Chapter 1194 1193. There Are a Hundred Ways to Prevent You From Dying (Part 2)

Liu Mang and McGrady directly let go of Snow and Larry Hughes. Prince, Kwame Brown, and Rasheed Wallace retreated to the basket to defend Gooden and Big Z's mid-range shots and Larry Hughes's cuts.

James was sandwiched by Liu Mang on the left and right! One step outside the free throw line, this awkward distance, the essence of human two free throws and one shot is a problem even for free throws, let alone mid-range shots?

The opponent is cheating!

James dribbled the ball, but the opponent didn't steal it. He didn't break through the opponent and didn't put too much physical pressure on him. The two of them blocked him. James dribbled the ball like that. He wanted to pass it inside. Larry Hughes was stuck by Prince when he went in. He wanted to pass it to Snow who was pulling to the baseline and Larry Hughes who ran out of the baseline. Big Z and Gooden blocked their teammates' receiving routes on both sides. With 5 seconds left, James finally passed the ball to Snow who ran out to the high position. Snow received the ball and shot a mid-range shot...

Snow's baseline mid-range hit rate was as high as 43%, but it was not good in the high position. The shot hit the rim. Liu Mang took it back to the basket and grabbed the defensive rebound!

Liu Mang retreated after James passed the ball, and McGrady immediately rushed down after James passed the ball!

After grabbing the defensive rebound, Liu Mang lifted the ball to the front court and led the team with the ball. McGrady just took one step inside the opposite three-point line and received the ball. He took three steps and scored two points with one hand.

The movements were very chic, like an elf floating in the air. Among the players over two meters tall, the only ones who could compare with McGrady in terms of beauty were Anfernee Hardaway, who was cut by the Knicks after this season and received a one-year maximum salary.

James felt the malice of the world and silently ran back to Snow to serve the ball. After advancing, Prince was still defending him. James was very excited when he encountered Prince's defense in the last round. Now that he calmed down, he saw the opponent's defensive formation, which was like an iron barrel under the basket!

The two teammates only had a certain mid-range shooting ability, and only Snow had a baseline mid-range shot. Larry Hughes had no shooting ability at all. It was not that Larry Hughes did not practice, but his talent limit was there. On the offensive end, he was a poor version of James. His defense was top-notch, but his shooting was worse than James. James had a three-point shooting rate of more than 30% since his sophomore year.

James hesitated when he saw the Hawks' defense.

In addition to his breakthrough, he has a step-back three-pointer, which is useless against Prince. It may be better against McGrady, but it is very stressful for Kobe and Pierce to rely on technology to beat Prince.

There is a wall in the mid-range, and James has a keen basketball IQ. He knows that as long as he breaks through, the wall will come out immediately.

Sometimes it is a problem for a person to have too high basketball IQ and too good judgment on defense, especially for someone as indecisive as James, who is now beginning to hesitate.

The Hawks used the same defense method that the Spurs used to defend the Heat Big Three in the finals seven years later!

And because the Cavaliers' lineup is much worse than the Heat Big Three, the Hawks' defense has become simpler, more direct, and more effective!

To defend James' three-pointer, let him shoot mid-range, double-team from the free throw line, let Snow and Larry Hughes shoot from the high position on the outside, and shoot from the baseline. The Cavaliers' own formation blocked James' route to pass the baseline from the high position. The Cavaliers have a baseline tactic, but that is after James breaks into the inside and passes to the baseline, not this kind of direct pass from the high position.

James started to hesitate again. After dribbling for a while, he passed the ball to Larry Hughes. Larry Hughes received the ball with only 8 seconds left. He rushed to the basket and missed the shot under McGrady's defense!

Rasheed Wallace defended the defensive rebound!

The Hawks counterattacked!

This time, the Cavaliers reacted quickly to retreat. After James passed the ball to Larry Hughes at the top arc, he immediately retreated after seeing Larry Hughes miss the shot. Larry Hughes and Snow also retreated quickly.

Liu Mang received the pass from Rasheed Wallace and rushed to the frontcourt. The Cavaliers crossed the midline first.

Liu Mang did not slow down and rushed to the basket. After attracting the defense, he passed the ball to McGrady who followed up. The Cavaliers defended three and two, blocking the counterattack of Liu Mang and McGrady, but there was Kwame Brown in the middle!

McGrady lifted the ball into the air. Kwame Brown took a step inside the free throw line and flew towards the basket. He caught the ball with both hands in the air and pressed the ball into the basket!

Kwame Brown was completely eaten up by Big Z's huge body in the positional battle, or in other words, a jumping center is not difficult for Big Z to defend, but when Kwame Brown runs, the Cavaliers have no choice.

Because of the disadvantage of rebounding, the Cavaliers need to play with success rate, and now they can't guarantee the success rate!

At the beginning, James scored one, and the TV commentator thought that James would play well today, but after that one ball, the Cavaliers' offense suddenly collapsed.

