Basketball Legends: Strikers Are King

"Something's not right."

The Pacers fans off the court looked at each other, feeling something was wrong.

"Isn't Qi a playoff softie?"

"It's not impossible. After all, his salary will have been paid after the regular season."

A rookie with high hopes suddenly turned into a weakling in the playoffs. This is obviously something that fans cannot accept.

Excluding some specific reward clauses, the contracts signed by the team and the players will end at the end of the regular season, and Qi Tian did receive the monthly first-year salary of the rookie contract two days ago.

Compared with the long regular season, the playoffs, which are only about twenty games at most, obviously account for a small proportion. And unlike the regular season, there are only bonuses in the playoffs and there is no stable salary.

Even if you go to the end and win the championship, the bonus amount will only be a few million, and the average salary distributed to each player will only be around a hundred thousand, which is not even close to the average salary of the league players.

Therefore, even for teams that have made it to the playoffs, not all players like to work overtime.

Increase historical status?

Of the 15 people on the team's roster, at least 6-7 of them don't get enough money to have financial freedom. Is it meaningful to talk about this?

Not to mention that players who play too hard in the playoffs and get injured may affect their performance next season are the biggest enemy of players.

However, rookies don't have such concerns. Since they don't have a chance to perform in the regular season, they will only show themselves in the playoffs. The same is true for Qi Tian.

The main reason for his poor performance was that he was not adapted to the opponent's defensive intensity.

After all, the regular season is too long. A slightly serious violation may be seen by the referee and the whistle will be blown immediately;

But it's different in the playoffs. The referees will let the two teams solve the problem on their own, and they will turn a blind eye to defensive actions that are slightly out of bounds.

Facing Redick's defense, Qi Tian finally understood why the playoffs are the touchstone for stars.

At the beginning of the second quarter, the Pacers sent out four substitutes led by George;

The Magic have a starting lineup of Glen Davis, Clark, Richardson, Redick and Duhon.

The intensity of the playoffs has continued, and what gives Pacers fans some peace of mind is that although Qi Tian did not regain his accuracy, his defense was on line and prevented his opponent Redick from missing a three-point jumper.

George's jump shot also missed. Fortunately, Hansbrough caused a foul and made one of two free throws.

Then Richardson hit a three-pointer and the Magic took the lead, while the Pacers' Hansbrough scored inside to help the team regain the lead.

"24-25."

"Apply for substitution!"

Vogel replaced West. The opponent clearly deployed three outside line-ups with less than 2 meters of defenders, but the team failed to take advantage of the inside line. He had to take action.

West defended Glen Davis' attack as soon as he came on the court, turned around and got the rebound and handed it to his teammates.

Unfortunately, Collison's pull-up jump shot also missed, and the two sides staged a blacksmithing feast.

Duhon held the ball and was about to attack, but Collison completed the steal.

"Quick attack!"

Seeing Qitian and George running wildly from the left and right sides, the Pacers fans at the scene almost stood up with clenched fists.

Collison made a long pass, George caught the ball to attract the defense, and passed the ball to Qi Tian who was cutting on the other side. Qi Tian scored a layup and finally opened an account for his playoff career.

"24-27."

But turning around, Clark caused a foul on West and made two free throws. Then Richardson hit a layup and just didn't let the point difference widen.

"Substitute!"

Halfway through the second quarter, Vogel made a decisive substitution and replaced Granger;

The Magic also replaced Nelson on the other side.

"Well played."

Brian Shaw still encouraged Qi Tian after he came off the stage and handed over the towel.

In his opinion, although Qi Tian was affected and his touch fluctuated, his defense was still online and it still met his expectations.

"Isn't it good?"

Qi Tian laughed to himself and sat on the bench.

"Of course."

Brian Shaw turned his head and glanced at him, but did not continue to speak.

The assistant coach who had been instilling an optimistic attitude in the rookies looked at Qi Tian, ​​who was still confused, sighed inwardly, and turned to look at the field.

The chief assistant teacher, it seems, is not a male ketone school without a story.

Qi Tian was attracted by the assistant's hesitant expression, and he even forgot about the pressure on himself for a short time.

What year did that happen?

Brian Shaw looked at the slightly familiar jersey on his opponent, and suddenly an unfamiliar figure appeared in front of his eyes.

In 1995, one of the two years sandwiched between Jordan's two and three consecutive championships, and one of the two years that took advantage of Jordan's retirement to establish Olajuwon's status as one person below ten thousand, that year's playoffs

, exciting:

The defending champion Rockets had a poor record due to injuries, not to mention they made a big trade in the second half of the schedule, acquiring super scorer Drexler. The team's run-in, Drexler and

Olajuwon's cooperation consumed too much time for the Rockets, and in the end they only ranked sixth in the Western Conference.

But the Rockets had no home court advantage in all four rounds and came back from a 1-2 deficit to beat the 60-win Stockton Malone-led Jazz. They came back from a 1-3 deficit to beat the 59-win Barkley-led Suns.

, Olajuwon defeated the 62-win Spurs MVP Robinson in the Western Conference finals, swept O'Neal's Magic team in the finals, and became the lowest No. 6 seed in history to win the championship.

After the game, Rockets coach Rudy Tomjanovich said:

"We have not been favored along the way. To those who do not believe in us, I have only one thing to say: Never underestimate the heart of a championship."

It can be called the most classic saying in the league.

NBA winner takes all, loser takes dust.

Unfortunately, Brian Shaw was among the losers at the time, and was the ugliest team to be swept - the Orlando Magic.

What's even more regrettable is that old fans may remember that O'Neal, Hardaway, and even G1 in the Magic team performed well, but at the critical moment when the Rockets caught up, after the Rockets foul tactics, they responded to the opponent by missing four consecutive free throws, and were finally defeated.

Naturally, no one will remember the then backup point guard Brian Shaw, who was the top war criminal Anderson when his opponent made a magical three-pointer to force overtime.

Perhaps we must also thank Anderson. A small part of the criticism was taken away by O'Neal's immaturity and Hardaway's. Most of the criticism was focused on him who made the final free throw. Brian Shaw's fast break three-pointer at the critical moment when leading by one point.

No one even cared about the two consecutive three-pointers and three-pointers during the second attack.

Of course, in the next three finals games, he made 9 of 21 three-pointers and a 42.8% three-point shooting rate, which was enough to make up for his own abnormality in G1.

By the way, the only Magic perimeter player with a better mental adjustment ability than Shaw is Hardaway. In the next three finals games, Penny made 10 of 18 three-pointers, shooting over 55% of the three-pointers - this

This is why after the Magic lost the 1995 Finals, Pence was still considered by the Magic to be better than O'Neal in terms of player career prospects.

"All in all, it's just a matter of adjusting."

Brian Shaw murmured.