When pride still matters

Chapter 593 I don’t know the answer to this question

Clay Bennett is still an intimidating strong man.

He has the typical image of a father who supported a family alone in the United States in the 80s. The Armani suit costing thousands of dollars looks awkward on him, just like Huang Bo being pursued by a beautiful woman in the TV series.

Today is a big day for the Supersonics. The opening of Boeing Air Arena one year ahead of schedule allows the Supersonics to get rid of the KeyArena. This is a new chapter for them.

If their opponent today was not the Clippers, Bennett would definitely get some cheers.

But the Clippers' visit awakened Seattle people's memories of Bennett forcing the GOAT away.

Thus, Bennett suffered the greatest humiliation a team owner could ever receive.

On the most important day for supersonics in recent years, when the Boeing Air Arena, as the "posthumous child" of the former supersonic empire, finally came into view of the world, everyone in the organization hoped that today would be a happy day.

At least that's what most people thought, but when Bennett walked onto the court, the boos and curses he received made people completely forget what kind of day it was.

NBA Commissioner Adam Silver was also present.

When Yu Fei saved Seattle, he came here many times. At that time, the relocation plan of the Supersonics had already started. It is safe to say that if the GOAT had not changed the fate, Seattle would probably have no NBA team now.

From a small perspective, this was the GOAT's success in keeping the Supersonics in Seattle and continuing the team's glorious history for 40 years; from a big perspective, this was an unprecedented feat of changing the will of the league by one's own strength.

Bennett's only contribution as a beneficiary behind the scenes was his decision as owner to keep the team, but he made this decision because the Seattle market was indeed profitable.

But how could he be so foolish as to fall out with the man who brought him endless wealth?
Silver knows that there are antitrust reasons involving the league, but he believes the bigger problem is that Bennett failed to handle his relationship with the GOAT well.

Therefore, he was destined to make a fool of himself today.

The league's schedule planning team knows the audience's preferences. The SuperSonics will move into a new arena? Then the Clippers must be arranged to be the first team to play away games at Boeing Air Arena. After all, this arena is the hard work of the GOAT, who is more qualified than him to enjoy the "first night" of Boeing Air Arena?

The immediate consequence of this arrangement was to publicly humiliate Bennett.

He read out the script on the court, thanking all the guests, but the fans at the scene regarded him as an enemy. The boos throughout the whole process made him feel no joy brought by the new stadium. Instead, he was filled with strong hatred for the fans and Yu Fei.

If he hadn't left the SuperSonics, how could Seattle have an NBA team now? If he hadn't run around and taken care of things, how could this new arena be completed and put into use ahead of schedule?

But the fans were not grateful to him.

These people, just like damn Fry Yu, think that he is worthless as a boss!
He vowed to make these people regret it. But how to do it? Force the team to tank? In the end, he would be the one who suffered.

So Bennett can only disgust the fans in other ways.

Boeing Air Arena will not have any traces of GOAT - no statues, no souvenirs, not even a tribute video. He wants to completely erase the presence of GOAT in Seattle, but he forgot to erase the championship banner on the roof.

As Bennett's humiliating speech comes to an end, the game is about to begin.

He went to the VIP box with a grim face, hoping that the team could play with full spirit tonight.

Before the game, Yu Fei greeted his old teammates.

Roy quipped, “Did you see Clay Bennett’s face?”

"Did you see it?" Yu Fei asked with a smile.

"I've never seen anyone look more miserable than he did just now," Roy said. "Thanks to you, he won't be able to sleep tonight."

In the winter of 2014, Roy was still a competitive NBA player.

"How is your injury?" Yu Fei knew that Roy had been playing intermittently due to injury last season, causing the Supersonics' record to plummet.

"Fortunately."

"Don't force yourself." Yu Fei said. "Rest when you need to."

Then, Owen came over to say hello.

