This season, he is only 21 years old, full of talent and hope, and fate has yet to show him its cruel side.
Coming off the bench, he hit a mid-range jump shot from the baseline and made a buzzer-beater floater, helping the Clippers close the gap.
In the first quarter, Yao Ming scored the game-high 11 points. When his energy is abundant, his offensive success rate is really quite high.
Once he gets the ball near the basket in the paint, it’s like gifting points to the opponent. Kaman had no solution defending Yao Ming.
Although Yao Ming hasn’t put on weight, his height and large frame mean that in the League, besides beasts like O’Neal, it’s hard for others to hold up against him.
He also has agility, and most importantly, he is very determined when shooting, never overthinking, and doesn’t worry about teammates—he just shoots.
Gan Guoyang has told him more than once, "When you get the ball inside, the only thing in your eyes should be the basket, nothing else. Just get the ball in the basket and your task is done. How you play in the national team is another matter; don’t overthink it."
Because he doesn’t have to think too much, Yao Ming plays freely and comfortably.
In the second half of the first quarter, he went to rest for a while, then continued to play in the second quarter.
After the start of the second quarter, Kaman obviously strengthened his defense against Yao Ming, especially in positioning battles, not allowing Yao Ming to easily get the ball in deeper positions. Otherwise, it’s just giving away points.
Gan Guoyang assisted from the top of the arc, finding Ariza cutting inside. Ariza’s movement was quite good, but his layup was disrupted by Brand and missed.
He jumped repeatedly under the basket to try and tip it in, but unfortunately, the ball was firmly controlled by the Clippers.
"Dunk it, kid, why didn’t you dunk?" Gan Guoyang patted Ariza as he retreated on defense.
"I... I’m afraid I wouldn’t make it."
"Did you get the layup?"
"No."
"Next time you have such an opportunity, you must dunk. After the game, do 50 dunks on your own."
"Understood."
Gan Guoyang was much stricter with the young players on the team than before.
He knows that his time on the NBA court isn’t long, and there’s no concept of growing together.
We need to push their development; any improvement is good.
Ariza is a very talented and smart player, having graduated from the prestigious UCLA. His basketball IQ is not a problem.
The problem is, first of all, he lacks a three-point shooting ability. When he entered the League in 2004, his three-point ability was zero; his offense relied mainly on mid-range and inside play, and his shooting talent is really not great.
After joining Glory, he was pressured to develop a three-point ability; last season, he finally managed to shoot 32% from three-point range. Standing at the three-point line, he’s barely considered someone, not just invisible and unguarded.
At the same time, his defense is quite good; he’s versatile. When it came time to choose him, Jordan disagreed, asking why they should pick someone from UCLA and not North Carolina?
In the end, it was Ah Gan who took a liking to him and insisted on drafting him. Now entering his third season, he’s starting to take shape and can be a good rotation player at the three, adequately taking over Gerald Wallace’s responsibilities.
Although he missed the offensive layup, Ariza immediately contributed on defense, intercepting Cassell’s pass to Maggette. The ball rolled into Luther Head’s hands, and Glory began their fast break.
Unlike Ariza, Head’s biggest advantage is his outside shooting, although it’s unstable. Even though he falters in the playoffs, he holds up in regular-season games, with a shooting rate that can exceed 40%, making him a pretty good three-point shooter.
Glory indeed lacks stable shooters on the outside. Porter watching these young guys shoot worse than himself is quite anxious.
These two aren’t bad: one was decent to begin with, and the other at least trained up. Yet, there’s still one more sitting on the bench—Rajon Rondo. He gives people the impression that his shooting is beyond help.
Before the draft, Porter didn’t even know who this guy was, but seeing his shooting in the training camp, Porter was overwhelmed.
How the heck can he play Point Guard? How can he spread the floor? If he holds the ball, how bad would the team’s strategic spacing be?
But during the draft, Ah Gan insisted on picking him, saying, "Even if he could shoot accurately, we wouldn’t need it now. It’s for future preparation."
