December 25, Christmas War, Chinese Derby, Staples Center.

"Kobe Bryant, you go to defend Jim Jackson, Steve Francis gives it to me to defend, how about Gary get Catino Mobley?"

Before the start of the game, Doon took the initiative to apply to defend Francis.

Peyton smiled when he heard this, "I thought you were going to defend Yao Ming!" ”

"I don't want to be abused!" Doon didn't have a good airway.

Yao Ming's height, Daben was beaten to the point where he was powerless, and Du En went to defend it, and he was simply looking for death.

If Doon wants to win tonight's Chinese derby, he can only guard the outside of the Rockets as much as possible.

is also because Payton's physical fitness has declined too seriously, and the defensive end can't keep up with the small agility that breaks through the particularly fierce or the small steel cannon with explosive physical fitness, Doon can only take the initiative to share Payton's defensive pressure.

"If you can't handle Steve, give him to me!"

Kobe Bryant knows Doon's strength, so he has no opinion on Doon's defensive arrangement.

is also because O'Neal is determined not to come back, and Kobe, who is desperate to win, can only put pressure on his teammates and force them to continue to practice hard to improve their strength.

Even a training gym rat like Doon, Kobe Bryant often practiced with Doon, and even took the initiative to ask for heads-up.

Doon also had the idea of using Kobe to test the results of his own digestion of Pippen's template, so he did not refuse.

In more than five consecutive iron battles, Doon has already won against Kobe.

Although Kobe Bryant doesn't know why Doon's strength is growing so fast, he still recognizes Doon's current defensive level.

Getting back to business, the game began as Yao Ming helped the Rockets jump to gain possession.

The Rockets played relatively simply, clearing one side and handing it to Francis for a single.

Doon knows that Francis is the same type of player as Iverson, who is better at breaking and has a worse basket.

So he took the initiative to let Francis take a step and defend Francis's breakthrough inside the three-point line.

Sure enough, Francis did not shoot a cold arrow and shoot a three-pointer directly, but patiently, jumping and dribbling, shaking Doon's center of gravity.

Doon was calm and unfooled, and Francis made a big change of direction to the left.

Doon immediately moved sideways to keep up, not wanting Francis to make a sharp stop to the crotch and rush to the right.

Just as Doon took a step back into the box and blocked Francis's breakthrough route, Francis turned and broke through again, turning to the left and rushing towards the baseline.

Grant under the basket had to come out to help Doon make up the defense, and Francis stopped in front of Grant and protected the ball with his back.

Grant stood in place and reached out to block it, Francis continued to turn and break through the baseline, and Doon ran to the reasonable collision zone to block Francis's breakthrough route.

Francis turned around again, pulled down to the half-volley area, and before Grant could catch up, he threw his hand high.

Playing with one person and nine people, Francis is unique in his play, but there is really something about this dazzling ball control and breakthrough.

After Doon obtained the Pippen template, his traverse speed increased a lot, but in the face of Francis's strange breakthrough rhythm, he really felt his scalp tingle.

Fortunately, the small toss between the marches is a common move for Francis, but it is not to the point of being a trick. It's like Kobe Bryant's leaning is picturesque, but it tends to turn into three irons.

As Francis threw the iron, six or seven people from both teams rushed to the basket to grab the rebound.

However, the Lakers' interior line is still too short, and Rockets power forward Kevin Cato is 2.1 meters, which is taller than the Lakers' two interior lines, not to mention a 2.2-meter-2 Yao Ming.

Yao Ming grabbed the offensive rebound in the crowd, then hit two people with his back, turned around and dunked the ball into the basket, and yelled "tomatoes".

Yao Ming has just started to gain weight, but he already has the feeling that O'Neill is overturning the river in the low position.

When the Lakers fans at the scene saw Yao Ming, they also missed the scene of O'Neal playing at the Staples Center.

There is no doubt that the Lakers at this time have an unstoppable O'Neal in the low post, and the game will be completely different.

It's a pity that now there is no O'Neill on the court, and even Malone, who has played more than 20 games, is nowhere to be seen.

Boom –

As soon as the Rockets returned to the center circle, they found someone hanging from their backcourt basket.

"Yao Ming, it turned out to be your little brother!"

"Can anyone tell me why he's under the basket?"

Jim Jackson rushed to the basket, picked up the ball and slipped off the baseline, and quickly sent the ball to Francis: "Sorry, I didn't pay attention."

He ran too fast, and I was still watching Yao Ming grab the rebound, and he had already run to the basket.

And his teammates understood him well and immediately passed the ball. ”

From the perspective of classical basketball, the small forward should be responsible for scoring and rushing rebounds in positional battles.

But with the advent of Pippen, the current small forward seems to be more functional, biased towards defense, organization, and transition offense.

