With three points at the start, Nash begged for a maximum salary to renew his contract
Chapter 319 The start of the 1718 season seems to be different from what you imagined?
Chapter 319 The start of the 17-18 season seems to be different from what you imagined?
At the end of September, all members of the Nuggets officially reported for duty, preparing for the preseason games of the new season.
After some operations in the summer free market and trade signings, the Nuggets' lineup has reached Wang Chao's expectations.
The Nuggets' starting lineup for the new season is: point guard Donovan Mitchell, shooting guard Jamal Murray, small forward PJ Tucker, power forward Wang Chao, and center Rudy Gobert.
This lineup has both offense and defense, led by Wang Chao on both ends of the offense and defense. The offense is supported by two small guards, Mitchell and Murray, with strong ball-handling breakthroughs and shooting support. The defense is Gobert and Tucker to assist Wang Chao. .
The main players on the bench are Derrick Rose and Kyle Kuzma.
The above seven are the absolute main force of Wang Chao in the Nuggets championship in the new season.
In addition to these 7 people, the Nuggets also have 7 role players, almost all of which are some unknown ordinary players left by the Nuggets last season. What an outstanding performance, but considering that the salaries of these players are generally not high, and the Nuggets must definitely make up the roster, they are all kept.
The outside world doesn't have any confidence in the Nuggets' lineup. Wang Chao can understand it. After all, they don't know how strong Gobert and Tucker's defense is, and they don't know the offensive capabilities of Mitchell and Murray. The lineup of the Golden Team can only be described in one word-rotten.
And Wang Chao is also absolutely sure that he surprised them all at the beginning of the season.
Moreover, apart from the players, the Nuggets have another advantage, and that is the devil's home court that is deeply feared by the entire league.
The altitude sickness and the fanatical Nuggets fans in the stadium atmosphere made the Denver Pepsi Center, home of the Nuggets, one of the league's well-known Devil's home stadiums, even stronger than the Boston Celtics' home TD North Shore Garden Arena.
This can be seen from the fact that the new players of the Nuggets have come to the Nuggets to report to the Nuggets one after another, and they have some symptoms of altitude sickness in daily training to varying degrees.
No way, even a strong athlete will experience short-term discomfort when performing strenuous exercise at a higher altitude, and the main reason for this reaction is that there are too few games against the Nuggets every season .
The Nuggets themselves have to play at least 42 games a season at home in Denver, while most teams in the West will only play 4 games in the Nuggets, and even fewer in the East, only 2 games per season.
If it weren't for special circumstances, no team would take teammates to adapt to the Nuggets' plateau environment in advance.
This has always been the biggest advantage of the Nuggets in the league, including the past few years. In the seasons when the Nuggets made the playoffs, as long as you investigate, you will find that the Nuggets have a better winning percentage at home than away. It is much higher, and even a boring guy who is free has done a special research. In more than 30 games in the past 4 years, when comparing the home win rate with the away win rate, the Denver Nuggets rank first in the league with a 28% win rate difference , That is to say, the Nuggets' winning percentage at home is 28% higher than that of away games, topping the league.
It is worth mentioning that the Utah Jazz, which is also one of the league's well-known devil's home courts, is close to the Nuggets' winning percentage.
The Denver plateau where the Nuggets are located is 1600 meters above sea level, while the Salt Lake City where the Jazz is located has an altitude of 1300 meters. Facing a group of coastal cities, the home court advantage is extremely obvious.
Of course, whether it is the altitude advantage of the plateau or the devil's home court advantage, they are only a small part of the factors that affect the game, and they cannot be the key to the team's victory. Otherwise, the Nuggets and the Jazz will not have a championship so far. nothing.
What really determines the outcome of the game is, in the final analysis, the team and the players.
-
In early October, the NBA 10-2017 season preseason started as scheduled.
Many people are paying attention to the Nuggets' preseason situation, but the Nuggets have revived again in the preseason.
In the 8 preseason games, Wang Chao only played 2 games and played less than 10 minutes.
For the remaining 5 games, the Nuggets sent Mitchell, Murray, Tucker, Kuzma and Gobert's main lineup.
Although it is only a preseason game, these Nuggets players are all players who are eager to prove themselves without exception, so they worked very hard during the game, and Gobert worked the hardest.
In early July, when the Nuggets signed Gobert for 7 million over four years, the entire league said he was not worthy of the 4 million annual salary.
Indeed, judging from Gobert's performance as a substitute for Whiteside in the Rockets, a contract in the early tens of millions is considered a very generous offer for him, and the Nuggets' 4-year 6400 million does seem to be a premium contract.
From that time on, Gobert wanted to prove to everyone that his strength was worthy of this contract.
After officially coming to the Nuggets to report, he was once again highly praised by Wang Chao.
When taking the Nuggets makeup photo in early September, Wang Chao mentioned Gobert, the second highest paid player in the team, in an interview with reporters.
"Rudy is a very good player. I valued and selected him when he was in the Rockets. No one knows his strengths better than me. I am optimistic that he will become the best defensive player in the future. His basket guard Basket ability will be the Nuggets' defensive gate, unbreakable."
