From sparring to superstar

Chapter 147. Chapter 145. The season is always difficult

Knowing that Li Ao went to train for two hours after lunch time, and then slept in the lounge for two hours, Gentry was very worried about Li Ao's physical strength and health problems.

But it was hard for him to say anything, for fear of affecting the enthusiasm of a rookie.

In Gentry's view, even if Li Ao is talented and mature, he is only 19 years old after all.

19 years old, full of vigor and drive, always going forward, doing whatever comes to mind, but easily influenced by others.

Before deciding how to speak, Gentry chose to suppress the urge to persuade Li Ao.

The same feeling goes to James Worthy.

Although he received the money, James Worthy would still worry about his employer—if Li Ao got injured because he didn't stop Li Ao from training extra on the match day, his famous trainer's name would be smashed!

He is not a white worker like Tiangou, he relies on it for a living.

Moreover, a rookie with such a talent was really hurt because of working too hard. As a basketball senior, he doesn't know how guilty he is.

But after the 8 p.m. game against the Wizards, the two found their worries seemed unfounded.

Li Ao was full of energy as always, actively running on the offensive end, and working hard to defend in a timely manner on the defensive end. It was impossible to tell that he had practiced for two and a half hours in the afternoon.

The two suddenly remembered that Li Ao was also like this in back-to-back games, and he didn't show fatigue at all... This talent in physical recovery is simply second to none!

19 years old, with good talent, top physical strength, strong physical recovery ability, and a higher level of effort than most people... If such a rookie is unsuccessful, who deserves success?

Tonight's game, the Clippers played very easily.

The Wizards, one of the two teams that have taken the initiative to perform poorly this season, is competing with the Bulls for the league's last place.

In order to show off, the boss of the Wizards made a show operation-the radio station in the Eagle Sauce Imperial Capital hired Lionel Hamilton, an information recorder in charge of basketball news, as the head coach.

He has no professional basketball-related work experience, and is only 37 years old. He is one of the youngest head coaches in the league. The Wizards even have players who are older than him. If he has any basketball-related experience... No Does knowing 25 years of experience as a Wizards fan count?
Under his leadership, the Wizards went from a strength of about 30 wins last season to the No. [-] pick.

In order to carry out the poor performance, he asked Richard Hamilton, who averaged 18 points, 3 rebounds and 3 assists per game, to serve as a substitute for veteran Mitch Richmond, regardless of the friendship of the same name.

Although it was very successful, it also made Richard Hamilton hate this team very much.

The last time the two teams played against each other, Li Ao was suspended. The Clippers played purely on defense, and they played a few games on the offensive end. They easily won 95 to 86. This time, the Clippers did better on both ends of the offense and defense.

李敖拿到21分4板6助攻1抢断4盖帽、奥多姆12分11板10助攻、小奥尼尔30分18板、大Q9分、马盖蒂13分、格雷格-安东尼6分7助攻……快船队以106比82屠杀奇才队，拿下5连胜！

5 consecutive victories, this is the longest winning streak in 92 seasons since the Clippers last made the playoffs in the 93-8 season!
Relying on this wave of 5 consecutive victories, the Clippers' record has improved to 16 wins and 12 losses, surpassing the Timberwolves, which suffered two consecutive losses with a record of 15 wins and 12 losses, and rushed to seventh in the West!

The Clippers players and fans enjoyed a day of fun in the playoffs. On the 28th, the Clippers came to Denver and challenged the Nuggets back-to-back in home and away games. They lost 87 to 92 and lost 5 consecutive victories. end.

李敖拿到21分8板4助攻1抢断3盖帽，在赛后只拿到了100成就点的安慰奖。

For a long time, he was not used to getting hundreds of achievement points in every game, suddenly getting 100.

After playing the Nuggets, the Clippers flew non-stop from the Northwest to Dallas in the Southwest the next day. After a night's rest, on December 12, the Clippers came to the American Airlines Center to challenge the Mavericks away.

The last game of 4 days and 3 games is still a continuous flying away game, which is a huge test for the physical strength of the Clippers players.

Playing against the Nuggets yesterday, the Clippers' physical problems had already begun to appear at the last moment.

The house leak coincided with the continuous night rain. The inside offensive core of the Clippers ranked second in scoring, first in rebounds and first in assists. Odom, who averaged 14.6 points, 9.3 rebounds, 7.9 assists, 1.3 steals and 1.3 blocks per game, was preparing for the game in the morning In the middle, the symptoms of knee soreness appeared.

Gentry immediately sent him to the hospital for examination.

