The Whip of the God of Basketball

On January 22, it snowed heavily in Boston, which made the visiting Milwaukee Bucks players feel at home, because Milwaukee was already covered by thick snow at this time. Since the beginning of January, the cold wave from Canada met with the transpiration of the Great Lakes and abundant water vapor, covering the entire central region in white.

A few days ago, the Celtics fell to the ice and snow in Milwaukee. Without Walker and Reid, they were lame in both offense and defense, especially the offense, which lacked powerful attack points and important shooting points from the outside. The Walters seem a bit stretched tactically.

Since Walker missed the game due to injury, Leon has been thinking about various issues. For example, in tactics, the coming of injuries made Leon feel that the Celtics' tactical system still lacks sufficient thickness and relies more on the unique abilities of certain players in the team. Once a certain piece is missing, the team's original simple and smooth tactical system Crashed immediately. For example, the management of emotions, he can clearly feel that when victory is mixed with defeat, the players' emotions are obviously not as surging as they were during the winning streak at the beginning of the season.

Fortunately, Reed and Walker returned in time, so that Leon had a solid understanding of tonight's game, but injuries were unpredictable and unavoidable, and Leon thought he still had a lot of work to do. For example, how to deal with fatigue, how to deal with injuries, how to deal with the mental distress brought to players by frequent and tiring games, and the passion that fades as the season progresses are the enemies that young teams must be wary of.

The lights at North Shore Gardens went out around 7 p.m. and then came back on after the national anthem was sung, as the Celtics' 42nd game of the season began. The number 42 means that the team has completed half of the schedule and started to enter the second half of the season. They've had a big start to the season, a steady run in the middle and a recent bump, and they've generally done a good job.

Leon stood on the sidelines, dressed in a smart suit and spotless uppers, looking completely different from how he had been all those years ago. He has become more and more like a coach who has been in the NBA for many years, appearing stable and refined. However, if you look closely at his face, the slight scars on the nose and the corners of the eyes have not faded with the passage of time, on the contrary, some marks have become deeper. This gave Leon a nickname - Scarface (Scarface).

Especially when the news about his criminal record was rampant some time ago, his nickname became even more resounding, and he was even admired by many fans at one time, thinking that a character with such a legendary experience should not be criticized but should be praised. Kudos to him for his motivation and hard work.

So at the North Shore Garden Arena tonight, Leon glanced at the auditorium and saw that some fans holding signs posted Al Pacino's headshots from the stills of the movie "Scarface" , and then drew a cigar around his mouth to support and encourage Fox Leon, which also warmed Leon's heart. No matter what kind of doubts there are, there will always be sincere and enthusiastic fans who pay attention to and support him. Sometimes he feels that this is a very happy place to be a coach or a player. Of course, the instigator of the negative news has now fallen into the trap designed by Leon, and he is waiting for the time to close the net.

After thinking about it wildly, the game has already started with the referee's whistle.

This is the second time the Bucks and Celtics have played against each other this season, and it's also a rematch in a week. The last loss at the Bradley Center allowed Leon to watch for three hours after returning to the hotel video of the game. He summed up three reasons for the team's loss. First, the outside defense was pierced by the Bucks, allowing the opponent to shoot 50% of the three-pointers; second, terrible mistakes, which have always been mistakes The less offensive and smooth Celtics made 22 turnovers inexplicably in this game; the third, and deeply hidden point, is the decline in the team's average running distance.

The first two points are mistakes that many teams will make. After all, the defense is slack, lack of concentration and a large number of mistakes are inevitable in a long and tiring season. But the third point, only ghosts like Fox Leon It can be seen at a glance that the players' enthusiasm for running has declined.

As a coach who understands the importance of space, this decline is unbearable, but Leon did not tell the players to run more before the game. If verbal lessons can help, the world does not need police and violence. It's off.

Five minutes into the first quarter, the two sides tied at 10:10. The Celtics' offensive speed was obviously not fast enough. Walker scored six points in a row, but the Bucks went back and forth. Ray Allen's The state is quite good. Facing the returning Michael Reed, he continuously used breakthroughs to hit mid-range throws or emergency stop jumpers, and scored eight points in a row. The other players seemed to have been frozen by the heavy snow, and they hadn't played their due form yet.

Because the game went smoothly, there were no fouls or mistakes on both sides, and the two sides were evenly divided. Neither side called a timeout, so the official timeout was quickly entered, and both sides took a break to adjust.

