的 or 得? Choosing the Sentence That Describes Skill
Chen Jie is reviewing a reading exercise that asks students to choose the sentence meaning 'He plays basketball very well.' The four choices are:
A 他打篮球打得很好。 B 他打篮球得很好。 C 他的篮球很好。 D 他打篮球的很好。
Chen Jie chooses C. She says 他的 looks like the possessive 的 she learned in 我的书, and she remembers seeing 他的篮球打得很好 in a textbook, so C seems close enough. The answer key is A. When her tutor asks her to compare A and C, she says both contain 他 and 篮球, so they must mean the same thing. The tutor then asks her to identify which word comes directly before 很好 in each sentence and what that word is doing. Chen Jie has not yet studied the 得 complement systematically; she knows 的 only as a possessive marker. The exercise is at HSK 2 level and uses only familiar vocabulary.
1. Explain why A is the only correct choice by identifying the job of 得 and the word before it.
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A is correct because 得 introduces a degree complement after the verb 打. In A, 他打篮球打得很好: the verb-object phrase 打篮球 is followed by the repeated verb 打 + 得 + 很好. 得's job is to connect a verb to a description of how well the action is done. The word directly before 很好 is 得; the word before 得 is 打, a verb. In B, 他打篮球得很好 puts 得 after the object 篮球, with no verb immediately before 得 - that is the error. In D, 的 replaces 得 before the complement, so 很好 no longer describes the action. In C, 他的篮球很好 has 很好 directly predicating 篮球: it means the basketball itself is good, not that he plays well. C is grammatical but answers a different question.
2. Chen Jie says C is 'close enough' because she has seen 他的篮球打得很好. What is the minimal change that makes C mean 'He plays basketball very well,' and why does that change work?
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The minimal change is to insert 打得: 他的篮球打得很好. Now 他的篮球 is the topic, 打 is the verb, 得 links to 很好, and the sentence describes his skill. Without 打得, 很好 has no verb to attach to, so it describes the ball. The pair 他的篮球很好 / 他的篮球打得很好 is a minimal pair for 的 vs 得: 的 marks possession before a noun; 得 marks a complement after a verb. Chen Jie's memory of 他的篮球打得很好 is correct; she dropped 打得 when she chose C.
3. Rewrite B as a correct sentence without changing the meaning, and name the structure you used.
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B can be rewritten as 他篮球打得很好 (topic-comment) or 他打篮球打得很好 (verb-object with repeated verb). In the first, 篮球 is fronted as the topic; the verb 打 is still directly before 得. In the second, the verb 打 is repeated before 得. Both keep 得 after a verb. B fails because 得 follows 篮球, an object, not a verb. The structure to name is the 得 complement (degree complement).