Anthony the Reborn

Chapter 183 The Limit of Running and Bombing

The All-Star Game ended with great vigor, and the Nuggets had a lot to gain in this All-Star Game. Williams won the Skills Challenge Championship, Korver won the new three-pointer, and Anthony won the All-Star The game MVP, and only after the All-Star Game ended, people noticed this. For a while, the Nuggets became famous in the league.

But what is even more interesting is the bet between "Magic" Johnson and "Big Mouth" Barkley. Originally, after the pizza ended, Barkley had already won the bet, but the bizarre scene that happened later made him still Losing to Johnson, he also invited Anthony to participate in TNT's entertainment program, but with his usual peeing, he didn't know when he would fulfill the bet.

After the All-Star journey is over, the star players of each team have returned to their respective teams, preparing for the second half of the season.

Anthony and his teammates also returned to the Nuggets, ready for the next game.

The wonderful performance of the All-Stars brought the morale of the Nuggets to an unprecedented climax, and their schedule for a long time after they just came back was also very easy. There were no back-to-back games. They defeated the Eagles two weeks later Teams, Jazz, Nuggets, Bucks and Trail Blazers, after a five-game winning streak, surpassed the Spurs with a record of 28 wins and 14 losses, ranking third among all teams in the West.

It was not until the sixth game after they came back that they faced a real challenge. They faced the excellent defensive Pistons, offense and defense, a game full of gunpowder. In the end, Anthony and Brand contributed a game before the end of the game. In this game, Anthony scored 6 points, and Brand even grabbed 0 rebounds, contributing 36 points and 21 rebounds. The large double-double, in the interior of the Pistons double Wallace, is their outstanding performance, allowing the team to expand the winning streak to 25 games.

The 6-game winning streak is not a big event for the league. People's attention to the Nuggets is not very obvious, but in the following week, the Nuggets made persistent efforts and successively conquered the Warriors, Wizards and Magic. , When the winning streak was extended to 9 games in one fell swoop, Denver followed up and began to report. Anthony averaged 9 points, 29.8 rebounds and 8.5 assists during the 5.4-game winning streak. Brand scored 24.5 points and 13.8 rebounds. The individual Gemini became the most dazzling combination in the league.

The team is on a winning streak, the cooperation between players is becoming more and more mature, and the performance of role players is becoming more and more mature. The Nuggets are on the right path, but after the winning streak, the opponents of the Nuggets are all hard-working Trying their best to stop their winning streak has put the Nuggets under a lot more pressure than before.

However, Anthony and Brand still performed strongly, and Williams, Nene, and Bell also performed steadily. The winning streak has expanded to 9 consecutive victories. This time, not only the media in Denver, but also the media of the entire league are focusing on the Nuggets. The winning streak slogans can be seen everywhere in the newspapers, and the dual-core figures of Anthony and Brand can be seen everywhere .

Not only in the United States, the strong performance of the Nuggets also set off a frenzy of star chasing in China. The gorgeous offense of running and bombing is pleasing to the eye, and fans compete to imitate it. They buy Anthony's boots through various channels. Just a few months after the brand opened up the Chinese market, the sales of Anthony's sneakers in China surpassed Tracy McGrady's 3rd generation of boots and Kobe's boots, becoming the best-selling sneakers in China.

The era when fans were proud of McGrady's boots was replaced by Anthony in a very short period of time, which can be called a miracle in the history of sneakers, but this is actually inseparable from Anthony's performance. Anthony is walking on a road that no one else has ever walked. On the road, his performance in his rookie season can only be described as phenomenal.

In fact, I don’t know the United States, China, and Europe. The Jordan brand is also sweeping like a spring breeze. There is a storm of Anthony sneakers in the world. Jordan’s investment has achieved unprecedented success.

The sneakers are selling well, and the bonuses Anthony received from the Jordan brand are also rising. Money is slowly becoming a number in Anthony's eyes, but he has not changed his original intention because of more and more money. He still insisted on training, and apart from secretly asking someone to go to China to find Su Xi, the relationship between him and Fox was also very stable.

Anthony's performance is still outstanding, but with the increase in the winning streak, the players' mentality will inevitably become a little slack, after 13 consecutive victories.

