Healthy basketball, starting from eating the old Lakers F4

"James, I will pass the ball to you later, don't hesitate when the time comes.

Believe in the training results during this period, believe in your teammates, and believe in yourself.

Tonight is your debut, I hope you can achieve a good result. "

In the opening game, the Bulls beat the Cavaliers.

The Bulls started with a championship-winning lineup of Ben Gordon, Duan, Zhu Fangyu, Josh Smith, and Milicic. However, the starting lineup only played for more than three minutes before they chose to suspend substitutions.

This is mainly to help rookies such as Curry, Harden, Evans and Ibaka integrate into the team as soon as possible.

Because Ben Gordon is currently the third in charge of the Bulls, he will start for a longer time.

Theoretically, the three guards Curry, Harden, and Evans together only have 50 to 60 minutes of playing time.

Among them, Curry also has the disadvantages of limited size and poor defense, which results in Curry's playing time being even more limited.

After all, if you let Curry play with Ben Gordon, you will need Duan, Josh Smith, and Milicic to wipe the butts of the two guards.

If this continues, the Bulls may have some defensive problems due to too much defensive pressure inside, and even the offensive end will decline due to the large amount of energy invested in the defensive end.

Although the Bulls are now rebuilt, they still want to try to reach the playoffs. For the sake of the team's record, Curry can only play with Harden or Evans.

And now during this timeout, the Bulls decided to replace Harden, the No. 3 overall pick, on the court first.

There is one thing to say. As far as the current situation is concerned, in the eyes of the vast majority of Bulls fans, Harden is more orthodox than Curry.

On the one hand, it is because Harden is the third overall pick, representing talent and player ceiling. On the other hand, Ben Gordon, who is about to be traded away, is also the No. 3 pick.

Once upon a time, Bulls fans had high hopes for Ben Gordon, but Ben Gordon has not yet become an All-Star player.

Of course, the Bulls don't have Garnett or Luol Deng who are better than Ben Gordon this year. Now that there is less competition within the team, Ben Gordon can get more ball rights and more support from Bulls fans, which will give him a chance to stand out.

In addition, considering that Ben Gordon assisted Duan in receiving four championship rings, starting from the championship puzzle, it does not insult the status of the third overall pick.

Now that the Bulls have been rebuilt, Chicago fans' expectations for Harden are at least the second Ben Gordon!

It is precisely for this reason that Bulls fans are particularly looking forward to Harden's debut performance tonight.

As a veteran and the big brother of the team, Du En still spent some words to encourage Harden before he came on the court.

As early as two months ago, during the training camp, Du En discovered that Harden's physical fitness was indeed not bad. After all, he was a defender who could be selected as the third overall pick. Even if his lateral movement speed is not fast, ordinary defenders can still Defensive.

In terms of technology, Harden's basic skills are also very solid, and he has no problem passing, controlling, and making sudden shots.

To this end, Dunn transformed Harden in advance and taught him and Curry the magic ball theory.

Some people may think that the magic ball will destroy people. In fact, for NBA players, finding the right position is more critical than anything else.

Dunn believes that as rookies, Curry and Harden should specialize in three-pointers and the basket, and first practice catching and shooting and finishing at the basket.

After the rookie period is over, you still have the energy to learn other skills, and you can slowly evolve by then.

Both Curry and Harden have been affected by the magic ball theory, and their abilities have declined mainly due to bad encounters with others.

Curry was influenced by Cole's "isolations hurt the team" theory and greatly reduced his ball-handling offense.

He was still in the period of rising goals and had the opportunity to make further progress, but he encountered Durant, who was more suitable for mid-range shooting.

However, Thompson refused to sacrifice the ball, and Curry had to sacrifice himself for the championship. In the end, he had no chance to hone a series of ball-holding skills such as mid-range in the game.

As for Harden, he was still the little prince of mid-range shots at the beginning, but due to the influence of Mogou, he completely transformed into a magic ball.

Playing too smartly and too efficiently results in the inefficient mid-range being completely abandoned. In the playoffs, without the whistle, once the opponent's defense becomes stronger and unable to hit the mid-range, it is easy to lose the ball just by relying on the magic ball.

Now that Duan is asking Harden and Curry to play magic ball, it is certain that they will be unreliable at critical moments.

