NBA: I am the god of basketball

Chapter 358 Can the Lakers beat the Clippers with rebounds?

The Clippers, who have won two consecutive victories, told the entire league with facts that Wang Chao is still the same Wang Chao. Although he is one year older in the new season, his dominance is still strong. Make a championship team.

On October 10, the Clippers defeated the Houston Rockets 21:118 at home and won three consecutive victories in the regular season.

In these three games, the Clippers scored very high. Among them, they almost crazily accounted for more than 50% of the three-point shots. Not to mention the opponents who played against each other directly, even other teams in the league were a little confused.

Good guy, is this three-pointer free of charge?
Even when Curry was in his best form for the Warriors in the first two seasons, the team's average three-point attempts per game were only in their early 30s.

The Clippers averaged an astonishing 41 three-pointers per game in three games, and their shooting percentage can still be maintained at around 38%. At the time, it is equivalent to 40% of the two-pointers!

Last season, no team in the league averaged more than 50% field goal percentage per game. Although there were many three-pointers that diluted the field goal percentage, the overall efficiency did not reach the level of 40% field goal percentage. .

Such a fierce three-pointer by the Clippers shocked all teams in the league, but also secretly raised their vigilance.

A large number of the Clippers' three-pointers rely on off-ball pick-and-roll screens similar to the Warriors to run out of space, but many of them rely on Wang Chao's personal breakthrough with the ball to attract double-team shots.

Five players on the court can shoot three-pointers, which is really useful in this era of small balls. Wang Chao can easily get a lot of one-on-one opportunities, and even use pick-and-roll screens to form a misplaced list.

Of course, the magic ball tactics are strong, but the overall tactical instability still exists. Once the outside players who rely heavily on three-pointers feel bad, the offensive rhythm of the entire team will come to a standstill.

On October 10, the Clippers defeated the Pelicans 23:116 in an away game. When the winning streak reached four games and launched an impact on the opening five-game winning streak, the team's victory came to an abrupt end, and it was fixed on the four-game winning streak.

Because on October 10, the Clippers lost the away game against the Rockets in World War II with a score of 26:107. This is the first time the Clippers have scored less than 111 points in a game so far.

The Rockets seem to have learned a lesson from the game a few days ago. In this game, they did a very good job of defending the perimeter and assisting in defense. Leonard didn't bother to limit Wang Chao, and instead tried to play as much as possible. Defend the Rockets' other perimeter players.

This made the Rockets' shooting percentage from outside the three-point line plummet, with only 36 of 10 shots in the game.

At the same time, Whiteside completely overwhelmed Lopez with inside rebounds, scored a large double-double of 21 points and 20 rebounds, and had as many as 7 offensive rebounds.

"Sure enough, although a large number of three-point shots are extremely powerful, they lack stability. They also have a lot of mid-range and basket attacks in the offensive link, not as extreme as the Clippers."

"In this way, as long as there is a team that can limit the Clippers' outside firepower first, even if Wang Chao is not counted, the other Clippers players' shooting percentages are lower, and there is great hope for winning. After all, the Clippers are not the diggers of last season. Jin, although his performance on the defensive end is pretty good, but he lacks in many aspects including rebound protection."

In fact, the Rockets are no longer the top team in the league. Leonard has worked hard for the Rockets in the past two years, but he has never been able to make the team go further. Locked up the team's signing space.

With Leonard's personal ability, the Rockets will definitely have no problem reaching the playoffs, but most people generally believe that the Rockets are at most the second round of the playoffs, and it is basically impossible to enter the Western Conference finals.

If the Clippers can lose to the Rockets, they may also lose to other teams.

But in fact, as long as Wang Chao is willing to win this game, it is still possible.

It's very simple, as long as Wang Chao takes over the ball in the second half and is responsible for all the Clippers' offenses, while allowing other teammates to strengthen their defense, with his personal ability, it is absolutely possible to turn the tide.

