From today on is the king

Chapter 684 683. The Kings' Curtain Call
"Rashid, that guy is the strongest opponent you said? The strongest forward you asked me to play more balls for you?" Liu Mang looked at the opposite power forward and his mouth twitched.

"..." Rasheed Wallace remained silent.

The Kings gave fans a lot of small surprises this year. With Webber absent for more than 50 games, they did not fall behind from the top teams, and they are still tenaciously ranked among the seven teams with the best regular season record in the league.

The records of the Eagles and Pacers are far ahead this season. The Eagles have 46 wins and 8 losses, and the Pacers have 41 wins and 14 losses. Judging from the current performance of these two teams, winning 60+ games is a sure thing.

As for the remaining teams that have a chance to hit 60 wins, the Kings are still among them, behind the Timberwolves and the Lakers, and ahead of the Pistons, and their record has tied the Spurs' record of 37 wins and 17 losses, tied for fifth in the league!
The Kings proved with practical actions that their best performance in the league in 2002 was not due to good luck, but bad luck. Apart from the referee factor, there was also the continuous injury of their core power forward Chris Webber in the following two years.

Although Iverson stole the limelight for Webber's comeback this time, it is "alleged" that Weber recovered perfectly after this operation. The knee injury will not hinder his strength. He is 31 years old and has been selected to the first team and second team twice in the past three years. In people's eyes, he is still at the peak. Many fans and expert media are looking forward to how powerful the Kings will be after his comeback.

For the Eagles, unlike Liu Mang and Iverson, the Eagles coaching staff and players don't pay much attention to the 76ers that Iverson now owns.

As for the Kings, they are only one game away from the second-place Lakers in the West, and only two games away from the Timberwolves, the No.

It is now less than two years before the 2002 Western Conference Finals. No one will forget the surprise that the Kings brought to people in the 2002 Western Conference Finals. If it wasn't for the forced loss in the sixth game, the Kings would be worthy of the Lakers even if it was a tiebreaker.

The most important point is that Weber has a better helper inside. After Divac got old, they got Brad Miller with similar functions and longer range.

However, imagination is beautiful, reality is very skinny.

When Liu Mang forcibly added motivation to himself, and came to Arco Arena with the feeling that the whole world was against him, and came to the court after warming up, the Webb he saw... became a fat man!

Although it's not as exaggerated as Kemp or Vin Baker, compared to the "slim" figure of the most gorgeous power forward in history that Liu Mang saw two years ago, he is almost unrecognizable!

Weber has never shown his face in front of the fans in such "slightly" clothes, and he is wearing suits and leather shoes for interviews. When he took off his clothes and played in jersey and shorts, it was obvious that he was a lot bigger than before!
Liu Mang seemed to have seen a talented super power forward with his naked eyes. From the hard steel O'Neal's god-level power forward he saw two years ago, he has now become a fat man who has fallen behind the ranks of the best players.

"Ding... Chris Webber, ability evaluation 82, offense 89, defense 73, three-pointer 40, mid-range shooting 83, layup 89, passing 80, speed 75, strength 89..."

The decline is so serious!Except for the fact that the tonnage has increased, Weber is no longer as good as before in other respects!

Liu Mang felt that the five-year, 2002 million contract extension that Weber signed with the Kings in 5 was in his hands. He remembered that Weber was cut off by the 8000ers with the Houston clause before the contract was completed...

And the main reason is undoubtedly injuries!
Minimally invasive surgery is terrible!

Minimally invasive surgery was only invented in 1987, and it has really started to enter people's lives since the beginning of the new century. So at this stage, many people, even professional sports people, don't know how much impact this kind of surgery has on sports ability, because not many people will choose to use this kind of surgery that has not been completely perfected. Weber is regarded as the pioneer of minimally invasive surgery in the NBA.

The future Stoudemire and Tracy McGrady, after minimally invasive surgery, slipped directly from top stars or even superstars to the point where they almost couldn't hit the ball.

Of course, if minimally invasive surgery is not performed, Weber's injury may not heal. Like many superstars who collapse after the age of 30, they will not be able to play in two years, or even have repeated injuries and have been reimbursed directly.

So whether to do minimally invasive surgery or not is just the difference between miserable and worse.

