basketball talent system

Chapter 510 The End of the Prohibition and Business Opportunities

After easily hammering the Mavericks, the Lakers finally returned to their home court. During the Chinese carnival shopping festival NO.11 in November, they rubbed the visiting Kings on the ground at their home court. .The king's book record last season was very good. They have "the league's first center" DeMarcus Cousins, a strong rookie Willie Cauley-Stein, and outside shooter Belinelli, a useful substitute Darren Collison; there are Rudy Gay, McClemore, Omri Casspi and others on the flanks. Judging from the paper lineup, the Kings should have a very good result and hit the playoffs completely. Should be in the plan.

But people are not as good as heaven, and George Karl once again broke up with the players.Prior to this, Karl had already broken up with "Rain Man" Kemp, the Bucks Three Musketeers, Denver Golden Double Guns, Iguodala and others.This time Carl made a high-profile attempt to clean up Cousins, which really caused a catastrophe. The King's record is dismal. Although the offense ranks 100th in the league per 15 rounds and the defense ranks 22nd in the league, the overall record is very poor and failed to perform as expected. Effect.

Judging from the style of play, the king's style of play is not a big problem. It ranks 10th in the league in three-point shooting percentage, 8th in the league in two-point attempts, 6th in the league in field goals, 8th in the league in total field goal percentage, 11th in rebounds, and 4th in assists. , No. 4 in steals, the foundation is quite good.As long as mistakes can be controlled and defense strengthened, the Kings are expected to rise rapidly.

The actions of the king's coach selection have already hinted at their attempts for the new season.The Kings interviewed a host of coaches, including Sam Mitchell, Vinny Del Negro, Mike Woodson, David Blatt, Jeff Hornacek, Nate McMillan In the end, Divac chose Jogel.

From the above-mentioned candidates, even the fans can see that the kings are all choosing coaches who "do not necessarily have great success, but must have led the rebuilding of the team and made certain breakthroughs."And Joeger is undoubtedly the best among them. He built the Grizzlies' defense very well in 2013-15, and made the Grizzlies move again last season. In the case of injuries (28 players were used in the regular season, a record in NBA history), he grabbed tickets to the playoffs.

It is certain that under the leadership of Jogel, as long as there are no major problems, the king will definitely have a more obvious change.After all, the king's main beam is not moving now, and Cousins, Gay, McClemore, Cauley-Stein, and Casspi are still there. As long as the relationship is straightened out, the tactical system is built, and the whole team is united, the king is not hopeless .

But the problem lies in the phrase "no big problem"-no one can count Cousins's brain accurately.Kao Shen's career has a total of 7 seasons and 6 coaches have been changed. He can be described as the NBA's number one coach killer.If Jogel can influence Kaoshen with his charisma, then the Kings will not have a problem making it to the playoffs.If Cousins ​​and Jogel are not in harmony, then everything may collapse-McLemo is not growing fast enough, Afflalo is getting old, and Barnes, Toliver and others are not the material to turn the situation around.

However, the wishful thinking of the Kings executives was wrong in the end. Jogel was not able to smooth out Kaoshen's hair, and naturally he shot himself in the foot again. The record led to the playoffs, but once again dived towards the No. [-] pick. Gay's dissatisfaction with the team's record is also growing, and he has already started planning to request a trade. The same is true for Kao Shen, and he has even spoken out. He is not going to renew his contract with the Kings. It is obvious that he wants to force the palace and let the team trade himself.

The Lakers' game was just for show. After the whole game, I won the game without much effort. The main reason was that the players of the Kings didn't want to play, so the defense was just going through the motions, so the Lakers On the offensive end, they basically didn't consume much energy, and they easily defeated the Kings.

Then the Lakers ushered in a wave of back-to-back games at their home court, and these two opponents are not particularly easy to deal with. First, they need to play against the Pelicans who have been strengthened again this season at NO.13, and then At NO.14, they will face the Timberwolves, the youth guard.

In the game against the Pelicans, the Lakers felt what it means to be a contest between top teams. Due to the lack of Ye Xuan, the strongest point, the Lakers were always under pressure during the game. At the end, they also lost by 16 points. Although Anthony Davis and Melon only scored more than 20 points, due to the lack of Ye Xuan, Holiday also scored more than 20 points, just like the Pelicans. The third giant.

In fact, this is also normal. After defeating the Lakers, the current Pelicans jumped to the No. [-] position in the Western Conference, because although they have the same record of eight wins and one loss as the Warriors, the Pelicans However, they defeated the Warriors in a head-to-head confrontation, so they naturally ranked ahead of the Warriors. The most important thing is that although the Pelicans lost Gordon and Anderson this season, there was no problem with their cooperation. Because the recruited Terrence Jones helped Brother Nongmei share some of the pressure on the inside, he played more smoothly.

After the game against the Pelicans, the Lakers had no time to sum up the lessons of the defeat, and immediately ushered in their next opponent, the Timberwolves.In fact, since the 2003-04 season, the Timberwolves have not been able to make the playoffs again, and after Kevin Garnett left, they were even more troubled.The return of Flip Saunders put the team back on track, but the hopes that had been raised were once again dimmed by his untimely death.

Last season, the Timberwolves already had reasons to look forward to - Andrew Wiggins and Zach LaVine continued to thrive, and the No. [-] pick Karl-Anthony Towns was even more amazing.However, because they are young and because they don't know how to win, their final record in the West is only better than that of the Lakers and Suns.

The talents of the Coyotes have been demonstrated last season. They averaged 102.4 points per game, ranking 15th in the league, and 106.5 points per 12 possessions, ranking [-]th in the league. , already has the firepower in the middle reaches of the alliance.

