Spotting his potential early on, sports officials fruitlessly lobbied for Yao’s parents to be given an exemption to the policy. They’d wanted more Yao champions. Increasingly sports recruiters complain that Chinese parents are reluctant to subject their precious one-and-only to this system, where young athletes are plucked away from their families and relentlessly drilled. Looking at the parade of athletes, I thought it was funny that the one-child policy could eventually spell the end to this sports system.
