This Forward is Not Serious

The summer of 2007 was destined to be a tormenting offseason for the Lakers.

Kobe scored crazy points for two consecutive years, but the Lakers fell in the first round one after another because of the strength of the lineup.

This kind of encounter caused Kobe to lose trust in the management, and therefore he was interested in leaving.

At this time, there is no "designated next home", and Kobe's move is more like forcing the management to strengthen the team.

After all, he is someone who is determined to surpass his idol Jordan, but now he is wasting his peak in Los Angeles.

Because of the precedent of Carter forcing the Raptors, the Lakers dare not say that Kobe will definitely not leave.

They will attach great importance to anything Kobe said at this time.

So in the wave at four o'clock in the morning, it must be unrealistic for you to say that the trial training was arranged by the Lakers.

It's more like Kobe couldn't find someone, so he asked Lin Ying to practice with him, and found that he was very suitable for him, and then took advantage of the opportunity to propose this person to the management.

Reasonable and reasonable.

As for why Kobe came to Lin Ying, this is probably only Kobe himself knows.

Perhaps, if Lin Ying really went to the Lakers, she could ask Kobe directly at that time.

There may be some interesting little stories in it.

Of course, the premise is that the Lakers can select Lin Ying.

But no matter what, Lin Ying ended her trial training in a way she never expected.

Although he has not received a clear draft commitment, unless he suddenly suffers a serious injury in the past two days, he should not fall out of the top 20.

He returned to Austin after the Los Angeles workout.

Not long after he went back, Duffy told him a piece of news.

He got an invitation from the "Little Green Room" of the league's draft office!

The small green room refers to an area surrounded by a green baffle of more than 1 meter between the draft stage and the auditorium.

That position is facing the stage, and it is also the focus area that the media cameras are facing.

Generally, only players who are considered to have a chance to enter the lottery zone in the draft, that is, players with the top 14 picks, will receive invitations.

Of course, this invitation will generally be more than 14 people.

After all, this list is only invited by the league according to the intention of each team, and no one knows whether those teams will suddenly change their minds.

But receiving this invitation meant that someone in the current lottery team had ideas about Lin Ying!

Judging from the trial teams he has participated in, the only lottery zone is the Hornets.

But an excellent hunter will not easily expose his tracks.

So the Hornets may be a possibility, but not the only possibility.

Q: If this guy is invited, can he still refuse?

Answer: Of course you can!

It's an invitation, so of course you can refuse.

In the 2021 draft in history, Usman Garuba refused because he wanted to represent Spain in the Olympics.

It's just that being invited to enter the Little Green Room is not only an honor, but also a kind of exposure, and most people will not refuse.

Of course, in theory, some people may not go because they are afraid of falling out of the lottery, or falling into the second round like Jordan and Paul Ball.

Lin Ying, of course, has no reason to refuse.

Sitting in the little green room with Durant waiting to be drafted, what a beautiful thing.

Then, Lin Ying also asked about the list of the Little Green House this time.

Including him, there are 16 people this year.

The remaining 15 people are: Oden, Durant, Horford, Jeff Green, Brewer, Conley, Noah, Brandon Wright, Julian Wright, Asi Law, Huo Iss, Al Thornton, Stuckey, Nick Young, and Yi Jianlian.

That means at least two of the 16 people invited will fall out of the lottery.

It is worth mentioning that although Yao Ming was elected as the No. 1 pick in the NBA in 2002, he was not able to come to the draft because of the national conditions at the time.

So this is the first time in history that a Chinese player entered the small green room and scored two at a time.

Tell me about Yi Jianlian.

During Lin Ying's trial training, two other Chinese players, Yi Jianlian and Sun Yue, who participated in the draft this year, were also undergoing trial training for the draft.

As in history, Sun Yue's trial training didn't get much news, but Yi Jianlian was very popular in the United States.

Yi Jianlian's talent must be better than Lin Ying's.

He has a height of 2.13 meters, a wingspan of 2.22 meters, the body of a power forward, the speed of a small forward, excellent athletic ability, and excellent outside shooting ability and offensive ability with the ball.

For these alone, he will be a lottery pick no matter what year he enters the draft, the difference is only in the level of the pick.

In fact, if Yi Jianlian had participated in the draft in 2006, he would have even had a chance to hit the top three in that draft year.

This is not an exaggeration.

Take this year as an example, even if Lin Ying helped the University of Texas win the NCAA championship, he won't get as much attention from the NBA team as Yi Jianlian.

In the draft, the higher the pick, the more talent is valued.

