On December 3, Beijing time, Luka Doncic scored 22 points and 10 assists in the first half yesterday, and the game was put into garbage time two quarters in advance, but in front of the Pelicans' paper paste-like defense, this "abuse of dishes" performance did not make people much interest.
However, in another game that ended at the same time, Doncic's "enemy of life" Trae Young, with another 30+ performance, led the Eagles to beat the Pacers, which was even more impressive.
This is the fifth consecutive game in which Trae Young has scored 30+ and set a new record for the longest consecutive 30+ this season so far. This little man, who has never been optimistic, once again responded to the outside world's doubts about him with practical actions!
Trae Young has never been the "son of genius", and although he leads the United States in scoring and assisting in two statistics in his freshman season, because of his short stats, it is widely believed that he cannot achieve the same success against the stronger and more physically talented NBA. So when he entered the NBA draft in 2018, the Lone Ranger would rather take a first-round pick than upgrade the No. 5 pick to the No. 3 pick in order to select Doncic, who became famous at a young age.
The two young people are forever linked, and although they feel sorry for each other and have a good personal relationship, the media prefers to hype them up as "enemies of a lifetime". In the subsequent career trajectory, the two people were treated very differently because of the difference in talent level.
As it turned out, Doncic was not ashamed of expectations. Although he did not have any American basketball background, he quickly succeeded in the league with mature technology, superb basketball IQ, and unique physical conditions. Trae Young, on the other hand, struggled in his early days, having scored in double figures only once in six consecutive games, 1-of-20 from outside the three-point line, and often made more mistakes than assists!
However, with the deepening of the season and the accumulation of experience, Trae Young slowly found his own way to adapt to the NBA, and his performance after the all-Star season in his rookie season reached an average of 24.7 points and 9.7 assists per game, officially fighting back against the outside world's doubts for the first time.
In his second year in the league, Trae Young already had a vague tendency to catch up with Doncic and keep pace with it: he averaged 29.6 points and 9.3 assists per game that season, and was selected as a starter as an All-Star like Doncic. However, the Hawks missed the playoffs again, leaving Young still at a disadvantage in his comparison with Doncic.
In the 2020-21 season, Young's average of points per game dropped by 4.3 points, and one of the key reasons was that the Hawks added a lot of helpers for him. In the end, he led the team to the playoffs and all the way to the division finals, and played game six with the later championship Bucks, which gave him a capital that he was proud of compared to Doncic for the first time.
But the voice of doubt has not stopped. Fans who once looked down on Trae Young can still find reasons to black him, and one of the most important black spots is that he loves to touch porcelain and relies on star whistles to cheat and go to the free throw line to ensure scoring output. After the league decided to change the rules in the new season to limit the deliberate deception of fouls, a considerable number of voices believed that as a negative typical Trae Young, there should be no curse!
In a way, it is reasonable to suspect that Trae Young would be difficult to maintain his game influence without a whistle. Last season, Trae Young won a total of 546 free throw opportunities, second only to Alphabet Brother and Embiid, ranking third in the league, and a total of 484 free throws, ranking first in the league!
And compared with several other negative examples of cheating fouls such as Harden and Doncic, Trae Young's physical condition is much worse, so without the blessing of the referee, whether he can adapt to the higher intensity of confrontation of defensive players is indeed questionable.
But Trae Young soon proved himself once more with his actions: Although the Eagles experienced a difficult time at the beginning of the season, with only a record of 4 wins and 9 losses in the first 13 games, Trae Young himself averaged 24.5 points and 9.2 assists per game, making him the best performer on the team.
As capela, Hertel and other teammates gradually picked up, the Hawks started from playing the Bucks on November 15, to today's away win over the Pacers, in the past 9 games, played 8-1 performance, back to the top eight in the East!
During this time, Trae Young took his performance to the next level: averaging 28.9 points per game, the league's first in the same period, shooting 50.8%, 43.1% and 88.2% from the shooting, three-point shooting and free throw shooting, respectively, in addition, he averaged 8.9 assists per game and averaged +12.8 points per game!
Today's game against the Pacers, although the other side has just experienced a coach change, is still in the pain of running-in, but it is still a defensive team in the middle of the league (14th in the league in defensive efficiency), and there is a block king Turner town guard on the inside, which is not a small restriction for Trae Young, who likes to break through the infiltration. But unexpectedly, Yang played the whole game with ease, breaking through, shooting long-range, throwing, and air contact, so that the opponent could not lose one or the other, and the defense was invincible.
In the first half alone, Trae Young had 15 points and eight assists and only one turnover, and after the whole game, he contributed 33 points, 8 rebounds and 10 assists. The following wonderful shots can be used to peek into the leopard, so that everyone can roughly appreciate the current state of Trae Young's field.
In fact, Trae Young's actual impact on offense now is even more exaggerated than the data can show. Take this attack at 1 minute and 01 seconds before the final game today as an example - Trae Young one-on-one after dropping Duarte and then directly under the basket, Turner was jealous of his fiery state, hurried over to make up for the defense, and completely let go of Capela, who should also be focused on prevention. As a result, although Trae Young's high-play layup was missed, Capela, who was completely emptied, easily made up for the dunk, and the Hawks took a 5-point lead 101-96, basically laying the victory.
This ball, reflected in technical statistics, of course, can only be counted as a missed shot by Trae Young, but the actual effect achieved is no different from playing the board.
Does the new rule have an impact on Trae Young? The answer is yes. The data shows that Trae Young's average number of free throws per game this season is only 5.6, compared to 8.7 times last season. But Trae Young, who has long been accustomed to fighting against various unfavorable conditions, is best at bravely facing difficulties and finding ways to overcome them. Although his free throw count has declined, his shooting percentage, three-point shooting and assist-to-turnover ratio this season have all set career highs.
By the end of the game, Trae Young had scored a total of 578 points this season, ranking first in the league (Alphabet Brother then surpassed Trae Young with a 40-point performance, and is currently promoted to the first place with 580 points), with a total of 200 assists, second in the league after Chris Paul! Is this still the "pseudo-superstar" who was considered to be weakened by the new version before the start of that season?
In addition to 30+ in 5 consecutive games, the total number of points and assists are among the best, the following records about Trae Young, it is also necessary to give you a brief list:
With today's game, Trae Young's career total assists have crossed the 2,000 mark, and he has achieved this achievement in a total of 226 games, and only five people in the entire history of the NBA have been faster than him: Oscar Robertson, Kevin Johnson, Chris Paul, Tim Hardaway and Mark Jackson.
Trae Young scored 30+10 in three of his five consecutive 30+games, and his 30+10 games throughout the season were therefore refreshed to 5, ranking first in the league.
Also, didn't we say that Doncic got 20+10 at halftime today? Data shows that since the 2018-19 season, Doncic is one of only three players in the league to have scored 20+10 points and assists at least twice. Who are the other two? One is Lillard, and the other is also Trae Young.
Is Trae Young a superstar? I think there are still a lot of skeptics to this day. He is only 6 feet 1 tall and weighs only 180 pounds, and in the long-lived NBA game, it is not too much to describe it as a thin and dry. Say he's fast, he's not as impressive as Wall, Fox, and other famous Scuds; what about saying he's shooting accurately? Obviously not at curry's and Lillard's level; he's not as good as Nash and Paul than passing; even with the ball-handling skills that small players must practice, he doesn't have much of a show like Owen's...
But this small man, who seems to have nothing special, has a certain unique spiritual temperament, and can respond to every time he is questioned. He has always been looked down upon and has never been defeated.
If this invisible talent is also a talent, then Trae Young is definitely talented.