The Golden Age of Basketball

Chapter 185 Bewitching
I'm pretty sure Forrest Gump has a seductive power. The first time you compete against him, he'll use mesmerizing rhetoric to lure you into a trap. Then, throughout your career, he'll drag you into a strange, unbalanced matchup. It's like he's put a switch on you, and when he flips it, something terrible is about to happen.

After becoming a team manager and coach, every season I would remind the rookies just entering the NBA to be careful when facing Forrest Gump; he was like a succubus. I like to trash talk because I enjoy the feeling of talking non-stop and to mentally and athletically overwhelm my opponents. However, I usually forget about it afterward, just like a stand-up comedian, making everyone laugh is enough.

Unlike Forrest Gump, he was like an orator and an ambitious schemer, weaving a massive trap from a very early age to capture everyone. (The above content is published with Forrest Gump's permission; you can also consider this one of Forrest Gump's traps.)

—Excerpt from *Bird Watching*, published in 1999, co-authored by Larry Bird and Jackie Macmullan.

During the jump ball, Gan Guoyang touched the ball first and passed it to Valentine, and the game began.

Robert Parish was a little slower; it's unclear whether it's due to his age or because he had something on his mind.

Gan Guoyang was right just now; Parish does indeed have a slight dislike for Larry Bird.

Although everyone in Boston loved Bird, he was the team's darling and the undisputed leader.

Everyone admired his confidence and recognized Larry's profound understanding of basketball and his extraordinary diligence.

But when it came to trash talk, Parish didn't appreciate Bird. This silent, steadfast traditional center disliked Bird's incessant chatter.

During last year's game between the Celtics and the 76ers, Bird kept humiliating Irving with "42:6". Parish didn't think this was right; he believed Bird had crossed the line.

So when Irving threw a punch at Bird, and Malone ran over to grab Bird and let him take the hit, Parish didn't help.

Parish believes Bird deserved it; he earned the opportunity to fight Irving using his own language, so he wouldn't help.

As for Moses Malone helping out, that's Malone's business, it has nothing to do with Parish.

During the 1981 NBA Finals, Larry Bird caused a huge controversy by yelling "Let Moses Malone eat shit!" at a Celtics fan rally, and Bird later had to apologize.

Therefore, it's understandable that Moses Malone would come to take sides, especially since he felt that Bird's foul mouth wouldn't be a big deal if he got punched a couple of times.

Parish dislikes trash talk; he plays basketball diligently and uses basketball to defeat his opponents.

If your opponent really makes you uncomfortable or angry, just punch them instead of nagging endlessly.

On the other hand, the Trail Blazers' number 11 has been on a winning streak since December, thrashing two of the league's most formidable centers.

When he threw Laimbeer, the Celtics erupted in cheers. Auerbach even said that if he crippled Laimbeer, the Celtics would retire his jersey.

Parish was shocked when he threw Gilmore; someone actually dared to move a train, this guy was terrifying.

When Gan Guoyang shattered the backboard during the morning warm-up, Parish even thought Gan Guoyang did a great job.

Parrish did not rush into the stadium; he waited outside until 11 a.m. before going in, believing it would be impolite to rush in early and drive people away.

Bird, McHale, and Angie, those three white guys, were too arrogant, and they got what they deserved.

When Gan Guoyang slammed the ball at Ainge, no one on the Celtics side dared to stand up for him, and they just watched as he swaggered out of the stadium.

Before this game, the Celtics knew the Trail Blazers were a rising team and were prepared to give this young team a hard time, but they ended up running into a tough opponent.

Parish had only slightly misjudged the situation, and as a result, on the Trail Blazers' first offensive possession, Gan Guoyang, while hovering at the high post, suddenly cut in and slipped into the paint.

Thompson, positioned high up, delivered a through pass to Gan Guoyang, who received the ball and made a deft layup with his left hand. Parish was too slow to react.

The other Celtics players also didn't expect the Trail Blazers' first play to be a center cutting to the basket; they hadn't seen that move on the film.

The Trail Blazers scored first, and Bird inbounded the ball from the baseline, reminding Parish, "Robert, stay focused!"

Parish didn't say anything, and ran towards the front of the field with his head down. He knew that he had just been distracted and couldn't think about things unrelated to the game anymore.

Playing at Boston Garden is definitely a different experience than playing at other arenas.

The old parquet flooring here is unique, not because the Celtics were trying to be different, but because when the ice hockey arena was being fitted with basketball wood flooring, they were poor and couldn't afford good long wooden planks, so they had to use parquet flooring.