After sighing Webb's sad fate, Liu Mang asked Rasheed Wallace who had been silent all this time: "Rashid, do you want to make more balls for you today?"

Although Liu Mang is alone, he also knows to give his teammates opportunities to perform. Recently, because McGrady has not been so strong, Liu Mang has maintained an average score of 32 points per game, and has been steadily leading McGrady by more than two points, so he is also happy to let his teammates show more.

"No, it's boring, Ace, come on, you see that Peja also wants to win." Rasheed Wallace shook his head, no longer had the strong idea of ​​wanting to score points with Weber.

Seeing that Rasheed Wallace seemed to have 'disdain' on his face, Liu Mang was a little surprised, and shouted at Tianzun...he also learned to be arrogant!Who did these guys on their own team learn from?One is more shameless than the other!
……

Rasheed Wallace is not interested. Raheem sacrificed a lot for the championship this year. He has no interest in collecting statistics in the regular season. He has given up a lot of things and is determined to focus on team honor. This season, Jason Terry is the sixth man.

So, today Liu Mang started making waves again!
After the game started, Rasheed Wallace easily won the jump ball from Webb, who had gained more than 20 pounds, or about ten kilograms.

Brad Miller's jump ball is poor, and the Kings fans who were expecting Webber to come back and win the jump ball are now disappointed. Webber can't jump now!
After receiving the jump ball, Liu Mang advanced to the frontcourt. Facing Doug Christie, who was on the first team of the All-Defensive Team last season, Liu Mang did not choose to fight recklessly.Specifically for Weber on this one.

Rasheed Wallace ran up to help Liu Mang block Christie's defense. Weber moved quickly for the first time, following Rasheed Wallace's footsteps and blocking Liu Mang's pick-and-roll cut.

but!

After Liu Mang's pick-and-roll master level 5 is triggered, his speed exceeds [-]!If it was Weber in the past, relying on strength and good mobility, he could still interfere with Liu Mang, but now Weber encountered Liu Mang's change of direction after the pick-and-roll, and tried to keep up with him, but almost fell down!

Liu Mang passed Webb with a change of direction, and Christie, who bypassed the pick-and-roll and came up to defend, saw only the picture of Liu Mang going inside and playing with Brad Miller with his footsteps.

The strongest first step is really easy to use. When encountering a center like Brad Miller who is soft and slow but still active in defense, Liu Mang has the opportunity to dunk a [-]-meter giant!

On the defensive end, Liu Mang signaled the others to block his defenders and let Rasheed Wallace single-handedly defend against Weber.

This defensive method is a bit unfriendly, but the effect is obvious.

Letting the strongest player on the team have one-on-one singles without being interfered by others is a very important type of NBA tactics. Although Webber is a little fatter, he is still the best in the hearts of the Kings players. It is just that he has just come back, and he will come back after recovering from injury. There is not much training time, and he needs the ball to find his status. Therefore, after he has the opportunity to play singles, the Kings players give him the ball more.

It's just that Webber really can't beat Rasheed Wallace who is focused on defense!
Rasheed Wallace is the defensive champion who can lock Duncan and O'Neal together with Ben Wallace!

Although Weber is definitely better than Divac, who is on the verge of retiring, even if he is not in good form, he always needs to find his form when he comes back. He was in a bad state and met Rasheed Wallace who went all out to defend when he saw him.

Liu Mang had been prepared for a long time, rushed in and immediately counterattacked when he saw the ball, throwing away Christie who rushed over, and counterattacked with one sword!

"Ding... I am the pioneer..."

"Ding...fancy dunk trigger..."

Liu Mang rushed to the opponent's basket, but no one followed. Christie, a defensive lunatic, gave up. After Liu Mang threw him off, the surge in speed surprised him. He rushed to the opponent's basket and turned 180 degrees.
After being blocked, Weber of course wanted to fight back, but unfortunately, in the next few rounds, Weber only made 5 of 1 shots.

When Liu Mang was helping the team to grab rebounds and pick-and-rolls, he counterattacked when he had a chance, and shot in various ways when he didn’t have a chance to land. Or after the pick-and-roll, he saw Christie’s quick retreat around the pick-and-roll and sniped, or rushed inside to make a kill. After more than five minutes, the Eagles played a 14-4 wave. After two points, the Kings' offense completely stagnated!

