Chapter 528: The Peak of Life: O'Neill and I'm Not Happy Howard
February 17, 2008, Oklahoma Ford Center Arena.
Huge Thunder fans at the scene'. G! The highly anticipated All-Star Game officially kicked off, with a brilliant long-distance singles pull from Arenas and a solid basket from Yao Ming to kick off the game!
As the head coach of the Eastern Conference All-Star, Eddie Jordan is under a bit of pressure in this game.
Originally, All-Star Weekend was meant to be a vacation to relax.
Now it's been made by the Eastern Conference All-Stars, and it's a game that has to be won.
In this world, no manager can guarantee that his team can win!
Not to mention him, not even his teacher, Pat Riley.
Before the start of this game, it was said that the East could easily beat the West, but now, looking at the current situation on the court, does the Western All-Star look like it will be easily defeated?
Seeing Howard sitting on Yao Ming's body with his back on the court, Yao Ming didn't move at all.
Eddie Jordan couldn't bear to look at it anymore.
Howard wanted to beat Yao Ming forcibly, but Yao Ming didn't do anything, just raised his hand high and stood there quietly.
Howard, the No. 1 center in the East, is stunned that there is no way at all!
The defensive end was exploded, the offensive end was stepped on, this gap is really too big!
The gap between the No. 1 center in the East and the No. 1 center in the league is too big to look at!
"Shouldn't it be like this?!"
As an experienced player who has played in the NBA for 9 years and coached for 7 years.
He really didn't want to believe that what was happening on the pitch right now was real.
Howard's improvement this season has been really big.
Averaging 21 points, 14 rebounds and 2.5 blocks per game, this is a center with dominant strength in the current NBA.
He really didn't believe that such a player was like a schoolboy in front of Yao Ming.
This season, Howard's performance can be called dominating the rest of the league's centers.
Such a dominant-level center was easily ruled by Yao Ming like this?
Is this a joke?!
Looking at the clumsy Howard on the court, Eddie Jordan's brow furrowed.
Don't?
It's true?
Regarding this point that O'Neill has been emphasizing, he is equally reluctant to believe, but .......
"Damn!"
Howard is really miserable now!
At this year's All-Star Game, he is really ready to put on a good show.
For the first time, O'Neal was pressed on the bench, and if he didn't put on a good show, he would be really sorry for the All-Star jersey on him.
At this year's All-Star Weekend, he was really successful.
The biggest news of All-Star Weekend right now, in addition to Yes's 58-point news in the Rookie Challenge, is that he shouted in front of Jordan in the slam dunk contest: Yes is Superman, Superman is Yes!
Even if Durant wins the three-point contest magically, he will be ranked behind.
In his opinion, as long as this game beats Yes, he will become the biggest winner of this year's All-Star Game!
What LeBron James, what Arenas, what Yes, the great beast emperor Dwight Howard is the one who can truly represent loyalty!
This Nima, this is different from what I imagined!
Howard reluctantly leaned Yao Ming behind him, and he could only lean Yao Ming behind him like this.
You really can't beat him hard!
And my teammates really don't help at all.
In the Magic, there are still people who run for him and give him a three-point shot.
Now that Nima looked at the uncle standing in the circle outside, Howard felt that his dribbling hand was a little unstable.
James crossed his waist there.
Sun Yue pretended not to see him there, as if you don't pass the ball to me.
Arenas ran for the ball again, but it was Yes who defended him!
Does he dare to pass it on?
In the end, the only point where he could pass the ball was that Garnett, who he hated so much!
In the playoffs between the Magic and the Celtics last year, he and Garnett had an unpleasant falling out.
Before entering the league, Garnett had been his idol.
This Nima, he has always known that this idol of his has a bad mouth.
He has always felt that bad mouth of idols is not a big problem.
But if you really want to put it on yourself, you really can't accept it.
His happy basketball was turned into a sad basketball by Garnett, and in the end he was sent off for locking Garnett's throat.
Hua Q, what now?
Howard really doesn't know what to do now.
In the past, when he faced Yao Ming, he really didn't have such a miserable situation!
