If Yu Fei were asked to choose a team between the Warriors and the Mavericks to advance, emotionally speaking, he would definitely choose the Warriors. It's not because the Dallas native has repeatedly declared over the past six months: "Our championship was stolen by Milwaukee, and if the penalty scale is consistent, the Mavericks will win last season's championship." ”

It's because the Warriors have Vince Carter on the team. In addition to this factor, there is also the head coach of the Warriors, Don Nelson, who has repeatedly said in public that Yu Fei is the "ultimate player" in his mind.

Yu Fei had never crossed paths with this illustrious veteran, and, given his reputation over the past few years, there was nothing to be gained from touting him like this.

Therefore, Nielsen's praise is most likely genuine.

Yu Fei was recognized by Nielsen because he was the complete embodiment of Nielsen's more than 30 years of basketball experiments.

In recent years, Yu Fei's Bucks have sparked a positional revolution in the NBA, and one of the most prominent features is to let a versatile player like Yu Fei serve as the core of the ball, and then let a small forward like Granger who can shoot as the No. 4 position.

Many teams began to follow the Bucks' lead, and Yu's explosive performance even influenced the 2007 draft, when Greg Oden, who had led the 2007 draft since his debut, was suddenly threatened by Kevin Durant when he entered college.

Not only because Durant played the strongest freshman performance since Carmelo Anthony, but also because of his combination of physique, flexibility, ball-handling ability and silky shooting that reminds people of Yu Fei.

When Durant was branded by scouts as a template for flying, things changed a little.

Now, back to Nielsen itself. When it comes to the positional revolution, he is the pioneer of the NBA.

In 1984, Nelson's coaching of the Milwaukee Bucks was an Eastern Conference powerhouse overwhelmed by Larry Bird's Celtics and Dr. J.'s 76ers. Just this year, the Bucks lost to the Celtics in the Eastern Conference Finals. That led Nelson to hit the reset button on the team and sent star forward Marquis Johnson to the Clippers in exchange for undersized short No. 2 Craig Hodges, scorer Ricky Pearce, who is nothing but offense, and athletic power forward Terry Cummings.

The deal was criticized at the time because the Nelson weakened their strongest small forward position and didn't bolster the weakest point guard position. But amazingly, Nelson has cleverly solved both of those problems by having Paul Plessy as the playmaker. Plessy's presence made Hodges, a short No. 2 starter, a viable option, with Pierce moving to the Sixth Man as his favorite scorer and Cummings making up for Plessy's playmaking but lack of offensive ability.

Arguably, this is the earliest positionless basketball.

Since then, Nelson has been obsessed with experimentation, but he has never been able to find the ultimate player who can perfectly adapt to his style. Until the appearance of Yu Fei and the success of the bucks, Nelson saw the light.

When he returned to the Golden State, he decided to continue his experiments here.

Fate also allowed itself to meet his last failed test subject in the first round of the playoffs, and now, the Mavericks have basically abandoned the concept of the Nelson era, and Avery Johnson, who came from the Spurs department, has turned the Mavericks into a fierce team that advocates defense and emphasizes half-court offense. In other words, they are very traditional.

Unfortunately, the Warriors are precisely a completely iconoclastic team.

Their eight-man rotation lineup includes an oversized point guard (Baron Davis), a pointguard-sized shooting guard (Monta Ellis), a classic post-Jordan 6-foot-6" shooting guard (Vince Carter), three small forwards with different skill sets (Stephen Jackson, Matt Barnes, and Michael Petrus), a projection power forward (Harrington), and an undersized center (Andris Biedlings).

They exploded at the right time, with the right amount of small-ball to big-ball downs, just as the Warriors did in the regular season in 2015-16.

It's just that this Warriors and the Warriors ten years later are from the same school, but the personnel structure is different, and if Dirk Nowitzki can play an MVP impact, maybe the ending of the series will be rewritten.

This is what Yu Fei didn't understand very much.

Yu Fei's knowledge of Nowitzki in his previous life was limited to the 2011 God Championship, which seemed to give Nowitzki a permanent immunity, no matter how weak he had been, and the basketball world reconciled with him after he defeated the Miami Big Three on behalf of old-school basketball.

Therefore, when Nowitzki, who had received a "soft name" for his weak performance, appeared in the world of flying, he only felt incredible.

Nowitzki was completely devastated in this series, as evidenced by his expression, and he didn't show up at the crucial moments when all the teams in Game 1, Game 3 and Game 4 needed him to step up and save the game. What followed was a disastrous sixth game.

In this "win or go home" game, Nowitzki suffered from cleanliness, refused to attack in the paint, was dunked by Matt Barnes, made more turnovers than he made (2 goals and 3 turnovers) and was the league's best player with 65 wins as the new MVP and was beaten by the eighth seed for 25 points in a life-or-death game.