In the first game in March, against the not-so-strong Heat, the Nuggets had been lagging behind in the first three quarters. At most, they were behind by nearly 3 points. Thanks to Korver's consecutive hits in the second half of the third quarter After scoring 4 three-pointers, the point difference was chased to 12 points. Afterwards, Anthony and Brand worked together to hit an offensive climax again, and then won the game with a 3-point advantage before the end.

After the game, the Nuggets unexpectedly did not attend the press conference. The players spontaneously held a player meeting in the locker room. It is said that Anthony took the lead in reviewing his performance at the meeting, which made many Nuggets players feel ashamed.

A small meeting had unexpected results. In the following games, the Nuggets showed unprecedented combat effectiveness, and the gap between them and their opponents seemed to be slowly getting wider and wider.

In the game in March, they first beat the Clippers, which had become a complete mess, with 40 points, then slaughtered the Trail Blazers at Portland's home court with 32 points, and then they scored 28 points. The superiority defeated the powerful Kings, and the running and bombing against Princeton were also gorgeous offenses. In the end, running and bombing completely defeated Princeton.

In the past three games, they have outscored their opponents by an average of 32.7 points per game, and their morale has risen unprecedentedly. It is precisely because of this strong performance that they have expanded their winning streak to 17 games in one fell swoop. Once again, there was an uproar in the league. Fans compared the Nuggets to an invincible team. Some gambling companies even offered to predict the Nuggets’ winning streak. Fans bet wildly, making the Nuggets The heat has once again risen to a higher level.

It is precisely because of this wave of winning streak that the Nuggets surpassed the Lakers and Timberwolves in one fell swoop, leading the West, and their record in the league is also outstanding.

The hot phenomenon of the Nuggets has even attracted attention in the political arena. Senator Bellac Obama of Illinois expressed his love for the Nuggets in public.

The Nuggets are surrounded by all the glory around them. They are experiencing a wonderful time that they have never had before. Because of the team's winning streak, the Nuggets occupy a very favorable position in the selection of various awards.

In the MVP rankings, Anthony is undisputedly ranked first on the list. In the selection of the best rookie, he also undisputedly crushed James and firmly occupied the top position.

And after the All-Star Game, D'Antoni surpassed Carlisle of the Pistons and Sanders of the Timberwolves for the first time in the selection of the best coach.

Even in the selection of the best sixth man, both Korver and Diaw have a very large approval rate, especially Diao, whose all-around performance amazed everyone.

In the most improved award, Bell's average data has nearly doubled compared to last season, and he also has a very large advantage in the selection.

This is probably the benefit of a strong team, and the selection of various awards will be tilted towards the team.

After the end of the 17-game winning streak, the Nuggets encountered the biggest challenge, challenging the Nets and Lakers back to back.

The Nets have the Big Three of Kidd, Jefferson and Martin this season, and their strength is very strong. After a series of victories, the Nuggets also encountered unprecedented challenges in this game. The two teams really Fighting with swords and guns, he played until the last minute. Anthony showed his super big heart at the last moment. He first hit a mid-range buzzer to overtake the score for the team, and then blocked Martin on the defensive end. A close hook, and then hit a chasing three-pointer to give the Nuggets a 1-point lead. After that, the Nets adopted foul tactics. Jefferson and Kidd hit two consecutive three-pointers, but fortunately The Nuggets made all free throws and finally beat the Nets by 4 points.

After a fierce battle all night, the Nuggets players had a great physical reaction, but before they had time to rest, they flew to Los Angeles the next day to face the Lakers again.

This time, the Nuggets failed to perform magic again. Anthony and Brand played steadily, but the physical strength of other Nuggets players obviously couldn't keep up. Even Koh Williams and Bell were sprained in the second half of the third quarter. D'Antoni broke his ankle. This sudden situation caught D'Antoni off guard. In order to protect other players from injury, he replaced the substitute when he was still behind by about 10 points in the third quarter, strategically giving up the game.

The Lakers finally defeated the Nuggets. Kobe fulfilled the promise of the All-Star, but this way of winning was obviously not what he hoped for. He found Anthony in the player tunnel after the game and chatted for a while, but compared to the last time , I don’t know how warm this time, just as Kobe said, he already regards Anthony as a true friend.

Because of the loss to the Lakers, the Nuggets' winning streak was fixed at 18 games. What's more interesting is that if they win another game, they can tie the Lakers' 1999 consecutive victories in the 2000-19 season. , they missed this record and failed to perform magic.

(End of this chapter)