Champions Creed

Chapter 164 Chapter 163: The Zen Master’s Warning and the Wonderful Fate (asking for a monthly ticket!)
Roger's roar from the technical booth at Madison Square Garden echoed in the night sky on Christmas Eve 1996.

The roar was like thunder, making the whole of New York tremble.

In the end, Michael Jordan and Patrick Ewing lost this epic battle that the league had begun promoting two months in advance.

Madison Square Garden seemed to be under a curse, preventing the Knicks from ever raising their heads in front of Roger.

From the Pat Riley era to the Jordan Ewing era, whenever the Knicks met Roger, there would definitely be no good results.

In this bloody competition that started in 1994, it is the Knicks that bleed every time!

虽然迈克尔.乔丹拿下了不逊色于罗杰的36分6次助攻7个篮板，虽然帕特里克.尤因也拿下了29分13个篮板3個盖帽的数据，虽然纽约尼克斯只输了一分而已。

But in such an important game, the result is what the fans care about most.

On a night like this, losing one point is the worst way to lose. Fans don’t want to hear bullshit like “just do your best”!

Jordan and Ewing have both lost to the Magic in the past, so they are actually very experienced in this matter.

But after joining forces and losing to the Magic again, the pain was even more intense than before, making them feel a tightness in their chests.

The dominance of the pair of college super guards and college super centers who swept the NBA All-Star team in 84 does not seem to be so terrifying nowadays.

In their place was another guard-center duo that had met in Baton Rouge.

The change of times always happens inadvertently.

The result of this battle was a devastating blow to the hearts of New York fans. They had been waiting for two full months. Considering the Knicks ticket prices, many fans had saved money for a long time to buy tickets to watch this year's Christmas game.

As a result, what they saw was Roger's close-range output again and again.

The most worthwhile part of tonight's game was the cheerleading performance in their fucking Christmas costume special edition!
The disappointment of New York fans stems from overly high expectations. You have to know that just 24 hours ago, people were even discussing whether the Knicks could beat the Magic by double digits, and whether they could return all the previous suffering to the Magic.

As a result, now they can't even do the basic thing of winning!
Of course, not all Knicks fans were disappointed. Carmelo Anthony, who has moved to Baltimore with his family, spent a perfect Christmas Eve cheering for Roger's victory.

After witnessing Roger's famous shot that sealed the Knicks' defeat in the last 18 seconds, Anthony planted the seed of wanting to be a player like Roger in his heart.

He is still a Knicks fan, but he wants to see Roger win. This Christmas Eve, he got his wish.

However, people like Anthony are a minority after all.

It's not hard to imagine how New York fans and media would treat Jordan after such a heartbreaking loss.

As we all know, New York fans may be the fans in the entire league who least appreciate their stars.

Even if the star is the once high-ranking Michael Jordan.

New York is heaven, New York is also hell.

The next day, NBC reporters conducted street interviews with some New York fans, asking them about their views on last night's game.

As expected, there were more people cursing Jordan than Roger!
"I don't know why the team wants to sign an old guy like Michael. Shouldn't we free up salary space to sign the Shark directly? Yesterday, Michael was like an old weapon from World War II in front of Roger!"

"I don't understand. People say Roger is a bad defender, but he blocked Michael at a critical moment. People say Michael is the best defensive guard in NBA history, but he and Charles couldn't handle Roger. Is there a possibility that we just thought Michael was still strong?"

"Every professional player will try to make himself look like a tough guy, just like the kid who always liked to yell in Minneapolis. Michael Jordan is no exception. He always uses ferocious expressions and rough trash talk to make himself look more powerful. But I have to be honest. No matter how hard Michael pretends, it's useless. Now the whole world knows that he is no longer good enough!"

"Michael had the Bulls send the most terrifying scorer in history to Orlando, but he was beaten by Orlando and fled Chicago. Now, he is going to be beaten again in New York. As a former absolute king, his experience in recent years is really shameful. Why doesn't Michael just retire? He can't beat Roger anyway."

"Is there a possibility that we can immediately cut off those two old bastards Michael and Patrick and still have a chance to swoop in for Tim Duncan? Who the hell can resist Tim Duncan? Why let those racist bastards in Boston get away with it? The Bulls wisely chose to rebuild!"

These scenes on TV made Jordan extremely embarrassed.

For the first time in his career, he was disliked by his home fans.

For the first time, someone actually thought that a fucking Tim Duncan would be more useful than himself!
After moving to New York and putting on a dominant performance and record, Jordan's reputation improved a lot.

But losing to Roger brought everything back to square one.

Even worse.

In Chicago, no matter how Jordan loses, at least the local fans cannot help but support him. He is still the "black god" in the hearts of Chicago fans.