Of course, Yi Jianlian also has an obvious shortcoming, that is, his current confrontation ability is very poor.

His agent, Dan Fagan, carried out a series of showmanship in order to cover up this.

First, he did not participate in the joint trial training in Chicago, and then during the trial training, he only showed some non-confrontational abilities.

This had the opposite effect, and some NBA team management expressed dissatisfaction.

The first to express dissatisfaction was Celtics general manager Danny Ainge.

Because he found that even if it was a trial training alone, Fagan would not allow him to arrange for someone to have a confrontational trial training with Yi Jianlian.

"It was an excellent trial, Yi Jianlian played against a chair or a coach, and that chair played a few good defenses."

This is also the root of Yi Jianlian's "chair man" in history.

Lin Ying stayed in the United States for two years, and knew that these words were actually Anji's American-style complaints.

The "chair" here is talking about non-confrontation training.

But from the fact that Durant was labeled "indifferent" before, you know how fucked the American media is.

Soon, the well-known American media person Bill Simmons began to use the "chair man" to describe Yi Jianlian.

The label also spread like wildfire.

...

On June 27, the day before the draft, Lin Ying and Durant flew to New York with Bill Duffy.

This year's draft will, as usual, be held at the Knicks' home court, the "Basketball Mecca" Madison Square Garden.

NBA officials have arranged for rookies participating in the draft to live in a unified hotel.

But if there are family members coming together, they have to find a place to live by themselves.

Durant ran to Lin Ying's room to chat.

The night before the draft can be a sleepless night.

As long as they are selected in the first round, among other things, they will become millionaires first!

The two ordered takeaway and watched TNT programs while eating.

Barkley and the others were discussing the draft predictions for the last issue of "NBAdraft".

This period, also known as the "Ultimate Prediction", in addition to rankings, also scored players based on physical test data from previous joint trials.

This score is divided into 12 individual items, namely athletic talent, size, defense, strength, agility, leadership, jump shot, NBA readiness, ball feel (outside) / rebounding (inside), potential, passing (outside) / basket Under the technical (internal line), spiritual willpower.

The maximum score for each item is 10 points, for a total of 120 points.

Both Durant and Oden scored a historic 106 points!

This score is the highest rating in the NBA in the past 15 years.

Barkley and Smith are now analyzing who will be the No. 1 pick.

It's just that the analysis of these two people is not to compare the advantages, but to compare the disadvantages, picking bones from the eggs.

Oden's shortcomings are that he has no shooting ability, has potential injuries, and is prone to foul trouble.

Durant's shortcomings are lack of strength and physical fitness, and there is a certain probability that he will not be able to adapt to NBA confrontation.

Lin Ying was quite impressed with this score.

In history, Durant has 2 points less than Oden, but now his defense and mental willpower are better than the same period in history.

The same score, so there is a lot of quarrel over who is the number one pick.

Still, the show works really well.

To be honest, Lin Ying can't guess whether Durant will be the No. 1 pick.

While the draft lottery is the same as it has been in history, many things have changed.

Not everyone discussed Barkley.

After discussing the No. 1 pick, they discussed Yi Jianlian.

After discussing Yi Jianlian, it's Lin Ying.

When the two were discussing, Lin Ying's complete score and draft report were given in the live broadcast.

Athletic talent: 7

Size: 8

Defense: 8

Strength: 8

Dexterity: 8

Leadership Skills: 6

Jump shots: 8

NBA readiness: 8

Rebounds: 8

Potential: 7

Passes: 9

Mental Willpower: 9

Overall Rating: 94

This score, basically 8 is the average level of lottery picks, those below 8 are insufficient for this pick, and those above 8 are considered excellent.

This is more evident in the text version of the report.

Pros: Very high basketball IQ, can always make the right choice in the game;

Excellent passing ability, particularly outstanding fast break pass ability;

Has excellent wingspan, good palm size, has shown NBA-level defensive ability, and still has room for improvement;

Possess good strength and agility, which allows him to be able to play both power forward and small forward positions in the NBA;

Possesses a stable three-point shooting ability and also shows certain low-post offensive skills;

He has a strong will to play and is a difficult player to beat.

Disadvantages: Lack of offensive ability with the ball, relatively single offensive means;

Due to the lack of sufficient offensive threats, the organizational ability is more dependent on the performance of teammates;

Although has a good size, but the athletic ability is relatively ordinary;

Introverted, unable to be a team leader;

A good immediate player, but with limited potential, it is difficult to grow into an All-Star player.

