There will be three NBA preseason games on the evening of October 15th. The 76ers vs. Raptors will start at 7 o'clock, then the Hornets vs. Bulls will start at 7:30, and finally the Magic will face the Heat at 8 o'clock.
In the eyes of fans, these three games are not interesting. They are not strong dialogues, and there are no grudges. As for the sordid history between O'Neal and the Magic, it really cannot be brought to the table.
8 o'clock in the evening, Amway Center (when I was checking information today, I suddenly discovered that the home court of the Magic in those years was called the Waterhouse Center, but I have written it as Amway Center many times, so I won't change it. Everyone knows it), the Magic vs.
The Heat game has officially begun.
Howard and O'Neal stood facing each other in the center circle. When he usually looked at Howard on the team, Edison felt that he was already tall and burly. But now that he was with O'Neal, he was not enough.
O'Neal is bigger than him in both height and volume, and he can fit Howard into it. Howard's face no longer looks like he was laughing and joking, but it is much more serious, and he really looks a bit like Duncan.
The referee stood in the middle of the two people, asked them to get ready, and then steadily threw the ball upward. O'Neal and Howard both squatted down first, and then jumped high.
In the past games against the Grizzlies and Hawks, Howard easily won the jump ball, but today he lost.
After missing out on the championship for two consecutive seasons, the Sharks have set their goal to win the championship in the new season. So this summer, O'Neal took the initiative to lose weight differently than usual and successfully lost about 15 pounds. This made him
His flexibility and jumping ability have been further demonstrated. For example, in today's jump ball, he completely crushed Howard with his height, arm length and excellent bounce speed.
The Heat's starting lineup is very fixed, O'Neal, Haslem, Rasual Butler (Caron Butler's brother), Wade and Eddie Jones.
On the Magic's side, Howard, Uncle Huo, Marion, Iguodala and Nash. For reasons of talent, Edison did not start Josh Smith.
After the Heat started to attack, Eddie Jones slowly dribbled the ball across half court, waiting for O'Neal to get into position and then attack in the half court.
The Heat's offensive and defensive tactics revolve around O'Neal. In order to better utilize O'Neal's power, Van Gundy redesigned the tactics and changed the Heat's original perimeter-based team to an interior-based team.
Eddie Jones has now withdrawn from the shooting guard position last season and assumed more of a point guard role. This is not only to better cooperate with O'Neal, but also to move Wade, the rookie who performed brilliantly last season, from the point guard position.
Completely liberated, further unleashing his breakthrough power, forming a one-shot and one-shot backcourt combination.
Everyone believes that with O'Neal and this extremely lethal backcourt lineup, the Heat, who are in the weakest Southeast Division, can defeat any team and enter the playoffs.
After O'Neal dropped into the low post, Howard pushed his waist hard from behind, but O'Neal continued to move towards the basket as if nothing was wrong.
Eddie Jones saw that O'Neal's position had fallen very deep, so he directly lobbed the ball into the inside. After O'Neal caught the ball, he pushed Howard backwards. Although Howard worked hard to hold him up, the difference in strength and tonnage was helpless.
It was too big, and he immediately lost his balance and was pushed away. Then O'Neal turned around. Although O'Neal looked heavy, he turned around very fast. Before Howard could readjust, he had completely turned around and then took off and dunked.
Under the influence of his huge weight and amazing strength, the backboard shook up and down greatly, and the basket made a "chirping" sound.
The Orlando crowd responded with loud boos to this goal...
Originally, when this man was wearing a blue uniform, this scene would often be staged here. At that time, all the audience cheered for it, but that scene can never be found again. Now O'Neal is wearing a red and white uniform.
, if he performs this scene again, it means that his team will lose points.
TNT's Barkley appeared on the sidelines as a commentator, "O'Neal can dominate the basket as always. This Howard is a complete child in front of him. But I have never understood why O'Neal has to lose weight. You must know that fat is essential for inside players.
A missing weapon, that's what I was like back then. But Kenny, have you noticed that O'Neal lost more than 10 pounds?"
"It seems like I've lost a little weight, but you know the Heat's uniforms look slimmer than the Lakers' yellow uniforms." Kenny Smith responded to Barkley, and the two of them laughed.
After Uncle Huo served, Nash did not advance as quickly as usual, but slowly pushed through the half court, thinking about Edison's tactical arrangement before the game.
"For the first goal after the opening, don't use the usual tactics, but use a half-court attack and hand the ball to Howard. Howard, you play O'Neal in the low post."
Although Nash didn't quite understand what Edison meant, he felt that Edison must have his own intentions in doing so, so he slowly pushed forward and waited for Howard to take his position.
Howard also followed Edison's instructions and found a good position low on the left side. He struggled back and leaned back, but he didn't move at all.
Nash glanced at Edison standing on the sidelines, full of doubts. What he meant was, "He can't even get a position, why should we give him singles?"