In the past, he could at least use flexibility to force attacks, which was not very efficient, but he could still shoot.
Now that Yao Ming has lost weight, he finds that his flexibility advantage is not so great.
Beep beep!
Just when Howard didn't know what to do, the bald Crawford's whistle blew.
"Five-second violation!"
Seeing the gesture of the bald Crawford, who was still shouting ". G! The Thunder fans were a little suffocated.
Nima's, we can actually see the offense in the All-Star Game for five seconds?!
Not to mention the audience, Howard himself was blown for five seconds of violation.
How else can such a whistle be sounded in such a game?
Howard looked at the bald Crawford incredulously.
Crawford didn't pay any attention to Howard's innocent eyes, but he enjoyed being the center of attention!
This time he blew Howard for a five-second violation, but it wasn't that he targeted Howard.
This time, Howard singled Yao Ming with his back, where was it only five seconds, and eight seconds were there!
No other referee would blow a whistle like that in an All-Star Game.
Is he Crawford an ordinary referee?!
"It's too low-level, this mistake of Howard is too low-level!"
"He had a lot of chances to get the ball to Garnett, but he chose to hold the ball until the end, and I can't think of any reason other than that he wanted to pay tribute to me with this attack!"
Kenny Smith: ...... What about the face?
"The Eastern All-Stars, who are more favored by everyone, did not show enough advantages after playing two minutes into the game, but this is normal, the game has just begun, the players of both teams are relatively serious, and the strength of the starting lineups of the two teams is also close, and now the score of 8-4 on the court is more of a reflection of the gap between Yao Ming and Howard."
Kenny Smith wasn't as shameless as Barkley.
The start of this game was truly incredible.
Although he didn't say it, he did think of the fact that Howard was an undercover agent of Yes reported by the media in recent days.
was beaten by Yao Ming, he can understand, he is Olajuwon's teammate, and he knows very well that a small-ass center like Howard is embarrassed when facing a big-ass center, and the generals were beaten and cried by Olajuwon.
He can also understand that Howard can't play Yao Ming alone, Howard's offensive skills and admirals are two dimensions, and the admirals are not very good at beating Olajuwon in this way, let alone Howard?
But he really couldn't understand how an NBA All-Star starter could make such a mistake.
The work ethic of a professional player is not to bring personal emotions into the game like a child.
Even if you don't like Garnett anymore, you must not be so childish.
Is Howard a boyish player?
Kenny Smith thinks so.
But no matter how childish he is, he is also an All-Star level professional player in the first place.
Such a player has a bottom line, and he doesn't believe that Howard has no bottom line.
Just like he believes that Howard's loyalty to Magic has a bottom line, and he wants to profit from his loyalty to Magic, which is understandable, as long as he doesn't betray Magic.
He also believes that the happy basketball that Howard has always advertised also has a bottom line. The bottom line for him to be happy with basketball is not to hurt his teammates.
The bottom line of Howard's childishness is to maintain the basic qualities of a professional player.
Kenny Smith doesn't believe that an All-Star-caliber professional player has no bottom line and no lower limit.
Unless......
Kenny Smith didn't want to make such a guess.
In fact, everyone knows what the answer is, unless the latter is the answer.
Howard's acting skills are so clumsy!
"Just two minutes into the game, the East asked for a timeout, and it was a substitution timeout!"
"The Eastern All-Star replaced Sun Yue!"
In addition to Sun Yue, the Eastern All-Stars also replaced ...... Howard! ”
Barkley was a little dumbfounded at the sight of the All-Stars from both teams who were on the court again.
Of course, he knew that the media hype in recent days about Howard being an undercover agent for Yes.
He has always scoffed, even if those media say that they have noses and eyes, he doesn't believe it.
He Charles Barkley doesn't have any other skills, just enough bastards!
In the history of the NBA, there is no one more jerk than him.
Even a bastard like him can't do such a thing!
But......
Looking at the Eastern All-Stars on the court, Arenas, Wade, James, Garnett, O'Neal, it doesn't matter whether he believes it or not, the important thing is that the Eastern All-Stars believe it!
"The East really replaced Howard!"
