Champions Creed

Chapter 100: Houston's miracle, the pleasure of mastering the locker room (asking for monthly tickets!)
The wind in Chicago is filled with the scent of roses.

A poor child from the Inglewood community in South Chicago saw the prosperity of downtown Chicago for the first time today and saw the bright side of this sinful city.

I also saw the decline of Michael Jordan.

Workers were taking down a giant poster of Jordan from a giant billboard in the mall.

In the mall, batches of Bulls No. 45 jerseys were sold at a discount, but even so, few people bought them. After all, who would buy a number that even the owner of the jersey would throw away?
AJ's stores are still very popular, but there are also many people in Reebok stores.

The mall's TV screens no longer show basketball games, but instead show highlights from the Chicago White Sox.

Even in Chicago, on Jordan's own home court, you could feel the sense of decay.

The godhood of No. 23 really began to become unstable.

But just a year ago, no one could have imagined that this would happen.

In the summer of 1994, Michael Jordan ended the drought in the basketball world with the words "I'm back".

And he quickly proved that he is still one of the best basketball players on the planet.

He can score 50 points in a single game, can ignore the defense and make a buzzer-beater, can easily get 40 points in the playoffs, and can make most opponents dare not even talk to him.

However, these are not the real Michael Jordan.

The real Michael Jordan is the one who is invincible, brave, always creating miracles and winning championships.

Roger sentenced Jordan to death with a complete sweep of 8-0 in a single season.

All of Jordan's wonderful performances this season came to naught.

Chicagoans' expectations turned into great disappointment.

"Derek, let's go, let's go home." A haggard black woman shouted, interrupting the little boy's thoughts.

He turned around, looked at his mother in tattered clothes, and ran over quickly.

His mother gave birth to four children with four different men. Apart from having the same mother, the only thing the four children had in common was that they had no father.

As a result, the family's life was unsurprisingly difficult. Although the mother worked several jobs a day, she still often cried over the monthly water and electricity bills.

Little Derek stopped and looked at the huge empty billboard behind him.

Can I put my own poster up there someday?

If Roger can defeat God, why can't I change my own destiny?

Roger didn't know it yet, but he was already influencing more and more people.

The Philadelphia Vipers practiced like crazy because of him.

Chicago's short version of Jordan planted the seed of riding in his heart.

Windy City Rose also gained the courage to fight against life early on.

But Roger doesn't care how much change he has brought to the world, he just comes to win the championship.

But before that, he still has to wait for the result of the Western Conference Finals.

After the first four games of the Western Conference Finals, the Rockets and Spurs each won two of them, and the series is currently tied at 2-2.

In other words, the two sides will have to play at least two more games to determine the winner.

But after four games, the Admiral could no longer fight.

He felt like he was just a toy in front of the big dream.

In Game 1, Olajuwon scored 27 points and the Admirals scored 21 points. At first glance, the gap is not big.

But the Admirals shot just 29.4% in this game.

Moreover, facing the Admirals' defense, Olajuwon was like an uncle holding candy in his hand, tricking the Admirals into jumping around like a silly child before putting the ball into the basket.

Although 2 points do not cause much damage, this kind of goal is extremely insulting to the general!
David Robinson vowed that he would never play such a shameful game again in this series.

In Game 2, the Admiral did it. That night, he won his own regular season MVP trophy. That night, he shot 18 of 10 shots and 14 of 12 free throws, scoring 32 points and 12 rebounds with a very high hit rate.

The general played well, right? But when I turned around, I saw that Dream had 41 points, 16 rebounds, 3 steals and 2 blocks!

Olajuwon beat the MVP badly on the Admiral's MVP night!

The admiral's mentality began to change. The most despairing thing in competitive sports is that you have given your all, but others are still better than you.

In G3, the Admiral's performance reached a new level, scoring 66 points with a 29% shooting rate.

But Olajuwon still had 43 points, 11 rebounds and 5 blocks.

The Spurs won, and Dream didn't lose.

It wasn't until G4 that the big dream that seemed like the Ghost Rider with flames all over his body finally came to an end.