Edison looked at Nash and understood his doubts, but he still stretched out his hand and pointed at Howard. The meaning was obvious, and the tactics continued to be implemented.
Nash saw that he had no choice but to do as he was told. So he made a signal, Iguodala lifted from the bottom corner to the wing, Nash handed the ball to Iguodala, and then Iguodala lobbed the ball to Howard.
Howard's low-post offensive skills were very poor, especially his back-to-the-basket skills. Until 2012, he only had two methods for low-post offense. First, for relatively soft inside lines, he directly relied on his body and his broad shoulders.
One step, then dunk; second, a cross-step hook. In short, he is a pick-and-roll center with limited offensive skills. He relies more on movement rather than the traditional back-to-the-basket attacking center.
After Howard received the ball, his mind flashed back to the private conversation between head coach Edison and himself before the game.
"Dwight, your opponent tonight is one of the best centers in history, and he is still in his prime. This is your last chance to feel what a super center is. So I will arrange more for you in tonight's game.
In singles with O'Neal, whether it's offense or defense, I won't let anyone else help you, I won't arrange double-teams or help defense, as long as O'Neal is on the court, I will let you play, and then you will be one-on-one."
"Just now, O'Neal easily defeated me on the offensive end. Now I should retaliate." Howard thought to himself, so he first tried to follow O'Neal's method just now, playing with his back, but he soon discovered that this method did not work.
, no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't move even half a step back, and he could even clearly feel that if O'Neal wanted to, he could easily push himself off the court.
So he planned to use another method that he had tried many times since high school.
Howard dribbled the ball first, and then pretended to move to the high post. Sure enough, O'Neal turned around after him. Howard suddenly turned in the opposite direction and slipped in from the baseline. However, when he slipped to the baseline and took off, he heard the sound behind him.
O'Neal said: "."
At this time, Howard found that he had been completely pushed behind the backboard by O'Neal, and there was no angle at all. No matter how much he could jump, it would be useless...
With a "dang" sound, the ball hit the bottom edge of the backboard, but Howard was unwilling to give in. He held the ball tightly and fell to the ground again.
At this time, the referee's whistle sounded, "Blue No. 12, jump up."
Kenny Smith looked at it and curled his lips, "Oh, our No. 1 pick wants to challenge O'Neal, this is not a good idea. If he wants to challenge O'Neal, he will have to play for at least two seasons. Whether it is physical, technical, or experience
, the gap between him and O'Neal is too big, just like the gap between you and Michael, Charles." Kenny Smith took the opportunity to squeeze Barkley.
Barkley was also quite helpless about this issue, "Yes, this is also the reason why he earned US$570 million in the end, while I could only earn US$30 million."
The game continued on the court. Eddie Jones slowly dribbled the ball past half court again and saw O'Neal asking for the ball in the low post again.
Eddie Jones is very strange. You must know that O'Neal immediately stated after coming to the Heat that he would help the entire team improve. The Heat will not be a one-man team. And he did the same in previous games, under the basket.
He stood up and served his teammates selflessly. What happened today? He kept asking for the ball to attack?
Although I was confused, O'Neal's prestige was there. If he asked for the ball, would you dare not give it to him? Even if you were scared to death, you wouldn't dare. So he gave the ball to O'Neal again.
This time, O'Neal did not lean to the basket and score directly like last time. Instead, he stopped near the three-second line. Then he made the same move as Howard just now, a fake move and then slipped to the baseline. But
Howard's one didn't succeed, but O'Neal hit a dunk.
The audience booed again.
At this time, Thibodeau came to Edison, "It seems that Van Gundy has made up his mind to attack the inside in this game. Should we replace Varejao to assist Howard and strengthen the defense inside? Or simply let Varejao.
Lejo fought against O'Neal and used Howard's certain quickness to double-team."
Edison glanced at Thibodeau: "No, let Howard defend O'Neal alone in this game. Moreover, O'Neal's frequent attacks are not arranged by Van Gundy, but because I called him in the morning and asked him to help him do it."
Thibodeau looked at Edison with a puzzled look, not understanding this.
"O'Neal is the only super center now, and he is about to leave his peak. So I want to take advantage of now to let Howard know what a center is."
When Edison said this, he stared blankly at the playing field, thinking about his phone call with O'Neal this morning.
"Hi Shaquille, I'm Paul from the Magic."
"Hey, what do you want from me? Ah, I understand. You want me to be merciful during tonight's game and not bully that high school student to go home to his mother. No problem." O'Neal's voice on the phone was still full of emotion.
He has a hippie style. Although he is very brutal on the court, he is a living treasure off the court.
"On the contrary, I hope you will be more proactive and aggressive, and teach Howard a lesson so that he can know what a truly dominant center looks like."