Wang Chao's unstinting praise made Gobert feel a kind of man who dies for his confidant.
Not for himself, even if it's just to respond to Wang Chao's expectations, he must perform in the new season to make everyone shut up.
The preseason is the first battle of Gobert's rise.
In all 8 preseason games, Gobert played as the starting center. He averaged 27 points, 11.4 rebounds and 10.6 blocks in 1.8 minutes per game, and his defensive dominance at the basket began to show.
Wang Chao was not surprised by this.
The 17-18 season was the first time Gobert won the best defensive player award in his career, and in the 16-17 season, Gobert was already able to be selected for the best defensive team.
Although in this time and space, because of being selected by Wang Chao, he was unfortunately reduced to a substitute, did not have much playing time, and did not play enough games, resulting in a slight decline in strength compared to another time and space in the same period, but at the same time Gobert also enjoyed it. With the blessing of Wang Chao's training potion, and the development route set by Wang Chao, he has avoided a lot of detours, so his strength is not much weaker than before.
The performance of the Nuggets is not only Gobert.
The performances of the two smaller guards in the preseason were also surprising, especially the first-year rookie Mitchell who entered the league.
Mitchell's starting point is very high. Although he was only the 13th pick in the first round, in the original time and space, in his first season in the league, he was able to shoot 43.7% in the regular season. Both contributed 20.5 points, 3.7 rebounds and 3.7 assists, becoming the Jazz's first scoring point, perfectly replacing the Jazz's main core Hayward last season.
Entering the playoffs, Mitchell's scoring average has increased to 24.4 points per game. Although the Jazz stopped in the second round like the 16-17 season, it is amazing enough for a first-year rookie to perform so well.
After that, Mitchell's personal performance also improved steadily year by year, averaging 23.8 points per game in the second season, 24 points per game in the third season, and 26.4 points per game in the fourth season...
It can be said that the Jazz's defensive core is Gobert, and the offensive core is undoubtedly Mitchell.
In contrast, Murray, who entered the league a year earlier than him, was even worse. The latter finally averaged 20+ points per game in the fifth season of his career. Different, the Jazz are good at defense, lack of offensive means, and are quite dependent on Mitchell's scoring ability. On the other hand, the Nuggets themselves have Jokic, a big ball-holding core, and Murray is only the team's second scoring point. , The average number of shots per game is naturally less than that of Mitchell. If Murray has the same number of shots as Mitchell during his rookie contract, the score may not be lower than the opponent.
However, in the preseason, Mitchell was the first offensive core of the Nuggets, averaging 18.7 points per game, which is quite surprising.
"Mitchell is a very impactful defender. Although he is only 1 meters tall, he has a wingspan of 85 meters and has top-notch athletic ability, which makes him extremely lethal in holding the ball. The finishing ability is excellent, and the defense is obviously better than expected, and it is expected to become Wang Chao's right-hand man in the new season."
"Jamal Murray also showed a better performance in the preseason than last season. His shooting has become more stable, especially the shooting percentage from outside the three-point line. Last season, his three-point shooting percentage Only 33.4%, following the greatest three-pointer in history has obviously made his three-pointer more accurate. During the preseason, his three-pointer hit rate was as high as 43%. If he can maintain such a hit in the regular season Rate, the Nuggets' offensive problems don't need to worry at all."
In the 8 preseason games, Gobert, Mitchell and Murray have all been praised to varying degrees. After all, their performance has exceeded people's expectations.
But this is only limited to the preseason. Everyone knows that the preseason is just a training session for each team in the league. The victory and defeat are not included in the regular season statistics. No team will take it seriously. Most of them are used to run the team and train new players. Mainly.
The rookies of the Nuggets who performed well in the preseason are still unknown what kind of performance they can perform in the regular season.
But this suspense will be revealed soon.
-
On October 2017, 10, the NBA regular season officially started.
The first game of the Nuggets is an away game, going to Utah to challenge the Jazz.
Unlike the Jazz in another time and space, the Jazz in this time and space in 17-18 highlighted a tragic word.
The two core players, Gobert and Mitchell, were intercepted by Wang Chao. Not to mention, Hayward was also poached by the Celtics this summer just like in the original history.
As a result, the Jazz's main player in the new season is only Spanish golden boy Rubio. The Jazz has cultivated power forwards Derek Favors for many years, Joe Ingle and Xia Tian have nowhere to go. Star player Paul Millsap.
Originally, Millsap should have joined the Nuggets for 3 million in three years, and in the next three years, he would serve as the partner of Jokic inside the Nuggets, and made great contributions to the Nuggets for three years.
But now that the Nuggets have Wang Chao, it would be too wasteful to spend another 3000 million annual salary to sign Millsap. As a result, Millsap went around and returned to the Jazz team where he played for himself.
Just looking at the Jazz's lineup, you can tell that the Jazz will go straight to the lottery this season. After all, they currently have neither an offensive core nor a defensive core in their lineup. They are a completely disorganized team.