Although the game was tied at 2-2, Olajuwon's performance of 40+ points in two of the four games completely suppressed the Admirals.

Not to mention those famous scenes that made the Admiral into the highlights.

In 1986, when Jordan, a sophomore, was still being swept by the Celtics, Olajuwon, also a sophomore, had already defeated the Showtime Lakers and reached the finals.

Although he failed to win the championship, people still praised him highly.

Four-time All-Star forward Maurice Lucas said of Dream at the time: "He's just a big Moses Malone."

And now, after Dream abused the MVP like a child, Maurice Lucas' latest comment was: "Moses Malone deserves such praise."

Bill Walton even jokingly reminded the Admiral: "When you are defending, it is better to let Hakeem dunk on you than to let him score and you look the other way."

The implication is that Da Meng played the Admiral like an idiot.

This is Olajuwon this season. Although the Admiral is the MVP, the Spurs have a great record, and the current total score is only 2 to 2, almost everyone thinks that if Dream can get a championship ticket, he will definitely teach O'Neal a lesson.

Except O'Neal.

He doesn't think so.

He felt that the championship was a foregone conclusion.

The Shark was so excited that after the Eastern Conference Finals, he took advantage of the team's two-day holiday and immediately went to Atlantic City to have fun.

Bars, dancing, gambling, listening to music, and looking for all kinds of women.

The headline of the Orlando Sentinel even featured a photo of him and Donald, the owner of Atlantic City's largest casino.

No one has ever started their vacation in a big way after winning the Eastern Conference Finals.

Roger called the Shark the day before his vacation ended: "Shaq, you should know that there is a training tomorrow, right?"

"Don't worry Roger, I will definitely show up tomorrow!"

O'Neal missed practice the next day.

Brian Hill was furious. He was not only angry because of the absence of Shark, but also because most of the team members were in extremely bad condition.

Stepping over Jordan seemed to make everyone relax.

All the players were thinking, "We beat Michael Jordan, so who can't we beat?"

Brian Hill scolded everyone, made them run laps as punishment, and personally called the Sharks: "If you don't come back this afternoon, you won't be able to play in the finals!"

That afternoon, as training was almost over, the Sharks showed up at the Advant Health Center.

He was wearing a floral shirt and flip-flops, and he walked into the training ground with a smile on his face and greeted everyone.

Brian Hill yelled: "You can't miss practice without reason, Shaq!"

O'Neal responded with a playful smile: "Boss, I'm just late, not absent."

Brian Hill eventually fined the Sharks internally, but that didn't seem to affect the Sharks' good mood.

In the locker room, Shark has been telling everyone in vivid detail about the happy times he had these days.

Tells how he conquered a sexy dealer who was 168 cm tall.

He was like a kid who, after returning to school from winter and summer vacations, would talk endlessly to his classmates about his wonderful vacation.

The problem is, the holiday hasn't even arrived yet.

The Magic still have the most important hurdle to overcome.

After talking about his trip to Atlantic City, O'Neal excitedly invited Roger, McKay and Harper to his home recording studio in two days to produce a rap song to celebrate his victory.

"If this song can be completed before we win the championship, and we play it live when we win, God, we will be the coolest rap group in basketball!" O'Neal's eyes lit up.

Harper and McKay also agreed with a smile.

The entire locker room was filled with a cheerful atmosphere, as if defeating Olajuwon's Rockets and the Admiral's Spurs was a foregone conclusion, and it was just a formality to go to the finals.

It is normal for the Magic to have this mentality. After all, they just defeated Jordan and won with a 4-0 sweep.

Michael Jordan is the most famous and successful basketball player in the world. No one has been able to beat him in a series since 90. And the Magic did it.

This inevitably makes the players complacent.

Also, the opponents in the finals do not seem to be strong enough.

Not to mention the Spurs, although they are first in the Western Conference, the Magic did beat them twice in the regular season after all.

The Houston Rockets will not attract people's attention.

As the defending champions, they only ranked sixth in the Western Conference in the regular season this season.

