Let's first review the famous scene that happened last summer.
Harden was interviewed and asked what Nets fans can expect from the new season. Deng Ge shook his beard in a dashing manner: "Moment of terror! ”
The steaming "horror" of summer has now become a cold "panic" in the cold winter.
After losing to the Nuggets, head coach Nash said they were likely to move into the playoff zone (divisions seventh to tenth) after the All-Star break.
Coach Na was "too modest", and after the Nets' eight-game losing streak, they had been surpassed by the Raptors, and the Eastern Conference fell to seventh, "catching up" with the All-Star before completing the task of falling into the playoff area. The Nets were still number one in the East at the time of the year-end war, and now they are in a trance.
Before the start of the season, American bookmakers introduced the odds for winning the championship, when the first and second places were the Nets and Lakers, respectively. Now the Nets are seventh in the east and the Lakers are ninth in the west, which is really "raising eyebrows".
What happened to the Nets?
Nash also said a passage after eight consecutive losses, perhaps explaining the Nets' problems from the root causes.
'We have some talented players missing the game and our squad is built on those talents.
The Nets are indeed short of manpower, Durant, Harden, Joe Harris, Aldridge and Clarkston are all on the injury list, but are the Nuggets on the roster? Murray and Porter are not also injured, how did the Nuggets slaughter the Nets with a 20-point advantage?
People nuggets have MVP Jokic, the famous handsome Zhuge Malone.
The Nets also have a single little prince Owen, former MVP Nash.
Do you touch your conscience and say that these two groups are of a grade?
Irving is an indiscriminate head-to-head master, but by no means a good team leader. To tell a small story, Irving worked with Coach Mike Brown when he was playing with the Cavaliers, and Brown asked Irving to play a role as a leading teammate in the game, and Irving's answer surprised Brown.
"I'm still in the stage of accumulating personal honors, and I'm not there yet."
Brown has coached superstars like James and Kobe Bryant, and is also experienced in dealing with stars, but Irving can say that brushing data is so frank, and Brown is also the first time he has encountered it.
A senior employee of the Cavaliers, who did not want to be named, once told reporters that Irving and James are very different in personality, James cares about the outside world's evaluation of him, although he does not say it, but he cares in his heart, while Owen does not hear things outside the window, immersed in the personal world, he only does things in the way he thinks is right.
Therefore, it is not surprising that Irving has become the only employee of the Nets who does not play the new crown vaccine, he is concerned about the universe, and it is a small basketball that can be swayed.
However, Irving eats on basketball, and he occupies the Nets' $35 million salary space, but he can only work part-time because of vaccines. The vaccine problem is a "minefield" in the United States, and the Nets will have trouble if they say heavy words, and can only deal with the suspension of Irving internally, but the away salary is given, but this has triggered a bad chain reaction.
Harden offseason recuperation did not train, the ship late and hit the headwind is the partial encounter with the league to adjust the blowing scale, the offensive version is weakened, originally still expected to be a low-key organizer behind Duou, did not expect Irving to directly pick the pick, Harden can only be hard scalp while playing while adjusting, the force is not less, scolding is not less.
Irving "skipping class", Harden's state is up and down, the Nets have to rely on Durant to support, Adu has averaged 36.5 minutes per game this season, and the last time he averaged more than 36 minutes per game was in the 2013-14 season with MVP. The Nets also realized that Durant's load was a bit large, so they released Irving's ban, at least to play the road game allowed by the epidemic prevention regulations, but it was too late, Adu was still injured, and it was expected that he would not return after the All-Star weekend.
In the 11 games after Durant's injury timeout, the Nets won 2 and lost 9, during which Harden was also injured, leaving Irving to play two games and lose a total of 43 points!
Recently, there have been great calls for Nash's class, but Coach Renner also has reason to say, what team I originally planned to bring, the team with the big three, now what team you let me bring. What level the Nets are at now, just a few people, Irving has gone to be the first core, can he do it, not this ability. If you lose again, you will lose nine times in a row and lose ten in a row, and you may be one of the first teams to prepare for the 2022-23 season.
Irving left James to prove that he can lead the team as the core, and his team leadership performance after breaking up with the old Zhan has repeatedly proved that he thinks too much. Although Harden is not talented, at least in the Rockets led the team into the Western Conference Finals, but also played back and forth with the peak Warriors, but now has become the protagonist of trade rumors, it is rumored that the Nets are open to using Harden for Simmons, willing to talk with the 76ers.
For this news, Nash debunked the rumors on behalf of the team, saying that the Nets had no plans to trade Harden, and Harden repeatedly expressed to the team that he wanted to stay in Brooklyn. The same question to Owen's side, "Ou Immortal" answer, is different.
"I don't care about the rumors, we'd love for him to stay in the team, but who knows what's going to happen?"
This is also true, and who knows what the future holds, but Owen is very inappropriate to say so in today's situation.
Of course, the inopportune is the secular view, Irving is beyond the three realms, not in the five elements, has he not wondered why Harden entered the trading rumors, not him?
It's not because it's too good to change.
Let's summarize and sort it out, the crux of the Nets is that Irving does not vaccinate, Harden is unstable, Adu is injured after the burden is aggravated, Harden is followed, Irving single-core does not move the team, Nash coaching level to play a rich battle barely OK, when there is a shortage of soldiers and food, they lose their armor and armor, and the rumors in the locker room are worse.
What to do, is the Nets so ruined this season?
No, the Nets still have a life-saving trick, that is, Durant's comeback. Nash revealed that Adu did not have a clear timetable for his return, but the recovery was progressing well, there were no repeated injuries, and everything went according to plan. Durant, who suffered a sprain of the medial collateral ligament in his left knee, was initially expected to be 4 to 6 weeks, and he was injured on Jan. 16, and if all goes well, he may be back after the All-Star Weekend (Feb. 19-Feb. 21).
The Nets boil down to superstar basketball, Durant is the star of the stars, he is on the court, Irving can focus on attacking the stronghold instead of the organization he is not good at, Harden can focus on the organization rather than the version of the weakened kill, the big three do their jobs, and maybe there is drama.
Mr. Qian Zhongshu has such a passage in "The Siege of the City": "This diploma, as if it has the function of the leaf under Adam and Eve, can cover up the shame and ugliness; a small piece of paper can cover up a person's emptiness, ugliness, and stupidity." ”
Durant is the Nets' "diploma" that envelops all the shortcomings of this team. With Adu, the Nets have their "Clayden University", even from internal unity to coaching level, there is a lack of "real talent", can also scare people.