The Golden Age of Basketball

Gan Guoyang understands Karl's meaning very well, that is to let Colt fend for himself and let him bear the price of his mistakes.

This is American society, and this is the law of the NBA. Survival of the fittest. If you can survive, there will be a lot of money waiting for you. If you can’t survive, go to drugs, crime, and alcohol, and the league will kick you out.

In the NBA at that time, the management of drugs was not strict, and there were too many players who smoked soft drugs such as marijuana. Maybe they could escape the supervision of the league, but their performance on the field will not lie, you can’t play games, Without high-level performance, no one will talk to you or care about you.

The former flying man, Jordan's idol "Skywalker" David Thompson was ruined by drugs, degraded from a league scoring champion to a player who no one cares about.

Gan Guoyang has also heard about Thompson's deeds. His scoring battle with Gervin in 1978 was wonderful.

When he first arrived in the United States, that is, in 1981, he could still appreciate Thompson's heroic appearance in the game on TV, but two years later, in 1983, Thompson had already been ruined by drugs.

In 1984, he fell down the stairs of a ballroom in New York and seriously injured his knee, which became the final straw of his career. At that time, he was only 30 years old and he was at the peak of his career .

Because of this, it is a great pity that neither Gan Guoyang nor Jordan were able to compete with this skywalker who used to fly around in their rookie season.

Gan Guoyang thought that Thompson, who possessed such talent, ended up in such a field. Compared with Thompson, Colter, who is like a candlelight by the moonlight, would have a more miserable result if he got deeper and deeper into it.

"Everyone is responsible for their own actions, do your own thing, you can be a savior on the basketball court, but only on the basketball court, you can't save others in life. And don't be with the people who deal with drugs Get involved and be a clean person." Kenny Karl reminded Gan Guoyang again.

Karl's words have always been very reasonable, and Gan Guoyang also knew that Karl was thinking of him, so he nodded, but he still felt a little uncomfortable when he thought that Colter would fall down because of this.

…………

The next day, the Trail Blazers flew to Los Angeles for their third game of the season against the Los Angeles Clippers.

In the first three games, the Blazers' opponents were all from the Western District. Compared with last season, their schedule was more than 01:30 points easier.

The Los Angeles Clippers have also changed a lot this season. They gave up Bill Walton, who had high hopes, and sent him to the Celtics in exchange for the 1981 fmvp Maxwell.

Then he signed veteran Jamal Wilkes, who was abandoned by his rivals in the same city, and formed a veteran frontcourt with Maxwell, but I don’t know how much fuel is left in the fuel tank of these two veterans who were abandoned by their old owners. How much enthusiasm for basketball.

In addition, the Clippers also took Beniott Benjamin with the third pick in the draft.

Gan Guoyang still remembers the confrontation with Benjamin at Creighton University. At that time, Benjamin, who was 7 feet tall and had an advantage in weight, caused Gan Guoyang a lot of trouble.

"Hi Benjamin, welcome to the NBA, I hope you like this wonderful place in Los Angeles and have a good time." Before the start of the game, Gan Guoyang greeted Benjamin in a friendly manner.

Benjamin also shook hands with Gan Guoyang and exchanged a few words of greeting, but he was still a little guilty of Gan Guoyang in his heart. In the league, Gan Guoyang's "notoriety" for talking trash has gradually become apparent, and his personality of "revenging every grievance" on the court is also impressive. Hate and fear.

The day before yesterday, Gan Guoyang defended Joe Barry Carroll without scoring a point in three quarters, which also made the league's centers start to worry about the matchup with this yellow-skinned devil.

Especially for a rookie like Benjamin, Benjamin played mediocre in the first two games. In the first game against the Sacramento Kings, he only scored 3 points and 4 rebounds.

In the second scene against the Houston Twin Towers, the performance of 7 points and 4 rebounds was quite satisfactory, at least not being blown too badly by the Twin Towers.

More importantly, the Clippers have won the first two games, which should be said to be very unexpected.

What was even more unexpected was that when the game between the Trail Blazers and the Clippers started, the Clippers did not lose the wind. They relied on the excellent performances of Marques Johnson and Derek Smith to bite the score tightly.

The Blazers' defense today doesn't seem to be very effective in suppressing the Clippers' perimeter, because the Clippers don't have too complicated coordination at all. They rely on the personal abilities of Johnson and Smith to attack the Blazers with the simplest coordination and methods. basket.

In this case, the Clippers can play an efficient offense without the need for ball circulation and cooperation, which makes Belmont's well-designed dense defense useless, and they simply don't fall into this set!