They experienced a series of injuries, and Olajuwon also rested for a while due to anemia caused by Ramadan. Even though they got Drexler in the middle of the season, the arrival of the glider did not significantly improve the Rockets' record because they needed to run in.

The sixth place in the Western Conference belongs to the lower half of the playoffs. In the history of the NBA, there has never been a champion in the lower half, and there is no precedent for a team ranked sixth in the regular season to win the championship.

Moreover, the Rockets also struggled in the playoffs.

It is generally believed that they got here by luck.

They were nearly eliminated in the first round.

First of all, there were problems within the Rockets.

Just after the playoffs began, last season's No. 1 pick Vernon Maxwell announced that he had a hamstring injury.

The Rockets had no choice but to let him recover from his injury and not let him participate in the playoffs. As a result, Maxwell complained everywhere during his recovery, saying to everyone that he couldn't play because the team brought in Drexler.

He had always been upset because Drexler had taken his starting position away from him, and this time, he just wanted to make things worse.

If you don’t let me start, I won’t play!
The Rockets were very happy to keep their word and announced during the playoffs that they would cut Maxwell after the season.

This is simply unprecedented. I have only heard of early contract renewals, but have never heard of early layoffs.

The reason the Rockets did this was to minimize the damage this incident would cause to the locker room.

But in any case, they still lost an important rotation, their strength was greatly reduced, and they struggled in the first round.

After losing Game 1, the Rockets inexplicably won Game 2 thanks to Kenny Smith's 8 of 7 three-pointers.

In the life-and-death battle of G4, Dream and Glider suddenly had great touch and scored a total of 81 points. Even they both claimed that "this was an unplanned victory."

In the Game 7, the Salt Lake City Jazz led by points with five minutes left, but in the next four minutes the Jazz inexplicably missed many open jump shots and were reversed by the Rockets.

The second round was even more outrageous.

Charles Barkley and his Phoenix Suns once led the Rockets 3-1. In the fifth game of the life-and-death match, Drexler did not arrive on the court from the hospital until half an hour before the game because of the flu.

The Suns were only half a minute away from advancing to the Western Conference Finals, but Olajuwon tied the score with a hook shot, and then role player Robert Horry suddenly showed his strength in overtime and directly took the game away, winning Game 5.

In the seventh game, the Suns led by 15 points in the second quarter, and the Rockets were still behind until 7 seconds before the end of the game.

In the final round, Kenny Smith couldn't even get across half court under tight pressure, and Olajuwon and Drexler had no chance to catch the ball.

The ball was forced to be passed to Mario Eli, who had only scored one goal in open play in the entire game.

The Suns' defense was undoubtedly successful. They forced the Rockets to put the fate of their advancement in the hands of the least threatening person. At that time, Phoenix fans must have thought they could go straight to the Western Conference Finals.

What was the result? The least threatening Mario Elie wiped out all the Suns' efforts with a three-pointer from the bottom corner. Moreover, that goal was only Elie's second field goal of the game, and the only three-pointer of the game!
It is difficult to explain why a player who had not made a single three-pointer before could be so accurate at the critical moment.

After the goal, Mario Elie blew a kiss to the Suns bench, which he boasted after the game was the "kiss of death."

This is the Houston Rockets' promotion process, full of luck and various accidents. Every team had plenty of opportunities to kill them, but it seemed that every time at the critical moment, the sudden burst of touch and insignificant role players would magically stand up to save the team.

Everyone thinks that the Rockets are really lucky!

In people's minds, the current Houston Rockets are like the Dallas Mavericks in 11. No one takes them seriously.

Although the Rockets were the defending champions, they were only sixth in the regular season and had a tough playoff run. Before the 11 Finals, no one was optimistic about the Dallas Cowboys. Even though the Mavericks swept the defending champions in the Western Conference semifinals, people thought it was just luck.

It is normal for the Magic, who just defeated one of the greatest players in history, to relax when facing soft opponents like the Spurs and lucky opponents like the Rockets.

But Roger would never make that mistake.

He didn't want to follow the old path of magic in the original history, nor did he want to follow the old path of a great goat.