Before the game, the outside world generally believed that the Nuggets had a high probability of winning. After all, they had the No.1 Wang Chao in league history.
Although he didn't play much in the preseason, no one will underestimate Wang Chao's dominance on the field.
But even with such expectations, the result of the game was surprising.
The Nuggets' official starting roster for the new season finally appeared in front of people before the start of the game.
During the preseason, many people had guessed what position Wang Chao would play in the new season.
If you continue to play point guard like the Nets did, one of Mitchell and Murray will go to the bench. After all, the height of the two cannot play the small forward position at all, and even Mitchell is 1 meter. It is difficult to play a shooting guard at a height of 85.
The final answer is that Wang Chao is now at the long-lost power forward position.
This result is not too surprising.
In the past ten years of his professional career, Wang Chao has tried various positions on the field. At first, he could only serve as a small forward when he was in the Suns, but after arriving in the Magic, he can already appear at the power forward in turn with Turkoglu In the position of the Rockets, Wang Chao completely let go of himself, tried from point guard to center forward and played extremely well.
When I praised a player before, I would say that this player can defend from the first position to the fifth position, such as Kevin Garnett, James and later Drummond Green.
But a player like Wang Chao who can play from the first position to the fifth position is really extremely rare in the league.
Magic Johnson used to play as a center in the Finals and led his team to win the FMVP. It is not a concept.
But now, Wang Chao has returned to the long-lost power forward position. Guards Mitchell and Murray, forwards Wang Chao and Tucker, center Gobert, and a balanced offense and defense seem reasonable.
In the first quarter of the game against the Jazz, the strength of the Nuggets was fully revealed.
On the offensive end, Wang Chao didn't have too many polite words. He directly took over the ball and attacked on his own. In that way, it is often necessary to assist in defense and supplement defense, and wipe the buttocks of teammates.
The result was that the Nuggets scored 33 points in a single quarter in the first quarter, while limiting the Jazz's scoring to 20 points, and achieved a 13-point lead in the first quarter.
In the second quarter of the game, Wang Chao made a new attempt to reduce his shots and handed over the ball to the two guards Mitchell and Murray. He built a defensive system with Gobert and Tucker.
The three top defenders teamed up to build a defense line like iron chains across the river, almost suffocating.
The super defense caused the Jazz's offense to collapse across the board. Only 15 points were recorded in a single quarter. The team made 15 of 5 and shot only 33.3%.
Without Wang Chao's massive participation in the offense, the Nuggets' offensive efficiency, which relies on Mitchell and Murray's offense alone, is not high, but they still scored 25 points in a single quarter.
In this way, at the end of halftime, the score of the two teams was 58:35!
The Jazz only scored 35 points in the first half. Although this score is still far behind the 1996 points in the first half held by the Portland Trail Blazers in 24, the lowest score in the first half in NBA history, it is still only fifty steps. The degree of a hundred steps.
The suffocating pressure displayed by the Nuggets on the defensive end can be felt by the audience across the screen.
"It seems a little different from what I imagined..."
In the second half of the game, with the debut of the rotation lineup, the Jazz's offense finally picked up. They scored 25 points in the third quarter. Although it is still not high, it is reasonable anyway.
But in the third quarter, the Nuggets still scored not low, with 29 points in a single quarter.
After three quarters, the difference between the two teams has reached 27 points.
In the final fourth quarter, Wang Chao and Gobert didn't play. Even Mitchell, a rookie, and Murray, a sophomore, went up and played for an extra 3 minutes before taking a rest.
In garbage time, the Jazz still failed to reduce the score.
At the end of the game, the Nuggets beat the Jazz 114:82 by 32 points and won a good start to the new season.
Regardless of the performance of the Jazz, the Nuggets have 6 players scoring in double figures. Wang Chao scored a game-high 28 points, 8 rebounds and 6 assists. He neither scored 30+ points nor averaged a triple-double per game. .
There is no way, the Jazz are too weak, Wang Chao didn't even play 30 minutes of the whole game, the main thing is to be a companion.
Mitchell's NBA regular season debut was eye-catching, 15 of 7 shots, 6 of 5 free throws, and 19 points.
In addition, Murray, Gobert, and Rose and Kuzma on the bench also scored in double figures. Even Tucker, who performed averagely on the offensive end, scored 9 points and almost scored in double figures.
The Nuggets' offensive and defensive performance in the regular season opener was perfect and impeccable.
"In the first game of the new season, the Nuggets surprised everyone. Although their opponent Utah Jazz is not a top team in the league, and after losing Gordon Hayward in the summer, their strength has further declined, but even so, the Nuggets King's offensive and defensive dominance in the game still cannot be ignored, and the Nuggets may really perform well under the leadership of Wang Chao in the new season."
Although the Nuggets successfully won the approval of many media commentators with this opening game, the subsequent performance of the Nuggets on the field was still surprising.
After the opening game, the Nuggets' follow-up opponents are the Kings, Wizards, Hornets and Eagles.