An obvious shortcoming of the Timberwolves offensive end is the lack of outside firepower: their overall shooting percentage reached 46.4% last season, ranking 7th in the league, but their three-point shooting percentage was only 33.8%, ranking 25th in the league. The number of attempts (16.4 times per game) and the number of hits (5.5 times per game) are ranked second to last.In addition, compared to the age structure and athletic talent of the Timberwolves lineup, their style of play is too slow. Last season, their number of rounds per game was only 95.2, ranking 20th in the league. 81.3 times per game ranked second to last).

In comparison, the Timberwolves have a bigger defensive problem.In theory, Towns and his inside partner Gurgui Dean are excellent defenders of the penalty area, and Wiggins and LaVine on the outside also have all the conditions to be excellent defenders, but in such a slow offensive rhythm Under the circumstances, they still lose an average of 106 points per game, ranking 23rd in the league. If the points lost per 110.1 possessions are calculated, their score (31.5 points) is even better than the Lakers and Nets, ranking third from the bottom.In addition, their defensive rebounds (28 per game) are only ranked [-]th.

The most important operation of the Timberwolves offseason is to invite Tom Thibodeau-although he is only a rookie as a manager (president of basketball affairs), he is in charge of the team's tactical board and teaches young people how to defend and how to play. In terms of winning, he is already the best option on the market.After Thibodeau took office, the first thing he did was to recruit the experienced Scott Layden from the Spurs as the general manager of the team, and then the two joined hands to start the process of transforming the team.

First of all, with a little bit of luck, the Timberwolves got point guard Kris Dunn from Providence University in the draft as they wished - he met all the qualities that Thibodeau wanted in a player: tenacity, fearlessness, full of fighting spirit .In the following summer league, he also showed all this very well.

In the free market, the Timberwolves wisely gave up Prince, Rudiz, and Smith, and introduced Aldridge, Hill, and Rush.Of course, these three new aids will not exist in the team's long-term plan, but at a certain stage, they can play a very good supporting role.Among them, Aldridge showed up occasionally when he was in the Clippers last season, Hill is a qualified rotation for the Pacers, and Rush can also provide the most lacking experience and outside firepower for the Timberwolves.Even the three training camp players Butler, Lucas and Murray signed with a partially guaranteed contract are also experienced NBA veterans.Of course, for Timberwolves fans, there is a huge regret that cannot be made up-that is Garnett's retirement.Although people have long been mentally prepared for this, when this day really comes, it still makes people feel reluctant to part.

For a team as young as the Timberwolves, you have to give them enough patience.But Thibodeau obviously doesn't want to wait any longer, he hopes the team will produce results immediately.Of course, Thibodeau has this confidence: In the five seasons of coaching the Bulls, he has achieved a total of 255 wins and 139 losses, during which he was elected the best coach of the year.At least in the regular season, his name is connected with victory; in addition, Thibodeau is always able to maximize the potential of players, Derrick Rose and Jimmy Butler are all under his training. grown up.As for the Timberwolves, some are rough jade that can be radiant with a little polishing.

Speaking of diamonds in the rough, the Timberwolves are in the happiest phase of building a franchise with all its core members still on rookie contracts.Although two or three years later, they will face the problem of contract renewal one after another, but at least before that, the team can observe them calmly to decide who is worthy of training, and who is more suitable as a bargaining chip to play value.

Therefore, even if the Timberwolves cannot make the playoffs this season (this possibility is very large, after all, the Western Conference is dominated by tigers), the team can fully afford it.And this process is the most important thing. Winning is certainly something to be happy about, but even if you don’t get the expected number of wins, as long as you gain valuable experience and develop correct game habits through each game, then this season will be the same can be considered successful.

Although such a Timberwolves team has not been able to fully demonstrate its combat effectiveness, it has surprisingly demonstrated its combat effectiveness and abundant physical strength when facing the Lakers led by two veterans in their 30s.Under the leadership of Towns and Wiggins, they even led by as many as 15 points.

But the bad thing is that they are young. Because they are too young, they are seriously inexperienced. As a result, in the second half of the third quarter, they were hit by a 15:2 offensive frenzy by the Lakers. The point difference between the two teams was completely evened out. In the fourth quarter, the young Timberwolves became impatient, but was seized by the experienced Wade. He scored 14 points in a single quarter and helped the Lakers win. Get off the game.

Ye Xuan's suspension has also come to an end. As long as the game against the Nets ends the day after tomorrow, the Lakers will be able to welcome back their core, which will also be very helpful for the next few consecutive battles.But for Ye Xuan, the suspension this time not only did not affect his commercial value, but also brought him business opportunities.

Based on Ye Xuan's few words at the press conference and the boxing incident this time, Nike compiled a Chinese martial arts-style sneaker advertisement for him. Of course, it's not going to be shot right now, but it probably won't wait too long. It will be turned on soon. In addition, Ye Xuan's move to kill the scumbag-Pachulia with one move this time also made some manufacturers who had not sought Ye Xuan to endorse them excited, and they all offered Ye Xuan an offer. It is also easy to understand, after all, everyone still worships heroes, especially in the United States, everyone respects those stories with personal heroism even more, and now Ye Xuan's instant killing of opponents is a real incident , so Ye Xuan became even more popular after this incident.

The incident passed quickly. After a day off at home, the Lakers had to leave for New York. They were about to challenge the Nets in Brooklyn. Ye Xuan finally didn't go with the team for this game, because he had already flown When he arrives in Houston, he will shoot two consecutive commercials here, not because of the convenience of framing in Houston, but because this commercial is an invitation that Ye Xuan received a long time ago, it is a public service advertisement, and he came to Houston because The ad will be put on trial in Houston. Of course, Ye Xuan chose to shoot at this time because he will come back in the next game, and he will play against the Spurs in Texas.

(End of this chapter)