On Tuesday, June 29, 2000, Washington, D.C., the weather was still a little hot, but fortunately a torrential rain washed away the summer heat, and the transpiring ground was cooled by water droplets. When the rain stops, the sky is exceptionally blue.

At the "China Doll" restaurant in Washington's Chinatown, Reed Auerbach had just finished lunch with his old buddies when he was the first to come out of the restaurant, wearing a gray-green casual shirt and dark brown cropped pants, with a cane in his left hand and a cigar in his right.

After a children's basketball camp in Marshfield, Auerbach returned to his home in Washington, D.C., where Tuesday was the day he and his old friends had dinner at the Chinese Doll's Restaurant.

As early as the sixties when he was a coach, Auerbach had a habit of eating Chinese food, for the simple reason that in major cities across the United States, the restaurants that opened late at night were basically Chinese restaurants.

After each game until 9 o'clock in the evening, Auerbach would order food in advance at the Chinese restaurant near the stadium, and he would stop by on the way back to the station after the game, and then warm the meal before leaving the place the next morning, and he would be in good spirits all day long.

He maintained this habit for more than a dozen years until he left coaching, and then he began to eat at a restaurant in Washington called "China Doll", and made it a ritual for the next few decades.

"Hurry, hurry." Auerbach urged his old friends behind him as he walked over to his car, a silver-gray Mercedes with the license plate "Celtics."

The old friends who were still gathered at the door knew that Auerbach was impatient, and finally reluctantly said goodbye to each other, and then two old men about the same age as Auerbach followed Auerbach into his car.

"It's already a little faster, we can't play the cards for long this afternoon, we have to hurry." Auerbach said with a roar, not looking like an old man in his 80s at all, but a child who was in a hurry to get home from school to play games.

An old man who looked a lot like Auerbach responded: "Reed, it's only a little bit, we can play until nine o'clock in the evening, and sometimes it's time." ”

He's Reed Auerbach's younger brother, Zane Auerbach, and after dinner together, he's going to play bridge with his brother at Woodmont Country Club, an event Auerbach must attend every Tuesday, and after stepping back from the Celtics line, he's not going to be able to beat it.

Listening to his brother's words, Auerbach snorted and said, "You don't understand. With that, he started the car and drove to his destination.

The other old man sitting in the car, former George Washington University athletic coach, Jack Kwanz, listened to the brothers' conversation and said to a confused Zane: "Tonight is the NBA Draft!" ”

It dawned on Zane that his brother had something more important to do today, and that it was no wonder that he was in such a hurry to play cards, and for Auerbach, not playing bridge on Tuesday was as uncomfortable as not smoking cigars for a day.

Knowing this, Zane understood what his brother meant, and talked to him about the Celts in the car.

He thought that many people had been rumored to have a young scout from the Boston Celtics recently, who was Auerbach's disciple and who was chosen by Auerbach to eventually replace Pitino, so he asked, "Who is that scout?" A lot of people are saying he's your student, but I don't remember you having a habit of taking students, and your last student should be Bill Russell. ”

Auerbach shook his head and replied, "I'm not his teacher, I just gave him a chance to learn." Tonight is when he presents his learnings, and I haven't contacted him in a while. Listen to Michael Carr and his learning progress is quite amazing, and his brain is like a computer. I'd kind of like to meet him, it's a funny guy. ”

When Zane heard his brother's comments about this scout, he thought to himself that it was really rare, Auerbach had never been kind to young people, and that he would want to meet a scout, which showed that he was indeed unique.

It was already half past one when they arrived at the Woodmont Club together, and Auerbach wasted no time, as soon as he entered the club's private room, he dragged out his chairs and sat down at the table to play cards.

At the table, in addition to his brother and Kwanz, was Rob Eze, a union lawyer who joined the club in Auerbach in 1980.

Leon's service in the Marshfield community was ultimately done by Mr. Ez.

"You're not always in such a hurry, Mr. Auerbach." Eze also saw Auerbach's hurried look, as if he would never be able to play his cards if he didn't start again.