However, when playing in the Bulls, it's not Curry and Harden's turn to play key balls. Isn't this due to Duane? It's not like Duen doesn't know how to play mid-range.

What's more, the magic ball is easy to use in the regular season!

Especially in today's era when role players' three-pointers are not accurate, if more people in the Bulls can shoot three-pointers and can help the team open up space, the Bulls' offense will be very comfortable and smooth.

Harden and Curry are both very talented, and Duane believes they can quickly adapt to the Bulls' style of play and game rhythm.

As long as Curry and Harden can use their talents early and steadily score two or three three-pointers per game, and can rely on air cuts to steal chickens, or break through with the ball and score two or three goals at the basket, then the average per game will be There will also be thirteen or four points.

Even if the touch is not good occasionally, it should not be difficult to average 09 points per game after a season as a 10 double iron.

But these days, averaging 10 points per game and above-average defense can serve as the team's starter.

Although Curry and Harden's defense is average, if two talented rookies play magic ball, their scoring efficiency will not be much worse no matter how bad it is.

Taken together, this is equivalent to the Bulls spending 500 million to sign a shooting guard who is slightly worse in defense and averages 20 points per game.

Therefore, it is absolutely no problem to let Curry and Harden play magic ball.

However, Harden has been playing with the ball since he was a child. Now that he is asked to play with the magic ball or even without the ball, he still needs to continue to transform and adapt.

After Harden came on the court, even with Duen taking care of him, he still failed to perform as he should have for the No. 3 overall pick.

Of course it's not too bad, I can only say that the performance is very ordinary. In more than six minutes of playing time in the first quarter, Harden made 3 of 1 three-pointers, plus an assist, and no rebounds. He performed normally and was quite satisfactory.

On the contrary, it was Curry who gave full play to his talents without the ball and three-pointers after coming on the court in the first quarter and made two three-pointers.

Beyond that, Evans' performance wasn't bad either.

Evans knows that he is not good at three-pointers, so he mainly breaks through and distributes the ball, focusing on finishing at the basket and playing to his strengths.

It was also because the Bulls' rookies played well, Ben Gordon and Josh Smith also performed normally, and Duan's performance was as stable as ever. The Bulls actually had a 50-50 tie with the Cavaliers in the first half.

James naturally couldn't accept this.

After all, the Cavaliers are also a championship team that has reached the Eastern Conference Finals, and they strengthen every summer. This summer is no exception. They have introduced Antawn Jamison and Anthony Parker to strengthen their shooting ability, making it easier for him to break through with the ball. .

The Bulls traded both Garnett and Luol Deng this summer. Their strength has declined significantly and they no longer have the strength to compete for the championship.

As a result, Du En and a group of rookies were actually able to compete with them...

In order to become a legitimate MVP, James had to show his muscles to the Bulls in advance and show the results of his hard training in the summer. However, another James suddenly appeared in front of him on the court.

"Didn't knock it away? What happened?" James was a little dumbfounded. He was clearly using his elbow to clear the way to the basket, so why was he blocked by a rookie.

Harden was stunned for a moment when he resisted James's first charge: "Straight-line breakthrough? No need for footsteps?"

In the past, Harden used the European step to break into the paint. James has never experienced a breakthrough method that relies solely on strength to push people away.

But now is not the time to think about this. Harden knows that his performance in the first half was average, and he also wants to save his debut as much as possible, so now he uses defense as much as possible to make up for everything.

Just in time, James reached him with the ball.

Although I don't have the idea of ​​"you deserve to be called James", but against the opponent's boss, if you have the opportunity to steal, you still have to steal it.

Speaking of which, Harden is still somewhat talented in stealing. Although Artest has not opened the Sharingan yet, the corresponding talent was still triggered in this round.

"Where's the ball?"

James was about to push Harden away, but found that Harden had already passed him and was getting farther and farther away from him.

It turned out that Harden didn't know when he hit the ball with one hand.

As a forward player, James dribbles relatively high, and it is common for James to be interfered with his dribbling.

However, in the past, I had the advantage in physical confrontations, and combined with the ball in advance, I was able to steal one, two, or three steps, so I didn't need to pay too much attention to the details of dribbling.

But this time, the boat capsized in the gutter, and Harden took the ball away. In the blink of an eye, Harden rushed to the basket and converted.