Leon looked at the players who walked off the court, pointed to PJ Brown who was panting heavily, and said to him: "PJ, come down and rest for a while, Chris, you go." He pointed to PJ Brown again. Reece Anderson, gesturing for him to take off his jacket and get ready to play.

Both PJ-Brown and Chris Anderson were a bit confused, and this was the first official timeout. Generally speaking, Chris Anderson would come off the bench until about the ninth minute of the first quarter, and depending on the situation of the opponent Does he replace Brown or Walker. Sometimes Leon will send Wang Zhizhi to keep Anderson on the bench. Now that Anderson replaced Brown so early in the game, everyone was a little confused.

Brown sat down heavily on the bench, staring at his eyes and gulping water, while Dick Hart approached Leon and asked, "What's the matter, Fox, it's not good to change the order of rotation casually, this is not the playoffs... ...PJ played hard."

Leon just nodded. In the first year of coaching, Dick Hart was a very good teacher for Leon. This very experienced assistant coach gave Leon a lot of things other than techniques, tactics and command. Relying on knowledge and cleverness cannot be learned in a short while, because it is accumulated over decades. For example, how to soothe the emotions of the players during the timeout, how to deal with the referee seriously, how to resist the interference of the fans in the away game and other useful things have benefited Leon a lot in 41 games.

But this time he had his own considerations. He still replaced PJ-Brown and replaced Chris Anderson early, which surprised the commentators on the sidelines. How could such an excellent starting center like PJ-Brown was suddenly replaced.

In terms of strength, Anderson is indeed a lot worse than Brown. First of all, Anderson is certainly not as good as Brown on the defensive end. He is not as stable and cautious as Brown. go. It is even more incomparable on the offensive end. Brown has a very good mid-range, which basically completely replaced the role of Tony Batty. He also has a certain low-post offensive ability. He can steal one if necessary. There are basically no other effective offensive techniques.

However, the situation on the court has changed subtly. The Bucks are still in the situation where Ray Allen alone supports the overall offensive situation. Only Sam Cassell recovers slightly and throws in a mid-range throw. On the other hand, for the Celtics, Anderson didn't touch the ball a few times after he came on the court, but he stirred up the sardines like a catfish. One of his beautiful blocks and two tip-ups after offensive rebounds created a sense for his teammates. There was an opportunity.

More importantly, when Anderson was on the court, no one considered passing him the ball or making the ball, and he had no idea of ​​attacking at all, just kept running, jumping, running, and jumping. It's like that in basketball, when one guy on the team is running non-stop, the rest of the team is running too, not to mention the Celtics are a Leon-trained team who can't run. It's a ring within a ring.

Maybe some runs are meaningless, but when these meaningless runs are combined and accumulated, it often becomes meaningful and effective. Relying on a sudden momentum, the Celtics played a wave of 20:12 offensive after the official timeout of the first quarter. They suddenly resumed the high-speed attack of light riding and fast running, riding and archery.

"Do you know why I replaced you?" Leon said to PJ Brown after the first quarter, when the score between the two sides became 22:30.

PJ-Brown looked a little embarrassed. He felt that Leon was criticizing him and was targeting him. He pouted and thought for a while and said firmly: "Maybe Chris is more suitable for the team."

Other players also noticed the conversation between Leon and Brown. Dick Hart wanted to stop it, but he didn't know what to say. If the old players in the team quarreled with the head coach, it would be a big mess.

"No, PJ, you are the better one, you learn quickly, you play very hard and dedicated, you also integrated into our tactics smoothly, and you carried the team when Walker was injured I admit that you are better than Chris, but you lack one thing that Chris has and that thing is very important, that is passion." Leon patted PJ-Brown on the shoulder and said, at this time during the break It's almost over.

"I still remember the last time against the Trail Blazers, you guarded the team like a King Kong, because I abandoned you throughout the first half, you want to prove something with your performance. But after a few games, you returned to ten In the day-to-day program, there is no emotion but due diligence. But I think, PJ, you should be more passionate than anyone else, because our goal is the championship." After speaking, the second quarter began, and Leon Signal PJ-Brown to play.

At the same time, Leon pointed to Michael Reid again and said, "Sit down Michael, you played enough in the first quarter, come down and adjust."

"It's okay, I don't want to rest for too long." Reid is very hungry tonight and wants to play very much.

"No, sit down and think about it, think about what you want to do, and it's not too late to play." Leon said. Some people need more passion, while others need calm.

Therefore, the head coach has to be like fire for a while and ice for a while. This may be like Leon's appearance. His calm and gentle appearance cannot conceal the raging enthusiasm under the scar.