It's not right to say that it collapsed. The game has just started, and the Cavaliers feel like a college team facing an NBA team. They don't know how to play!

The key lies in their core, and they don't know how to solve the problem in front of them!

Compared with the Heat Big Three, the Cavaliers' outside combination is close to the poor version of James, Wade and Chalmers, but the poor version is even worse.

Wade still has a mid-range shot, especially Wade after the serious injury. After the serious injury, Wade's burst speed dropped sharply, which is a pity. He went from the strongest first step to one of the strongest first steps, but the mid-range shot was very accurate, while Larry Hughes did not have a mid-range shot.

Snow does have some mid-range shooting ability, with a career mid-range shooting percentage of 39%, which is first-rate, but who cares about a defensive point guard who averages 6 points per game...

Even though Snow is 33 years old, this player who was once selected to the All-Defensive Team is much better at defense than Mario Chalmers and Norris Cole, but on the offensive end, he is not even as good as Norris Cole.

In the next 3 minutes or so, the Cavaliers' offense was like constipation, and they couldn't squeeze it out. The Hawks made 5 of 7 shots in 5 minutes and played a 12-2 wave!

Except for James' two points at the beginning, the Cavaliers played completely blindly afterwards. James made a mid-range shot, which missed. He made a three-pointer from the outside against Prince's defense and hit the rebound. Snow and Larry Hughes' shots were also iron-iron.

At the beginning, the Cavaliers made 1 of 6 shots and only scored two points!

The Cavaliers called a timeout!

...

The effect was too good! Incredibly good!

McGrady saw James would hesitate just as Liu Mang said, and the opponent really hesitated with the ball and didn't know how to play. He was terrified by Liu Mang's ability to grasp the opponent's mentality.

McGrady thought about how he felt powerless every time he met the Hawks before he came to the Hawks. Now think about what he went through at the beginning...

Seeing James, who was anxious but didn't know what to do, McGrady felt sympathy for this guy who was also a high school student.

Compared with the confused state of the Cavaliers, the Hawks were in high spirits!

Although the rhythm was not comfortable, the opponent's offensive decisions in every round were very hesitant and slow, and almost every attack took more than 20 seconds, but they were leading at the beginning!

Lost the first game of the first round, the Hawks didn't want to lose a game in the second round!

If it was the first two seasons, every time they swept the opponent and waited for the next round of opponents, the Hawks players were eager to wait, but this season was different. This season, the Hawks players wished for two more days of rest. Although they are still young overall, they have played too long in the past few years. Most teams rest for six months a year, and they only have four months of rest a year.

…

After the timeout, both teams made personnel adjustments. On the Hawks side, Alonzo Mourning replaced Kwame Brown. Rasheed Wallace and Alonzo partnered in the interior. There was no adjustment on the outside. It was also a hard job to block with Big Z. Alonzo and Kwame Brown took turns.

On the Cavaliers side, James, Larry Hughes, Big Z, and Gooden continued to stay on the court. Snow was replaced by Damon Jones.

Snow was replaced by Damon, who has good three-point shooting ability. The Cavaliers' substitution was very targeted. Snow was left open and couldn't make a shot, so he was replaced by Damon Jones, who has three-point shooting ability.

The Cavaliers' idea was good, but after the game resumed, the effect was not good.

The Cavaliers just made Liu Mang's defense a little more tiring. After the double-team, he had to defend Damon Jones.

Damon Jones no longer has the accurate three-pointer of last season. Last season, Damon Jones, who was in the contract year, averaged 2.7 three-pointers per game, 12 points and 4 assists per game in the Heat. After cheating the Cavaliers into paying him a full mid-term salary of 18 million for 4 years, this season he averaged 6 points per game, the number of three-pointers hit fell to 1.4 per game, and the three-point hit rate fell to 36%.

When McGrady and Prince were both on the court, Liu Mang's role was to quickly switch defense and defend shooters, which just restrained the personnel adjustments made by the Cavaliers.

As the game went on, the Cavaliers could only use the worst method.

James and Larry Hughes began to take turns to break through with the ball and forcefully attack the inside line...

Popovich was so good at dealing with James. In the 13-14 season finals eight years later, he was able to defend the Heat, whose rhythm was already fast and the rules were very conducive to offense, so that all five games of the finals scored less than 100 points, and it was even difficult to score more than 90 points.

If it was James and Wade at their peak, they could still think of a way out. For example, in the 2013 Finals, they were only 2-3 behind in the first five games. But now James, whose hairline is so young that he hasn't even had a hair transplant, was forced to start an inefficient play of holding a bomb and going inside after one quarter.

At the end of the first half, the Cavaliers were already 20 points behind 35-55!

12 points, 4 rebounds, 2 assists in the first half. James' own statistics are always good because he always has the ball in his hands and his strength is indeed strong.

But James can't see any hope of winning!

James began to doubt his life. How can the opponent always find a way to defend him? He felt that the opponent could target him in a hundred ways!