It was the Eagles attacking again, and Liu Mang hit it off. After catching Rasheed Wallace's pick-and-roll, when Weber pounced, Liu Mang made a strong three-pointer against Weber's defense!
"Ding... The King of Ganba triggers at level 5..."

Weber's height of [-] meters did put some pressure on Liu Mang, but the king of dry pulls corrected Liu Mang's affected shot tilt. With the touch of Liu Mang's previous shots, Liu Mang made a pick-and-roll against Weber's defense and hit a three-pointer yanshe!

17 to 4, it took less than 6 minutes to play, and the point difference was stretched to more than 10 points!

Adelman finally couldn't sit still and called a timeout!
Webber was targeted like this, and the opponent did not double-team Webber at all. This was beyond Adelman's expectation, because although Webber has gained weight, he has been a top power forward in the league in the past two years.

There is no doubt that Webber is still the best insider in the Kings team, so after Webber came back, Adelman immediately changed his tactics back to the tactics of the previous seasons, but he did not expect the Eagles to play like this, and Rasheed Wallace even defended Webber!
Originally, in Adelman's opinion, even if Weber had declined more, the Eagles were unlikely to be able to defend against Weber inside, but he didn't expect that the original defensive sieve turned into a top defensive insider!

Rasheed Wallace's data is bleak, and the defensive performance can't be reflected by statistics in many cases. This is also the reason why Rasheed Wallace was not taken seriously before the Pistons won the championship. Adelman only now knows that the Eagles players and coaching staff often say that Rasheed Wallace is the most important signing.

Obviously, the current Kings are in an embarrassing situation. If there is no Webber, they are still a top team and still have a chance to compete for the third place in the league. But now that Webber is back, Adelman is bound to put Webber back in the core position.
The point is, Adelman also had to let Webber play more time to find the state!Good coaches are very sensitive, and Adelman clearly felt that the tacit understanding that the team had cultivated when Weber was away might be wiped out!
……

After returning from the timeout, the two teams began to rotate.

Stockton probably had to rest for several days because he played the whole game last game. Liu Mang played with a lineup of Jason Terry, Raheem, Boozer and Rasheed Wallace.

The Kings didn't make any substitutions, but just changed their style of play. Webber no longer had the opportunity to play singles all the time, and became a pick-and-roll organizer, using his mid-range shooting ability and roll-down ability to help Bibby organize the offense.

It's just that this style of play made Weber unhappy. He was lazy during the pick-and-roll, which was the same reason why Weber was traded in history. Every time he encountered this situation, he would be unhappy, and the worse he played, the worse he played.

Although the Kings offensive started a lot better after Bibby regained possession of the ball, Peja finally had a chance to catch and shoot. He was already unhappy with Liu Mang, and wanted to fight back after seeing Liu Mang score 11 points in half a quarter, but Webber kept grabbing the ball. He was very unhappy but had no choice.

The offense of the Kings has improved, and the offense of the Eagles is even sharper!
Still playing against Weber, Liu Mang is very sorry for Weber's fate. Although Weber is only 31 years old, he is obviously at the twilight of his career when he comes back from a serious injury, but as an opponent, Liu Mang will not be soft-hearted. The opponent has weaknesses.I am not a philanthropist, and there is no such thing as "respecting the old and loving the young" in the game. After experiencing Weber's loophole against the Kings a few minutes ago, Liu Mang specifically picked Weber's point to play.

Liu Mang scored 11 points in the half quarter. After the Kings' defensive pressure came towards him, Liu Mang came back from a timeout and started to pass the ball. In the next six minutes, he only scored 3 points.

After the first quarter, the Eagles lead 36 to 19 by 17 points!
The Kings played well in the next six minutes and scored 15 points, but they played poorly in the first half of the first quarter and only scored 4 points. The Eagles led by 17 points in a single quarter!
When Adelman used Webber as a player to open up the space, the Kings did play well, but after the Hawks took a 17-point lead, Liu Mang either passed the ball or scored himself. points lead!