"Give me the ball!" James reached for the ball under the basket in the frontcourt, preparing to make a conversion immediately when the Bulls weren't paying attention.

However, Du En has too much experience in the game.

After noticing Harden scoring the ball, he immediately ran to the backcourt.

As expected, the Cavaliers also paid great attention to passing the ball to James, so Dunn predicted the passing route in advance and intercepted!

"Fake..."

When James saw Du En coming out of the way, he could only curse, and then took two steps towards Du En in a strolling manner.

By the time James reached the free throw line, Duan had already dribbled the ball across half court and fed the ball to Milicic through a pick-and-roll.

Because the Cavaliers were in transition again and the defense was relatively messy, Milicic seized the opportunity to take off and dunk, successfully taking the cake.

At this time, Duan returned to the backcourt again, intending to get close to James.

Seeing this, the Cavaliers players no longer thought of passing the ball to James, but just passed the half court honestly.

James learns from every experience, knowing that Harden is difficult to deal with, so this time he replaced someone in the pick-and-roll.

In fact, when James named defenders in the pick-and-roll, he had a mismatch advantage, but he just named Harden, who is talented, relatively stocky, and good at defending small and big players.

Nowadays, the Bulls do have certain defensive problems on the outside. Regardless of whether they use Curry or Evans for Ben Gordon, James will name them and break them.

After Duane was got rid of by James with the help of a pick-and-roll, James quickly opened up the situation by calling out Ben Gordon.

After the Bulls are without Garnett inside, their defensive quality has indeed dropped by one or two levels.

Milicic's talent is okay, but he doesn't have Garnett's defensive attributes. If it were Dampier, he would be dazzled by James's subtle steps.

Even if you keep asking the referee to argue, what can you do if someone walked just now but there was someone above him?

After all, it's just "Who in the audience dares to sue me?"

It's also because James' killer moves are easier to use. If the Bulls don't want to lose, they can only rely on Duan's personal ability to offset James' scoring.

The Cavaliers also understand that if they want to win, they must not only rely on scoring, but also strengthen defense and limit Duan's offense.

Duan forced a few shots, but for most of the quarter, he was playing alone, which didn't work. He didn't have that much energy.

Duane can only distribute the ball to Ben Gordon and Josh Smith, hoping that they can continue to add firepower.

However, Ben Gordon spent a lot of energy because he was called by James. Now he cannot find his touch and wastes a little bit of the ball.

Josh Smith's performance is okay, but James is not the only one in the Cavaliers who can play well.

With James scoring 13 points in the third quarter and Maurice Williams and Antoine Jamison scoring 10 points together, the Cavaliers still took a slight lead after the third quarter.

78 to 73, the Bulls trailed the Cavaliers by 5 points.

At the beginning of the fourth quarter, Duan continued to play and helped the Bulls overtake the score, but only achieved a 3-point lead.

After Duane took a break, Ben Gordon and Josh Smith failed to withstand the attacks of James, Morris, Jamison and others, and the point difference was instantly opened to 7 points.

Duan came back to bite the point difference, but it was still a step too late.

James was very whistley at the last moment. He stood on the free throw line twice in a row and made all four free throws. There was nothing that Duan could do.

The Bulls tried foul tactics to get the ball back, but no one in the Cavaliers missed a shot.

And Duan did not score every three-pointer. In the end, the Bulls lost this year's opening game by 5 points.

However, the Bulls are still in the rebuilding period, the four rookies are still very immature, and the team has not adjusted well. They can actually compete to this extent with a championship team like the Cavaliers, which explains some problems.

It can only be said that the Bulls have a strong foundation. Even if they trade away two leading players, they are still very competitive.

Indeed, the starting lineup of Duane, Ben Gordon, Josh Smith, and Milicic is at least the top three in the league.

Even if the bench lacks reliable players and instead plays with a group of rookies and scraps, the Bulls still have the possibility of making the playoffs.

The following games also confirmed this. The Bulls only needed three regular season games to re-establish their confidence in winning.

Curry, Harden, and Evans each performed their duties and found their position in the team and the style of play that suited them.

Only Ibaka is rough and needs constant training and learning.

However, the Bulls currently have no shortage of players inside, so it's not a big problem. (End of chapter)