Although Irving, who basically led the team alone last season, showed the fans his strength, the problem that his playing style could not independently improve the team's combat effectiveness was also exposed.

The Supersonics relied on their record to become popular in Seattle. If the record was not good, no matter how good the style of play was, it would just be a show.

Irving, who realized the difficulties of being a core player, had more respect for Fei. He couldn't imagine how the former GOAT led him to the Western Conference Finals.

It was the first time we met in the new season. He didn't say much, just asked about my recent situation and then prepared to start the game.

The Clippers' Titan lineup landed in the regular season for the first time.

Antetokounmpo, Thompson, Yu Fei, Jokic and Yao Ming.

This is a starting set with an average height of nearly 210 cm.

This was a starting lineup that made Klay Thompson feel like a dwarf.

As the five people stood on the court, wearing the Clippers' red away jerseys, a strong pressure came over them.

"Not everyone who is tall can play basketball. Don't be afraid of them!" Roy shouted.

Then, Yao Ming, who was in charge of the jump ball, won the ball for the Clippers.

Antetokounmpo took the ball and strode forward. The Sonics' defense was obviously careless. They didn't expect that the Greek monster would take the initiative to attack after dribbling the ball across half court.

In just a moment, the Greek player broke into the basket, received the ball, turned around, and dunked.

Entering the defensive round, this is the main point of doubt for the Titans lineup.

Experts believe that the Clippers will collapse on the defensive end because of their height.

This concern is indeed justified.

Yao Ming and Jokic both have difficulty defending pick-and-rolls, but the difficulty varies.

Yao Ming is not good at defending breakthroughs or shots. He is too tall and cannot keep up with the rhythm from the outside.

Although Jokic does not have the speed to defend against breakthroughs, he has outstanding awareness, and the main difficulty lies in defending shots.

If the opponent does not play tricks on him and directly uses the space created by pick-and-roll to shoot, his godly hands that can be salty, sweet, wet or dry will be of no use.

Irving didn't take the difference too seriously and just attacked inside when he was called for a pick-and-roll.

Jokic blocked him for a second and was broken through.

But this one second is enough for the Clippers' defense to be in place.

Yao Ming had a towering goal in the restricted area, and Irving dodged in the air and pulled up. Suddenly, he opened his eyes wide and saw the Clippers' No. 44 appear in his field of vision. He clapped his hands and nailed his ball hard on the backboard and grabbed it.

“!#￥￥%#”

No matter how you look at it, this shot was a huge blow to morale. However, the Sonics fans still cheered for the man who blocked Irving's shot.

Bennett wanted to erase all traces of Yu Fei's existence, just like when Aby Pollin drove Jordan away, he used the Thunder to erase everything about No. 23 in Washington. This is the boss's privilege and a microcosm of the professional league - it seems that everything a star has comes from the boss's gift, and when the boss is no longer willing to give, the star will be swept out like garbage.

But Yu Fei is different from Jordan.

Jordan's departure was ugly, and he was doomed to never return to the court to avenge Washington. Pollin squeezed the last bit of value out of Jordan and then left him behind.

Yu Fei is still full of energy and seems to be able to win eight more championships.

The more Bennett tried to make his mark disappear, the more fierce the fan backlash became.

Because Yu Fei was on the court.

No statues? He could create a best-selling poster in a fan's home with a slam dunk.

No souvenirs? The Clippers will help Bennett fill this market gap, and even thank him for giving up this part of the proceeds. No tribute video? No problem, every post-game highlights of Yu Fei at Boeing Air Arena will be more moving than any tribute video, and become Bennett's public execution.

For example, in this round, Yu Fei blocked Irving's shot and then launched a counterattack. He is not the kind of person who likes to show off and humiliate his opponents, especially when facing the Supersonics. He never intended to humiliate the fans of the Supersonics or Seattle. He just thought of Bennett, threw the ball behind his back to the backboard, then jumped up and dunked the ball into the basket with a powerful clockwise dunk.

