Daryl Morey, the general manager of NBA team Houston Rockets, announced that he is leaving his role from Nov. 1 after 14 years with the team.

https://twitter.com/HoustonRockets/status/1316886286800740357

Who is Daryl Morey?

Outside of his achievements for his team in professional basketball, Morey is perhaps best known for a tweet on his personal Twitter account that expressed support for Hong Kong's pro-democracy protests.

His tweet, posted in October 2019, sparked a geopolitical row with China.

China proceeded to ban all NBA pre-season games despite him promptly deleting the tweet and the NBA's strongly-worded Chinese statement that apologised for the offending tweet.

Several Chinese firms also pledged to cut their business ties with the NBA.

Tencent, the digital rights holder of NBA in China, updated after they announced blacklist of Daryl Morey due to his 'Free HK' tweet: They will suspend all reports/streaming of Houston Rockets. Rockets subscribers are eligible to change service. NBA China market in trouble. pic.twitter.com/PGjWoZ8uPq

— Titan Sports (@titan_plus) October 6, 2019

After a year-long blackout, Beijing recently announced on Oct. 10 that it would resume regular broadcasts of the NBA games, citing strong demand among domestic basketball fans.

Anyone who hurts the Chinese people's feelings will pay the price

Chinese state broadcaster CCTV said in a brief statement that it would not comment on Morey's resignation.

But it appeared to make a veiled reference to Morey's tweet, which created a fallout that is still felt today. It said:

"We congratulate Rafael Stone for getting promoted to be the new GM for Houston Rockets.

We hereby stress that anyone who hurts the feelings of the Chinese people will have to pay the price."

"Rest in peace"

CCTV ended its statement by saying: "We hope Mr. Morey rests in peace."

While the Chinese phrase used in this case, "一路走好" (yi lu zou hao), can be interpreted as to "have a safe journey", it is mostly used by the Chinese to refer to people who had passed away recently, and mostly translates to "rest in peace" in English.

Chinese nationalists happy to hear the news

According to state-controlled media Global Times, the expression is used by the Chinese for "seeing someone off when you don't like them very much".

It reported that many Chinese believed it was Morey's "prejudice and irresponsible words" that contributed to the breakdown in sports exchanges between the United States and China.

Citing an online poll on popular microblogging site Weibo, it said almost half of 43,000 respondents were happy when they heard the news, and that as many as over 16,000 netizens agreed that Morey's resignation should have come much earlier.

It also quoted frequent NBA commentator Su Qun, who said the Chinese people are happy with the news:

"Everyone's happy now with his resignation. Actually, a minute after the Rockets were defeated by the Lakers, he made the announcement."

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"Everyone all over the world is celebrating! I can finally change my Weibo display name ("Has Morey been fired yet today?")!!

Some thought he resigned too late

Commenting on the news, which became one of the trending topics on Weibo within a few hours, Chinese commenters welcomed Morey's departure from the team, and expressed their dissatisfaction at him.

(Replying to Su's post) "Not much to be happy about since he wasn't fired... he resigned himself... The owner of Houston rockets still wouldn't give China face."

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"He resigned, and wasn't fired. To put it plainly, no matter how much we reprimand them, they (NBA) still don't view us as human. Even without us watching the matches, they are still going on with their lives just fine."

Reply: "You're too naive, have you not been out working in society before. When something of this magnitude happens, the top management will put pressure on you to resign, would you dare to not do so? The Rockets' boss is not stupid, he knows who his daddy is. Morey didn't resign previously as his boss thought the situation could still be managed, but they didn't expect the Chinese Basketball Association to be so tough. CCTV has also gotten back at them on our behalf (referring to CCTV's statement)."

Does not wish Morey well

Some did not wish Morey well, even likening him to being "dead" -- a common expression used when directing curses at public figures deemed to be supportive of separatists.

"Wasn't he already dead?"

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"Rest in peace."

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"Hope something (bad) happens to him."

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