The above four opponents have caused a little trouble for the Nuggets, and only the Hornets with the three heroes of Charlotte, and even the Hornets who are at home, have not been able to defeat the Nuggets.
The Hornets' recruitment work this summer is not ideal. Originally, their best goal was to get Wang Chao and form a super lineup to compete for the championship. However, Wang Chao gave up the easy mode and chose the difficult difficulty, and joined the Denver Nuggets.
Then the Hornets searched for a player in the free market but did not like it. In the end, they could only complete the renewal with their own player Victor Oladipo with a five-year contract of 5 million yuan. This renewal also completely locked the Hornets’ salary. In the future, if the team wants to pursue superstars, it will not have enough salary space to operate, unless one of the Charlotte three heroes is traded away from the team.
In this game against the Nuggets, the Hornets at home did not actually play very well.
Long-established star point guard Kemba Walker didn't have the upper hand against Mitchell, a first-year rookie of his height.
When Mitchell was in the draft, he was considered to have the opportunity to become the gate of the perimeter defense. Although he was only 1 meters tall, his confrontation was not weak at all. With a wingspan of 85 meters, he was very strong on the defensive end. Very threatening.
Here we can actually make a comparison. The former Celtics star point guard Rajon Rondo is 1 meters tall and has a wingspan of 85 meters. Although Rondo is not good in height, he has been selected to the best defensive team many times and has the honor of stealing king.
The current Mitchell certainly cannot compare with Rondo in terms of defensive ability, but the natural advantages brought by his talent can still make him much easier on the defensive end.
Kemba Walker is 1 meters tall and has a wingspan of 83 meters. While his static talent is completely incomparable to Mitchell's, his dynamic talent is also not as good as Mitchell's.
Walker is considered a very fast player among defenders. After all, if he wants to survive in the league with his height, he must have the support of speed.
But Mitchell, who is physically fit, is faster than him.
This is called hitting the master to death with random punches.
In one-on-one situations, Walker couldn't get rid of Mitchell's defense at all, and could only rely on his teammates' pick-and-roll screens to separate Mitchell.
But in this way, the question arises again, who will pick and roll Walker?
Usually, the pick-and-roll personnel are more suitable for the team's forward players and centers. After all, the big players have a large body and the quality of the pick-and-roll is better.
But who are the players at the forward position of the Nuggets?
Small forward PJ Tucker, power forward Wang Chao, center Gobert... none of them are easy to mess with.
Needless to say, Wang Chao, his four-time best defensive player, relied on defense assistance, and Tucker is also famous for his strong body and flexible feet.
That is to say, as a center, Gobert's footsteps are slow, his movement speed is not fast, and the efficiency of big defense and small defense is relatively weak, but Gobert's height and wingspan are too exaggerated.
With a height of 2 meters and a wingspan of 16 meters, standing in front of Walker with open arms is simply blocking out the sky.
In this case, how could Walker's offensive efficiency be high?
Walker is lying down, and Anthony Davis, the team's first core thick-browed brother, is not much better.
He mainly played the position of power forward in the Hornets, and his opponent was Wang Chao.
Wang Chao's defensive characteristics can be said to just restrain Brother Nongmei's style of play... No, to be precise, Wang Chao's defensive characteristics, in the current league, there are almost no players who cannot be defended.
The strength of 89 and the blessing of a fighting madman make him comparable to James in strength.
Although the height of 2 meters is relatively low among interior players, it will not be suppressed by opponents because of this height difference.
Strong confrontation ability, foot speed is the highest in the league, jumping and explosive power are also at the top level, even if you really can't defend against the opponent, you still have the talent of lion roar.
At present, in the league, only a few top stars such as James and Durant can play normally under Wang Chao's defense.
Big Eyebrow Davis is also considered a top player, but the situation is quite special. His offensive ability is relatively weak, although his skills are comprehensive, but he does not have a unique trick, such as Duncan hitting the board at 45 degrees, Novus Fund Chicken Independent, which can be finalized moves.
This makes Davis similar to Garnett in essence. When he is strong, he is terrifyingly strong. He can completely dominate the game on both offense and defense. Sometimes it's always disappointing.
The shortcoming of thick eyebrows during the Pelicans period was not visible because of the team's level, but after arriving at the Lakers, this problem still exists.
It's not that the thick eyebrows are not strong enough, it's just that he has not reached the historical top level that people expected, and his style of play is soft, which is a little disappointing.
Thick eyebrows with a soft style of play, met Wang Chao with a tough defensive style, and the result was that he was blocked outside the penalty area all year round, and could only shoot from the outside, completely Embiid and Downs.
But the problem is that under the defense of Wang Chao, the thick eyebrows as an inside player, the outside shooting rate is not high, and it is difficult to maintain even 40%.
Two of the three greats in Dallas were restricted, and only Oladipo was left. Oladipo, who played against Murray, played well throughout the game. He was also very active when he just got a big contract. Scoring 26 points and shooting 46% from the field, it doesn't work for him to play well alone.
