鲜明的球员提供了足够的娱乐性，联盟也乐于让邓肯成为一个避开聚光灯的安静的超级巨星。
在很多方面，邓肯和文班亚马是 kindred spirits。他们都因为无私而受到队友的喜爱，都欣然接受成为球队基石的责任，并且都有一种不可思议的能力，能够从现代名人身份带来的喧嚣中抽离出来。
不同之处在于，邓肯从未融入过这种喧嚣。文班亚马在20岁时可能就拥有老灵魂，他可能会关闭自己的社交媒体账户数天、数周甚至数月，但他仍然知道如何在需要的时候运用它们。
这就是他在周六早上所做的，他在X（原Twitter）上发布了一条消息，邀请任何想冒雨加入他在曼哈顿人行道上对弈的人来一盘象棋。接下来的事情并没有完全复制披头士乐队抵达肯尼迪机场时的狂热景象，但还是有几十个当地人路过，马刺队的摄像机捕捉到了文班和挑战他的棋手之间许多引人入胜的对弈画面。
NBA总裁亚当·席尔瓦(Adam Silver)，他的办公室距离文班亚马挥舞“骑士”的地方只有50个街区，他并没有出现在前来观看的纽约人群中。但他一定和其他人一样喜欢这一幕，因为他肯定意识到了这样的出行对联盟的未来意味着什么。
詹姆斯即将年满40岁。斯蒂芬·库里(Steph Curry)和凯文·杜兰特(Kevin Durant)都是36岁。NBA需要一张新面孔。如果席尔瓦可以在实验室里设计一个出来，那它将属于一个Z世代的超级新星，他能够在圣诞节那天在麦迪逊广场花园砍下42分，并在几天后的华盛顿广场公园吸引过往行人。
联盟从未要求邓肯做到这一切，这对邓肯来说也正合适。他可以得到他的25分和12个篮板，赢得他的五个总冠军，礼貌地用一些屡试不爽的陈词滥调回答几个问题，然后回家和孩子们玩电子游戏。
他不希望世界了解他更多。而文班亚马则不然。他欢迎成为NBA渴望的21世纪偶像的一切，这并不意味着他缺乏专注。他相信自己可以掌控这一切。
当然，这意味着马刺队作为一个组织需要做出一些调整，而他们已经这样做了。任何由R.C. 布福德(R.C. Buford)担任首席执行官、格雷格·波波维奇(Gregg Popovich)担任总裁的球队都会保持低调，马刺队也不会改变他们的制度价值观或他们建队的方式。
但有了文班亚马，就有充分的理由多一些曝光。这不仅对联盟有利，对马刺队也有利。
毕竟，他们知道如何围绕一个有书呆子气一面的当家球星建队。文班亚马和邓肯都被需要动脑的消遣所吸引，他们都有一个为了友谊赛而与普通人斗智斗勇的故事。
唯一的区别？
只有一个人乐于让体育记者讲述它。
San Antonio Spurs’ Victor Wembanyama reacts during an NBA basketball game, Monday, Dec. 23, 2024, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)
NEW YORK, NEW YORK - DECEMBER 25: Victor Wembanyama #1 of the San Antonio Spurs reacts against the New York Knicks during the second quarter at Madison Square Garden on December 25, 2024 in New York City.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK - DECEMBER 25: Victor Wembanyama #1 of the San Antonio Spurs reacts against the New York Knicks during the second quarter at Madison Square Garden on December 25, 2024 in New York City.
点击查看原文：Victor Wembanyama embraces spotlight Tim Duncan didn't
Victor Wembanyama embraces spotlight Tim Duncan didn’t
The Spurs’ franchise player had a nerdy side, and it attracted him to forms of competition in which his height offered no advantage.
He liked a game that made him think. A game that forced him to remember what an opponent had done before, and to anticipate what that same opponent might do in the future. A game that rewarded patience, observation, and well-timed aggression.
He took it seriously. He read up on strategy. He practiced. And when he was ready, he tested himself not against fellow multimillionaires or world-class athletes, but against common folks who he figured enjoyed the game as much as he did.
Then, one summer night well over a decade ago, a sports writer walked into the room where Tim Duncan was playing poker.
Unlike Saturday morning, when Victor Wembanyama happily let the whole world in on his friendly chess games against New Yorkers in Washington Square Park, this was a crisis.
A good day for chess
— San Antonio Spurs (@ spurs) December 28, 2024
Duncan texted the host almost immediately, demanding to know why the media had been invited. The eventual Hall of Famer, decked out in an oversized cartoon T-shirt and baggy denim shorts, was not there to be seen, and he certainly didn’t want the public to know where he spent his offseason leisure time.
It didn’t matter that the greatest power forward in basketball history was playing for delightfully humble stakes, folding to $10 raises and stealing the occasional pot with a $21 bluff. It didn’t matter that most fans would have found this charming, or that it probably would have made them love him even more.
Duncan saw no reason to divulge any more about who he was – or what he enjoyed – than the NBA required him to. Intentionally bland and famously unforthcoming, he protected his private life better than he defended the paint.
And because he played during an era in which guys like Kobe Bryant, Shaquille O’Neal and LeBron James provided personality, the league was perfectly content to let Duncan be the quiet superstar who shunned the spotlight.
In plenty of ways, Duncan and Wembanyama are kindred spirits. Both are adored by their teammates for their selflessness, both embraced everything about the responsibility of becoming a franchise cornerstone, and both have an uncanny ability to unplug from everything that comes with being a modern celebrity.
The catch is, Duncan never plugged in at all. Wembanyama might be an old soul at age 20, and he might shut down his social-media accounts for days and weeks and months at a time, but he still knows how to wield them when he wants to.
That’s what he did Saturday morning, when he posted a message on X asking for a game of chess with anyone who wanted to brave the rain and join him on a Manhattan sidewalk. What ensued didn’t exactly replicate the mania of the Beatles landing at JFK airport, but a few dozen locals swung by, and Spurs’ cameras captured plenty of compelling action between Wembanyama and the chess players who challenged him.
Commissioner Adam Silver, whose league office sits 50 blocks away from where Wembanyama deployed his knights, was not among the New Yorkers who came to watch. But he had to love the scene as much as anyone did, because he surely recognizes what outings like that mean for the future of the league.
James is about to turn 40. Steph Curry and Kevin Durant are 36. The NBA needs a new face. And if Silver could design one in a lab, it would belong to an Generation-Z supernova capable of scoring 42 points in Madison Square Garden on Christmas Day and riveting passersby at Washington Square Park a few mornings later.
The league never needed Duncan to do all that, which suited Duncan just fine. He was allowed to score his 25 points and 12 rebounds, win his five championships, politely answer a few questions with a few tried-and-true clichés, and then head home to play video games with his kids.
He didn’t want the world to know more about him than that. Wembanyama does. He welcomes everything about being the 21st-century icon the NBA craves, and this does not mean he lacks focus. He believes he can handle all of it.
What this means, of course, is that the Spurs will have to adjust a bit as an organization, and they already have. Any franchise led by R.C. Buford as CEO and Gregg Popovich as president is going to keep a low profile, and the Spurs aren’t about to change their institutional values or their approach to constructing a team.
But with Wembanyama around, there’s good reason to throw back the curtain a little more. It’s not only great for the league, but it benefits the Spurs, too.
After all, they know how to build around a franchise player with a nerdy side. Both Wembanyama and Duncan are attracted to the a pastime that makes them think, and both of them have a story about testing their wits against regular folks in the spirit of friendly competition.
The only difference?
Only one of them is glad a sports writer told it.
By Mike Finger, Staff writer, via San Antonio Express-News