86: 062: This is a great humiliation!
(Please subscribe!) 86: 062: This is a great humiliation!
(Please subscribe!) Michael Jordan had thought that once the playoffs started, people would begin to miss him.
But Roger demolished the Nets and the Hawks with an overwhelming force.
He also thought that when the Bulls faced the tough New York Knicks, people would start to miss him.
Instead, Roger delivered one of the most classic game-winning shots in playoff history.
The most irritating part was that the world’s best second-in-command, Scottie Pippen, even set up a perfect stage for Roger.
Pippen’s refusal to play added a lot of legend to that game-winning shot.
Without Pippen’s mindless move, Roger’s game-winner might not have been so explosive.
Pippen refused to enter the game, leaving Roger alone, who ultimately withstood the pressure of internal and external troubles to complete the game-winner.
This plot, the best directors couldn’t think of, but Pippen did.
What else could be said?
This is the self-cultivation of the greatest second-in-command in history.
He always excelled at helping the lead star create greatness in various ways.
However, even if Roger had an easy time in the first two rounds and put on such an exciting game-winning performance last night, Michael Jordan’s heart was still relatively calm.
Until he saw the line in the newspaper: “We are entering the Roger era.”
That truly stung him.
Because the subtext of that sentence was: Michael’s era had ended.
Jordan didn’t retire because of physical issues, which was fundamentally different from other stars’ retirements.
Last summer, when he left, he was still at the top of the world.
My era isn’t over yet, how can Roger’s era even begin?
Besides, even if there really were someone to replace him, Michael Jordan wouldn’t want it to be Roger!
How could he possibly watch someone who disrespected him and almost made him lose an eye replace him just like that?
The dissatisfaction on the baseball field could not satisfy Jordan’s desire to win.
Roger’s success made Jordan’s desire to win incredibly intense.
He had to find a way to satisfy his desire.
So, while the whole world was immersed in Roger’s game-winning shot, Michael Jordan made a call to Grover:
“Do you think it’s possible for me to make a comeback next season?”
Michael Jordan made up his mind faster than Grover had anticipated.
Jordan was planning on taking back his era, while the bloody battle between Roger and Riley continued.
After losing the first game, Pat Riley exploded in the locker room.
He could accept his team losing in the playoffs, but he couldn’t accept losing to the Bulls without Jordan.
What was even more unacceptable for Riley was the change in public opinion after that game.
Apart from the New York media, nobody favored the Knicks anymore.
“Sports Illustrated” suggested: “The Knicks struggled to a Game 7 with the Pacers, and now they lost to the Bulls.
Is there a possibility that the East’s number one isn’t as strong as we thought?
The Bulls might even make it back to the Finals!”
Bill Walton was even more blunt: “Pat has too much faith in Michael, he thinks Michael is a god, and that the Bulls without Michael would be a pushover.
But he forgot, Roger is the one who dares to challenge Michael!”
The angry Riley had the whole team practice extra the next day, regardless of the fact that they were in the midst of the intense Eastern Conference Finals.
In this world, there is probably no coach who loves drilling players more than Pat Riley.
Under Riley’s reign, good performance still means extra practice, and poor performance means even more practice.
In ’89, it was because of Riley’s intense training before the Finals that Byron Scott and Magic injured, leading to their missed chance at a three-peat and resulting in the Lakers players led by Magic conspiring to oust him.
But Riley’s method of practice wasn’t entirely bad; his intense training was adept at unlocking players’ potential in a short amount of time, helping them find their best competitive states.
Magic practiced in the gym until midnight after his comeback but still couldn’t find his old form.
The next day, he flew straight to New York to let Riley push him fiercely, almost handing the whip over to Riley himself.
Even the Magic who once ousted Riley admitted that this man who always kept his hair slicked back could help players reach their best state in a short period.
Therefore, Riley’s current practice regimen wasn’t purely a psychological aberration; he wanted to bring out the players’ full state.
He sought to use devil-like training to drive the Knicks players into a maniacal fighting condition to win the game.
In front of the media, Riley also expressed his determination to win: “If this were a 10-round heavyweight title bout, then right now we’ve only finished the first round, and just scraped a bit of skin.
The real bloody battle is just starting.”
Riley was right; Game 2 of the series was even crazier.
In Game 2, Roger scored 25 points throughout the whole game, proving that he could keep up a high-efficiency offense even against the Knicks’ terrifying defense.
He proved he deserved his spot on the All-NBA Third Team.
Pippen, having endured extreme humiliation last game and deciding not to play any tricks, also performed exceptionally, scoring 23 points.
But the rest of the Bulls, under the Knicks’ frenzied muscle defense, completely shut down.
Most of the Bulls’ role players managed only one field goal throughout the entire game.
Patrick Ewing, after the loss in the previous game, also utterly erupted today, scoring 9 out of 12 shots with an absurdly high 75% shooting efficiency for 26 points.