NBA: Magic Johnson opens the season, crowned MOP

On November 8, the Spurs faced the challenge of the Los Angeles Clippers at their home stadium in the Holy City.

This match was also called by the outside world as a match between the"most gorgeous and explosive style of the new era vs. the old-fashioned positional warfare master in the West".

Since the Clippers traded for"CP3" last year, the team's market has suddenly opened up. Although the Clippers were located in the Los Angeles metropolis, the fan market has always been firmly controlled by the Lakers. Not to mention eating meat, even"soup" can't be drunk much.

Since Paul came to Los Angeles, he formed the"Alley-Oop City" with the 2009 No.

1 pick Blake Griffin and the new era"Cake King" DeAndre Jordan.

The gorgeous and explosive style of play instantly attracted the love of many fans.

In the second half of the 11-12 regular season, the price of a single ticket for the Clippers' home court (then shared the Staples Center with the Lakers) even exceeded that of the Lakers.

The season ticket was once sold for 30,000 US dollars, which was"hard to get a ticket"!

In the playoffs last season, the Clippers' Big Three led the team into the playoffs, and successfully eliminated the Utah Jazz in the first round and advanced to the Western Conference semifinals, but unfortunately they were swept out by the experienced Spurs 4:0.

Although the main reasons were the season-ending injury of Billups and the cowardice and inaction of head coach Negro, the main responsibility still lies with Chris Paul, the team leader.

In the four playoff games, Popovich tailored a defensive system for Paul - first Parker pressed closely in the half court, then set up 1-2 meat walls near the center circle, and cut directly into Paul's soft spot.

When Paul was defended to death, the remaining offensive routines of the entire Clippers were Griffin's strong attack, Mo's sudden shot, Nick Young's sudden shot, Butler's sudden shot, and the rest of the players' sudden shot.

The Spurs happened to be the best at defending this kind of"you singles - I singles - teammates singles" style of play.

So the Clippers were shaved bald by the Spurs.

So this regular season was also generally regarded by the outside world as Paul's"revenge battle"!

At the beginning of the game, the starting lineups of the two teams were:

Spurs - Parker, Green, Leonard, Duncan, Split.

Clippers - Paul, Billups, Butler (Caron), Griffin, Jordan.

The peak Jordan, who was full of explosive power and extremely fast, easily won the first attack from Duncan.

Paul held the ball against Parker who was closely defending him, and started the game with the classic two-man pick-and-roll tactics of the Clippers, that is, Griffin mentioned the high screen, and Paul used the pick-and-roll to get rid of the defense and cut into the inside. At this time, if Griffin successfully went down, he would pass the ball to the latter to score.

If the above inside players have strong switching ability, the second person's screen will be used. Anyway, the final end point of this tactic is three people: Paul, Griffin, and Jordan.

Parker did not bypass the pick-and-roll, which led to Paul's direct breakthrough into the inside free throw line and a mid-range shot!

2:0, the Clippers took the lead!

The players of the two teams were also well matched, and they met good talents and refused to give in to each other.

Paul and Parker exploded against each other. Either Paul used the screen to slip past Parker to score, or Parker passed Paul in one step and made a layup while moving...

The competition in the interior was also very fierce. Griffin and Jordan did everything they could to get a position, including double-teaming, elbowing, and"roujiamo"."……After a game, the 36-year-old Duncan took off his jersey, and the bruises on his body were no less than Manu's remaining hair.

The competition between the two teams' benches was also fierce. It has to be admitted that the Clippers, with all the healthy players, are really a team that is expected to win the championship. Whether it is the starting lineup or the bench, the depth of the lineup is very strong.

Jamal Crawford, the best sixth man in history, and Manu scored to the limit. The Spurs' outside blockade line composed of Joey and Leonard successfully blocked Lamar Odom, Grant Hill, Matt Barnes and other strong players outside the paint area. The

"Three Musketeers" of the Holy City, Green, Neal, and Mills, took turns to shoot from the outside, and made 9 of 21 three-pointers in the whole game, and scored 38 points together to save the team.

Unfortunately, the Clippers' Big Three came in with great momentum. Griffin and Jordan used"high-altitude operations" to continuously bombard the Spurs' basket. Dio, who successfully restricted Griffin in the playoffs last season, was forced to be included in the team's daily observation list before this game because of toe nerve tension. Old Duncan was isolated and helpless.

The two teams had a 17:8 lead in frontcourt rebounds. Even though Duncan was still as wild as a young man and scored 26 points and 9 rebounds against two inside beasts, he still couldn't beat his opponent.

In the end, the Clippers visited the Holy City and narrowly defeated the Spurs 121:114, successfully taking revenge!

Paul played for 36 minutes and scored a super double-double of 18 points and 17 assists; Griffin played explosively, scoring 21 points and grabbing 13 rebounds over Duncan; Jordan was restricted by the experienced Split, and it was a bit difficult to eat the cake, but he also got 7 points and 11 rebounds.

The other players of the Clippers also played well.

K6 even contributed 24 points in the"battle" with Manu, and led the team to victory over the demon sword who scored 19 points in the whole game.

The iron gate formed by Leonard and Joey on the outside defended all the forwards of the Clippers. They also used their abnormal defensive ability to treat Griffin, Barnes and other tough guys to hot pot.

