NBA: James wants to team up with me

Chapter 185 Kobe: I need better helpers

The Bulls' opponent in the first round of the playoffs is the Orlando Magic.

Although they only achieved a record of 38 wins and 44 losses in the regular season, the Magic are still one of the eight best teams in the Eastern Conference, at least much better than the other seven Eastern teams that can't even make the playoffs. .

The biggest contributor to the Magic's return to the playoffs is of course Dwight Howard, who averaged 17+12 per game.

In the third year of his career, Howard has been able to show the level of the league's top center, especially on the defensive end. His mobility is almost comparable to that of the perimeter, making Howard's ability to protect the basket and help defend the basket quite outstanding. The Magic's The paint is a no-fly zone for defenders from other teams.

Howard has outstanding defensive ability, but his offensive methods are still relatively rough. He mostly catches the ball under the basket to eat the pie, or grabs offensive rebounds and then scores on the second offense.

The Magic's management is not in a hurry. Howard, who participated in the draft as a high school student, has played in the league for three seasons, but he is only 21 years old. There is a lot of room for growth. As long as he is carefully cultivated, there is a great possibility. Become a top inside center with excellent offense and defense and comprehensive skills.

Of course, Wang Chong, who traveled back from the future, knows very well that even if he practices for another ten years, Howard's skills will still be the same, and it cannot be said that he has no skills at all. Howard can also use all the inside steps, hooks, and rebound shots. He can perform one and a half moves, but their lethality and efficiency are extremely limited. At best, he can only be considered a third-rate player. More often, he prefers to use his physical fitness and dynamic talents to play, because it is easier, simpler and more efficient.

This habit ruined Howard. When the accumulation of injuries increased, especially when repeated back injuries greatly affected his explosive power, Howard's dominance in the penalty area plummeted, degenerating from a super blue-collar to an ordinary blue-collar.

But it is undeniable that at his peak, Howard's defensive ability in the penalty area was so strong that he even surpassed Duncan. Coupled with averaging 20+ points per game, his level was indeed not bad.

It's just that Howard at this stage does not have the dominance under the basket that he will have in the next two or three years. The battle between the Bulls and the Magic was completely a one-sided beating.

In addition to Howard, the main lineup of the Magic in the 06-07 season also includes Grant Hill, Hedo Turkoglu, Jameer Nelson and other players. Compared with the Magic team that entered the finals, they are missing an All-Star-level outside sharpshooter, Rashad Lewis, and Turkoglu will have to wait until next season to fully understand and show the true strength of the Turkish magician.

Therefore, the Magic's regular season record is only 38 wins and 44 losses.

On April 2007, 4, the opening game of the first round of the playoffs began.

At the Chicago United Center, the home of the Bulls, the Bulls carried out an inhumane one-sided beating against the Magic.

The game started at 2 minutes, and the Bulls were in the lead until the end of the game.

100:92, the score is not very disparate, but anyone who has watched the entire game knows clearly that the Magic had no hope of reversal from the beginning to the end.

The gap in strength between the two teams was so huge that Wang Chong didn't play seriously in this game at all. He made 19 of 10 shots, only scored 25 points, 4 rebounds and 4 assists, and only played 32 minutes.

As the most important part of the Bulls' offensive system, Wang Chong does not need to score high points, which means that the Bulls only need other players to exert their strength, which is enough.

On the Magic team, Howard scored 13 points and 19 rebounds, completely suppressing Chandler in rebounding, but on the offensive end, there was nothing he could do against Chandler. There was no way, Howard's offensive ability was too rough, and he couldn't play with Chandler. Chandler is really similar, so Chandler also knows how to defend against Howard.

This season, Chandler's scoring has not improved significantly compared to last season. He still averages only 8 points per game, but his average rebounds per game have increased to 12.4, ranking second in the rebounding list, second only to 12.8 rebounds. Garnett is slightly better than Howard who has 12.3 rebounds.

However, in this matchup, Chandler's rebounding ability was completely blown away by Howard. He only grabbed 9 rebounds in the game, including 6 offensive rebounds that Howard lost directly.

This can only show that although Chandler is a relatively excellent blue-collar player, compared with Howard, even the current third-year Howard is still inferior.

