NBA: This Center Is So Stable

The best defense is offense.

Chapter 296 “The best defense is offense”

The Zen master looked grim.

He never expected the Lakers to be as glorious as the Bulls’ iron triangle.

It’s rare for a team with multiple stars to be top defenders.

Normally, stars with both good offense and defense are as rare as pandas.

Basically, as long as you have the background of a star, the team will use you more in the offensive aspect, giving full play to your personal characteristics.

And if you want to be good at both offense and defense, first of all, don’t consider the quality of the star, and assume that the player is a so-called all-around fighter, it is also difficult to do this.

The reason is simple.

Top athletes are still human after all!

As long as it is a human, this allocation of energy must conform to biology.

After all, there are only a few perfect top athletes who can not only do the offense to the extreme, but also work hard on the defense. Such all-round warriors will be scrambled by countless teams.

On this basis, it is a fantasy to have two or more players who are both offensive and defensive in the same team.

Therefore, the Zen Master has never asked the current Lakers to be on par with the former Bulls.

More importantly, the opponent.

In the eyes of the Zen Master, the Knicks in front of him do not need the existence of the Bulls’ iron triangle at all, except that Wang Song is a unique existence, which will cause a lot of trouble to the Lakers.

In the eyes of the Zen Master, most of the others are not at the level of first-line superstars, so there is no need for the Lakers to have a historical level of offensive and defensive super giants.

What’s more, they are not without.

Although O’Neal is already in the decline of his peak, he can still be regarded as an offensive and defensive existence in the twilight years of these four centers.

In addition to him, there is Kobe, who is growing rapidly and preparing to take over the Lakers.

With the configuration of former All-Stars such as Gary Payton and Karl Malone, the Lakers’ defense is not so bad.

Therefore, when the Knicks completed the empty cut against the Lakers’ defense, the Zen Master attributed the reason to the players’ attitude. This situation will only occur when the attitude is not correct.

“Shaq! Don’t stand inside, follow that guy!”

“The rest of you move, pay attention to the inside cut, don’t let me see those guys in New York easily penetrate your defense again.”

On the sidelines, Phil Jackson shouted to the court.

Change the ball, the Lakers attack.

Kobe ignored the Zen Master who was shouting on the sidelines, and continued to attack in the low post.

The concept of “the best defense is offense” can be said to be deeply rooted in Kobe’s heart!

As long as the offense can open up the situation, he believes that the old man who is chattering on the sidelines will shut up.

Facing Prince’s defense again, Kobe made a mid-range shot after continuous probing with his right foot.

Swish!

Hit again!

O’Neal, who was originally a little unhappy, narrowed his eyes slightly. It should be said that this stubborn afro has a lot of character to improve in all aspects, but he can find the toughness of his state on the court, which even he cannot question.

The Lakers took the lead again, but before the Lakers bench celebrated, the Knicks immediately returned a 3-pointer.

···

The main theme of the first quarter was set in this way.

Both sides started the bombardment with extremely high offensive efficiency, which was destined to be a high-level offensive battle.

The alternating leading scores of the two teams made the coaching staff of both sides very entangled, especially the Lakers coaching staff.

The Zen Master sat on the sidelines with a green and purple face.

When he wanted to lose his temper with Kobe and stop him, the other party always blocked his mouth with one goal after another.

This game was somewhat similar to G3, except that the person with the overwhelming desire to attack was replaced by Kobe instead of O’Neal.

27:29!

The Knicks led by 2 points into the second quarter.

During the timeout, D’Antoni formulated some relevant strategies for the Lakers’ performance in the first quarter.

For example, the defense against Kobe.

In the first quarter, “Little Flying Man” scored 15 points alone, which was most of the Lakers’ points, and he also had 4 assists.

The only goal that the Lakers had nothing to do with him in the entire first quarter was the tip-in when O’Neal grabbed the offensive rebound and completed the second attack under the basket.

It can be said that in the first quarter, Kobe not only played the role of shooting guard, but also took over the organizational responsibilities of Payton and Fisher.

He is an absolute all-around warrior.

D’Antoni was considering

At this point, he decided to increase the intensity of Kobe in a targeted manner.

He didn’t believe that Kobe’s style of play could sustain four quarters of the game without exhaustion under high-intensity defense.

Wang Song thought the same as the head coach.

Kobe was indeed strong in the first quarter, but even so, the Lakers did not open up the score with the Knicks, which just confirmed Wang Song’s pre-match conjecture.

Now Kobe is like a lone boat in the sea, drifting alone in the sea. Although Kobe seems to be omnipotent in the first quarter, behind the scenes are the invisible bonuses brought by high ball possession.

The high concentration of ball possession is not good news for the Lakers. Once Kobe rests, the Lakers’ offensive situation in this game is equivalent to starting all over again.

So there will be a very strange situation on the court. When Kobe is full of energy, he will maintain a relatively stable situation on the court, and once he leaves the court, after losing this main attacker, the Lakers are likely to fall into a slump.

From Kobe’s perspective, there is no doubt that he will blame his teammates and enjoy the fruits of victory.

But once Kobe’s physical strength declines in the second half, and he can’t maintain his touch and his offensive efficiency begins to decline, his dissatisfied teammates will vent their long-accumulated resentment on him.

With Kobe’s temper, it’s a small matter to get angry, but he is unwilling to play.

And all this, the resentment of teammates must start from the pre-match warm-up…

Thinking of this terrifying butterfly effect, Wang Song couldn’t help shaking his head.

Who said basketball is just about fighting and killing?

After the second quarter, as D’Antoni and Wang Song expected, Kobe still stayed on the court as the core.

On the contrary, O’Neal, who had been running with Kobe for nearly a quarter, was replaced to rest.

Judging from the latter’s resentful expression sitting on the bench, O’Neal finally calmed down the “anti-Ko” emotions in two games, and they were stimulated again.

Now the reluctance to play is the most direct and obvious move.

Since Kobe likes to fight alone, O’Neal simply gave up the power and let him perform on the court.

The Zen Master, who is most familiar with the two, can be said to have a clear grasp of the psychological dynamics of both sides.

Kobe on the court wants to perform.

O’Neal off the court wants to see Kobe embarrass himself.

But at the moment, there is no better way for the Zen Master to ease the emotions of the two. Phil Jackson can only leave O’Neal off the court and let the assistant coach give him psychological counseling.

On the other side.

is to pray that Kobe can continue the hot hand in the first quarter and keep the game suspenseful.

(End of this chapter)