He has to change the mentality of the team.

So when most of the other people in the locker room had left, Roger sat next to the Shark: "Shaq, let's talk."

"Want to talk to me about where to go for the holidays?" O'Neal looked up, but found Roger's face gloomy, so he put away his smile and said, "What do you want to talk about?"

"You broke the rules, Shaq, you shouldn't have done that."

"what?"

"You promised not to go out and fool around the day before the game and not to miss training no matter what. These are the keys to our success. Now, you have broken the rules. Shouldn't you say something? You should apologize to me and the coach." Roger said in a serious tone.

O'Neal felt a little disappointed. He didn't like someone talking to him in such a lecturing tone, especially when he was happy.

But he admitted that he did break the rules he promised himself.

So O'Neal temporarily put aside his dignity: "Okay man, I apologize to you, I'm sorry. I originally bought a ticket for the morning, but the dealer was really fierce last night, and I couldn't get up this morning. Hey, I spent a lot of money to get a first-class seat at noon today, I tried my best."

Roger was stunned for a moment. A 168cm dealer is too powerful for a 216cm shark?
OK, they play a game where height is probably another way of measuring.

"Very good," Roger's expression remained serious, "Now let's talk about something else."

"Can we talk about the holiday now?"

"No, we need to talk about the finals."

"Wait, you're not worried about that idiot Admiral, are you? I can handle him. I embarrassed him during the regular season. And I heard that Dennis Rodman and him had a falling out. Such a team will not be able to fight. Think about it, if you and I had a falling out, would the Magic still have a chance of winning?"

"I'm afraid it's another opponent we have to worry about."

"Houston Rockets? Why does this bother you? Man, you're too nervous, you should relax. Where's your old flame Yasmin? Didn't she come to Orlando to see you? If you break up with her, my croupier friend has a few girlfriends."

"I'm not in the mood to joke with you, Shaq."

"I'm not kidding either. The whole world knows that the Houston Rockets got to this point by luck, but we killed Michael. Why should we worry?"

Roger stood up and looked down at the shark:

"It might be luck once or twice, but they made it all the way to the Western Conference Finals!

You see luck, what do I see? I see the Houston Rockets as a team.

They don't have enough depth, and the regular rotation in the playoffs is only seven or eight people, but these people are completely dedicated to winning. Every night, they can find a different person to bring victory to the team.

Many times, you can't tell who is the key to their victory. For example, in the seventh game against the Suns, Clyde and Hakeem both scored 29 points, but Sam Cassell scored 22 points, 18 assists and 7 turnovers in 0 minutes, and it was Mario Eli who killed the game. You can't tell who is more important, because each of them made an outstanding contribution to the victory.

We are going to face the Houston Rockets, a team that is full of players. Yes, I am sure the Rockets will be our opponent in the finals. The Admiral is finished, and the MVP will be broken into pieces by Dream like Lego blocks.

The Houston Rockets have someone who can stand out in every game. This is not luck, but their strength! "

Roger reminded O'Neal, and the shark seemed to have listened to him and was thinking about something thoughtfully.

Soon, the shark swallowed his saliva. He was a man who cared about his reputation, and he could not imagine how humiliating it would be to lose to the Rockets, who were not favored by the whole world.

But he had not yet completely relented.

"Okay, man, I won't underestimate them anymore. I'll practice seriously starting tomorrow. But hey, at least let us finish that winning song. Also, you're not going to let us go to the Children's Day parade at Disneyland, are you? We can't let our children down!"

Roger came close to O'Neal and put his forehead against his
"Shaq, let me tell you something that's not fair. When we win, you and I get most of the credit. But when we lose, we get all the blame.

So, even if Ron Harper shot 10-for-0 in the finals and lost, we would still be the ones who got scolded. Even if Horace couldn't grab a single rebound in a game and lost, we would still be the ones who got scolded.

You can certainly evade it, you can say you tried your best but your teammates were not up to the NBA Finals level, but only a coward would put the blame for the loss on role players.

If we had lost to such a 'weak' Houston Rockets, you can imagine what the media would have said.

