Basketball Legend: When Pride Still Matters

The Bucks entered the last month of 2005 with a record of 9 wins and 4 losses.

On the first day of December, Yu Fei suggested to George Karl that they should increase their post-up plays.

Karl thought that was unnecessary.

With the Bucks' current system, Yu Fei handling the ball facing the basket was already capable of solving most problems. As for those minor issues, they shouldn't be dealt with by Yu Fei since no player can handle everything.

"But I can't never play in the post," Yu Fei said. "I want to become more versatile."

Karl had no choice but to comply with Yu Fei's wish.

In the first game of the month, they faced Yu Fei's former team, the Wizards. It wasn't a suitable match to polish post skills, as the Wizards had a decent average height.

The shortest in their starting lineup was Arenas at 191 centimeters, and the rest were all over two meters tall.

Yu Fei devoted himself to finding mismatches against Arenas in the post, after all, for starters, it's best to pick the easiest one.

However, after suffering a few times, the Wizards no longer gave Yu Fei the chance to isolate and post-up against Arenas.

They started to double-team Yu Fei.

Yu Fei was happy to be double-teamed, casually passed the ball, and once again had a double-digit assist total, easily defeating the Wizards on the road.

Two days later, facing the Magic, Yu Fei tried a few post-ups, but they were not effective.

This reminded him of his high school days when he played as a center, often practicing back-down and post moves, but after entering the NBA, he had successfully transitioned to becoming a wing guard, not only becoming one of the NBA's best swingmen but also nearly forgetting the post moves he practiced while playing as a center.

Yu Fei's current post game was very rough, capable of exploiting only small defenders. Against players with size, he relied basically on pushing a few times and then turning around.

Seeing that it wasn't effective, Yu Fei immediately abandoned the post and used his own preferred style to blow out the Magic.

As for low-post offense, he still needed specialized training, to study videos of footwork experts, and to maintain training combined with real combat to accumulate experience.

If he could spend five years developing his shooting, he could spend another five years studying the low-post offense.

Then, the date came to December 6th.

The Bucks returned home, about to welcome the highest-traffic team in the league at their Bradley Center: the Los Angeles Lakers.

Following a failed season, the Lakers needed a fresh start.

Therefore, after the end of last season, they shockingly rehired Phil Jackson, who had an irreconcilable relationship with Kobe Bryant.

This was an unforeseen major event because the conflict between Jackson and Kobe was no less than the one with Shaquille O'Neal.

In the OK era, Jackson was a recognized O'Neal supporter. There was a clear difference in his coaching approach towards the two, directly reflected in two things: O'Neal's laziness was understandable, Kobe's selfishness was not acceptable. During those years, Jackson repeatedly asked the team to trade Kobe, and after the dismantling of the F4, during a brief rest period, he wrote a book titled "The Last Season: A Team in Search of Its Soul" (published in China), in which he made extremely sharp comments about Kobe.

The famous story of Jackson taking Kobe to dinner with Jordan, following which Kobe boasted he could crush Jordan one-on-one, also comes from this book.

Anyone lacking understanding of Kobe would develop a considerable bias against him after reading that book.

No matter how you looked at it, there seemed to be no room for reconciliation between the two.

However, according to Charley Rosen, a close friend of Phil Jackson, the Lakers got Kobe and Jackson to sit down and talk for a while before making this decision, and that was that.

Regarding the specifics of this meeting, few people knew, but one thing was certain: at least one consensus was reached, that from now on, Phil Jackson could no longer attack Kobe in the media as he did in the past.

After re-signing Jackson, the Lakers wanted to make a move in the free agent market but lost the battle for Kwame Brown to the Bucks and then made a max offer to restricted free agent Tyson Chandler, which was matched by the Bulls.

In the end, desperately needing to strengthen their frontcourt, the Lakers downgraded their priorities repeatedly and finally signed the mediocre Tony Battie with a mere 3-year, 21 million US Dollar contract.

Just like in Yu Fei's previous life, the Lakers, the team with the least talent since the new century, officially kicked off the 2005-06 season.

The main star Kobe Bryant had not proven himself the previous season, the second star Lamar Odom was suspected to have mental issues but was still something like a star, Caron Butler was out with an injury at the start of the season, and thus the third star was downgraded to the future CBA notable, Smush Parker.

This gave Kobe the opportunity to unleash his true nature.

In the past month, Kobe averaged 29.2 shots per game, scoring 33.5 points, 4.8 rebounds, and 3.9 assists – truly hogging the ball.

Tonight, as Kobe walked into the Bradley Center, Yu Fei took the initiative to greet him, "Should I call you Black Mamba, or something else?"

In fact, Kobe had never publicly announced that his new nickname was Black Mamba.

The "Mamba" moniker was an internal nickname used by Kobe's circle. Somehow, it leaked out and when people asked Kobe about the nickname, he unreservedly explained, "The Black Mamba can strike its prey with 99% accuracy at maximum speed. That's the precision I want. Because of the lack of systematic training for the past two years, I went into battle with a rusty butter knife. Though I did what I had to do, it was only to survive."

In his previous life, Yu Fei liked this nickname. It sounds cool, doesn't it?

But now, he couldn't judge.

What exactly was an NBA star, once accused of sexual assault, aiming for by embracing the name of a thirteen-foot-long snake as his moniker? It was ironic because large snakes easily lend themselves to sexual innuendos, and such associations were vehemently repelled by Kobe's camp.