Doon, with his excellent conversion offensive awareness and speed, caught Jim Jackson off guard.

However, Jim Jackson saw Doon's unicorn arms and felt that even if he followed Doon closely, it would be difficult to prevent Doon's score in the transition attack.

Soon, Doon confronted Francis again.

This time, Francis directly bowed to the Buddha and started, and Doon was unmoved, so Francis shot directly and cleanly.

Doon immediately pounced, but he didn't pounce, but the long two points were not what Francis was good at, and it was considered that Doon interfered.

It was also because of the long two points that the ball bounced far, and Stanislav Medvedenko, who started the game, helped the Lakers protect the rebound.

Payton reached for the ball and quickly advanced when he got it.

Although there is one less Ma Long's fast attack, the Rockets have two big and tall ones of more than 2.1 meters, and the return speed is obviously slower than that of the Lakers.

So, Payton went directly to the middle, relying on Kobe and Doane to fly together, attracting defense, spears straight to the basket, and fast layups.

Seeing that the Lakers finished playing a fast break, the Rockets also served quickly.

But Francis pushed halfway through and came out again.

Yao Ming hung a screen for Mobley under the basket, and Mobley came out as if to catch the ball and shoot from the baseline.

And Francis at the top of the arc also looked in the direction where Mobley was, but when the ball was passed, he found that it was stuffed into Yao Ming's hand.

Yao Ming had no one to defend under the basket, so he stood on tiptoe directly after getting the ball, jumped slightly, and dunked the ball into the basket.

can't stop Yao Ming, and the Lakers can't do anything.

You can only push the speed up as much as possible, maintain the score with the score of the transformation attack, and consume Yao Ming's physical strength with the continuous switchback run.

However, it's not like the rocket can't defend every fast break.

This time, Payton couldn't push the speed up, considering that the two big and tall men under the basket were too strong to protect the frame, Payton could only give the ball to Doon and play according to the triangle offense.

Doon plays very simply, can Jim Jackson play? I can hit it!

But Doon didn't choose to play alone, but followed the triangle attack, calling Grant out to block and dismantle.

Kevin Cato can't follow up, relying on the three outside players of the Rockets alone, if you want to defend four people, there is definitely no way to prevent it.

While the Rockets explained the defense on the outside, Doon switched to Mobley, and then a back-to-back and turn, easily squeezing into the restricted area.

Doon knew that to win this Chinese derby, Yao Ming would have to be beaten down. So he chose to solve Yao Ming in Magetti's way.

However, Yao Ming stood under the basket in advance, and there was no intention of blocking it at all.

Moreover, Yao Ming's frame protection is different from other inner lines, other inner lines fly at a point, Yao Ming takes root under his feet no matter how he shakes, and he doesn't jump at all.

For this reason, Doon could only make a sharp stop, take the ball and pretend to shoot, luring Yao Ming forward.

Sure enough, Yao Ming was fooled, pounced, and reached out to try to seal it.

But Doon took another step forward with the ball and took the initiative to hit Yao Ming's chest.

Yao Ming's weight is not light, and when he rushed out, he couldn't control his body, he didn't stand still but continued to take a step forward, which was naturally blocked.

After the confrontation, Doon made a step-back jumper.

The ball didn't go in, but the whistle blew and two free throws were in hand.

"I'm sorry, Da Yao, we don't have O'Neal, if we want to win, we can only punish you."

After Standing on the free throw line, Doon said with Yao Ming a smile in Mandarin.

"It's okay, I can understand that. It's also your ability to make fouls, don't mind. ”

Yao Ming expressed his understanding, responding to Doon with a trademark smirk.

Duon took advantage of the fact that there was still a little preparation time before the official free throw, so he read a few more words to Yao Ming.

"I also want to be able to play on the international stage with you.

I'm a little worried about your form though, like O'Neill and Ewing.

is as strong as O'Neal, and will miss for such a long time due to a toe injury, which will cause a lot of trouble for the Lakers.

Ewing is the only one of the four centers who doesn't have a championship!

I don't think it's because he can't do it, it's because he suffered a big knee injury early in college.

It is precisely because of the impact of injuries that there is always a breath of air at critical moments. ”

"You think Kobe Bryant is strong enough, right? At least the top 10 superstars in the league today!

As for me, I am now averaging more than 24 points per game and am the 7th leading scorer.

However, Kobe Bryant and Peyton, even though we were in good shape, we couldn't win.

Ever since Malone was injured, the Lakers have been losing!

This is enough to show that any team needs a strong big man.

If the men's basketball team wants to produce results, it doesn't matter if there is me or not, the important thing is that you can't be missing.

Once you can't play, even one or two more mes won't get good results. ”

With the help of the current situation of the Lakers, Doon explained his worries to Yao Ming.