Draft template: Sean Marion/Larry Bird.

"Fxck!"

Durant looked very engaged in the front, but jumped up when he saw it.

Except for the potential, everything from scoring to analysis is relatively objective.

But what the hell is the final template!

No, it is enough for you to give Marion, what is that thing added later!

Lin Ying also had a Nick Young-style question mark face.

The head of the person in "NBAdraft" must have been kicked by Barkley's donkey, and Bird was included in the template for him...

This is simply a curse!

In fact, let alone the two of them, Barkley and Smith in the show also started laughing when they saw the end.

That made people suspect that it was the effect of the show that these two guys and the talent show website worked together.

But they are really doing the analysis.

Barkley analyzed some similarities between Lin Ying and Bird. They have average athletic ability, can play two positions at the same time, have outside three-point ability, excellent passing ability, outstanding mental attributes, and of course the most important thing is top-level golf quotient.

Other players who used Bird as a template did not play out in the end. A large part of the reason is that the golf quotient is not enough.

However, Kenny Smith quickly analyzed that Lin Ying and Bird were not compatible, or even completely opposite.

The biggest thing is character. Bird is a king. Lin Ying's words are more like Tim Duncan after being sanctioned by "bald" Crawford.

And Bird's ability to hold the ball is far beyond Lin Ying.

"When did personality become a template reference factor? And Kevin Durant doesn't have T-mac's ability to hold the ball now, does he? Kenny, players will improve."

For some reason, Barkley actually had a hint of "forest blowing".

Both Lin Ying and Durant were silent.

What he said was so reasonable that we couldn't refute it!

"Shadow, it's actually not impossible."

Durant suddenly changed his tune.

Lin Ying looked at Durant suspiciously.

"Just because others can't do it doesn't mean you can't do it!"

Lin Ying froze for a moment.

What you said is very reasonable, but I still can't refute it!

"I am the first person, you can force yourself to be the second person."

Durant is really yy, this is starting to divide the world!

Lin Ying smiled and nodded.

yy, whatever.

"By the way, Ying, what lucky item did you prepare for tomorrow?"

Durant then asked.

During the NBA lottery, the representatives of the lottery will use various lucky objects to bless themselves.

Similarly, players do similar things during the draft.

"Yes, I'm ready."

He is really ready for this.

Two small national flags.

This is still the plot in the novel "My Shooting Is So Accurate" that he has read before.

He thought it was pretty good and borrowed it.

The national flag is not very easy to buy, and he had brought it from China with Yang Yi.

Durant gave Lin Ying a thumbs up, and then showed off his lucky item by the way.

It was a pair of green lucky underwear.

...

On June 28, Madison Square Garden was crowded with crowds.

The major media were in place, including Yang Yi, who also came to the scene to prepare for the domestic live broadcast.

There may be three people selected by the NBA at the same time this year!

Of course, there are more fans of each team at the scene, with turbulent waves and enthusiasm.

This year is the year of the draft, the teams in the league are highly motivated, and the enthusiasm of the fans is even higher.

Especially fans of the Trail Blazers, Sonics and Hawks.

These three teams failed to beat the Celtics last season, but in the end they got the top three picks. Can you be unhappy!

Lin Ying entered Madison Square Garden with her uncle, Duffy, and Durant's family.

NBA venues basically have an attendance rate of around 20,000 people, which is much smaller than the venues where they used to play crazy three-game games.

But this size is actually the most suitable for basketball games.

And as a "Basketball Mecca", the iconic significance of this arena even exceeds that of the Staples Center.

They were led into the small green house by the staff.

The staff was very considerate and told them that there was a draft process on the table, and also carefully explained the location of the bathroom.

The draft will last a long time.

The tables were all arranged, and Lin Ying and Durant were at the next table, directly below the stage.

A small detail reflects the professionalism of the NBA.

On Durant's side, brother Tony Durant, mother Wanda, Ross Springman, and Randy Williams sat at a table.

On Lin Ying's side, he only had his uncle as a family member, so Duffy sat at his table, and Rick Barnes was also at his table.

Because they are so close together, this arrangement seems quite lively.

Then, the table next to Durant was Oden, and the table behind Oden belonged to Yi Jianlian.

When Lin Ying looked up, it happened that Yi Jianlian was also looking in his direction.

It is difficult for the two Chinese in the little green house not to pay attention to each other.

This was also the first time Lin Ying met Yi Jianlian.

What a sunny and handsome guy!

At this moment, the scene lights began to dim, and all the spotlights hit the center of the stage.

The talent show is about to start!