But if Kobe could reconcile with Phil Jackson, what's the big deal with such a nickname? In Yu Fei's view, the reconciliation between the two men was as incomprehensible to him as when Huang Baoqiang and his ex-wife got back together.

In response to Yu Fei's greeting, Kobe retorted, "You can call it whatever you like, but I'm curious, how should I address you? Prohibition Ambassador? The Big O? Or Mr. Triple-Double?"

Seeing that Kobe had finally found the thing that had vanished from him over the past two years—his sense of humor—as an eleven-day-old Kobe fan, Yu Fei felt happy for him.

"Just call me Frye," Yu Fei said.

"The kid who personally took the ABCD Most Valuable Player award from my hands?" Kobe asked.

"That's right, that Frye."

"If you're that Frye," Kobe said, "I think he would call me Kobe." Enjoy more content from My Virtual Library Empire

Hearing this, the two men both laughed, but as soon as Yu Fei returned to the backcourt to shoot, his thoughts shifted from greeting Kobe to how to limit Kobe's offense.

If he remembered correctly, this season was Kobe's offensive explosion season, with consecutive 50-point games, scoring more than the Mavericks Team in three quarters, and a single game of 81 points all coming from this season.

Yu Fei just hoped the Bucks wouldn't become a part of those records.

That shouldn't be too much to ask, right?

After warmups, the starters took the court.

For the Lakers, Kobe and Lamar Odom were flanked by Smush Parker, Vujacic, and Tony Battie.

Aside from Kobe, there was no stable strong point.

But the Lakers had enough manpower to fight a war of attrition against Kobe.

As long as they could extinguish Kobe's offensive drive, winning the game wouldn't be too difficult for the Bucks.

At the start of the game, Battie, being taller, won the tip-off for the Lakers, and Smush Parker, like a racecar losing speed, charged into the paint to attempt a fast break.

Kwame Brown, reacting, came up with a huge block.

Yu Fei grabbed the rebound, the Bucks' fast break was lightning fast arriving at the frontcourt, not giving the Lakers any time to react. Yu Fei passed to Martin on the left, who had gotten into position, and Martin hit a trailing three-pointer right in the heart of the basket.

"Smush is already fast, but Frye is faster, and moreover, the Bucks' offense is well-organized," the commentator explained, clearly distinguishing between the types of speed.

Phil Jackson whistled to slow down the Lakers' pace.

Inside the League, there was a consensus that the 2002-2004 Bucks Team was a rough prototype of the S.S.L.O Suns. But after the Suns' playoff defeat, the experts changed their tune, saying the Suns were actually the prototype. The Suns' fast offense worked well in the regular season but lacked defense and rebounds in the playoffs, which were the Bucks' strengths.

The difference between the Bucks' speed and the Suns' speed was clear; the latter was the whole team's style, while the former could be attributed to Yu Fei alone.

The biggest characteristic of both teams was an average time of less than 17 seconds per offensive possession.

Any team trying to match them at this pace would be slaughtered; those who couldn't stop them from playing at this pace didn't stand a chance; only those who could break their offensive rhythm had a shot at victory.

Jackson was well aware of this, so he reminded his team.

But Smush Parker was someone who could only play fast, not slow. If he couldn't play fast, he would just disappear on the court, waiting for the defensive play.

Hoping to avoid the team falling into a scenario of Kobe playing solo while four watched, Jackson had to accept the fact that Kobe would have a lot of one-on-one opportunities tonight.

Want to control the pace? It's simple, let people move around, spread out, clear one side, give Kobe the stage and time.

With the last ten seconds of the shot clock, Kobe received the ball at the right wing, backed down Raja Bell, used his body, then turned and raised the ball, got Bell off his feet, stepped forward, and scored off the glass.

3 to 2

In Yu Fei's eyes, Kobe's figure inexplicably overlapped with an old acquaintance from the Wizards, the one who wore number 23.

It struck Yu Fei as ironic since he had spent a year working with Jordan but had not learned even the basics of post play from him because he didn't need to play in the post at that time. Moreover, as their relationship rapidly soured, he was even less likely to imitate, learn from, or even ask Jordan for advice.

But now he suddenly found that if he wanted to get a foothold in post offense, imitating Kobe's emulation of Jordan might be a shortcut.

Halfway through the court, when he saw Kobe coming up to defend him, Yu Fei thought, why should I imitate Jordan? As an eleven-day-old Kobe fan, isn't imitating Kobe good enough? Isn't he just as beautiful on the court as Jordan?

"Kobe, how can I improve my post offense?"

Remember, Kobe had found his sense of humor again. He knew how to answer in a way that would irritate Yu Fei.

"Why ask me?" Kobe said teasingly, "You just need to review the game tapes from back when you were in D.C."

What a great response that made Big Fei's face tighten, prompting him to launch an aggressive attack.

Kobe, even at the peak of his offensive and defensive game, managed to maintain his position, but Yu Fei was no longer the rookie who couldn't initiate personal offense if he couldn't shake free.

Yu Fei drove aggressively to the free-throw line, then suddenly stepped back, creating separation from Kobe, caught the ball and jumped for the shot.

5 to 2

"You know," Yu Fei said, "I won't let any asshole who mentions that guy in front of me off the hook."

Kobe responded with a "Hmm," indifferent to Yu Fei's harsh words.