But Wang Chao didn't do that. This is only the first month of the regular season. The team's tactical system and coordination are in the process of adjustment. When encountering those top enemies in the league such as the Nets, Lakers and Warriors, what should he do when he really needs help to come forward?
When I was in the Nuggets last season, the team also encountered similar problems. At that time, the main problem was that Mitchell and Murray, the main scorers under the superstars, were not stable enough due to their age. Handling the ball is also a little immature and reckless.

At that time, Wang Chao did not immediately take over the game as soon as there was a problem, but continued to hand the ball to the two until they learned and adapted how to face such situations and gained experience in handling similar situations.

This is why after the Nuggets entered the playoffs, Mitchell and Murray can always play some bright performances, making the Nuggets win twice the result with half the effort.

For this reason, the regular season record of the Nuggets has been greatly affected. The final record is only a little over 60+ games, which is Wang Chao's worst regular season record in recent years.

But if you don't go to training during the regular season, what will you do when you wait for the more intense playoffs?
This group of Clippers players are all much older than Mitchell and Murray. They have rich experience in NBA games and naturally have a stronger ability to learn and adapt. Therefore, Wang Chao is willing to give enough time for them to They learn and adapt to the magic ball game.

And the major media in the league just because of the Clippers' away loss to the Rockets, hotly debated whether the Rockets' extremely relying on three-pointers in the new season is reasonable. Immediately after the last two games of the Clippers at the end of October, the The fleet gave a different answer.

On October 10, the Clippers defeated the Washington Wizards 28:136 at home.

10月30日，快船客场133：110击败费城76人队！

The two games were normal games without overtime, but the Clippers scored 130+ super high points in a single game. They made 42 of 19 three-pointers in one game and 48 of 22 shots in one game. They used three-pointers exaggeratedly. The ball killed the opponent cleanly and vividly.

It is true that the Clippers' magic ball tactics are relatively unstable, but once the outside shooters feel online, no team in the league can compete with the exaggerated offensive firepower.

The first month of the regular season officially ended. The Clippers ended their journey in October with a record of 7 wins and 6 loss in 1 games, ranking second in the Western Conference.

Ranked first in the West is the Warriors with 7 wins and 1 loss, and the reason for their better record than the Clippers is only because they won one more game than the Clippers in October.

Ingram's debut performance in the Warriors was quite good. His excellent height and wingspan allowed him to act as the Warriors' junior Durant and provide the Warriors with a relatively stable scoring contribution in the middle distance. With Durant's ability to score consecutive points at critical moments, it still makes the Warriors' death five small lineup completely complete, and there is no longer the embarrassing situation in the Cousins ​​period.

Under the Warriors and Clippers, the Los Angeles Lakers and San Antonio Spurs are tied with 5 wins and 2 losses.

The Lakers' super five lineup obviously needs a period of time to run in. The five starters came from five different teams last season. The changes are not comparable to the Clippers and Warriors.

But there is no suspense, that is, when James came to the Lakers, he deservedly became the leader and core tactical point of this team, and other players served him on the court.

After 7 games, James averaged 25 points, 7 rebounds and 9 assists per game, which is as gorgeous and versatile as ever, while Cousins ​​and Towns, two inside players, can both get a double-double of around 18+10, although compared to before. As the core insiders of each team, there was a slight decline, but because they all have the ability to shoot in the middle and long distances, they are more in line with James' style of play, and the data decline is not obvious for the time being.

If you want to say who is the worst in the Lakers team, it is undoubtedly Carmelo Anthony who defected to his good brother with a basic salary.

Anthony, whose contract in the new season has plummeted from 2500 million to 239 million, his personal statistics are like diving from a high platform. The average data in 7 games in the new season is only 12.4 points and 3.8 rebounds per game, and his shooting percentage barely reaches 40%. Only 32%.

The decline in Anthony's data is inevitable, just like in the Thunder. On the one hand, the decline in his personal ability is an indisputable fact, but on the other hand, it is also a more important reason. Anthony himself is not a player who is particularly good at off-ball tactics. players.

