The Houston Rockets' five games after the All-Star Weekend were pretty much hard-hitting.

A real journey of revenge.

The Timberwolves want to repay the "Rose" being robbed, the Nuggets want to avenge the away defeat, the Jazz have the personal grudges of Yang Yiming and Mitchell, the Clippers have the Gaps brawl, and the home whistle that the Celtics gave to Harden is still fresh in my memory. All in all, five games, all with a story, all with a watch.

1/

Let's start with the Timberwolves challenging the Rockets.

The game took place on February 24, Beijing time, on the second day after the All-Star break.

The Minnesota Timberwolves are really menacing, apparently to avenge the shame of Derrick Rose's "defection". At that time, the whole league knew that the Timberwolves and Rose who had just lost their job were eyebrow-fighting, coupled with the recruitment of Ross's mentor Thibodeau and the lobbying of old teammates Jimmy Butler and Ty Gibson, even the bookmakers offered the Timberwolves super high odds of 1 to 3. Before the Rockets' away game against the Timberwolves, Rose personally visited Minneapolis and posted a Weibo with a picture of the target center at night, isn't it ready to tell everyone that this is my goal (synonymous with the supermarket chain Target that named the target center)?

Unexpectedly, not only was the Timberwolves humiliated by the visiting Rockets with a score of 126-109, but even Rose, the strong reinforcement who saw it on his lips, also made an "official announcement" that night, but the former regular season MVP was recruited by the new owner who won the game!

How can you endure the humiliation of snatching love with a sword?

Sure enough, the Timberwolves opened with a reversal and played with momentum. Carl Towns and Jimmy Butler hit back-to-back jumpers, with the latter hitting a difficult step-back jumper from Tucker to lead the team to a 15-8 start, and the Rockets were forced to call a timeout. After the timeout, the Rockets had just been connected by Harden and Capela after playing a single block, and Towns and Jeff Teague scored consecutive points to further widen the score. Harden used his signature crotch dribble to step back for three points, and the team got up slightly, but the opponent Timberwolves floated like a hoist and replaced Andrew Wiggins. In the end, the two sides changed to the substitute lineup, and the scene was slightly tied. The Timberwolves ended the first quarter with a 32-26 lead.

In the second quarter, the Houston Rockets' two new signings, Rose and Joe Johnson, played alongside Yang Yiming, Gerald Green, and Trevor Ariza, who returned from injury. On the other hand, on the Timberwolves side, the bench lineup is really the only one who can really get the shot at Jamal Crawford. It's a pity that although the latter's offensive ability has taken advantage of Rose and the aging Johnson, once the Rockets replace the defense with Yang Yiming and Ariza, who are tall and long arms and good at defense, Crawford's super-large shaking jump shot immediately became a ridiculous job before hitting the iron, and the Timberwolves' offense was suddenly dumb.

On the other hand, the Rockets, although they were replaced with a five-small lineup without a center, but who made the Timberwolves incompetent, finally had Nemanja Bjelica 208 cm tall, but he couldn't take any advantage in the competition with Yang Yiming. At the beginning, his teammates also passed the ball to him, hoping that he would carve out opportunities by his weight advantage, but he didn't expect to top it twice, but he was pushed farther and farther away by Yang Yiming, who stabilized the lower plate, and was just picked up by the rocket after he missed the hook. The rocket version of the "five smalls" has Ross to show speed, and the remaining four people are pulled away from the three-point line, leaving the tired Timberwolves defenseless.

After a few rounds, the Timberwolves' advantage in the first quarter was eroded.

Waiting for the main force of the Rockets to reappear, Paul and Harden took turns to attack, and the Rockets overtook one point and entered halftime!

2/

In the second half, the Timberwolves wanted to fight back, but an episode with three minutes left in the third quarter completely killed their hopes:

Jimmy Butler, who probably wanted revenge in this game, injured his right knee while attacking under the basket, and he fell to the ground in pain, but the Rockets thought it was just a normal injury, and Gibson hugged Harden, who pushed the counterattack, but the latter still scored two points, and the two sides almost clashed on the court.

Fortunately, the conflict quickly subsided, but the injured Jimmy Butler was able to leave the field with the help of his teammates.

In the post-game press conference, Harden said apologetically: "I really didn't expect Jimmy to be that badly injured, I thought it was just a normal sprain because there was no physical confrontation at the time... I'm really sorry, otherwise we would have called a timeout for Jimmy, and hopefully he recovers soon. Good thing we won the game, now we have to focus on the next opponent..."

The next opponent is the Denver Nuggets.

The Nuggets had just won four in a row, but their losing streak was a 26-point loss to the Rockets on the road. This time in the home field of the snowy plateau, it is naturally also for revenge!

It's a pity that today they are facing a strong rocket!

Rocket attack, naturally there is bearded brother Harden. In this game, he scored 41 points, 8 rebounds and 7 assists, and shot 6 of 10 from beyond the three-point line. The numbers don't tell the whole story of his dominance. On this night in Denver, Harden almost blew up the entire Nuggets team from beyond the three-point line - Devin Harris, Will Barton, Wilson Chandler, Nikola Jokic, and everyone became Harden's ghost. Playing four points twice and hitting a three-pointer once, plus the team's new core Jokic was decently danced by Harden and completely injected lead on the soles of his feet, even if the fans who came to the Pepsi Center arena booed Harden every time he held the ball, but these four boos didn't blow out the home team's heart?

With James Harden on the offense, the defensive burden falls on the entire Rockets. And among the whole team, Capela and Yang Yiming have the heaviest task: Nikola Jokic!

Jokic could still record a quasi-triple-double of 21 points, 14 rebounds and 8 assists this night, but his role on the court for the Nuggets' offensive tandem was not as conspicuous as the stats. Among the starting five Nuggets players, he has the lowest plus/minus contribution value, not only 3 turnovers and 4 fouls, but also a shooting rate of only 38.9% mainly from the basket - all of which are the credit of Capela and Yang Yiming taking turns to play a wheel battle with Jokic!

At that time, when Yu Xiaochun saw Yang Yiming for the first time in the men's basketball game of the Tianjin National Games, he felt that his skills in the low post were quite similar to Jokic, but what he didn't expect was that Yang Yiming, who had developed low-post defensive skills in the NBA, was better than Jokic in defense!

There was a ball in the second quarter, Yang Yiming defended Jokic who held the ball on the bottom line, the latter grabbed the ball and swayed left and right in the air, but Yang Yiming did not leave the opponent's offensive line at all times. Sure enough, after seeing that all his teammates' receiving routes were blocked, Jokic calmed his weight and pushed with his back from a 45-degree angle on the left!

He chose to go online first, but Yang Yiming guessed that this was just a feint, and he should take a few steps and switch back to a skilled right-handed hook shot, so he took a few steps back cooperatively. Sure enough, seeing that it was pushed to a reasonable collision zone, Jokic felt that the distance was right, half sideways, and the ball was switched back to his right hand, ready to hook up!

Unexpectedly, Yang Yiming had already prepared for this move, and before Jokic could lift the basketball above his head, he had already jumped up in advance. Jokic just turned his head and was about to aim for the basket, when he saw that Yang Yiming didn't play his cards according to common sense, and waited for the ball to be shot before blocking. Instead, he threw himself into the air early, but it also just blocked his shooting angle. He was shocked, but the coherent movements in his hands couldn't be contained, the ball was thrown shorter, and the rebound was accepted by Anderson, who rushed to protect him!

I can't imagine a similar technology that can be used so well.

In the end, the Rockets, who had excellent offense and defense, passed the danger, and the revenge of the Denver Nuggets fell through again!