Chapter 271 T-MAC

Kobe is now in a state of pain and happiness.

The pain is that he cannot play due to injury. For a basketball fanatic like him, it is a painful thing not to be able to play.

He didn't even dare to imagine what kind of life he would lead after retiring, and he would not leave basketball anyway.

Happiness is because, without him, the Lakers' record has not declined significantly.

Although without Kobe, the tone of the Lakers game seems much more monotonous.

Playing against the Suns was led by a big score, and it was finally reversed; while playing against the Wizards was the opposite, almost being reversed.

Fortunately, the Lakers survived both games, all thanks to Li Liang's outstanding performance.

An unreasonable three-pointer, a calm judgment at the last moment.

After these two games, the Lakers had to reevaluate Li Liang's value.

Now, the Los Angeles media is getting louder and louder about keeping Bruce Lee in advance.

But Li Liang is not that you want to stay, you can stay if you want to stay. He won a contract player option for himself when signing the contract, so the initiative is completely in his hands.

Once he chooses to jump out in the summer, the Lakers have almost no chance to keep him.

So now the management is actively mobilizing, mobilizing the people, friends, and teammates around Li Liang to persuade him to make the promise left by Xia Tian.

But the Lakers are doing all this in vain.

First of all, needless to say, Zhu Shu, she doesn't get in, and doesn't have much contact with the Lakers management at all.

Wei Dazhi has recently changed his gender and rarely participates in social activities in Los Angeles, saying that he wants to focus on his journalism career.

Ryan West came over to communicate with Li Liang, but during the chat, Ryan West was told by Li Liang that he wanted to leave the Lakers to prove himself.

In the end, the person who has the energy to persuade Li Liang is Kobe.

Unexpectedly, Kobe rejected the management's request to be a lobbyist, saying bluntly, "Bruce will make his own choice, and I don't want to interfere with him. Besides, our attention should be on the present, on the playoffs, not Next season. This season isn't over yet, is it?"

Kobe's words are of course reasonable, but the management must have a long-term perspective, and it is too late to cram for the moment.

But there is no way, Li Liang will not let go, so he can only continue like this.

After playing against the Wizards, the Lakers rested for two days.

Li Liang continued to pay close attention to the training in the system, and this time he restarted the task of [basic defense on the outside line].

At present, his [basic perimeter defense] ability is 71, which should be enough to play in the regular season.

But thinking about going up against Michael Jordan in the system, that number just isn't enough.

On the 23rd, Li Liang entered the system at night and re-entered the task of [basic defense on the outside line]:

[Task, lock T-MAC, time: March 20, 2003, location: Palace of Auburn Hills, Detroit, USA, against: Orlando Magic VS Detroit Pistons, task requirement: Lock Tracy McGregor in the game Dee, suppress his score to no more than 30 points and help the Pistons win. Task reward: basic defensive ability on the outside line +10, follow-up/post defense ability +5, task difficulty: star]

Seeing this mission, Li Liang was sweating, because this was the first time he was involved in the playoffs during the mission.

And the difficulty of the task is really not small, you have to lock up McGrady!

What is the concept of McGrady in 2003? As a Chinese fan, I will definitely know.

Although the series against the Pistons in 2003 became McGrady's eternal pain, but his personal ability is really nothing to say, it is purely the magic's poor strength.

With a 3:1 lead, they suffered a major reversal from the Pistons.

McGrady was ridiculed by many people because of the phrase "I'm thinking about my opponent in the next round".

But in fact, his complete words in the interview were "If it was last year, we should consider our opponents in the next round."

That's right, the NBA game system was reformed in the 2003 season. Before that, the first round was a 5-game 3-win system.

After 2003, in order to sell more tickets, it was changed to a 7-game 4-win system. As a result, the Magic was overturned and left with eternal regret.

Regrets are regrets, McGrady dedicated a wonderful offensive performance in this round of the series.

Especially in the first two games, in the away game environment of the Palace of Auburn Hills, he scored 40 points in two consecutive games.

A game of 43 and a game of 46 made the Pistons tremble outside.

Li Liang has watched these two games, so the task requires him to defend McGrady to 30 points?

I have no choice but to try.

...

On the 25th, the entire Lakers team headed to Oakland for the last long-distance road trip before the playoffs.

Li Liang appeared on the plane with dark circles under his eyes, and sat down beside Nash.

Nash glanced at Li Liang and said, "Boy, are you going to be a thief tonight?"

Li Liang shook his head and said, "I'd rather be a thief, I need to rest..."

After speaking, Li Liang fell asleep on the chair.

Nash felt strange and unreasonable. After two days of rest, he should be full of energy.

Why does Li Liang feel hollowed out?

It is said that he lives with two girls...could it be...

Nash didn't continue to think about it, he was still very decent.

Li Liang is even more decent, what kind of woman do you need if you have a system to play?

Fighting against T-MAC in the system for the past two days almost exhausted him!

The results of it?

One mission kept McGrady at 38 points and one game 35 points.

Lost one game, won one game, but neither completed the task.

In fact, it is not particularly difficult to win. The problem is that McGrady is really too difficult to defend!

And this is not the regular season, it is the playoffs, and the intensity has risen to a level.

Li Liang is still a little uncomfortable with the task. The Pistons' defensive strategy is completely different from that of the Lakers, and there are also communication problems.

In short, Li Liang was very annoyed by the two games, and felt that it was difficult to pass this task easily in a short time.

Sure enough, the difficulty has reached a certain level, and it is impossible to pass the level easily by opportunistic tricks like before.

Hard power must be improved.

After arriving in Oakland, the entire Lakers team went directly to the Oracle Arena to participate in the game on the evening of the 25th.

The distance between Los Angeles and Oakland is very close, so they are too lazy to stay in a hotel and leave after the game.

In this game, the Lakers did not continue the good luck of the previous two games. They were bombarded by three-pointers from the Golden State Warriors from the very beginning.

The Warriors are now 39 wins and 32 losses, ranking seventh in the West, followed by the Houston Rockets who are eighth behind, and the Utah Jazz and Dallas Mavericks are also eyeing.

Therefore, the Warriors must strive to win to ensure the team's playoff spot.

Klay Thompson made 6 of 11 three-pointers in the game, and Stephen Curry made 4 of 9 three-pointers. The two contributed 10 three-pointers.

For the Lakers, Howard, as usual, stopped after beating the Warriors. He only scored 10 points on 4 of 10 shots and 2 of 6 free throws.

Pau Gasol is still recovering, and he scored 8 points on 3 of 8 shots off the bench.

Of course, this is not the point, the point is that Li Liang's performance is not good.

There is no way, he has been drained by McGrady in the system for the past two days.

And not only was the defensive McGrady drained, because he played two mission games in a row and was still on the Pistons, which caused his offense to be biased by the Pistons!

A rubbish Pistons team is desperately defending and slowing down the pace, which makes Li Liang not used to playing against the Warriors.

Even so, the Lakers fought the Warriors to the last minute.

Nash missed a key three-pointer and was counterattacked by the Warriors. Thompson made a fatal three-pointer, and the point difference was opened to 8 points, which made the game lose suspense.

The Lakers lost to the Warriors by 100:109 by 9 points, which gave a bad start to the road trip.