exxtoria:

Did you notice how, in all these shitty games of “who can score more” and “let’s manipulate the game to set an specific score”, Midorima was the only one in the GOM –without counting Kuroko– deliberately saying how stupid those games were and not agreeing to join them?

And I’m not counting Kuroko here not because his opposing was not important, of course it was, absolutely vital… But I’m focusing in Midorima here because, these “games” were supposedly created to avoid “boredom”, weren’t they? Because GOMs were so strong they always win, without any resistance, right?

Kuroko built his own playing style, from the very beginning. It’s impossible for him to agree with the other GOMs’ perspective here, not when he was part of the other side of the court for so much time. But, it’s different for Midorima. Midorima is one of these amazingly strong, naturally talented players. His shoots are just perfect, it was impossible to block them. So, he could easily say the same than the others, right? He could just say “yeah, sure, I will definitely score more than you all”, couldn’t he?

The truth is that, even being such a naturally talented player, Midorima’s been always a very hard worker. Actually, that’s what his future teammates in Shuutoku specially Takao, please add this to the list of reasons of why Takao fell in love with Midorima Shintarou will respect so much about him: how he train more than anyone else, staying late after every practice, doing his best. 

And yeah, he didn’t try to stop his teammates –because, as he said, he follows the course set for the team, no matter what the form. He probably wouldn’t be able to do anything anyway, even if he tried. But he was there, and he said how stupid those games were and that he won’t be part of them. He went to practice, even when the coach and Akashi said they didn’t have to. Because, to Midorima, it’s not about being talented: it’s about doing everything you can, no matter how much that is, or if you’re a genius or not.

Bonus:

You can add this aspect of Midorima’s personality to the already-long list of reasons of why he fell in love with Takao Kazunari too