As a result, although the Hornets made two gestures with the Nuggets in the game, with Wang Chao's efforts, they were quickly defeated in the fourth quarter and lost the game 106:93.
(End of this chapter)
At the end of September, all members of the Nuggets officially reported for duty, preparing for the preseason games of the new season.
After some operations in the summer free market and trade signings, the Nuggets' lineup has reached Wang Chao's expectations.
The Nuggets' starting lineup for the new season is: point guard Donovan Mitchell, shooting guard Jamal Murray, small forward PJ Tucker, power forward Wang Chao, and center Rudy Gobert.
This lineup has both offense and defense, led by Wang Chao on both ends of the offense and defense. The offense is supported by two small guards, Mitchell and Murray, with strong ball-handling breakthroughs and shooting support. The defense is Gobert and Tucker to assist Wang Chao. .
The main players on the bench are Derrick Rose and Kyle Kuzma.
The above seven are the absolute main force of Wang Chao in the Nuggets championship in the new season.
In addition to these 7 people, the Nuggets also have 7 role players, almost all of which are some unknown ordinary players left by the Nuggets last season. What an outstanding performance, but considering that the salaries of these players are generally not high, and the Nuggets must definitely make up the roster, they are all kept.
The outside world doesn't have any confidence in the Nuggets' lineup. Wang Chao can understand it. After all, they don't know how strong Gobert and Tucker's defense is, and they don't know the offensive capabilities of Mitchell and Murray. The lineup of the Golden Team can only be described in one word-rotten.
And Wang Chao is also absolutely sure that he surprised them all at the beginning of the season.
Moreover, apart from the players, the Nuggets have another advantage, and that is the devil's home court that is deeply feared by the entire league.
The altitude sickness and the fanatical Nuggets fans in the stadium atmosphere made the Denver Pepsi Center, home of the Nuggets, one of the league's well-known Devil's home stadiums, even stronger than the Boston Celtics' home TD North Shore Garden Arena.
This can be seen from the fact that the new players of the Nuggets have come to the Nuggets to report to the Nuggets one after another, and they have some symptoms of altitude sickness in daily training to varying degrees.
No way, even a strong athlete will experience short-term discomfort when performing strenuous exercise at a higher altitude, and the main reason for this reaction is that there are too few games against the Nuggets every season .
The Nuggets themselves have to play at least 42 games a season at home in Denver, while most teams in the West will only play 4 games in the Nuggets, and even fewer in the East, only 2 games per season.
If it weren't for special circumstances, no team would take teammates to adapt to the Nuggets' plateau environment in advance.
This has always been the biggest advantage of the Nuggets in the league, including the past few years. In the seasons when the Nuggets made the playoffs, as long as you investigate, you will find that the Nuggets have a better winning percentage at home than away. It is much higher, and even a boring guy who is free has done a special research. In more than 30 games in the past 4 years, when comparing the home win rate with the away win rate, the Denver Nuggets rank first in the league with a 28% win rate difference , That is to say, the Nuggets' winning percentage at home is 28% higher than that of away games, topping the league.
It is worth mentioning that the Utah Jazz, which is also one of the league's well-known devil's home courts, is close to the Nuggets' winning percentage.
The Denver plateau where the Nuggets are located is 1600 meters above sea level, while the Salt Lake City where the Jazz is located has an altitude of 1300 meters. Facing a group of coastal cities, the home court advantage is extremely obvious.
Of course, whether it is the altitude advantage of the plateau or the devil's home court advantage, they are only a small part of the factors that affect the game, and they cannot be the key to the team's victory. Otherwise, the Nuggets and the Jazz will not have a championship so far. nothing.
What really determines the outcome of the game is, in the final analysis, the team and the players.
-
In early October, the NBA 10-2017 season preseason started as scheduled.
Many people are paying attention to the Nuggets' preseason situation, but the Nuggets have revived again in the preseason.
In the 8 preseason games, Wang Chao only played 2 games and played less than 10 minutes.
For the remaining 5 games, the Nuggets sent Mitchell, Murray, Tucker, Kuzma and Gobert's main lineup.
Although it is only a preseason game, these Nuggets players are all players who are eager to prove themselves without exception, so they worked very hard during the game, and Gobert worked the hardest.
In early July, when the Nuggets signed Gobert for 7 million over four years, the entire league said he was not worthy of the 4 million annual salary.
Indeed, judging from Gobert's performance as a substitute for Whiteside in the Rockets, a contract in the early tens of millions is considered a very generous offer for him, and the Nuggets' 4-year 6400 million does seem to be a premium contract.
From that time on, Gobert wanted to prove to everyone that his strength was worthy of this contract.
After officially coming to the Nuggets to report, he was once again highly praised by Wang Chao.
When taking the Nuggets makeup photo in early September, Wang Chao mentioned Gobert, the second highest paid player in the team, in an interview with reporters.
"Rudy is a very good player. I valued and selected him when he was in the Rockets. No one knows his strengths better than me. I am optimistic that he will become the best defensive player in the future. His basket guard Basket ability will be the Nuggets' defensive gate, unbreakable."