Porter couldn’t care less about all that ’for the future’ stuff. He already decided that once Ah Gan retires, he’s really going to quit, he’s sure of it.
Head passed the ball to Gan Guoyang during the fast break. Gan Guoyang caught it and shot a mid-range jumper from the 45-degree angle, and it was in.
Gan Guoyang is increasingly relying on mid-range shots, and his mid-range shooting is becoming increasingly accurate, to a rather terrifying degree.
When his energy is abundant, even with someone defending, his mid-range shooting rate can reach 62%, which is extremely frightening.
Of course, there’s a premise: his energy has to be relatively abundant, and he’s only facing a single defender. Once his energy declines, facing defenses, his shooting percentage will definitely drop.
However, it can still remain above 45%, higher than some players’ overall shooting percentages.
His overall shooting percentage is 58%, still historic among historic, but his number of shots is limited. His production isn’t high, still due to his stamina.
Clippers’ Cassell immediately responded with a mid-range shot from the top of the arc and intercepted Luther Head’s ball in defense, then high-arched a pass to Brand. Brand caught it mid-air and dunked, also drawing a foul from Yao Ming!
The Clippers began to speed up their offensive tempo and increased the confrontations against Glory’s young players in defense.
Gan Guoyang immediately stabilized the situation with a mid-range shot from the wing. This guy is now a veritable mid-range jumper ace.
With Yao Ming carrying two fouls, Porter worried that the Clippers would exploit this weakness and target Yao Ming, so he substituted Mutombo for Yao Ming.
Glory in recent years has been both getting younger and not slacking on adding old guys to the team.
Besides Robert Horry, there’s also Mutombo, this African Mountain whose exact age is unknown.
Public information shows that this season Mutombo is already 40 years old, and Glory has become the only team in NBA history with two players over 40.
The team still has the old being very old, and the young being very young.
But despite Mutombo’s age, his defensive impact is still significant.
Basketball really is a big man’s game, with Mutombo, at 40, standing under the basket like a big tree limb.
Anyone thinking of scoring under the basket finds it not so easy.
With Mutombo on the field, Gan Guoyang has to take more finishing tasks on offense.
Mobley caught the ball at the top of the arc and hit a mid-range jump shot.
Gan Guoyang then moved to the right side of the sweet spot baseline, caught the ball, and hit a mid-range shot as well.
The two teams entered a phase of exchanging offense and defense, maintaining a relaxed and stable defense, entering a steady rhythm.
Mobley did a low-post back-to-basket move against Ariza but missed, and Gan Guoyang grabbed a defensive rebound and passed it to Head.
Head pushed forward and distributed the ball to the fast-breaking Gan Guoyang, who caught it and made a left 45-degree three-pointer, and it went in again!
The Clippers saw the situation wasn’t right, and it seemed Ah Gan was hard to defend again. What’s going on?
Deng Liwei called a timeout, and Porter replaced Gan Guoyang with Robert Horry and also brought Gerald Wallace onto the court.
"Damn, you’re making me rest again? I was just getting my shooting groove, are you undercover, Terry?"
"Do you want to play in the second half or not? This is just the second quarter, don’t tell me you enjoy shooting, and then in the second half, you run out of energy and brick all your shots, ruining the game! Rest!
Gan Guoyang really couldn’t argue because there were quite a few games like that in these two seasons.
Aiming sharply in the first half, and hammering it in the second half with no energy, he increasingly needs to allocate his stamina more meticulously.
Porter saw the team regain a 10-point lead and immediately gave the opportunity to the youngsters, instead of letting Ah Gan go "scorched earth," this strategic change was out of necessity.
If they had a high-output scorer to partner well with Ah Gan, they could really compete for the championship this new season.
Porter nodded to Rondo, signaling him to enter the game. Rondo was a bit surprised, obviously not expecting it to be his turn this early.
He hurriedly took off his warm-up jacket, ready to start his career’s first game.