It's said that the wooden flooring here is uneven, with some sections lacking elasticity, causing rackets to not bounce properly and resulting in turnovers that the Celtics can steal the ball and launch counter-attacks. Besides being familiar with the properties of each plank of wood flooring, the Celtics players try to dribble less and pass more during offense to prevent their rackets from failing to bounce properly and being intercepted.

Therefore, the Celtics are probably the team with the fewest dribbles and the most passes on the court in the entire league, a situation that has remained true since Auerbach took over as coach in the 50s until today.

The Celtics quickly made a shot, with Bird receiving a pass from Dennis Johnson on the perimeter and suddenly shooting past Vandeweghe to score two points.

After scoring, Bird looked at Vandeweghe and said, "Damn it, Dr. Jack sent you to guard me alone? No double-team? What grudge does he have against you?"

Vandeweghe attempted a counterattack, faking out Bird with a layup and driving to the basket. Parish helped defend, and Thompson received a bounce pass from Vandeweghe and prepared to lay up, but Dennis Johnson appeared out of nowhere and knocked the ball away from Thompson from the side.

The ball went out of bounds, and the Celtics completed a decent defensive play. It won't be so easy to score repeatedly under the Celtics' basket.

This freckled perimeter player has outstanding defensive abilities and can always help the inside players cover for any gaps in their defense.

Gan Guoyang inbounded the ball from the baseline and noticed that Parish was not facing him directly, but rather sideways, protecting the area under the basket.

Gan Guoyang then feinted by throwing the ball outwards, deceiving Parish's line of sight, and suddenly smashed the ball into Parish's back.

The ball bounced back, Gan Guoyang entered the court to get the ball, dribbled to the baseline, and scored with a reverse layup.

"Sonny Gan, he smashed the ball onto Parish, then grabbed it and made a layup! That smart lad is as cunning as a fox." Moster didn't hold back his praise for the visiting player.

The Celtics missed two consecutive opportunities to pass to Gan Guoyang under the basket, which angered Bird.

He said to Parish, "Pay attention, Parish, that's two."

The usually silent and resolute Parish replied, "You too, don't get carried away."

Bird couldn't believe his ears. The chief actually retorted, saying, "I was just reminding you."

Parish added, "Me too."

As he spoke, Parish served the ball to Dennis Johnson.

Johnson sensed something was off between the two and shouted while dribbling the ball, "Attack! Attack! Stop talking nonsense!"

There was some argument between the two, but it didn't affect the Celtics' smooth offensive performance.

In the narratives of some writers who later looked back on this history, the Celtics and the Lakers were two sides of the same coin: the Lakers were fast and agile, while the Celtics were slow and heavy, as if the Celtics were a defensive team.

But in reality, the Celtics, like the Lakers, are an offensive team that excels at fast breaks, and their fast break scoring is comparable to that of the Lakers.

This is an ironclad rule of early basketball philosophy: always launch a fast break, because the scoring success rate of a fast break is much higher than that of a set offense.

This ironclad rule continued to play an important role in the 80s until the 90s when some teams reduced or even abandoned fast breaks in order to deliberately slow down the pace of the game, and the ironclad rule was broken by new tactical ideas.

However, in the first quarter, the Celtics didn't get any fast break opportunities because the Trail Blazers had a high offensive success rate at the start and no defensive rebounds, leaving the Celtics without fast break ammunition.

Secondly, Gan Guoyang repeatedly grabbed offensive rebounds under the basket, denying the Celtics any chance to grab the rebounds and launch a counterattack.

When Gan Guoyang grabbed his fourth offensive rebound, instead of attacking himself, he passed the ball to Vandeweghe on the perimeter and slowly drove the ball forward. Bird, whose shoulder was aching from Gan Guoyang's aggressive play, said, "You get the rebound but you're afraid to attack?"

Bird's rebounding was outstanding; as a power forward who could play both the three and four positions, he consistently averaged over 10 rebounds per game after entering the league.

In the 81 Finals, despite his own scoring woes, he grabbed 21 rebounds in two consecutive games, averaging 15 rebounds per game in the series, to counter the offensive rebounding onslaught from Moses Malone of the Rockets.

However, during the match tonight, he discovered that this rookie, Forrest Gump, was stronger than Moses Malone and could barely move him.

Instead of engaging in a verbal battle with Bird, Gan Guoyang asked him, "If I were to hit you today, would your teammates come to your aid?"

(End of this chapter)