The two of us will become clowns even more embarrassed than Jordan and the most ridiculous losers.

Then the Admiral will be able to watch the highlights of the finals on his bed and laugh until his prostate fluid comes out, because you will replace him and become the number one wimp known to everyone.

We are stars. If we lose, we need to take all the responsibility and bear all the blame. This is the rule of the game.

Do you want to come out of the Finals as the biggest loser, Shaq?

"Damn it, Roger, we can't lose this round of finals, otherwise all our efforts will be in vain. We have to prepare well and win the championship!" For the championship and face, O'Neal is willing to put aside everything else temporarily.

"Congratulations, Shaq," Roger smiled, "You have regained your wisdom."

The next day, in the locker room at the Advant Health Center.

All the players on the team wore Mickey Mouse ears or Donald Duck's buttocks, ready to participate in the June 1st parade at Disneyland this afternoon.

This was an event specially organized by Disneyland and all members of the Magic Team were invited. Everyone was as excited as elementary school students who were about to go on a spring outing.

Head coach Brian Hill cursed at the assistant coach: "Stupid, the stupidest thing in history! Look at their outfits, it's a shame!"

There was no way around it. The activity was agreed upon by General Manager Pat Williams, and as a coach he had no right to obstruct it.

At this time, O'Neal and Roger walked into the locker room.

Horace Grant ran over happily, holding a pair of Mickey Mouse ears and a Donald Duck's butt: "Shaq, which one do you choose? They all say your butt is perkier than Donald Duck's even without any clothes on!"

The whole team burst into laughter.

But O'Neal, who always loved to play and joke, did not laugh. Then, Roger clapped his hands and said, "Guys, the activity is cancelled. Let's continue with regular training today."

"what?"

"I've already told Pat, I told him, screw Disneyland, that's for boys. Men, go get that damn championship trophy. No more parades, no more championship songs. We have to be ready for battle, that's all we're going to do these days. Who's for, who's against?"

After Roger finished speaking, the shark next to him shrugged: "You'd better listen to him."

Everyone looked at each other and then took off their cartoon accessories.

No one objected.

This was the first time that Roger tasted the joy of controlling the entire team in the locker room. He admitted that it felt really good!

In the original history, the Magic became complacent after the Eastern Conference Finals, which led to disastrous performances by several of the Magic's main rotation players in the finals, resulting in a humiliating 4-0 sweep by the Rockets.

But now, the Magic don't have that problem.

After stabilizing the locker room, there was only one last thing left to do.

西部决赛G5和G6，奥拉朱旺分别砍下42分9篮板5盖帽和39分17个篮板5盖帽的非人数据，率队连下两城击溃马刺，来到了1995年的总决赛。

The Houston Rockets, who created a miracle, will meet the Orlando Magic, who successfully killed the gods.

Roger and Olajuwon, fate brought them together again.

Before the finals began, many media outlets were impressed by the Rockets' miraculous victory over the opponent. Therefore, they interviewed many stars who had played against the Rockets before.

It is not difficult to see from their interviews how much the Rockets hurt their opponents.

Advice? Never, ever let them take a damn game to the final minute! Never! —Jazz guard John Stockton on the Houston Rockets in the Finals.

Don't underestimate the Rockets, they really have the heart of a champion. - Kevin Johnson, the Suns guard who scored 46 points in the seventh game but still lost the game, said with emotion.

The Rockets are a disgusting Texas cockroach, you can never crush them! Clyde? Oh, he is a coward! If it were me, I would never join my opponent! ——Barkley angrily facing the camera.

No one may believe it, but I have done a good enough job in most of my defenses against him. ——The Admiral sighed helplessly.

It’s not that no one can create miracles in the playoffs, it’s just that this year the one who creates miracles has changed from Michael to the Houston Rockets. - Spurs General Manager Popovich said.

Sports Illustrated also interviewed Rockets coach Tomjanovich, who was about to board a plane to Orlando and told reporters only one sentence: "All those who look down on us should shut up now."

The most magical team in NBA history landed in Orlando, trying to continue their magical performance.

(End of this chapter)