The reason the Magic lost was because the only player on the team who had a matchup advantage was actually a blue-collar inside center. Not to mention Howard grabbed 19 rebounds, so what if he grabbed 30 rebounds? The scoring efficiency on the offensive end was not high, and the defensive end was not as strong as the Bulls, which doomed the outcome of the series.

The Bulls didn't make any ink with the Magic. In four games, they beat the Magic 4:0, sending the opponent home for an early vacation to go fishing, and became the first team to advance to the second round of the playoffs. .

One day later, the Cavaliers swept the Washington Wizards 4-0, following the Bulls into the second round.

These two teams are also the only two teams to sweep their opponents in the first round of the playoffs.

Many people originally thought that the Dallas Mavericks, who were first in the Western Conference with 66 wins in the regular season, should be able to easily sweep the Warriors and qualify.

But the situation of the Mavericks is not clear. The team lost a home game in the first game, and then lost all two away games. After four games, the Warriors got the match point in advance 1:3.

The entire league was dumbfounded by this situation.

What the hell? Are the Mavericks going to be hacked by the Warriors?

5月1日，已经1:3落后的小牛队在绝境之下爆发出顽强的战斗力，诺维斯基砍下30分12篮板，总算带领球队艰难的赢下一场，将比分追至2:3。

But the shocking reversal that Dallas fans were looking forward to did not happen. Two days later, the Warriors defeated the Mavericks at home, eliminating the Mavericks with a big score of 4:2, completing the miracle of defeating the Mavericks.

This result shocked the entire league. They never expected that the Mavericks, who were thought to be one of the favorites to win the championship, would actually fall in the first round and suffer a defeat!

How difficult is it to complete the Black Eight Miracle?

NBA的历史上在此前一共就出现过两次黑八，分别是93-94赛季丹佛掘金3:2击败西部第一的西雅图超音速，98-99赛季纽约尼克斯3:2击败东部第一的迈阿密热火。

The Mavericks are the first team to be eliminated by a black eight since the league was restructured and the first round playoffs were changed to a 7-game, 4-win system. They are also the third team in history to encounter a black eight.

This defeat was enough to put the Mavericks on the pillar of shame in history, and it also completely confirmed Nowitzki's title of softie. It was a complete defeat.

Correspondingly, the Golden State Warriors completed the miracle of the Black Eight. The Warriors led by Baron Davis won the title of Golden State Gangster with their outstanding performance in this series and received countless flowers, applause and praise.

<divclass="contentadv">However, this scene is completely consistent with the original historical process, so Wang Chong is not too surprised. He knows very well that there is only one real strong enemy in the Western Conference in the playoffs, and that is San Antonio Spurs.

It is worth mentioning that this Warriors team does not have Monta Ellis because Wang Chong interfered with it, but this did not prevent them from creating a black eight miracle, because the Warriors version of Ellis, this At that time, he was still at the stage where he was completely suppressed by Baron Davis and could not hold his head up.

Although he entered the rotation due to team injuries during the regular season and averaged 16.5 points and 4 assists per game, he was still reduced to a substitute role player in the playoffs, averaging only 8 points and 2 rebounds per game in six games with the Mavericks. 1.2 assists is by no means a key factor for the Warriors to win, so the Warriors without him did not miss out on the Black Eight Miracle.

The shock caused by the Mavericks' tragic defeat in the eighth round allowed several other sets of matchups to determine the outcome, and after the first round of the showdown, the league's announcement of the All-NBA and All-Defensive lineups was no longer so topical.

In addition to the two teams that completed the sweep in the East, the Bulls and Cavaliers, the results of the other two sets of duels were the Heat 4:3 Pistons and the Nets 4:2 Raptors.

The Heat are indeed weak to a certain extent this season. Neither Wade nor O'Neal is in a state of complete victory. In the original historical process, they met the Bulls in the first round and were swept out 4:0.

韦德场均23.5+5+6，奥尼尔场均18.8+8.5，完全没有上赛季一路过关斩将赢得总冠军的水平。

Fortunately, they are also facing the Detroit Pistons, who are beginning to rebuild.

Without Billups, the Pistons' strength has declined further.

Monta Ellis, who replaced Billups, steadily contributed 20+5+5 during the regular season, which looked pretty good.

But in the playoffs, Ellis immediately revealed his true colors. His scoring efficiency and contribution on the court are far from comparable to experienced veterans like Billups.