Wang Chao's unstinting praise made Gobert feel a kind of man who dies for his confidant.
Not for himself, even if it's just to respond to Wang Chao's expectations, he must perform in the new season to make everyone shut up.
The preseason is the first battle of Gobert's rise.
In all 8 preseason games, Gobert played as the starting center. He averaged 27 points, 11.4 rebounds and 10.6 blocks in 1.8 minutes per game, and his defensive dominance at the basket began to show.
Wang Chao was not surprised by this.
The 17-18 season was the first time Gobert won the best defensive player award in his career, and in the 16-17 season, Gobert was already able to be selected for the best defensive team.
Although in this time and space, because of being selected by Wang Chao, he was unfortunately reduced to a substitute, did not have much playing time, and did not play enough games, resulting in a slight decline in strength compared to another time and space in the same period, but at the same time Gobert also enjoyed it. With the blessing of Wang Chao's training potion, and the development route set by Wang Chao, he has avoided a lot of detours, so his strength is not much weaker than before.
The performance of the Nuggets is not only Gobert.
The performances of the two smaller guards in the preseason were also surprising, especially the first-year rookie Mitchell who entered the league.
Mitchell's starting point is very high. Although he was only the 13th pick in the first round, in the original time and space, in his first season in the league, he was able to shoot 43.7% in the regular season. Both contributed 20.5 points, 3.7 rebounds and 3.7 assists, becoming the Jazz's first scoring point, perfectly replacing the Jazz's main core Hayward last season.
Entering the playoffs, Mitchell's scoring average has increased to 24.4 points per game. Although the Jazz stopped in the second round like the 16-17 season, it is amazing enough for a first-year rookie to perform so well.
After that, Mitchell's personal performance also improved steadily year by year, averaging 23.8 points per game in the second season, 24 points per game in the third season, and 26.4 points per game in the fourth season...
It can be said that the Jazz's defensive core is Gobert, and the offensive core is undoubtedly Mitchell.
In contrast, Murray, who entered the league a year earlier than him, was even worse. The latter finally averaged 20+ points per game in the fifth season of his career. Different, the Jazz are good at defense, lack of offensive means, and are quite dependent on Mitchell's scoring ability. On the other hand, the Nuggets themselves have Jokic, a big ball-holding core, and Murray is only the team's second scoring point. , The average number of shots per game is naturally less than that of Mitchell. If Murray has the same number of shots as Mitchell during his rookie contract, the score may not be lower than the opponent.
However, in the preseason, Mitchell was the first offensive core of the Nuggets, averaging 18.7 points per game, which is quite surprising.
"Mitchell is a very impactful defender. Although he is only 1 meters tall, he has a wingspan of 85 meters and has top-notch athletic ability, which makes him extremely lethal in holding the ball. The finishing ability is excellent, and the defense is obviously better than expected, and it is expected to become Wang Chao's right-hand man in the new season."
"Jamal Murray also showed a better performance in the preseason than last season. His shooting has become more stable, especially the shooting percentage from outside the three-point line. Last season, his three-point shooting percentage Only 33.4%, following the greatest three-pointer in history has obviously made his three-pointer more accurate. During the preseason, his three-pointer hit rate was as high as 43%. If he can maintain such a hit in the regular season Rate, the Nuggets' offensive problems don't need to worry at all."
In the 8 preseason games, Gobert, Mitchell and Murray have all been praised to varying degrees. After all, their performance has exceeded people's expectations.
But this is only limited to the preseason. Everyone knows that the preseason is just a training session for each team in the league. The victory and defeat are not included in the regular season statistics. No team will take it seriously. Most of them are used to run the team and train new players. Mainly.
The rookies of the Nuggets who performed well in the preseason are still unknown what kind of performance they can perform in the regular season.
But this suspense will be revealed soon.
-
On October 2017, 10, the NBA regular season officially started.
The first game of the Nuggets is an away game, going to Utah to challenge the Jazz.
Unlike the Jazz in another time and space, the Jazz in this time and space in 17-18 highlighted a tragic word.
The two core players, Gobert and Mitchell, were intercepted by Wang Chao. Not to mention, Hayward was also poached by the Celtics this summer just like in the original history.
As a result, the Jazz's main player in the new season is only Spanish golden boy Rubio. The Jazz has cultivated power forwards Derek Favors for many years, Joe Ingle and Xia Tian have nowhere to go. Star player Paul Millsap.
Originally, Millsap should have joined the Nuggets for 3 million in three years, and in the next three years, he would serve as the partner of Jokic inside the Nuggets, and made great contributions to the Nuggets for three years.
But now that the Nuggets have Wang Chao, it would be too wasteful to spend another 3000 million annual salary to sign Millsap. As a result, Millsap went around and returned to the Jazz team where he played for himself.
Just looking at the Jazz's lineup, you can tell that the Jazz will go straight to the lottery this season. After all, they currently have neither an offensive core nor a defensive core in their lineup. They are a completely disorganized team.
Before the game, the outside world generally believed that the Nuggets had a high probability of winning. After all, they had the No.1 Wang Chao in league history.