Kenny Smith nodded, it was an easy decision to make.
It's him, and he's doing it, and Howard is truly one of the best players in the East to defend Yes.
But O'Neal proved that he can do just as well defensively against Yes, and in Game 2 of this season's Cavaliers and SuperSonics, O'Neal and Ben Wallace defended Yes to the extreme.
It was only in the end that James ran over to go undercover and let Yes finally complete the lore.
O'Neal doesn't have enough energy right now to play every game like the Cavaliers and SuperSonics Game 2.
But it's okay to play one or two games that way.
If this game is just for the effect of pursuing happiness, if it is just for stubbornness, everyone will laugh.
Leaving Howard on the field and playing undercover with Yes, of course, is no problem.
But is the atmosphere of this game comparable to those previous All-Star games?
Even O'Neal, who likes to be funny so much, didn't have any weirdness at the beginning of this game!
In this game, the East is all about winning!
Since it's to win, Howard really can't stay.
He has a lot of ability, especially defensively, but if they can't be used in the East, it's useless to keep them.
Kennesmith looked over to the bench in the East, and Howard was staring at head coach Eddie Jordan.
"You, you've made me unhappy!"
Howard's voice was almost squeezing out between his teeth.
Listening to it made Eddie Jordan feel absurd.
God's TM makes you happy!
This game is here to win, not to be happy with you!
Eddie Jordan had felt a little embarrassed to replace Howard like this.
Now it's like he's saying to Howard, how far and how far to roll!
I didn't see the opening of the East and fell behind!
You know happiness, you know the show, do you understand my pressure?
Seeing the annoyance on Eddie Jordan's face, Howard finally gritted his teeth and sat down in the corner next to Sun Yue.
Sun Yue didn't have Howard's frustration on his face now, only joy.
Ah, finally don't have to stand on the field, the pressure is really too much!
He was on the pitch for two minutes and he was uncomfortable!
0 points, 0 rebounds, 0 assists, 0 steals, 0 shots, 0 turnovers, 0 fouls, even the number of touches is 0, it's the same as not, but, it's good!
"There is no surprise that Sun Yue was replaced on the eastern side, it was very surprising to replace Howard, and on the western side, it was not Durant and Yi Jianlian who were replaced, but Roy!"
"Kobe Bryant replaces Brandon Roy!"
Kenny Smith didn't think it was a surprise to replace Howard and Sun Yue in the East, but he was really surprised when he saw that Kobe Bryant was replacing Roy.
According to his guess, the West should replace Durant with Maddy, and Duncan replace Yi Jianlian.
Although Maddie and Duncan will not be serious in the whole game, they will definitely be serious in the period when the game has just begun.
So, before the game began, Kenny Smith had always felt that how much humiliation Yes was going to be in this game depended on how much the West opened the lead in this game.
With Durant and Yi Jianlian on the court, the West will not be much ahead even in the opening with an advantage!
Sure enough!
When the East brought in O'Neal and Wade, the whole situation on the court changed dramatically.
Yao Ming's state of blocking and killing gods on the offensive end is gone.
Bryant took over the offense in the West.
After the timeout on the Western side, the first offense ended with Bryant facing Wade's iron.
In turn, when attacking in the east, O'Neal crushed Yao Ming to complete a powerful dunk!
Yao Ming, who teased Howard like a child before, was like papier-mâché in front of O'Neal.
Looking at the way O'Neal and Garnett beat their chests on the court, even Howard, who was already sitting below, was stunned.
This Nima, am I too stupid? Is this Yao Ming's defense?
Why can't I understand it?
And...... Soon, the expression on Howard's face darkened.
After Kobe Bryant hit the iron again, and O'Neal pressed Yao Ming again to complete the dunk, the score on the court became 8-8!
After O'Neal and Garnett finished beating Kobe's chest, they actually began to beat his chest at him!
"This fat man is too arrogant!"
Almost at the same time, Howard and Kobe yelled inwardly.
And what about Yes?
Listen to the live Thunder fans all over the stadium 'Big Shark! 'Hurray.
Yes's eyes kept switching between Kobe and O'Neal.