In the game against the Heat, Ellis basically carried the ball and rushed into the Heat penalty area. With his speed and flexibility, the effect of breaking through with the ball was quite good, but this is not how the game is played, especially when the intensity of confrontation increases. Playoffs.

In the past, Ellis didn't have to think so much because the Bulls' first offensive core was Wang Chong. All teams needed to focus their main defense on Wang Chong and had no time to deal with him.

But now it's different in the Pistons. Ellis, who was defended by the Heat, performed poorly in 4 games, shooting only 36% from the field. As a result, the Pistons, who should have had a slight advantage in overall strength, lost to the Heat and were defeated. Defeated 4:3.

As for the Raptors, whose record ranks third in the Eastern Conference, they lost to the Nets 2:4, which is not surprising.

The Raptors led by Bosh were originally a group of rookies with little playoff experience. Even if they finished third in the Eastern Conference during the regular season, it was not unreasonable to face the Nets led by Kidd and Carter. possible.

In this way, the two sets of matchups in the second round of the Eastern Conference are the Bulls vs. the Heat and the Cavaliers vs. the Nets.

The Bulls and Heat, two teams that met and played against each other in the Eastern Conference Finals last season, faced off again this season, but in just one year, the situation of the two teams has changed dramatically.

As for the Western Conference, the first round of the playoffs was almost exactly the same as the original historical process. The Warriors defeated the Mavericks 4:2 to achieve a black eight, the Spurs swept the Nuggets 4:1, the Jazz defeated the Rockets 4:3, and Germany The new Utah duo of Long and Boozer still caused the majority of Chinese fans to suffer from Jazz PTSD syndrome for two years.

During the three years when the Yao-Mai combination was at its strongest, the Rockets fell to the Jazz twice in the first round, and lost to the Lakers in the second round in the third year. Yao was injured because of this, which indirectly led to the advancement of his career. end.

Basically, the Rockets' peak and strongest years were wasted struggling in the first round of the Western Conference.

The last set of matchups in the Western Conference, the Suns vs. Lakers, is the only matchup where the scores are slightly different from the original history.

The Suns failed to defeat the Lakers in a gentleman's sweep 4:1, but defeated the Lakers 4:3 in a tiebreaker.

Although there is not much difference in the results, both Suns won and qualified for the second round, but it is undeniable that this Lakers lineup is indeed much stronger than the original Lakers, and without the single defense restrictions of Laga Bell, the Suns The team also struggled when facing Kobe.

Kobe averaged 35+5+4 per game in the series, and his performance was impeccable. Because of this, the 3:4 loss to the Suns made it even more difficult for Kobe to accept that he lost in the last game. At the post-game press conference, Kobe made it clear that the team must be strengthened and he needs an excellent helper to help him win the championship.

When Kobe said this, it was no surprise that he was ridiculed by the media in Los Angeles and even the entire league.

"In Kobe Bryant's eleven-year career, are there still few outstanding helpers? Whether it is O'Neal or Wang Chong, they are the best helpers to win the championship. It's just that Kobe's petty mind cannot tolerate anyone on the team who has a higher status than him. He cannot tolerate the existence of players who are better than him. Now that O'Neal and Wang Chong have left the Lakers and have been severely beaten by society, they want to start seeking help from outstanding teammates?"

But Kobe himself didn't say this to the media. It doesn't matter what the outside world wants to say. The key is that the Lakers management heard this.

Kobe's words clearly revealed a threat. If the Lakers are unable to continue trading for signings, it is not ruled out that Kobe will apply for a trade.

The Lakers and Buss put almost everything on Kobe. How could they let Kobe leave? Therefore, they will inevitably find ways to meet Kobe's requirements. Fortunately, the Lakers currently have a lot of excellent chips in the lineup. People such as Hinrich, Ben Gordon and others are all valuable trading chips.

No matter what, the journey of Kobe and the Lakers in the 06-07 season is over. They are seventh in the Western Conference in the regular season and eliminated in the first round of the playoffs. This result is absolutely unsatisfactory. Everything depends on the offseason basketball after this season. How will the team operate?

The two sets of matchups in the second round of the Western Conference were thus announced.

Spurs vs. Suns, Warriors vs. Jazz.