Although he didn't play much in the preseason, no one will underestimate Wang Chao's dominance on the field.
But even with such expectations, the result of the game was surprising.
The Nuggets' official starting roster for the new season finally appeared in front of people before the start of the game.
During the preseason, many people had guessed what position Wang Chao would play in the new season.
If you continue to play point guard like the Nets did, one of Mitchell and Murray will go to the bench. After all, the height of the two cannot play the small forward position at all, and even Mitchell is 1 meter. It is difficult to play a shooting guard at a height of 85.
The final answer is that Wang Chao is now at the long-lost power forward position.
This result is not too surprising.
In the past ten years of his professional career, Wang Chao has tried various positions on the field. At first, he could only serve as a small forward when he was in the Suns, but after arriving in the Magic, he can already appear at the power forward in turn with Turkoglu In the position of the Rockets, Wang Chao completely let go of himself, tried from point guard to center forward and played extremely well.
When I praised a player before, I would say that this player can defend from the first position to the fifth position, such as Kevin Garnett, James and later Drummond Green.
But a player like Wang Chao who can play from the first position to the fifth position is really extremely rare in the league.
Magic Johnson used to play as a center in the Finals and led his team to win the FMVP. It is not a concept.
But now, Wang Chao has returned to the long-lost power forward position. Guards Mitchell and Murray, forwards Wang Chao and Tucker, center Gobert, and a balanced offense and defense seem reasonable.
In the first quarter of the game against the Jazz, the strength of the Nuggets was fully revealed.
On the offensive end, Wang Chao didn't have too many polite words. He directly took over the ball and attacked on his own. In that way, it is often necessary to assist in defense and supplement defense, and wipe the buttocks of teammates.
The result was that the Nuggets scored 33 points in a single quarter in the first quarter, while limiting the Jazz's scoring to 20 points, and achieved a 13-point lead in the first quarter.
In the second quarter of the game, Wang Chao made a new attempt to reduce his shots and handed over the ball to the two guards Mitchell and Murray. He built a defensive system with Gobert and Tucker.
The three top defenders teamed up to build a defense line like iron chains across the river, almost suffocating.
The super defense caused the Jazz's offense to collapse across the board. Only 15 points were recorded in a single quarter. The team made 15 of 5 and shot only 33.3%.
Without Wang Chao's massive participation in the offense, the Nuggets' offensive efficiency, which relies on Mitchell and Murray's offense alone, is not high, but they still scored 25 points in a single quarter.
In this way, at the end of halftime, the score of the two teams was 58:35!
The Jazz only scored 35 points in the first half. Although this score is still far behind the 1996 points in the first half held by the Portland Trail Blazers in 24, the lowest score in the first half in NBA history, it is still only fifty steps. The degree of a hundred steps.
The suffocating pressure displayed by the Nuggets on the defensive end can be felt by the audience across the screen.
"It seems a little different from what I imagined..."
In the second half of the game, with the debut of the rotation lineup, the Jazz's offense finally picked up. They scored 25 points in the third quarter. Although it is still not high, it is reasonable anyway.
But in the third quarter, the Nuggets still scored not low, with 29 points in a single quarter.
After three quarters, the difference between the two teams has reached 27 points.
In the final fourth quarter, Wang Chao and Gobert didn't play. Even Mitchell, a rookie, and Murray, a sophomore, went up and played for an extra 3 minutes before taking a rest.
In garbage time, the Jazz still failed to reduce the score.
At the end of the game, the Nuggets beat the Jazz 114:82 by 32 points and won a good start to the new season.
Regardless of the performance of the Jazz, the Nuggets have 6 players scoring in double figures. Wang Chao scored a game-high 28 points, 8 rebounds and 6 assists. He neither scored 30+ points nor averaged a triple-double per game. .
There is no way, the Jazz are too weak, Wang Chao didn't even play 30 minutes of the whole game, the main thing is to be a companion.
Mitchell's NBA regular season debut was eye-catching, 15 of 7 shots, 6 of 5 free throws, and 19 points.
In addition, Murray, Gobert, and Rose and Kuzma on the bench also scored in double figures. Even Tucker, who performed averagely on the offensive end, scored 9 points and almost scored in double figures.
The Nuggets' offensive and defensive performance in the regular season opener was perfect and impeccable.
"In the first game of the new season, the Nuggets surprised everyone. Although their opponent Utah Jazz is not a top team in the league, and after losing Gordon Hayward in the summer, their strength has further declined, but even so, the Nuggets King's offensive and defensive dominance in the game still cannot be ignored, and the Nuggets may really perform well under the leadership of Wang Chao in the new season."
Although the Nuggets successfully won the approval of many media commentators with this opening game, the subsequent performance of the Nuggets on the field was still surprising.
After the opening game, the Nuggets' follow-up opponents are the Kings, Wizards, Hornets and Eagles.
The above four opponents have caused a little trouble for the Nuggets, and only the Hornets with the three heroes of Charlotte, and even the Hornets who are at home, have not been able to defeat the Nuggets.