"Oh? Paul, you are not kidding, is it really okay for me to do that?" O'Neill was very surprised after hearing what Edison said.
"Shaquille, since you, there has never been a decent center in the league. Duncan was originally one, but he was more at the power forward position instead of sitting in the middle. If this continues,
When you get old, people in the future, like Howard, will not know how a center should play. They will think that a center who can run, jump, block shots, and grab 10 rebounds is a good center. Shaquille, I say
I think you can understand these.”….
O'Neal was silent for a long time after listening to Edison's words, then laughed and said, "Paul, you have to understand one thing, I will never grow old. Even if I am 50 years old, I will still be the best center in the league."
"Shaquille, if you are still the best center in the league when you are 50 years old, will you be happy?"
O'Neill was silent again. Edison waited for a long time, but O'Neill hung up the phone directly. Edison was also very uneasy and didn't know what O'Neill was thinking. But now it seems that he and Edison have the same thoughts.
Although they are all players and play basketball, there are 5 positions. In the past, the center has always been the boss, but now the spotlight has been taken away by the guards. The center has even declined a little bit. As a center, O'Neal is also very painful.
. He is also eager to prove that the position he plays and that his work is the most important, but one person cannot prove anything. People will think you are a special case. Only when there are many people will believe it and agree.
Let’s digress again: This kind of recognition is effective only if it is recognized by the majority of people. It is actually a population recognition effect in nature. A Japanese zoologist once discovered a wonderful phenomenon in a zoo. Later he extended this phenomenon to the natural world. As a result
It can still be verified. What is this phenomenon? People often mention Japan’s Monkey Mountain when watching Japanese animal programs. There are many more monkeys in their zoos than in China. There are often hundreds of monkeys in one zoo. Of course.
, This is related to the size of the country. Our area is large and there are many zoos. Once there are too many monkeys, they are moved to other zoos. Later, in the process of raising these monkeys, this person discovered one thing. Many tourists will give food to the monkeys.
, this is very common and also exists in China. But he later discovered a phenomenon. Some people gave monkeys a jelly-like liquid food. This kind of thing has never been seen by monkeys in nature, and in zoos, keepers will not feed it.
Their.
At this time, something interesting happened. Many people threw such things to the monkeys, but at the beginning, the monkeys did not dare to eat them. Only one or two monkeys went to eat them, and every time very few monkeys ate them, most of them were
Later, it was collected as garbage. But suddenly one day, he found that all the monkeys went to eat. However, only a few monkeys would eat the night before. The animal researcher was very puzzled, so he wanted to know what happened.
What, did something happen at night? But after questioning the breeder, he found that everything was the same as usual, and he had normal food at night, no difference.
So he started experimenting with other foods. Later, the zoologist finally discovered that only a few monkeys ate the food that the monkeys had never been exposed to, and the food they had never thought of entered their diet.
Only, and which ones are not fixed, but when the number of meals reaches more than 100 times, suddenly this food is recognized by the entire group, and all monkeys will eat it.
This is the group identity effect. When a certain proportion of people in a group accept a fact, suddenly everyone will accept it.
This is actually very common among humans. Let me give you a simple example: Van Gogh. Van Gogh’s paintings can be said to be priceless now, but at the beginning he was not recognized by people. After he died, slowly
In the slow art world, some people began to think that his paintings were good, and more and more people thought so, and then suddenly the entire art world recognized Van Gogh. But this was not the climax yet.
The climax is: Soon the entire human race recognized Van Gogh. Regardless of whether you are engaged in art or not, whether you are from the East or the West, most people suddenly think that Van Gogh's paintings are particularly good. You must know that in that
At that time, television broadcasting was not as developed as it is now, and there would not be any advertisements to promote Van Gogh. But it is amazing that a painter who was not recognized by others more than ten years ago (not just in the art circle, but also by ordinary people at that time)
If you don’t like Van Gogh’s paintings, no one buys his paintings, so his later life is very poor) was suddenly recognized by everyone more than ten years later. Now you show Sunflowers to someone who has never known who Van Gogh is.
, he will also say it looks good. This is a very wonderful phenomenon. No one knows what the principle is, but it is a fact that exists in nature...
The same is true on the basketball court. Now everyone says that the center has declined, but when did the center begin to decline? In fact, it has been in decline for a long time. Since the emergence of Jordan, the center is no longer the most dominant. But now
When everyone talks about the decline of centers, they say it started in the "new century." Why, because at that time, Olajuwon and other centers began to grow old and gradually withdraw from the stage of history. But many people who don't watch NBA don't know about Olajuwon.
Some people will also say that from "the beginning of the new century", this is actually the result of the group identity mentioned above, a quantitative change to a qualitative change.
Similarly, in order for a center to rise again, it must first be recognized by some people. O'Neal knows that he cannot do it alone. He cannot carry the banner of a center by himself, so he needs more people to help him.
