Chapter 334: Second Round Outlook
With four clean kills of the Nuggets, melons to the ground, and answers to the ground, the Rockets will sit in Houston and wait for their second-round opponents, the Mavericks, who are fourth in the West, and the Suns, who are fifth in the West.
The outside world is not very optimistic about the prospects of both teams, and for no other reason, the Rockets have been too dominant this season.
With 73 wins in the season and a 34-game winning streak to start the season, the defending champions, who strengthened last offseason, have surpassed the standards of basketball teams on Earth, and now they are a cosmic galaxy team, a mountain that all NBA playoff teams want to challenge but can't climb anyway.
The league doesn't know how many team general managers and owners hate the Hornets' old man, this guy obviously doesn't plan to run the NBA market, but before he sold the team, he pit a wave of all other teams in the league, and packaged the league's number one league star Chris Paul to Houston, in exchange for only a few potential young players or quasi-All-Stars, but none of the fundamental figures of the Rockets have moved.
This is equivalent to the Rockets retaining the original championship-winning team last season, and adding Chris Paul and Tyson Chandler for nothing. What's even more infuriating is that a few months after the deal, the owner of the door slamming the team handed over the Hornets to the league trusteeship, and if he could have done the deal a few months later, David Stern, who had already taken over the Hornets, would definitely reject the deal for "basketball reasons........
And the most desperate thing is that the Rockets can maintain this complete facelift next season, although they are the nominal Big Three, but in terms of salary, there are only two real giants of Da Yao and Paul, Totoro is a rookie, his rookie contract is three years, which means that next year the Rockets can also use the superstar who is only $1 million a year.
This concept is quite terrible, the biggest drawback of the Big Three model is the salary space, after giving the money of a whole team to the Big Three, the team has no money to sign those starters and bench players who can play, but this problem does not exist at all in the Rockets, the salary of the giant Totoro is the third lowest in the team, and the only ones lower than him are Jordan Hill and Gibson, two rookies this year, Jordan Hill and Gibson, just ask such a salary at the core, how can their competitiveness be weak?
Although the outside world thinks that whether it is the Mavericks or the Suns, who can enter the second round is only four more games, but they themselves will not retreat, for the team, as long as they can start a new round of the series, as long as they can start a new game, it is a new beginning, when the game whistle blows, they will not focus on how strong the opponent in front of them is, nor will they care how many games they are behind, they will only try to play every game that belongs to them.
Moreover, relative to the Rockets, whether it is the Mavericks or the Suns, they are all challengers, even if they are really swept, the outside world will not have too much harsh criticism of them, because the Rockets are the defending champions last year, the Rockets are the overlords of this year's regular season, and it is a matter of course for the Rockets to win, everyone thinks so, everyone has no hope for the Suns or Mavericks, and they will not lose anything even if they lose.
But on the other hand, if they are lucky enough to have a miracle, then the Rockets will face the abyss, and they are rich overnight, and the second round of the series between them and the Rockets is like an unfair gamble, on the one hand, they put 100 million dollars in chips, and on the other hand, they only put 10 cents on the table, the Rockets can only get 10 cents when they win, and the whole world where the Suns or Mavericks can win but can win, so why should they not participate in this kind of series? Dreams are always supposed to be, aren't they?
But having said that, it's not easy for them to decide a winner, the Mavericks are now losing two games on their home court, their slow opening and positional battles were completely destroyed by the Suns' fast fight whirlwind, but when everyone thought the Mavericks were cold, the Suns knelt twice without warning on their home court, and they were successfully dragged into the quagmire of positional warfare by the Mavericks.
Now the game between the two teams is tied 3-3, and the Rockets want to know that their opponents in the next round are estimated to have to wait for another two days to do it, and the boring Rockets players during this time are almost playing cards in the training hall to fight the landlord, no way, it's not that their professional quality is not high, but the opponent is too incompetent.
Except for the already winning Rockets and the still entangled Sunspurs, there is no suspense in the other two sets, the Spurs and Lakers easily advanced to the second round, and then they have already started the first game in the second round.
Today's GDP has not completely fallen to the peak, although the ages of the three of them are almost 90 years old, but Duncan has been like a day for ten years, Ginobili is getting older and more demonic, Parr is in the prime of life, plus the new former All-Star power forward Jamison, the Spurs are still very competitive this season, their opponent in the first round is the Hornets who have changed their blood, but the star Paul is gone, the Hornets are helpless even if they hoard more high-quality interior players on the inside, the responsibility of the point guard is the engine of the interior players, The wasp is now equivalent to preparing countless high-power machines, but throwing away the wires and plugs, so how can a machine without electricity support move on its own?
4 to 1, Ginobili and Parker broke out, Lowry, who is still relatively young, is not the opponent of the two old monsters at all, the French sports car and the Pampas Eagles are almost all you sing and I appear, as long as the two of them are on the game, there is no cold time, except for the fourth game, the league really can't stand it, and the Hornet, who can't bear to be attacked by the hurricane and robbed by the core players, is in pain, so they are swept out, so they use the shameless home whistle to forcibly leave a pair of pants for the Hornets, The other games have been won by more than 15 points, which is already telling.