The Hornets' recruitment work this summer is not ideal. Originally, their best goal was to get Wang Chao and form a super lineup to compete for the championship. However, Wang Chao gave up the easy mode and chose the difficult difficulty, and joined the Denver Nuggets.
Then the Hornets searched for a player in the free market but did not like it. In the end, they could only complete the renewal with their own player Victor Oladipo with a five-year contract of 5 million yuan. This renewal also completely locked the Hornets’ salary. In the future, if the team wants to pursue superstars, it will not have enough salary space to operate, unless one of the Charlotte three heroes is traded away from the team.
In this game against the Nuggets, the Hornets at home did not actually play very well.
Long-established star point guard Kemba Walker didn't have the upper hand against Mitchell, a first-year rookie of his height.
When Mitchell was in the draft, he was considered to have the opportunity to become the gate of the perimeter defense. Although he was only 1 meters tall, his confrontation was not weak at all. With a wingspan of 85 meters, he was very strong on the defensive end. Very threatening.
Here we can actually make a comparison. The former Celtics star point guard Rajon Rondo is 1 meters tall and has a wingspan of 85 meters. Although Rondo is not good in height, he has been selected to the best defensive team many times and has the honor of stealing king.
The current Mitchell certainly cannot compare with Rondo in terms of defensive ability, but the natural advantages brought by his talent can still make him much easier on the defensive end.
Kemba Walker is 1 meters tall and has a wingspan of 83 meters. While his static talent is completely incomparable to Mitchell's, his dynamic talent is also not as good as Mitchell's.
Walker is considered a very fast player among defenders. After all, if he wants to survive in the league with his height, he must have the support of speed.
But Mitchell, who is physically fit, is faster than him.
This is called hitting the master to death with random punches.
In one-on-one situations, Walker couldn't get rid of Mitchell's defense at all, and could only rely on his teammates' pick-and-roll screens to separate Mitchell.
But in this way, the question arises again, who will pick and roll Walker?
Usually, the pick-and-roll personnel are more suitable for the team's forward players and centers. After all, the big players have a large body and the quality of the pick-and-roll is better.
But who are the players at the forward position of the Nuggets?
Small forward PJ Tucker, power forward Wang Chao, center Gobert... none of them are easy to mess with.
Needless to say, Wang Chao, his four-time best defensive player, relied on defense assistance, and Tucker is also famous for his strong body and flexible feet.
That is to say, as a center, Gobert's footsteps are slow, his movement speed is not fast, and the efficiency of big defense and small defense is relatively weak, but Gobert's height and wingspan are too exaggerated.
With a height of 2 meters and a wingspan of 16 meters, standing in front of Walker with open arms is simply blocking out the sky.
In this case, how could Walker's offensive efficiency be high?
Walker is lying down, and Anthony Davis, the team's first core thick-browed brother, is not much better.
He mainly played the position of power forward in the Hornets, and his opponent was Wang Chao.
Wang Chao's defensive characteristics can be said to just restrain Brother Nongmei's style of play... No, to be precise, Wang Chao's defensive characteristics, in the current league, there are almost no players who cannot be defended.
The strength of 89 and the blessing of a fighting madman make him comparable to James in strength.
Although the height of 2 meters is relatively low among interior players, it will not be suppressed by opponents because of this height difference.
Strong confrontation ability, foot speed is the highest in the league, jumping and explosive power are also at the top level, even if you really can't defend against the opponent, you still have the talent of lion roar.
At present, in the league, only a few top stars such as James and Durant can play normally under Wang Chao's defense.
Big Eyebrow Davis is also considered a top player, but the situation is quite special. His offensive ability is relatively weak, although his skills are comprehensive, but he does not have a unique trick, such as Duncan hitting the board at 45 degrees, Novus Fund Chicken Independent, which can be finalized moves.
This makes Davis similar to Garnett in essence. When he is strong, he is terrifyingly strong. He can completely dominate the game on both offense and defense. Sometimes it's always disappointing.
The shortcoming of thick eyebrows during the Pelicans period was not visible because of the team's level, but after arriving at the Lakers, this problem still exists.
It's not that the thick eyebrows are not strong enough, it's just that he has not reached the historical top level that people expected, and his style of play is soft, which is a little disappointing.
Thick eyebrows with a soft style of play, met Wang Chao with a tough defensive style, and the result was that he was blocked outside the penalty area all year round, and could only shoot from the outside, completely Embiid and Downs.
But the problem is that under the defense of Wang Chao, the thick eyebrows as an inside player, the outside shooting rate is not high, and it is difficult to maintain even 40%.
Two of the three greats in Dallas were restricted, and only Oladipo was left. Oladipo, who played against Murray, played well throughout the game. He was also very active when he just got a big contract. Scoring 26 points and shooting 46% from the field, it doesn't work for him to play well alone.
As a result, although the Hornets made two gestures with the Nuggets in the game, with Wang Chao's efforts, they were quickly defeated in the fourth quarter and lost the game 106:93.
(End of this chapter)
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