But at the same time, the two rookies were completely silent on the offensive end. Leonard was okay, scoring an economic double-double of 10 points, 10 rebounds, 1 steal and 3 blocks.

Joey was called for military training by Paul and K6 in turn. He played for 20 minutes, and 19 minutes of him took the main responsibility for outside defense. At least 15 minutes of him was"beaten". In the end, he hastily contributed 4 points, 6 assists and 2 rebounds. However, the 5 blocks on the defensive end broke his career single-game block record, which was a little consolation.

After the game, some media with good intentions gave the combination of the two a resounding nickname.——

""Death forward locks the line"!

Meaning - not only locks the enemy's forward line, but also locks the own forward line...

Through this game, 58pao officially taught Joey a lesson, making the latter fully realize how big the gap is between him and the league's top guards at this stage.

I believe that after this game, more and more teams will begin to study and target Joey's playing style, and coach Popovich will gradually improve the latter's targeted training in daily team training. After the game, the media who touted Joey as"EJ's successor" a few days ago, just like the ruthless piaoke, began to change their words according to the wind:

"The Spurs' dazzling new star suffered a Waterloo, and the league's top point guard learned a lesson"

"Damn the 12th rookie rankings, this Asian player shouldn't be ranked first. The mass media should focus more on Anthony and Damian!"

"The death front line locks down the opponent and also locks down yourself……"

"The strongest rookie of this year, No. 3 pick Joey encountered the rookie wall, the best sixth man and the best point guard of the season took turns to guide……"

"The worst third pick in the new century, Joey uses his painful lesson to tell us that we should never use a high draft pick to choose a yellow guard player!"

"……"

Sports media coverage was overwhelming, and the pictures in the news were basically all photos of Joey scoring after being tricked by Paul.

INS、Some marketing accounts on social media such as Twitter began to upload"carefully edited" videos of the game - various videos of Joey being dribbled past, top-shotted, and dribbled through the crotch...

Overnight, Joey went from being a strong contender for the best rookie to a"fake third pick.""——

It only took five games.

Therefore, in this small-scale public opinion storm, O'Neal, Barkley and Lakers legend EJ successively posted tweets to support and encourage Joey, which is precious.

O'Neal and Barkley first explained the Knicks the day after the game.���He talked about this during the game, using the example of Joey's compatriot and predecessor Yao Ming to illustrate that the loss of a game is not enough to prove anything. Yao Ming went through more than 20 NBA regular season games and suffered nearly two months of abuse from the fans of the Milwaukee team before he gradually got into shape and showed the world his dominance in the interior.

He also comforted Joey not to lose his fighting spirit because of this, and to become the league's next All-Star guard like his predecessors.

Magic, who rarely stood up to encourage a rookie, was even more direct. He posted three identical updates on social media - if you (referring to the outside media) regard him as my successor, then give him enough time and patience to grow. No one is a born superstar. Just like a piece of unpolished jade, acquired polishing is the most important. Come on, young people of Kentucky, you must believe that you are a powerful character who has come to change the entire league.……

"The words of the"child-rearing" expert directly shut up most of the media. They began to keep silent about the matter in their reports, hoping to wait until the public opinion storm gradually dissipated before continuing to take advantage of the popularity of the Spurs'"topic" third pick. Magic's words directly admitted to the outside world that Joey was his recognized successor, shutting up most of the so-called sports media and writers.

In fact, not only them, many players in the Spurs were also a little worried about Joey.

But in the training game on the 9th, preparing for the away game against the Kings the next day, Joey just said���This dispelled their concerns:

"What doesn't beat me makes me stronger!" On

November 10, facing the Sacramento Kings, the second-to-last team in the Western Conference, Joey came off the bench for 28 minutes, made 7 of 14 shots, and scored 19 points, 7 rebounds, and 6 assists with a shooting percentage of 50%, including 2 of 5 three-pointers and 3 of 4 free throws. His true shooting percentage was 68.4%, and his plus-minus value was +14, the highest in the game.

Joey played well in this game.

Not only was he 50-50 with the 2009 fourth pick Tyreke Evans on the offensive end, but he also used his strong outside defense ability to successfully limit the performance of the Kings' John Selmers and other forwards.

He was an important factor in the Spurs' victory with a score of 89:104 when Duncan and Manu were resting.

After the game, Joey took the initiative to find Thomas, one of the Kings' backcourt players, to exchange jerseys.

With the team's boss Cousins and outside linebacker In the puzzled eyes of the core player Evans, they hugged and took photos together affectionately.

Joey not only did not seem to be disturbed by the outside public opinion, but at this moment, he was like a little fan who saw his idol, hugging Thomas and not letting go.

In the end, if the Kings coach had not communicated with the staff, Joey would probably have wanted to meet Thomas offline alone.

Later on the bus back to the hotel, curious baby Cousins came over and asked what the relationship between Thomas and Joey was.

The latter also said in a confused look that he didn't know.

In fact, how could Thomas know? In the future, he played in the NBA for nearly ten years with an average height of 1.75m. In the hearts of guys like Joey who have an average height but have the dream of playing professionally, his status is no less than that of Goat Michael Jordan.