By the time Yao Ming began to think about what Doon had said, Doon had already put both free throws into the basket.

After the game resumed, Doon continued to defend Francis.

Unsurprisingly, Doon failed to stop Francis, and this time Francis passed Doon to the basket.

But it didn't matter, Francis had just made a layup, and Doon had already run to the front court to launch a fast break.

Jim Jackson was able to defend in time, but couldn't keep Dhorn from playing hard under the basket.

It was with Doon's increasingly skilled transition offensive experience and skills that the Lakers stabilized the situation in the first quarter, 28-26 on both sides, and the Lakers only trailed by 2 points.

And little Van Gundy is actually doing okay in terms of using Yao Ming.

Yao Ming only played more than 9 minutes in the first quarter, and in the second quarter, he came off the bench and played 8 minutes.

In the third quarter, Yao Ming only played 7 minutes.

In the fourth quarter, Yao Ming himself had little physical strength, and he received a fifth foul, and after playing 5 minutes, he was replaced because of foul trouble.

At the critical moment, the dizzy little Van Gundy even forgot that there was Yao Ming on the bench, so Yao Ming did not return to the court.

Because of this, the Lakers did not have much interior defensive pressure at the decisive moment, and the Lakers relied on the iron chain of Payton, Kobe, and Doon to lock the hands of Francis, Mobley, and Jackson.

Combined with two step-back jumpers and an open three-pointer from Kobe Bryant and Fisher at key moments, the Lakers won a hard-fought two-point victory over the Rockets.

Kobe Bryant and Fisher are undoubtedly the big contributors to the Lakers' victory in the Christmas game tonight!

But if you really want to talk about it, tonight's Christmas game, the biggest winner is still 16 of 26 shots, 2 of 5 three-point shots, 7 of 11 free throws, and Dhorn who scored 40+ points for the first time and won the Chinese derby.

In fact, Yao Ming was not bad, shooting 8 of 14 and 4 of 5 free throws, and scored a double-double of 20 points, 11 rebounds, 2 assists and 2 blocks.

However, Doon's data is too dazzling! 41 points, 6 rebounds, 5 assists, 1 steal and 1 block.

Tonight, he kept beating Francis and Mobley's Doon with the ball, and kept making trouble for Yao Ming under the basket.

The Lakers also relied on Doon's large number of free throws and converted offense to score, and repeatedly bit the score at critical moments.

In the fourth quarter, no one scored on the inside of the Rockets, and because Francis liked to play alone, he was sandwiched by Doon and Kobe, and the left and right were men.

The Lakers reversed the 8-point difference in the final quarter and turned defeat into victory!

However, the Lakers had just won the Christmas game to revive the Rockets' morale, and the bitter enemy from afar, the Celtics, gave the Lakers a fatal blow!

After Christmas, the form of the vast majority of NBA players will decline, and the Lakers will basically do the same.

Kobe Bryant has an attitude of fighting against the Celtics, but he has the attitude of fighting against sworn enemies and fighting everything.

But Doon wasn't very interested in it. In Doon's view, not every game is a Christmas game plus a Chinese derby.

Therefore, I didn't pay much attention to the yellow-green battle during the regular season, and I didn't keep "running pigs and wolves" under the basket like I did when I played the Rockets before.

As a result, the Lakers were taught by an old drunkard like Wen Baker inside! Now, there is no way to hide the fact that the Lakers are CBA insiders!

Lakers fans were thrilled and strongly demanded an explanation from Lakers management.

The local media in Los Angeles also began to criticize management, O'Neal, and Kobe Bryant, who did not lead the team to success, around the flaws in the Lakers' roster.

As the saying goes, the bigger the wind and waves, the more expensive the fish, O'Neill continues to die and is not afraid of boiling water, and in order to win a big contract renewal, he is even ready to further delay time.

And for the Lakers management, no one can lose to the Celtics.

was also forced by public opinion to have no choice but to temporarily compromise with O'Neal and renew the big contract of 45 million for 3 years.

Of course, in a way, in terms of O'Neal's value, this is undoubtedly a very large salary cut.

However, O'Neal's original contract with the Lakers was extended until the 05-06 season, and he will be 35 years old when the contract ends.

Who will give a 35-year-old fat man a contract with a maximum salary of 15 million per year?

Not to mention, the Lakers also gave a three-year contract, which is enough for O'Neal to play until he is 38 years old and then retire with dignity.

After getting the contract he wanted, O'Neal was satisfied and immediately held a press conference with the Lakers.

said that the Lakers have been in a bad situation recently, and he, as the boss of the team, had to risk injuries and come back early.

All in all, Superman Shaq is back!

Los Angeles finally has big fish in the lake!