The Rest, Only Noise

The 1985 playoffs began, and Louie was indifferent.

Everyone is looking forward to May 12. This year, the NBA has created a new way of playing, lottery drawing, which is more complicated and more accidental than the past coin tossing to guess coins.

However, in mid-April, Ewing's coach, John Thompson, dismissed some bad teams' comments that Ewing was "willing to win": "Patrick is a dignified player, and he doesn't want to play on a mediocre team. , if this happens, there will be a group of lawyers filing an antitrust lawsuit against the NBA, and Patrick is willing to miss his rookie year for that."

These remarks, as well as the NBA's new lottery draw, are aimed at the bad teams represented by the Clippers who have lost without a lower limit and completely trampled on sportsmanship.

Last season, in order to compete for Olajuwon, the Rockets let a veteran play 53 minutes in an overtime game and successfully lost.

They got their wish at the bottom, got the No. 1 lottery, and won Olajuwon.

Sterling was jealous and blatantly declared that he would let the team lose the game in order to win the probability of winning the No. 1 pick.

The Clippers are definitely the representative of a bunch of hopeless bad teams.

In 1976, they were not yet in Los Angeles, and their name was not called the Clippers (Brave), but with a first-round pick + $230,000, they were lucky enough to get Moses Malone's signing rights from Portland. Six days later, Buffalo sent Moses to Houston for two first-round picks in 1977 and 1978. Why did they abandon Moses so quickly? New head coach Tates Locke didn't like him.

Locke was fired 10 weeks after trading Moses.

April 1977: The Braves go 16-56, kicking off their 16-year absence from the playoffs. Two months later, they traded the No. 3 pick (Marquese Johnson) in a star-studded draft for Sven Turner and the No. 13 pick.

That September, rookie Adrian Dantley won them Rookie of the Year, and the Braves celebrated by trading him from Indiana for overrated scorer Billy Knight...

They repeat the same hapless operation every year.

Summer 1981: Donald Sterling buys the Clippers from Levin for $12.5 million and sets out to build the franchise into the worst team in sports history...

The most troubling thing is that the potential players who come to this team will have physical problems.

So, to stop someone like Sterling from getting Ewing, the league changed the lottery system to at least minimize their chances of getting Griffin.

Ewing's mentor Thompson even warned directly, suggesting that the league should do some tricks and not let Ewing go to those unlucky teams.

After Ewing hired David Falk as his agent, reporters asked him which city he would rather play for, Indiana or New York.

This is a funny question, Ewing still has the most basic emotional intelligence.

He replied: "Whoever chooses me, I will play for whomever, that's the rule."

In late April, the league announced that the 1985 lottery draw would be the first live lottery draw in history.

Stern is worthy of being Stern, he can always think of ways to make money by changing tricks.

After Sampson lived up to expectations and became the league's No. 1 center, Ewing became the most coveted lottery.

To understand how coveted Ewing was in 1985, one has to forget about the future of small ball and go back to a time when big men ruled the league. Sure, there are outlandish all-around forwards like Larry Bird and Magic Johnson, but for the most part, position is determined by height and size. It's Russell and Chamberlain, Walton, Malone and Abdul-Jabbar.

Ewing not only saves the bad team, but also saves the team's ticket revenue.

He is definitely the most recognized non-professional player in history of all pre-professional sports.

The seven teams that didn't make the playoffs all have the same 14.3 percent chance of getting Ewing. Among them are the Warriors who are really in trouble, and there are the Eagles who have stumbled and shyly won 31 games for a while, but they can't talk about their bodies but are honest. The Seattle SuperSonics need a real center, Lanier is retiring, and they're left with power forward Jake Hikma masquerading as center, and nothing else. Clippers general manager Carl Hill issued a letter of apology to fans holding season tickets after the season ended. The Pacers were still as lost as they were in the ABA, and the Kings fled Kansas City amid boos and relocated the team to a ranch in Sacramento.

Then there's the Knicks, who are the least blamed team in the bottom seven.

They hired LittleLu from Boston, hoping he would be the messiah to save the team. As a result, Cartwright was fractured before the season began, and as the season progressed, injuries swept the team. On many nights, fans cheered the team's losses.

If Ewing had to find a perfect foothold, it would be New York, the league's largest market. Anyone who knows NBA history will admit that the 1980s was the heyday of the NBA, but it's easy to forget that the NBA's true heyday wasn't in the black-and-white rivalry that piqued people's interest, but to keep fans entertained. Continue to pay attention, need more dazzling new stars.

The 1984 generation came out, so in the middle and late 1980s, the audience of the NBA became more and more. Today, Jordan has made the Blazers the darling of the media. Olajuwon sold Houston's season tickets.

Barkley and McHale, one fat and one thin, are also saving the Chicago Bulls, dubbed the Poison Dog Circus.

Also, the NBA's four-year, $91.9 million TV contract with CBS expired in the summer of 1986, and a more attractive and interesting league could help them sign even bigger contracts.

In early May, The New York Times published an editorial: "If Ewing ends up wearing a Knicks jersey, it will benefit every team in the league."