But now? Jordan couldn't believe that New York fans were clamoring to cut him!
He couldn't believe that this was what Patrick Ewing had been enduring for so many years!
This game was just a warning, Jordan only lost to Roger in the regular season, but it was already to the point of "cutting him and replacing him with Duncan".

What if we lose in the playoffs?

The cruelest thing is that most of the great players in history were born in different periods, and it is impossible to directly compare who is stronger and who is weaker.

If someone wins four consecutive championships in the 21st century, the media cannot say that person has surpassed Jordan. After all, that person has never directly competed with Jordan.

But Michael Jordan has lost to Roger for two consecutive years, and the win-loss relationship between them is very intuitive.

Jordan realized that if he was really dominated by Roger, then his previous three consecutive championships would be more like something that existed to highlight Roger's greatness.

After all, if he couldn't even rule Roger, how could he claim to have ruled an era?

This summer, when David Falk reminded Jordan that this could be the last dance, Jordan was furious.

Being beaten into retirement by a little brat? How could that happen? That's the most ridiculous thing in the world. Besides, how could I lose when Patrick and I team up?

I can fight as long as I want!
But today, Jordan found that being forced to retire was a real possibility.

Competitive sports are like this. Falling from the altar happens in a flash, leaving you no time to react.

Jordan watched all this, silently turned off the TV, and drove to the training ground.

When Jordan arrived, Patrick Ewing was there as expected.

But Jordan actually doesn't want to see his good friend Ewing on the training ground. Ewing is probably the only teammate that Jordan hopes can be a little lazy.

"Your knees are not suitable for any kind of intense training. We should have discussed this. You cannot train more."

Ewing was sweating and slammed the ball to the floor: "I didn't practice extra, I just wanted to play basketball."

He wanted to vent his frustration after losing last night.

The series of victories in the previous two months made Ewing imagine the scene of himself holding the O'Brien Cup almost every night.

He felt that the championship ring and the O'Brien Trophy were within his grasp.

But the battle last night made all of this come to naught.

Ewing was deeply aware that the championship was not as stable as he had expected.

Now he is like a bald eagle who always thinks he is invincible but always runs into obstacles.

He didn't know how to comfort himself and could only numb himself by sweating on the basketball court.

After that, Jordan and Ewing didn't say anything else, they just shot the ball silently on the basketball court.

I don’t know how long it was, but when Jordan’s jersey was soaked with sweat, other teammates finally arrived.

Phil Jackson walked into the training ground calmly and did not mention yesterday's failure. He just asked everyone to do the routine warm-up.

After standing on the sidelines and watching for a while, the Zen Master walked up to Jordan and asked him to go to his office with him.

Jordan didn't ask any more questions. He followed the Zen Master into the office and sat casually on a chair: "What's up, Phil?"

"This book is for you."

The Zen Master handed Jordan a book.

This is Phil Jackson's habit. His favorite thing to do is to give books to players.

He believes this can make the players mentally stronger.

Of course, it is also possible that he simply wants to pretend to be cool, maintain his mysterious personality, and make the players willing to listen to him.

This wasn't the first time Jordan had received a book from Phil Jackson, so he wasn't surprised.

The book Phil Jackson gave to Jordan was "Siddhartha", a classic work by German writer Hermann Hesse, with the subtitle "An Indian Poem".

Jordan didn't know who Hermann Hesse was, nor did he know why the book was given such a convoluted title, nor did he know what the connection was between basketball and India.

Do Indians know the difference between a basketball and a monitor lizard?

He had no interest in reading the book at all.

In fact, Jordan had never finished reading any of the books that the Zen Master had given him.

I only read half of the book I read the most, and I have almost forgotten the content.

This is normal. If you have assets worth hundreds of millions of dollars, you probably don't need to spend your time reading.

This is why people like David West are so rare.

Of course, it’s not shameful for NBA players not to like reading, just don’t pretend to like reading.

Jordan was in no mood to look for any damn peace or courage in a book.

He needs to win, he needs to destroy his opponent to vent his anger. But he is a polite person after all, and Jordan is not in a good mood to offend the Zen Master.

So he took the book, unlike Kobe Bryant who later became a person with super high emotional intelligence, who turned around and threw the book given by the Zen Master into the trash can.

After the training, Michael Jordan threw the book given by the Zen Master into the car and drove home.

If nothing unexpected happens, the next time this book is picked up will be when Jordan sells the car.

Jordan thought the Zen Master wanted to use this book to inspire him, but that was not the case.

If he was willing to open this book, the title page would contain a sentence that the Zen master wanted to say to him: There is no such word as eternity, everything is just scenery.

Rather than being an inspiration, it would be more accurate to say that the Zen Master wanted to give Jordan a warning.

That way, when his crown actually falls to the ground, maybe he'll feel better.