As the game began, Auerbach was preoccupied, and he was uneasy in bridge, a sport that requires careful calculation and calm. And as time went on, Auerbach became less and less interested in playing cards.

"Bid, you have to bid!" Kwanz reminded Auerbach that he had to bid before the cards were played after each deal, but this time Auerbach forgot about this basic rule and threw the cards out.

"No more fighting! Not in state today! Auerbach was in a hurry, threw the cards on the table, and then fell down in his chair in a huff, took out a cigar and began to smoke it in large gulps.

Clearly, the evening draft upset Auerbach's heart, which he hasn't done in years, and since Lewis' death, Auerbach hasn't cared much about the draft in 1997, whether or not he was in the Celtics chairmanship, except for the opportunity to win Tim Duncan in 1997.

In this draft, there are no rookies who can compete with Duncan at all, and the Celtics' pick is not good, and the reason why Auerbach cares so much is only because this will be the time for Fox Leon to submit his answers.

Just the day before yesterday, Michael Carr sent Auerbach news that Fox Leon had managed to convince the coaching staff to decide on the final selection in the draft.

Auerbach didn't ask who the final selection would be, nor did he ask how Leon would convince the team to choose the player he wanted, and the old bishop's biggest concern at this time was whether all the blame would be placed on Leon if the final result of the draft failed, and what kind of impact it would have on his return to the Celtics.

Thinking of this, Auerbach was not in the mood to play bridge at all, he just wanted to quickly call Leon and ask how the situation was within the team's coaching staff at this time.

After much hesitation, Auerbach left the chess and card room, picked up the phone in a small office next door, and dialed Leon's mobile phone.

They hadn't been in touch for almost a month, but that didn't mean that Auerbach was ignorant of Leon's actions, on the contrary, he continued to know everything about Leon's daily itinerary and work.

After the rookie camp, Leon first went to Las Vegas to observe a small camp held there, which included several of this year's rookies; Leon then traveled to Los Angeles to watch Moiso practice with Chris Wallace at UCLA, and after this practice, Leon used one of his scouting reports to dispel Wallace's idea of picking Moiso in the draft.

After three days in Los Angeles, Leon went to Minnesota again, this time with Pitino and Vogel, and the target, of course, was Purzbilla.

However, the Houston Rockets seem to have taken the lead, and they have already negotiated with the Milwaukee Bucks to use the No. 9 pick to take the Minneton center and send him to Milwaukee in exchange for the chips the Rockets need.

It was here that Leon learned that many of the NBA's drafts and trades are not completely open and transparent, and many pre-draft tacit understandings and private contacts are part of the NBA draft.

One person was with him on these trips, and that was Wesland, who was actually tasked with tracking down everything about Leon and reporting back to Auerbach. So the first scouting report written by Leon, the player data analysis sheet that Leon did, including a copy of Leon's notebook contents, were finally sent to Auerbach's desk.

Only in the end, Wesland had to leave because of Boston's affairs, and Leon finally went to Ohio alone to meet Michael Reed, about which Auerbach knew nothing.

Now, he doesn't know what the Celtics' final choice will be, and what Leon's proposal will be, which makes the Bishop feel like a hundred claws scratching his heart, he's not a guy who likes to watch the excitement of the draft and play with his heartbeat, he enjoys the feeling of being in control "before the dust even starts," which he used to do in the draft.

Finally, the call went through, and Leon was at the Target Center in Minnesota, less than two hours before the draft began.

"Hello, Leon, I'm Auerbach!" Auerbach exclaimed, his ears aren't so good right now.

As soon as he finished speaking, Leon replied like a cannon: "Hello old man! I'm at the target center, the draft is about to start, there are a lot of people, I know you want to know our options, or you won't be able to sleep well. But I can't say right now, just hold back if you have any problems and wait to see the results on TV. Okay, let's not say I'm going to hang up the phone and turn it off, I'll call you when it's over, goodbye. ”

Then, Leon hung up the phone.

And Auerbach, already mad.