So, the time came to that day, May 12, Mother's Day.

Louie bought Mom cake, flowers, and a bigger TV.

In the afternoon, the family was going to use this TV to watch the first lottery draw in NBA history broadcast on CBS TV.

At the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York, representatives of the seven teams fidgeted in their seats.

In order for the team to win the jackpot, they did a lot of meaningless and ridiculous things.

St. Patrick Ewing's Day is celebrated in Seattle, and locals hope that this holiday will bring good luck. The Clippers had arranged to turn on their switchboard that Sunday in response to overwhelming demand for season tickets. The Kings threw a party at the new Sacramento arena and brought in two psychics to give them a practice call for good luck.

Meanwhile, Knicks general manager Dave DeBusschere once again received prayers from fans on the road. Later, he revealed to the public that he may have "somewhat selfishly made some requests to God" during his prayers at Mass at St. Joseph's Church near his home at 9:15 a.m. that morning.

When the lottery began, the Celtics and 76ers playoff games were in sync.

The league deliberately chose to start the live draw at halftime of the game.

The atmosphere at the scene was extremely tense. In order to ease the terrible atmosphere, Stern made a joke: "Everyone, relax, the security guards have no weapons."

Moments later, Stern left the stage and stepped back on stage.

What happened next turned out to be the most famous clip in NBA lottery history, replayed on YouTube and dissected by conspiracy theorists in the future. Stern re-explained the entire lottery process to representatives of the seven teams.

Then, it started.

A white-haired man from Ernst & Young Whitney named Jack Wagner threw seven envelopes into the plastic globe one at a time, pausing briefly—perhaps to tune in for a special purpose? Before pouring the fourth letter, the globe would slam against the outside of the letter, crumpling the corners. The NBA's head of security, Jack Joyce, made the globe turn eight times.

Then it was time to decide the grand prize.

It can be seen that Stern is very nervous. Before opening the globe, he carefully looked at the letter inside. Finally, he seemed to have found the target. He exhaled in amnesty and began to reach out to find the first choice, which would decide Ewing. choice of destiny. Stern fumbled for a while, grabbed the envelope, turned it over, and took out the lucky envelope, which "happens" to have a crease at the corner.

Sterling then selected six more envelopes, placing them in order after the first envelope, and he began to show, counting down from the last choice. "The No. 7 pick in 1985," he announced in a nasal voice, "belongs to the Golden State Warriors!"

Louie in front of the TV saw the scene turn the camera on Al Attles (GM Al Attles), he is the pride of the Bay Area, has a stoic face, he is the general manager and former coach of the Warriors, his team Finishing the season with the worst record, a year ago he would have been guaranteed at least the No. 2 pick.

As soon as he saw the result, he was in pain as if someone had stabbed a knife in the heart.

"It's pathetic, he's as disappointed as Al Pacino when he learns that his wife deliberately aborted the child." Lorraine is an avid "Godfather" fan who always likes to use the plot in the movie as a metaphor.

Louie nodded in agreement: "Well, I'm sure, give him a chance, and he will slap the president's face with 10 times more force than Pacino."

Next, Stern continued to open the envelope—Kings, Hawks, Sonics, Clippers. Finally, there are the Indiana Pacers and the New York Knicks: one for the Ewing Super Jackpot, the other for the Benoit Benjamin C, or the Wayman Tisdale consolation prize.

Stern had to choose between two letters, one normal letter and one with a folded corner. Finally, he chose the normal letter to open, raised his head and announced, "The second pick in the 1985 NBA draft belongs to the Indiana Pacers!"

The crowd, including the New York media, erupted into a huge cheer, and at that moment three things happened at the same time.

Pacers owner Herb Simon, who came to the scene in person, stood up and learned how desperate he was when he learned that his team had passed Ewing and slumped down like a nerve in his spine had been pierced?

The camera shows Debusschere, who pinches his trigeminal nerve, as if thanking God for answering his prayers.

Louie unscrewed the lid of a Coke bottle with one hand.

"Drink again~www.readwn.com~ How many bottles have you had today?" Li Xuanbing said unhappily.

"Mom, I have a headache, let me drink it." Louis didn't realize that he was already a 25-year-old adult man, and he was acting coquettishly with his old mother.

"Okay, okay!" Although Li Xuanbing didn't know what happened to his son in recent years and why his temperament changed so much, there should be very few mothers in the world who can resist their son's coquettish behavior, "I don't want a second baby. You can drink whatever you want!"

Louis was drinking Coke, and by the way, he listened to Stern say the words that have been sung by New Yorkers as a Bible for more than ten years.

"Friends, basketball is back in New York."

Louie was troubled, and he believed Ewing was the same.

Even before it started, Louie knew that rebuilding Ewing would be a difficult project, and Ewing, he definitely didn't want to play for Louie.

So, let's do it again: Mr. You, all encounters in this world are reunions after a long absence.

PS: There are clips of the lottery meeting on the Internet. I will see if I can post it in the Easter Egg Chapter.