The whole world has smelled the danger signal. This time, Michael Jordan may really fall from the altar.
-
The players of the New York Knicks had a rather unhappy Christmas, with the whole team in an emo state.

The Magic recovered from their previous emo state.

Because everyone has seen that even though the relationship between Roger and the Sharks has broken down, the strength of the team remains unshakable.

The Orlando Magic, at least this season isn't over yet.

The media were frantically looking for the reason because the Magic's performance was far from people's expectations.

Look at Dallas 3J and then look at the Magic, it's an extreme contrast.

Indeed, even if there were no conflicts between Dallas 3J, the Mavericks would not be able to become a championship-level team.

But it's not that bad.

Kidd, Mashburn and Jim Jackson, each of them is talented, but because of things outside the basketball court, this team has become a mess.

There are reports that the Mavericks management has become fed up with the situation and they plan to make a trade.

It’s not about trading one of the 3Js, but about selling all of them, a triple blessing.

This is the first team in NBA history to undergo a rebuild.

In short, the Mavericks' ending is more in line with people's expectations. If there is a conflict between the players, or a conflict between the core players, then the team should fall apart, just as it is natural for butter to melt slowly on fire.

But instead of falling apart, the Magic defeated the invincible Knicks.

In the evening, the magician will host his exclusive talk show "Magic Hour" at 20th Century Fox Television Studios.

This show made people realize that Magic Johnson is definitely one of the worst hosts in the history of television. His show was full of boring moments and embarrassing "humor". Even though many big-name basketball stars were willing to participate in the show, the ratings of the show still couldn't go up. So it didn't last long before the show came to an end.

But that’s a story for later. At least now, there are still people watching this show.

During the show, Magic took advantage of the situation and explained why the Magic were able to defeat the Knicks even though the relationship between Roger and O'Neal was completely broken.

"Other teams need to maintain good relationships to improve their team's combat effectiveness, but the Magic don't need it at all.

Because Roger and Shaq are so strong, they don't need to rely on unity and friendship to improve their combat effectiveness, and they are enough to kill the strongest team in the league. It's very simple, this is the reason. That's why I say they are the strongest duo in history.

Because even after many years, it is difficult for us to see two such strong and young individuals playing in the same team.

If they hadn't been traded, do you think there would be any young strong players who would form a team? Believe me, they all think about how to defeat each other.

And Roger's deal was a well-known accident.

Reinsdorf encountered a happy trouble, he had to choose one of the two beauties. I know you will say that you want both, but considering the relationship between Michael and Roger, it was impossible for the Bulls to keep both of them at that time.

Therefore, if Michael had not returned, the Chicago Bulls would never have sent Roger away. The terrifying duo combination of Magic would never be born again.

I'm willing to make a prediction, and I think the Orlando Magic will be able to successfully defend their title, and they will become the second team in the 90s to win three consecutive championships.

Sorry Michael, but it's hard for me to imagine anyone beating Roger and Shaq in their prime.

Well, I hope after the finals, I won’t regret saying these words.”

The magician's show is broadcast across the United States through television signals. As a celebrity, his speech is still very influential.

However, his early assertion that the Magic would win the third championship still made some of Jordan's fans very unhappy.

Paul Pierce, the sophomore forward at the University of Kansas, is one of them.

This kid from Inglewood, a suburb of Los Angeles, loved the Los Angeles Dodgers of Major League Baseball as a kid and dreamed of becoming a baseball player.

Of course, he is also interested in basketball. So as a Los Angeles native, his favorite basketball team is naturally the Showtime Lakers of Magic and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. If he had to be a basketball player, he would most like to play for the Lakers.

Now, in his sophomore season, Paul Pierce can average 16.3 points, 6.8 rebounds, 2.1 assists and 1.7 steals per game. He has a soft touch, a broad vision and smooth movements. He is already a perfect scorer in college.

And, as Hawks scout Sasha Reddy said: "This kid understands that fundamentals are more effective than 360-degree dunks. He will become a mature killer."

But these are not his greatest characteristics. His greatest characteristic is that he has a kind of self-confidence that comes from nowhere. He dares to confront anyone, say anything, and do anything.

Even if someone came with a knife and threatened to stab him, he would still dare to fight him head-on. Even if his sphincter was already under great pressure, he would still dare to stay on the court and fight until he could no longer hold it back.

This year, he and Reeve LaFrentz led Kansas to an undefeated record, which brought him even more exposure and attention. He was already considered a lottery prospect.
Tonight, the University of Kansas defeated the Colorado Buffaloes, led by another super college star Chauncey Billups, in a key battle.

After the game, Pierce, who scored 21 points, 7 rebounds, 4 assists and 2 steals, continued to display his fearless speaking style in an interview.

"Paul, will you participate in the draft this year? If so, where do you think you will be selected?"