The situation became stalemate like that. When there were more than 5 minutes left in the fourth quarter, Mike Bibby scored 9 points in a row, narrowing the point difference to 8 points at one point, which shocked the Eagles. But then Liu Mang scored 8 points in a row, broke through 40 points personally, opened the point difference to more than 10 points again, and stifled the counterattack momentum of the Kings.

最终，刘莽29投14中拿到40分6板10助攻的数据，本赛季第三次至少40+10，刷新了老鹰队队史球员个人单赛季40+10助攻次数记录的同时，老鹰队112比98，有惊无险的击败客场击败国王队拿到7连胜！

The entire Kings team performed very well. After all, they are tied for fifth in the league with the Spurs. The Kings were already strong, but Webber's comeback obviously affected their chemistry.

Webber, who only made 13 of 3 shots and scored 8 points and 6 rebounds, not only had a poor offensive performance, but he was once the rebounding leader, and his defensive rebounds declined the most. There is no doubt that Weber's performance in this game was very disappointing.

In particular, his current body shape makes people seem to see the curtain call of an era. Obviously, the era of the talented Kings team has not yet begun, and the curtain call will come...

……

……

To say how miserable Weber is, it's not just that he played poorly in his comeback debut, the key is that his poor performance didn't make the headlines!
Iverson, who came back on the same day as him, played a surprising performance against the Pistons with the third record in the Eastern Conference and the current 36 wins and 19 losses in his comeback debut!
Before the game between the 76ers and the Pistons, people saw the poor state of Webber's absence for most of the season, and they didn't have much hope for Iverson's comeback debut.

But the more unexpected the unexpected, the more surprising it is!

Facing the Pistons, Iverson's shooting performance of 22 of 6 was really bad, but he also got 14 assists!In addition, he also grabbed an offensive rebound at a critical moment in the fourth quarter, which was the seventh double double in his career. At the same time, Ben Wallace fouled and made two free throws.

Relying on Iverson's critical moments, the 76ers made a big upset and defeated the Pistons 99 to 96!
After winning the game, Iverson asked the reporter to tell Liu Mang during an interview: "Let Ace wash his ass and wait for his buddies to kick him! If that bastard doesn't get beaten up, he won't know who is the boss!"

……

Iverson's desire to defeat Liu Mang is very strong now.

In addition to wanting to "revenge" Liu Mang's previous curse, there is also the matter of scoring champion.

Iverson's previous highest scoring average was 31.4 points, while Liu Mang has now averaged 32.6 points per game, which is higher than McGrady's average of 32.1 points per game last season.

As the season progressed, it became more and more difficult for McGrady to overtake Liu Mang. Now every time McGrady wants to improve by 6 point, he has to score 20 points more than his average per game. If he wants to surpass Liu Mang, he has to average at least 35 points per game in the remaining [-] games.

In the past ten years, only two people have achieved this kind of performance. One is Jordan in the 86-87 season. He scored 11+ points 35 times in a row, 40+ points in nine consecutive games, and averaged 38 points in all games after the All-Star Weekend.

The second is Kobe last season, who performed 13+ in 35 consecutive games. In February, he had 2 consecutive 9+ games, and averaged 40+ per game in a single month. After counting the 40 points per game in March, he averaged 3+ per game in two months.

Except for these two, in modern basketball, no one has completed the difficult task of McGrady trying to catch up with Liu Mang's scoring average.

Moreover, Liu Reck's scoring momentum is also very fierce now, and McGrady is trying to catch up with soaring points, but Liu Reck will not just watch.

Therefore, basically Liu Mang can determine the scoring champion with more than 20 games left.

Of course, there may also be a situation where O’Neal and David Robinson competed for the scoring title. McGrady first stabilized the current average scoring gap and did not allow himself to be stretched too far. In the last two or three games, McGrady’s scoring ability is obviously stronger than David Robinson.

This is also the media's prediction for McGrady and Liu Mang competing for the scoring title.

But Iverson is also a super scorer and knows how difficult it is to get 60+. It is very difficult for McGrady to accomplish such a miracle, so he is even more upset now!
Back then, the younger brother had to surpass his own scoring average to become the scoring champion!

Tolerable or unbearable!
……

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(End of this chapter)