One Thousand Seven Hundred and Twenty-Nine. The Tears of the Basketball God Are Flying

In April, we have reached the last half month of the schedule.

Each team has only 7-8 games left, but let alone the ranking, even the playoff spots have not been determined!

The regular season champion was locked when the Grizzlies won 64 games. At that time, the Warriors had the second lowest loss in the league with 18 losses, and the Grizzlies led the Warriors 2-1.

In the West, in addition to the Grizzlies, the Lakers, who are currently second in the West with 55 wins and 19 losses, the Warriors, who are third in the West with 55 wins and 20 losses, the Thunder, who are third in the West with 52 wins and 22 losses, and the Spurs, who are fifth in the West with 54 wins and 20 losses, have locked in a playoff spot.

Starting from the Mavericks, who are sixth in the West with 47 wins and 27 losses, they are not safe!

The Pelicans, who are seventh, have 46 wins and 28 losses, the Trail Blazers, who are eighth, have 46 wins and 29 losses, and the Jazz, who are ninth, have 45 wins and 29 losses!

The sixth to ninth teams all have the opportunity to win 50 games, which means that there is a possibility that a team in the West will not make the playoffs with 50 wins!

The tenth-placed Timberwolves currently have 38 wins and 36 losses. Such a record has nothing to do with the playoffs. Theoretically, there is a chance. If the Pelicans, Trail Blazers, and Jazz lose all the remaining 8 games, the Timberwolves may be able to enter the playoffs by winning or losing, but this possibility is infinitely close to zero.

In the East, the Hawks are currently ranked first in the East with 54 wins and 20 losses, the Bulls are ranked second with 53 wins and 21 losses, the Raptors have counterattacked after the All-Star Weekend, and are ranked third with 47 wins and 27 losses, the 76ers are ranked fourth with 46 wins and 28 losses, the Knicks are ranked fifth with 46 wins and 29 losses, the Heat are ranked sixth with 45 wins and 30 losses, the Celtics are ranked seventh with 40 wins and 34 losses, the Pistons are ranked eighth with 38 wins and 36 losses, the Bucks are ranked ninth with 37 wins and 37 losses, and the Pacers are ranked tenth with 37 wins and 37 losses.

There is no doubt that in the last half month, the crazy duel between the teams after the All-Star Weekend will continue!

The season was extended by half a month, and the number of back-to-back games was reduced every month. After the All-Star Weekend, each team only had 1-3 back-to-back games, so they rested better than in previous years, and the games were more intense.

A media outlet released a data that after the All-Star Weekend, among the teams competing in the Eastern and Western Conference playoffs, only the Grizzlies, Thunder, and Spurs lost less than 5 games, and all lost three games, with a winning rate of more than 75%. The highest winning rate of other teams competing in the playoffs was only over 70%.

Moreover, the winning rate of the top teams was lower, and the winning rate of the teams ranked in the back was higher, so the record was caught up.

Among these teams,

only the Lakers had a winning rate of more than 70% with a record of 13 wins and 5 losses.

Many teams played very well after the All-Star Weekend, which means that the first All-Star Weekend that was extended to 9 days of rest did bring very good results.

…

After a day of rest, on April 2, the Grizzlies welcomed the game against the Suns at home.

With Sun Ce's stable performance of 32 points, 13 rebounds, 6 assists, 3 blocks and 3 steals, and Randolph's performance of 28 points, 8 rebounds, 2 assists and 1 steal, and Paul George's offensive connection, the Grizzlies defeated the visiting Suns 114-99 and won 6 consecutive victories!

68 wins! The Grizzlies tied the Celtics' highest single-season win record and the fourth highest single-season win record in history!

On April 4, the Grizzlies came to Portland and played against the Trail Blazers for the last time this season.

The Grizzlies, who had regained their touch after the game with the Lakers, did not give the Trail Blazers a chance to upset tonight. 114-93, the Grizzlies swept the Trail Blazers and won 7 consecutive victories, bringing their record to 69 wins and 7 losses, tying the third highest single-season win record in history held by the Lakers and the Bulls!

Sun Ce was in hot form tonight, scoring 44 points, 7 rebounds, 4 assists, 2 blocks and 3 steals. The easiest way for the Grizzlies to win was that Sun Ce fouled Whiteside from the start, and then Whiteside was in a foul crisis.

Although Whiteside has bad defensive habits, he has been changing them. The better the Grizzlies play, the more he wants to make himself better after leaving the Grizzlies. Indeed, this season, in addition to having better statistics than Gobert, Whiteside has also begun to try to actively defend close distances like Gobert, and his defensive role has improved to a certain extent.

His ability to guard the basket, which was already among the top few in the league, combined with Batum's defensive connection ability, is an important reason why the Trail Blazers were able to rank fourth in the Western Conference in the early stages of the season. However, as the season progressed, the mid-range shots of other teams began to pick up, and the Trail Blazers' inability to defend mid-range shots began to show. Now they are in a very dangerous situation and may not even make the playoffs.