Now you know what Novitzki fans affectionately call Dirk "I'm soft", right?

Explain: "I've already said he's a softie, and it's boring for you to say it again." ”

After watching the sixth game between the Mavericks and the Warriors, Yu Fei said in disbelief: "This person actually got more MVP votes than me?" ”

Hearing this, although Lawson and Kevin Lin and other henchmen were upset about Yu Fei, they did not have much opinion on this year's MVP selection.

In the past two years, Yu Fei has completed two consecutive MVP championships with terrifying statistics, which has raised people's expectations for him, and when he ends this season with an average of 27+8+9 data per game, even if his team has played the second record in history, it is still not good enough for voters to complete the MVP three consecutive championships.

In fact, there is even some "pity but not necessarily a bad thing" mentality within Yu Fei's camp, because after the MVP three consecutive villages, the media's expectations and the psychology of "giving others some chances" will be maximized, and it will be difficult to win awards in the future.

It's just that I didn't expect Nowitzki to be selected as the regular season MVP, and then he showed off his hard work in the playoffs.

Yu Fei has never wanted to see the MVP acceptance speech more than now.

It is to be expected that this will be the most embarrassing moment for the NBA since the merger era.

Then, another team that narrowly missed the top of the East last season sank in the first round.

The newly promoted Chicago Bulls extinguished the fire in Miami with the power of the youth army and successfully reached the semifinals to challenge the Bucks.

The Heat's failure basically declared the failure of their plan to trade O'Neal in 2004.

Against the Bulls, O'Neal averaged only 18 points per game, like an ordinary star center, and the name of the No. 1 center in the East is no longer deserved.

Wade, who may have a whistle-sucking soul in some piece of jewelry, averaged just eight free throws per game in the first round, well below average, and his astonishing three-point accuracy in last year's playoffs is completely gone. In the Bulls series against the Bulls, he didn't score a single three-pointer.

The Heat are the team that wins in the moment, and their "now" refers to last season, and now, with the window closed, the only thing they can do is tear everything down and start all over again.

Coming to the Bucks with a passionate Bulls can't win with the same youthful vigor as they did against the Heat.

When it comes to youth, the Bucks don't lose to the Bulls.

Heading into the playoffs, their starting lineup has become: Yu Fei, Martin, Granger, Aldridge and Kwame Brown.

In this lineup, the oldest Yu Fei and Brown are not yet 25 years old, and the youngest Aldridge is only 21 years old, on the other hand, the Bulls' starting center is a veteran who was abandoned by his former club - Ben Wallace.

In order to sign Big Ben, the Bulls let go of the younger Tyson Chandler.

It doesn't take long to prove the decision wrong, as Big Ben's decline is becoming more and more apparent, and soon, his contract will be premium and then rubbish, and then the Bulls will have to rethink whether they are building the team right in mind.

Yu Fei doesn't care about the future of the Bulls, he just wants to solve the opponent as soon as possible.

Every time he came to the United Center to play, Yu Fei's mood was very depressed.

Because this is where No. 23 fought, No. 23's jersey and the championship flag he won fluttered in the air.

Even today, the 23rd still affects his life from time to time like a ghost.

Although he has completed his revenge on the 23rd, the world has now given him a more important mission than revenge on the 23rd - beyond the 23rd.

Yu Fei didn't like this arrangement.

It's not that he doesn't want to overtake Jordan.

In fact, all the players who have come to this point have faced this dilemma, on the surface, they want to be themselves, but deep down, the desire to surpass the number 23 is extremely strong.

It's just that, unlike those who are haunted by the ghosts of Chicago, Yu Fei has direct conflicts and grievances with the ghosts themselves, which strengthens his beliefs.

This strange mood has caused Yu Fei, who has been stable so far in the playoffs, to have terrifying fluctuations on the offensive end.

To the horror of Chicagoans, Yu Fei's performance fluctuated upwards — Yu Fei, who had averaged 28 points per game in the playoffs, scored 46 points tonight before garbage time arrived.

Yu Fei's roll call made the re-elected DPOY Da Ben like a hole on the field, the talented Ben Gordon was completely blown up, the Iron Guard known as Kirk Hinrich left the field with six fouls, and the boos of the United Center became softer and softer, until the moment Yu Fei walked off the field, no fan dared to trash talk to him.

"It looks like there's only one suspense left in the east."

At the end of the game, TNT's Charles Barkley said, "Can LeBron bring the Cavaliers to the Eastern Conference Finals to prove to Frye that he and his team are better than last year?" ”

(End of chapter)