For Odom, whose style of play is highly dependent on his physical fitness, his knees cannot be hurt!
Odom confirmed that there was no problem with the bones through X-ray examination, and Gentry was relieved, but he still cautiously put Odom on the inactive list. When he returned to Los Angeles, he did a more detailed examination to confirm the knee joint Make plans after considering the specific conditions of structure, musculature, etc.

After making arrangements for Odom, Gentry began to have a headache.

This season, he wants to win every game!

First, it is to prove his ability to the new boss, otherwise he will not be hard-hearted and play basketball that goes against his dreams. Although every time he wins, he enjoys the professional ability he learned from Larry Brown. hapiness……

Also, there are mostly young players in the team!
He has been an assistant coach in college and NBA for 20 years, and he has seen too many geniuses disappear for various reasons.

Among them, the talented players of the teams that take the initiative to perform poorly have the highest probability of falling.

He can often see a team that has been doing poorly for years and selects one of the most talented players every year, and these talents have no water after entering the NBA, and they have shown strong ability and talent... But in the end The result is that these teams are poor year after year, the geniuses have extremely poor game habits, and their obsession with victory and honor is getting lower and lower...

In recent years, the team that has impressed him the most in this regard is the Warriors.

Even if the Warriors have cultivated Jamison in recent years, who is strong and can score 25 points per game, he doesn't think this is a good player, a team with ambitions and dreams, even if it uses more mediocre players, it won't matter. Will choose such a star.

Here, although the new boss has no requirements for this season's record, he is not allowed to perform poorly.

Now that the conditions are available, he doesn't want his beloved players to develop bad habits. He hopes that all these players can play well and stay in the NBA for a few more years.

Therefore, even when encountering the Mavericks with a disparity in strength, he is still trying to find a way to win.

Even if they can't win, they still have to cause trouble for the Mavericks and use this top team to train themselves.

Odom is a very important part of his game plan against the Mavericks.

If you want to be able to beat the Mavericks, at least you can limit Nowitzki on the defensive end.

Odom is the best candidate for their Clippers team. With the speed of a small forward, the body of a center, and the flexibility of a guard, he performs better when he is serious about defending.

Injuries are also a part of sports. As a head coach, all you can do is to try your best to avoid them, but when injuries come, he can't stop them.

But without Odom, they may not even have the ability to fight tonight... Hey!

To limit Nowitzki, you don't have to be inside!They have a player with a bigger shot-contest area than Odom...

...

At 7:58 p.m., the American Airlines Center in Dallas, the Clippers and the Mavericks started the game.

After being stared at for 58 minutes, Gentry, who was all hairy, finally breathed a sigh of relief.

At 7 o'clock, when the players were still warming up, he announced the starting lineup for tonight, and then he was followed by Spider-Man.

The Clippers' starting lineup tonight: McGinnis, Piakowski, Maggette, Li Ao, O'Neal.

Odom couldn't play and lacked scoring passing points, so he went to McInnis.

Big Q doesn't match McGinnis' style of play, so he went to the versatile spot-up pitcher Piakowski.

Without Odom, he lacked inside impact, so Maggette was used.

This is the starting lineup that Gentry discussed with the assistants based on Odom's injury and Li Ao's defense against Nowitzki.

58 minutes!For the entire 58 minutes, Spider-Man stared at him from time to time as he warmed up.

He almost lost his nostalgia for this world, and even wondered whether it was better to buy a wheelchair or a cemetery.

On the court, when Li Ao first heard that he was being asked to guard against King Silver Horn, he was in a bad mood.

But when he came to the court, he was excited and defended hard... and Odom defended Nowitzki better than the previous two games against the Mavericks!
全场比赛下来，诺维斯基12投仅4中，其中三分球只有4中1，加上8中8的罚球才拿到17分。

Nowitzki saw that the opponent lost the long-handed and fast Odom. He thought he could have a good time tonight, but it turned out that a longer-handed one came, and his defensive attitude and ability were not what Odom could do. Than!
Also... this guy is so good at talking!

He once blew his hair, elbowed Li Ao, and ate the technical offender.

At that time, he frightened himself silly after pushing his elbow, and the first thing he thought was - which hospital has a better environment?
As a result, the opponent saw the technical offender, and happily walked to the free throw line to score a point...

It was the first time he faced Li Ao's single defense, and Nowitzki suffered a big loss. The opponent's physical condition and defensive style were very restrained by a big outside shooter like him.

When they met for the first time in the preseason, he saw an overseas lottery rookie like him, and he took the initiative to say hello, was stared at, and ran away in fright.

Afterwards he heard about the 'one hit seven incident', fortunately he didn't provoke Li Ao.