"I don't know if I will participate yet. It depends on whether we can win the championship this year. But if I participate in the draft, I will definitely be selected in the first two picks. You know, the whole college basketball world, besides me, is Tim."

"How do you rate your opponent, Chauncey Billups, who is considered a top-3 pick."

"Yes, he's great. But as I just said, I'm at least in the top two. The top two beat the third, isn't that reasonable?"

Seeing Pierce's confidence and courage, the reporter decided to bring up something more explosive:
"One last question, not about college basketball. What do you think of Magic Johnson saying on last night's show that the Magic can win three consecutive championships?"

Because Pierce is a Lakers fan, he happened to watch Magic's show.

But the magician's words almost made him stop being a fan of Maji:

"To me, that's bullshit. Magic was a great player, but he was not a great basketball analyst.

The Orlando Magic only won the Christmas game against New York by 1 point, and that was because Larry Johnson was not up to par on the offensive end. If Larry had played normally, the Magic would have had no chance. And I must say that Roger's block on Michael at the end was a foul. He would not have been able to catch up with Michael without pulling him.

That's Michael Jordan and Patrick Ewing, how could they lose a series? Roger and Shaq weren't dominant, they just got lucky to be on the same team. They would have lost the series against a duo as strong as theirs, I believe in Michael."

The reporter left satisfied, and the hotshot in college basketball blasted Roger for just being lucky.

Yes, this news headline is scary enough.

After the interview, Pierce's good partner Reeve LaFrentz returned to the locker room and shook his head:

"Don't you know Roger's Law, Paul? Don't make the truth unhappy. You'd better be careful when answering questions about Roger, man. After all, you will enter the NBA sooner or later, and you will have to face him sooner or later, and he is a person who holds grudges very much. Jerry Stackhouse and Kobe Bryant are both living lessons."

LaFrentz often felt that Paul Pierce's overconfidence would sooner or later cause him to suffer.

Pierce shrugged it off: "Relax man, it's just an interview. And even if I were to face Roger in the NBA, I wouldn't be afraid of him. Jerry Stackhouse and Kobe Bryant are asking for trouble, I'm not like them."

"Yeah, you are not afraid of him. After all, no matter how bad it is, he can only torture you for 48 minutes at most. But have you ever thought about it, what if you become teammates? He can torture you for an entire season, he definitely will." LaFrentz put forward another hypothesis.

"Become teammates? How is that possible? Will the Magic get a high draft pick? I almost forgot that in order to get Roger, the Magic didn't even have the first-round picks in 97 and 99. Unless the Magic choose to tank in 98, there is no chance that they will get me."

"You can't say that about Paul. The Chicago Bulls in 93 also didn't have a high draft pick, but they still managed to pick Roger with the fourth pick. I mean, fate is very strange."

"Fantastic? Well, maybe."

Paul Pierce didn't take LaFrentz's words to heart at all.

Scott Pippen and Steve Smith, who had heard the same words before, did not take it seriously.

Who can predict fate?

They didn't realize that the Jordan era was coming to an end and the Magic had already had their last dance.

That means a new era is coming.

After the Christmas War, the gears of the times have been turning faster.
-
Roger is the most unreasonable person in NBA history. I never provoked him. I was just a bystander who let Shaq speak his mind. Why did he insult me ​​in a public interview? To be honest, I really want to see the guy who won the game by missing a call and was so proud of it fail! - Jim Gray mentioned Roger in his show.

Will Tim Duncan become a Celtic? Or will he team up with David Robinson? Yes, before the season started, you would never have thought that the San Antonio Spurs would join the battle for Tim Duncan. It is hard to imagine what impact the combination of Tim and David would bring to the league. - "Slam Dunk".

I am not saying that Michael will definitely lose, but all these things that have happened recently are reminding Michael: Pay attention and be prepared to accept the worst possible outcome. I mean the worst possible outcome. - The New York Times

Roger's wine brand "Truth 14" was officially established, mainly selling wine, tequila and whiskey. Currently, the products are available in major supermarkets. Roger is very relaxed because he told us: if it can be sold, it will be sold. If it can't be sold, at least I don't have to worry about having no wine to drink when I get together with my friends. - Orlando Beacon News.

The reason why Paul Pierce dared to be so bold is that there is no NBA team in Kansas, and Roger would not go there to play away games. Otherwise, he would not dare to be so rude. Because if Roger went to Kansas to play away games, he would definitely go to Paul Pierce. Believe me, he is that kind of person. - Orlando Daily News

I know that after the epic battle between the Magic and New York, no one will remember that the Magic will face the Sonics, their opponent in the finals last season. But am I the only one who is curious about what Roger will teach George Karl? He repeatedly shouted in front of the media that the Magic are going to collapse. But it is obvious that Roger will let him know what a real collapse is. - "Sports Center" program.

(End of this chapter)