After scoring 40+ points for the 9th time this season, raising his average score to 31 points, and once again widening the gap of 0.2 points with Durant who averaged 30.2 points per game, Sun Ce returned to Memphis with the team the next day and rested for a night. On April 6, the Grizzlies defeated the Nuggets 109-97 at home and won 8 consecutive games!

70 wins!

In this game, Sun Ce played only 26 minutes. After easily scoring 30 points, the Grizzlies led the Nuggets by 20 points, 80-60, after three quarters. Sun Ce clocked out after three quarters!

70 wins and 7 losses, the Grizzlies tied the second highest single-season win record in history held by the Heat!

…

The fans are going crazy!

I thought that after the Grizzlies suffered their 7th loss, the remaining games would be difficult for them. With 62 wins and 7 losses, they still have 13 games left. With the constant change of cities every two days, it may be difficult for the Grizzlies to win 11 of them.

At that time, many fans noticed that after the All-Star Weekend, the winning rates of the top teams in the East and West were declining, and the teams in the back were desperately chasing.

In this case, the Grizzlies have been fighting for a whole season, and it is difficult to guarantee continuity, just like the Heat in the 12-13 season. They also had the opportunity to break the Bulls' 72-win record, but a wave of three consecutive losses turned from only losing 8 games to losing 11 games, directly losing the opportunity to break and tie the record.

It is too difficult to ensure that you are not proud with such a good record, maintain your state in the constantly alternating home and away games, and win the game steadily when there are many opponents in the playoffs and the opponents are desperately impacting the playoffs!

But the Grizzlies did it!

Looking at the Grizzlies' next three opponents, the Timberwolves, Kings, and Pistons... Among the three teams, only the Pistons are still in the playoffs, and they are ranked eighth in the Eastern Conference, and they are still a very unstable eighth. Fans found that the Grizzlies seemed to have broken the Bulls' single-season record of 72 wins!

Fans began to look for reasons. After the All-Star Weekend, although the Grizzlies' winning rate was still high, they occasionally lost. Since when did they seem to be stimulated to fight so hard?

A fan posted a post - "The Cruelest Revenge of the God of Basketball on the Bulls".

The content of this post is very interesting. First, it analyzes the grievances between Jordan and the Bulls. In 1998, although there were factors of the owners of each team, the Bulls' management was the most critical reason for Jordan's second retirement. He was completely forced to retire.

In that labor-management agreement, the owners of each team requested the cancellation of Michael Jordan's special salary treatment.

Because Jordan's salary of 33 million US dollars was higher than the salary cap of 30 million US dollars at that time, in order to save the ratings, the owners of each team voted in the summer of 1995 to agree that Jordan's salary would be independent of the league, and the Bulls could pay as much as they wanted.

In the labor-management agreement, the Bulls were the most active team to cancel Jordan's independent salary.

This is equivalent to forcing Jordan to retire, because the Bulls had to pay the same luxury tax as Jordan for the renewal. Even without Jordan, the Bulls' salary at that time had exceeded the luxury tax threshold.

Retired Jordan also wanted to buy part of the Bulls' shares and become a small boss, just like he later bought part of the Wizards' shares, but was rejected by the Bulls.

So, Jordan formed a team by himself, slowly bought all the shares by himself, and became the absolute big boss.

Finally, here comes the point!

The post reads: The Grizzlies have a chance to break the Bulls' historical record this year. Seeing that the Grizzlies lost to the 76ers and gradually lost the chance to break the record, Jordan took the initiative to stimulate the Grizzlies players and angered the Grizzlies players.

This is revenge on the Bulls! Since he is not the owner of the Bulls, he will destroy all the records he has created in the Bulls!

This nonsense content, when everyone is praising the Grizzlies and Sun Ce, is like a clear stream and has become the hottest topic.

If you can't get the Bulls, you will destroy the Bulls. Such behavior is really possible for Jordan.

Although it is obvious that it is nonsense, this topic is indeed attractive.

After hearing about this, the East Coast boss Joe was so angry that he went to a nightclub to find a girl and output crazily, and almost sprained his waist.

Although he smiled and said in an interview recently, "Records are meant to be broken, and I especially hope that there will be players who can surpass me", he had already started cursing in his heart!

He knew very well that Sun Ce's offense this season was more stable than in previous years. His summer guidance was very important, and Sun Ce's one-on-one defense was getting better and better, and it was he who taught it himself!

The other best defensive player guard who coached Sun Ce in the summer was so happy that his face was about to break. When commenting on the game, he would occasionally mention the fact that he and Jordan coached Sun Ce last summer.

This was more like "confirming" that Jordan "cultivated" a superstar to deal with his old club.

Sun Ce and others didn't care about the heated discussions of the media and fans, the responses of other team stars to the fact that their Grizzlies were about to break the regular season win record in interviews... and so on. Now they just want to break the record quickly, faster, they feel that their nerves are already nervous to the point of collapse!