At his peak, Anthony was known as an offensive kaleidoscope, with comprehensive offensive capabilities, both internal and external, and was once one of the players with the strongest heads-up ability in the league.

The technical characteristics have led to the fact that Anthony must have the ball in his hands if he wants to show his true strength.

Whether it was in the Nuggets or the Knicks, even when his teammates were Iverson who was also sticky to the ball, he played like this.

But the Thunder last season was the period when Westbrook was inspired to achieve a triple-double for two consecutive seasons. In addition, there is Paul in the team, and basketball can give Anthony very few opportunities.

Now it's the Lakers, facing the good brother James who is also sticky to the ball, let alone mention it.

This is also one of the reasons why Wang Chao declined when Anthony wanted to join the Clippers.

Wang Chao's stickiness to the ball is no worse than that of Westbrook and James. Although he played the position of an off-ball spot-up shooter at the beginning of his career, he did not intend to delegate power to the inefficient Anthony. Lu Wei is such a good player with the ball, why bother?

Besides, at this stage, Anthony has not yet recognized himself. The shrinking of the ball and data will make him feel annoyed, and he will even quarrel with the team and even the team management.

In fact, Anthony has recently expressed his dissatisfaction with his current team positioning in front of the media. He feels that if the team can give him more playing time and more possessions, he will not play so badly.

That's true, Anthony's strength is indeed not so bad that he doesn't even deserve the ball, but if there is an efficient ball-handling core like James in the team, Anthony will definitely not be considered, so he still keeps it. Anthony go to toss the Lakers.

It's just that although in terms of team record, the Lakers temporarily overwhelm the Lakers with the advantage of one more win, but after the previous game, the Lakers fans also think they have found the Clippers' weakness-rebounds ball.

I have to admit that Brook Lopez's rebounding ability is really poor. As a 2-meter big center, Lopez averaged only 13 rebounds per game in his career, which is not as good as James who averaged 6.3 rebounds per game in his career.

This caused the Clippers to be grabbed many offensive rebounds by opponents with strong rebounding ability many times in the game.

As for Harris and Gallinari at the forward position, they are only the average level of forward players in terms of rebounds, not particularly strong, and only Lu Wei appeared on the field. When Wang Chao moved from the point guard position to the forward line, the Clippers The rebound protection can be slightly better.

Thanks to this, Wang Chao has averaged 13.8 rebounds per game so far this season, the highest value since the 13-14 season, second only to the Pistons' Andre Drummond.

But the Clippers can’t just have Wang Chao alone, because the Lakers are a standard inside two-tower lineup, Cousins ​​and Downs both rebounded in double figures, and there is James who averaged 7+ rebounds per game on the front line, which can be regarded as a league rebound. One of the top teams.

Now the fans of the Lakers believe that when two Los Angeles teams have a derby in the same city, as long as the Lakers can effectively contain the Clippers' three-point firepower and at the same time give full play to their advantages in height and strength inside, they are fully capable beat each other.

But what disappointed the Lakers fans was that the game between the Lakers and the Clippers would have to wait until the end of December at the earliest.

The Christmas game on December 12 is the first game of the season between the Lakers and the Clippers, and before that, there are still more than half a month of November and December.

This is obviously a marketing tool for the alliance.

The Lakers vs. Clippers in the new season is definitely the most interesting battle in the entire league. James has formed a super-carrier team for the third time. Can Wang Chao, who is leading the Clippers with a single core and hard core, cross this high-level battle? Unclimbable mountain?
Of course, Wang Chao and the Clippers will not consider this issue in advance. Although the Lakers are the biggest imaginary opponent of the Clippers in the playoffs this season, before that, the Clippers must further improve the shortcomings and defects of the magic ball tactics in the game. At the same time, the tactical system of the entire team becomes more perfect and fit.

Throughout November, the Clippers had a total of 11 games, and their opponents included the Warriors, Spurs, Nets, Bucks and many other strong enemies. Although the game against the Lakers is still far away, it is by no means easy for the team.

(End of this chapter)