"Fry looks particularly excited!"

"Yeah, we rarely see him dunk like that!"

Yu Fei listened to the cheers of the audience and glanced at Bennett's box. It seemed as if he was saying, you can erase my traces in Boeing Air Arena, but how can you stop my performance on the court? How can you stop the fans from loving me as they did in the past?
As long as this situation persists, Bennett will have no chance of turning things around.

The only way to change the public opinion is to lead the team to win the championship and prove that they can succeed even without Yu Fei.

But with Irving as the core, this is extremely difficult.

The game between the Clippers and the Supersonics soon turned into a one-sided contest. Although the concerns about the Clippers' "Titan lineup" before the game were reasonable, the experts obviously exaggerated its disadvantages and underestimated its advantages.

Although the super-large lineup does run counter to the current concept of space basketball, not every team has the ability to exploit the weaknesses of this lineup.

It is true that Yao Ming has problems defending pick-and-rolls. Jokic is also not good at defending pick-and-rolls. But even if he is not good at defending, at least he can buy a second to delay time. This is the case with the defense against Irving tonight. When Jokic stepped forward to defend the pick-and-roll, although he was eventually passed, the one-second delay was enough for other Clippers defenders to arrive.

One second on the court is enough to change the outcome, just like Derek Fisher once completed a buzzer-beater in 0.4 seconds.

The core of the Clippers' defense is to shrink, but this does not mean that they will let the opponent shoot three-pointers right away. When the opponent attempts to break through or play small against big against the twin towers, the Clippers' defense immediately shrinks. This is thanks to Yu Fei and Antetokounmpo, two running and jumping players with wide defensive range.

Jokic's defensive delay gave them enough time to rush to the inside from the left and right wings, and Irving fell into the Clippers' trap.

The problem with this defensive strategy is that if the opponent's ball handler has a wide vision and accurate pass, they have a chance to find teammates in the corner. However, the Clippers are willing to voluntarily give up some corner three-point defense to reduce the pressure on the twin towers.

Fortunately, the Supersonics are not a team that is good at corner three-pointers, so they were completely suppressed by the Clippers' shrinking defense.

After one quarter, we were already trailing by double digits.

Starting from the second quarter, the Sonics' game became a one-on-one match between Irving and Roy.

Tyronn Lue kept wiping sweat and yelling on the sidelines, trying to get his team to seize the weaknesses of the Clippers' twin towers and attack them, but throughout the game, the Clippers lost points to the twin towers only a few times.

The Supersonics, who were obsessed with one-on-one plays, had low offensive efficiency, allowing the Clippers' twin towers to easily grab a large number of rebounds.

This is Jokic's favorite game.

The opponent didn't look very smart and made unreasonable offensive choices repeatedly, and rebounds fell into the hands of the Clippers one after another.

A large number of rebounds also allowed Jokic to frequently perform the classic scene of grabbing rebounds in the backcourt and assisting in the frontcourt.

ESPN commentator and former NBA star Chris Webber excitedly shouted: "It's time to apologize to Arn Tellem! This Serbian can really play! Look at his pass! Oh my God, he reminds me of Vlade Divac!"

The climax of the game came in the last attack of the third quarter.

At that time, the Clippers were already leading by 29 points.

Yu Fei blocked Roy's shot, and Jokic grabbed the loose ball and advanced with the ball alone.

Antetokounmpo quickly left the court and thought that the fat Serbian player would pass the ball to him, but Jokic, who had been staring at him, unexpectedly passed the ball to Yao Ming who was following up.

Yao Ming dribbled the ball from outside the three-point line, came to the free throw line, received the ball and jumped for a slam dunk.

"The scariest thing is not that the Clippers beat the SuperSonics by relying on their height, the scariest thing is that they won the game tonight by relying on their super high basketball IQ!"

The fourth quarter basically entered garbage time.

Yu Fei only played 25 minutes tonight and contributed 22 points, 6 rebounds and 4 assists.