This is exactly the difference between the nba and the ncaa. Regardless of offense or defense, the importance of individual ability is ranked above teamwork.

The single defense ability of the Trail Blazers is their weakness. Vandeweghe is always caught by Marquese Johnson. Even Drexler is suffering from a leg injury. Facing the explosive Derek Smith , he didn't have a good solution either.

Derrick Smith is not the kind of fast backcourt player. Instead of relying on speed to tear apart the opponent's defense, he uses his strong body and strong biceps to deal with players in the same position.

Gan Guoyang has always been good at dealing with fast players, because he reacts quickly and can always judge in advance to put pressure on the opponent.

But for Smith's outside line, which uses slowness to control fastness, he has no good solution. Fortunately, he is as good as ever in controlling the backcourt rebounds and did not give the Clippers too many second-attack opportunities.

Gan Guoyang also played an arrow role in the offense. Without Bill Walton, no one in the Clippers can stop Gan Guoyang's offensive footsteps, whether it is their starting center James Donelson or the backup rookie Benjamin.

However, without much resistance, Gan Guoyang felt that the Clippers seemed to be strategically abandoning the inside line. No matter how turbulent Gan Guoyang was inside, the Clippers would never double-team.

In contrast, the Blazers' perimeter performance was much worse. Marquese Johnson and Cedric Maxwell took turns to play, making Vandeweghe miserable.

Marquese Johnson and Vandeweghe are completely two types of players. Johnson is strong, fast, has amazing jumping, he is full of explosive power, and has excellent defense. When he was in the Bucks, he was the third best forward in the East. (Bode and Owen in front)

After coming to the Clippers last season, Marquese Johnson has inherited the playing habits he developed in the Bucks, with fierce defense and strong offensive impact, and he also has strong organizational skills.

You must know that when he was in the Bucks, he was arranged by "Frankenstein" Nelson to be the team's "point forward".

After the Clippers are recruiting this season, they are ready to do a big job. Even defeating a strong opponent in the first two games also let people see a glimmer of hope in the Los Angeles second who lives in the shadow of the Lakers.

At the end of the first half, the Blazers still relied on their superior strength to lead the Clippers by 60 points 55:5, but Ramsey could feel that the Blazers were not playing well.

"I don't think we're going to grab that many offensive rebounds in the second half! We've never been a rebounding team, are we the Philadelphia 76ers? Of course, it's good to get offensive rebounds." , It shows that we are active enough, but it also shows that our luck is good enough, so good that it covers up our problems on both ends of the offense and defense! They are playing singles, and we are also playing singles. I need results, and you have to give me results, not dry pulls There was a bang at the end! What are we doing in the afterlife in Los Angeles? Because the opponent is not the Lakers, why not play a good game? This state will only be torn apart by the Lakers! Thoroughly, torn apart!"

The Blazers' lead in the first half did not suppress Ramsey's anger. In his opinion, the team's offense was scattered and relied entirely on personal strength.

An important reason why the Blazers are still ahead is that the Blazers grabbed 6 more offensive rebounds in the first half, which has a certain element of luck.

Ramsey is not against singles players, and he also accepts Adelman's point of view on releasing players' talents, but in this game, the Blazers' players seem to have passed and become too self-centered.

"In the second half, pick up our team, cooperate more, and pass the ball more. Also, I hope everyone can focus on the game instead of the messy things outside the field!" Ramsey roared It has been a while since Ramsey roared after training camp started this season.

Gan Guoyang heard that Ramsey's words meant something, but it didn't seem to be completely directed at Colter. You must know that Colter didn't get 1 minute of playing time in the first half.

Naturally, these words cannot be said to himself. Gan Guoyang understands this. His performance in the first half was absolutely amazing. He scored 20 points, 7 rebounds and 3 blocks, which is the biggest pillar of the Blazers.

It shouldn't be possible for Drexler, Gan Guoyang also knows how hard he worked in the summer.

Could it be Vandeweghe?Or Sampson?Kenny Carr?Or which new player?

Anyway, Ramsey's roar made the locker room drop to freezing point. Gan Guoyang suddenly felt that the Blazers this season didn't seem to be united as one, but each had different ambitions.

Colter's drug use, players not thinking about basketball, and the Blazers in the midfield locker room have some problems again. It seems that everything has returned to the situation in the playoffs against the Nuggets last season.

This time, Gan Guoyang didn't want to be confused again, and he didn't want to always be excluded from the business circle. He decided to have a good chat with Carl after the game.