Therefore, although he did not agree to Edison in person, he did speak for himself with his actions on the field.
In the next attack, Edison did not ask Howard to play O'Neal alone, but used the V-shaped tactics normally. Because Haslem, who was defending Uncle Huo, was too short, Uncle Huo frequently shot and scored from the free throw line.
On the Heat's side, O'Neal no longer plays alone, but frequently cooperates with Wade in pick-and-rolls, and Wade also performs bravely with sudden shots.
The scores of both sides increased alternately.
As mentioned before, the preseason is mainly to test the level of substitutes, so Van Gundy soon replaced O'Neal and other main players. Edison saw that O'Neal was off the game, so he also replaced Howard, and then asked Nash to play with a group of players.
.
Although Howard played less than one quarter, he felt as if he was waterlogged after he came off the field. The front and back of his jersey were soaked with sweat. After he came off the field, he wiped his sweat with a towel and drank a sports drink without saying a word.
, no longer acting like a big kid as usual, he remained silent, looking at the Heat's bench from time to time.
Edison saw it, but didn't say anything. There are some things you can't say. People need to understand them themselves. When they understand to a certain extent, you can enlighten them. Otherwise, just preaching will have no effect.
At the end of the first quarter, the Magic trailed the Heat by 4 points, 25-29.
After the start of the second quarter, the Heat still did not send O'Neal, and Edison could not bear to let Howard play.
After playing for about 4 minutes, Van Gundy finally decided to send out the Sharks again. So Edison also waved his hand, and Howard came on the court.
When O'Neal saw Howard coming on the court, he glanced sideways at Edison, who nodded calmly.
So as soon as O'Neal came on the court, he asked for the ball again. Damon Jones, the Heat's backup point guard, didn't dare to make any sense and quickly passed the ball to O'Neal.
After O'Neal got the ball, he didn't dribble. Instead, he swung his big arm and turned around to dunk. Howard also wanted to jump up to block the shot, but was knocked over by an elbow. He was lying on the floor, with O'Neal hanging high.
O'Neal walked to the free throw line, shot it, and - I guess everyone knows the outcome.
Josh Smith grabbed the rebound and handed the ball to Nash, who was about to advance quickly. When he heard Edison calling him, he turned his head and looked at Edison. Edison made a hand-down gesture, which meant "slow down."
When the Heat set up their defensive position, Edison pointed at Howard again, so Nash directly gave the ball to Howard and asked him to play singles.
As a result, Howard had a better memory this time and knew that hard work would not work, so he walked out and took a step back shot. But as soon as he took the shot, he heard "Too naive" and then a very dark shadow.
He rose from in front of him, and then "bang, whoosh" his ball was directly whipped into the audience by O'Neal. After landing, O'Neal looked at the stunned Howard provocatively...
After the foul ball was sent, Nash still succeeded in shooting based on his personal ability.
When it was the Heat's turn to attack, O'Neal asked for the ball again. At this time, one person couldn't bear it anymore.
Who is it? Josh Smith. I said before that Josh and Howard have been good friends since childhood. Now that I saw O'Neal beating Howard completely, he naturally felt uncomfortable, so he planned to help Howard. So after seeing O'Neal catch the ball, he
Regardless of Edison's explanation before, he suddenly rushed over and double-teamed him.
But O'Neal remained unmoved. He bumped Howard with his shoulder sideways, knocking Howard backwards, and then jumped up to dunk with one hand. Howard himself was knocked off balance, and O'Neal brought it back when he dunked.
Suddenly, he couldn't stand at all and fell to the ground.
Josh also looked depressed and helpless, and quickly pulled Howard up, thinking, "Brother, I've already helped you, but I can't stop him."
At this time, the whistle was heard, and Edison replaced him with Dior.
Josh didn't think much and went straight to the bench, only to hear Edison say coldly: "Who told you to double-team O'Neal just now? How did I arrange the tactics before the game and let Howard defend O'Neal alone? Didn't you hear it?
forgotten."
"Coach, I..." Josh opened his mouth to explain, but was interrupted by Edison.
"Okay, I don't want to hear what you have to say. You put on long sleeves and you don't have to play for the rest of the game today."
After Josh heard this, he was stunned for a moment, with his mouth wide open and his eyes wide open. A kind of idiotic footnote was added to his already ugly face. He looked at Edison blankly, and then looked at
Other players on the bench.
Although the conversation between the two people just now was not very loud, everyone on the bench could still hear it clearly. They looked at Josh looking for help. Some of them spread their hands, expressing helplessness; some gave way to him.
He waved to him and asked him to sit down quickly, and sit down first before talking; some people simply turned their faces away, not daring to look at him.
,
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The score of this book is not very good right now. Please give me more feedback, not to mention the update speed. I am a newbie and I hope you can give me more advice.