Today, he doesn't need to take on a big role like he did in the past two years. The rise of Antetokounmpo and the arrival of Jokic, two all-around players who need space to grow, so he must adjust his playing style.

Yu Fei's style basically returned to the early days of the Supersonics. In order to cooperate with Roy's style of play and provide Durant with room for growth, he abandoned his usual core style of play and turned into a traditional small forward. This change did not have much impact on him personally, the only difference was that his data dropped.

In the end, Rivers only left Antetokounmpo and Thompson as the two main control players, and replaced them with Jefferson, Nine-Finger Green and Zaza Pachulia.

Faced with a 30-point gap, the Supersonics were powerless to fight back.

12 minutes of garbage time couldn't change any results.

At the final whistle, the Clippers defeated the Supersonics 124-96 and won their first victory of the new season.

This was the first NBA game in the history of Boeing Air Force Arena, however, it was not the owner of the arena who won the game.

However, the Seattle Times reported the next day that "the owners of Boeing Air Arena deservedly won the first game in the arena's history!"

The post-match turmoil was not over.

Yu Fei remained polite to the Supersonics and did not use the victory to settle accounts with Bennett.

But Bennett, speaking to reporters, directly slammed those fans who cheered for the visiting team.

"I think we need to introduce a rule that permanently bans fans from cheering for the opposing team at our home stadium!" Bennett's mind seemed to still echo the cheers for Yu Fei. "If you are from Seattle, you should support the Seattle team. This is a matter of course!"

As soon as these words came out, the fan circle went wild.

They already harbored resentment towards Bennett for overthrowing the empire, and now hearing him blaming them in return, they all responded.

Some people returned their season tickets, some cursed at the official website, and some cursed Bennett on the official Twitter account.

However, that wasn’t even the worst thing about the night.

After Bennett lashed out at the fans, reporters noticed that he was in a bad mood and seemed to be angered by the game.

So the reporter mentioned the grudge between him and Yu Fei.

"Frye once had a very pleasant time working with you. Although the cooperation broke down due to various reasons, the honor he brought to Seattle will not be erased. In the future, do the SuperSonics plan to retire Frye's No. 44 jersey?"

Bennett's response was astonishing:

“I don’t know the answer to that question right now.”

Whatever Bennett was thinking at the time, his answer was bound to spark global outrage.

"Frye kept the SuperSonics, made Clay Bennett hundreds of millions of dollars, brought Boeing Air Force Arena to Seattle, and won four consecutive championships. This is the greatest achievement of the modern NBA. The result? Frye, who brought all this, has no statue, and Bennett doesn't even know whether to retire his jersey? How can the NBA allow such a person to be a team owner?"

Yu Fei's friend Mark Stein slammed Bennett.

Subsequently, major mainstream media followed up and ridiculed Bennett, and the Supersonics were caught in a public opinion storm.

As the situation escalated, the image of the Supersonics seemed to have returned to the period before 2007, and Bennett had no choice but to come out and clarify his remarks.

"Obviously, Frye's honor can never be erased, and no one can take it away. I think a lot of people misunderstood what I said. What I meant to say was that I didn't know if Frye would want his jersey retired by the SuperSonics. If he did, I certainly wouldn't have any problem with that."

Although it was too late at this time, it finally appeased the angry fans.

However, after Bennett said those words, he will never be forgiven by the GOAT.

Right after Bennett’s press conference, Yu Fei sent a tweet:
“My jersey will never be retired by Clay Bennett’s team.”

When a person who doesn't like to say "forever" breaks his habit, it means that even in a world that denies "forever", there are moments of eternal damnation.

The story ends when the greatest sports star in Seattle history publicly refuses to have his jersey retired by Bennett's team.

From this point on, Bennett became the carbon copy of James Dolan in Seattle.

Everywhere he went, people would yell at him, "Sell your team!"

(End of this chapter)