But now, he has a new understanding of Li Ao.

It is completely different from the demonized image in his mind!
Putting aside his prejudices, he recalled the 'one-on-seven incident', regardless of the outcome of the final fight, it seemed that this Spider-Man had no faults during the match... No, this bad mouth is indeed quite hated by opponents, and he has always been cautious His Germanic chariots can't stand it.

However, Nowitzki is quite envious of Spider-Man's open-minded personality.

After he no longer had any color vision, he found that the opposite Clippers team had an excellent atmosphere, not like a team that had been bad for many years at all!

Nowitzki thought about this after the game because they won!

Jermaine O'Neal bullied Slim again tonight, scoring 21 points and 15 rebounds in the face of Sean Bradley, but Bradley has degraded seriously in the past two years. This season, only 7 points, 7 rebounds and 2.8 blocks per game are left. In terms of performance, it is normal for the Mavericks this season to be overwhelmed at this point.

In the future, Cuban will frantically give blue-collar centers big contracts like a brain twitch, and it is this period that has left a shadow.

李敖20投9中拿到25分7板4助攻2抢断2盖帽，是挺难搞，在第三节曾带领快船队打出单节32分的表现。

But the Mavericks broke out collectively in the backcourt!

Nowitzki was limited miserably. Howard Eisley, who was defended by McGinnis, Nash, who was defended by Piakowski, and Finley, who was defended by Maggette, were all hilarious. , all 3 people got 20+!

Four of the Mavericks scored in double figures and gave the Clippers a two-game losing streak 4-105.

...

The Clippers ended 2000 with a two-game losing streak.

At noon on the 31st, the Clippers returned to Los Angeles, and Gentry immediately took Odom to the hospital.

After a detailed examination, the doctor's diagnosis was that the muscles in the knee were overly fatigued, and the symptoms of overstretching had already appeared.

Not only the knees, but also the calves and ankles have muscle fatigue.

That is to say, the game is played too closely, playing too much time, and playing too hard.

Odom has been focused for most of the season, or at least not distracted.

The sleepwalking situation has greatly improved compared to last season, and the performance has naturally improved greatly.

During the Christmas award predictions, Odom has been placed in the ranks of the most improved players, ranking higher than Jermaine O'Neal.

Because there is a violent big spider beside him...

At the beginning, after playing a few games, Odom confirmed that Li Ao was not that difficult to get along with, but that he was the kind of person who could take jokes, and then he began to habitually distract himself.

Then 'One Dozen Seven' came.

Odom, who was easy to think too much, put himself into the player who was beaten by the Knicks.

It hurts just thinking about it!

Therefore, when he saw Li Ao on the court, he didn't dare to lose his mind, at least he didn't dare to lose his mind when he was present at the same time.

Although his performance has been greatly improved, there are also hidden dangers of injuries now. After all, he is the kind of play that is both a father and a mother. This team still needs his parents to lead the team.

The doctor suggested that Odom rest for 2-3 weeks and receive physical therapy. Gentry accepted the advice and decided to let Odom rest. stress injuries.

The probability of stress injury is not high, but once it occurs, it will take several months, and the loss outweighs the gain.

But Odom couldn't play, and Gentry realized the importance of Odom to them more clearly.

In addition to being the team's first offensive organization point, Odom is also the best setter and support point for Li Ao.

Odom's 2-3 assists per game are obtained by Li Ao's support. On the other hand, Li Ao's transfer support also relies heavily on Odom's setter.

On the defensive end, Odom's role is also higher than it seems. At least this is an all-around player who is very comprehensive in single defense and defense, and can switch defenses in various positions.

However, even if Odom can play, Gentry had an idea after last night's game and was going to discuss it with the general manager.

Against the Mavericks last night, McGinnis played pretty well, scoring 17 points, second only to the inside twin towers, and he has the ability.

But his style of play is similar to that of Francis, the type of 'leading the team by himself', without considering the problem of cooperating with the supporting players, and attacking with the ball to the end, unless his teammates have vacancies and he himself has no chance. Spread the word, or be reckless.

Compared with Francis, there is a huge gap in ability. Playing on the bench may not be able to kill the Quartet, let alone lead a team.

Gentry did what he said, and after chatting with Wally Walker for an afternoon, he confirmed the next arrangement... Increase the performance opportunities of two players. One is Li Ao. Now the offense is not well organized, so shoot more.

The other is McGinnis, who is most suitable for getting good data in the bench group!
The decision was made, but Gentry was going to start feeling sorry for his little hair again...

(End of this chapter)