Wow "plug" | The war did not destroy Serbia, but made Jokic and Deyo stronger

This content is the series "Why is Serbian sport so strong?" The second part.

After reading the relationship between athletic talent and achievements of Serbs in the previous article, wow "Sei" | Jokić and Deyo dominate the sports world, why is Serbian sports so strong, let's take a look at the spiritual core of this sports power.

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Like Nikolai Jokic's most famous nickname, Joker, he has many facets.

In an NBA regular season game in 2021, the world remembered his fierce and rewarding side. At that time, Jokic was hit by the Heat's Morris on the court, Jokic was furious, and immediately rushed forward with several strides, his right elbow was pressed on Morris's back with huge force, and Morris, who was 2.06 meters tall and weighed 111 kilograms, fell out like a child and stumbled to the ground. It is said that the strength of this elbow is huge, and it has been personally recognized by the parties. Because of this elbow, Morris took a 30-game break in one go. After such a long time, some netizens expressed their views on social media: It seems that Jokic is not heavy at once, Morris is too brittle. Morris saw this and angrily replied on the Internet: "This is really hurt!" Imagine having one

136 kg fat man pounds your spine with all his might! I said I'll be back soon. ”

Regarding Morris's return, there were once rumors that he would take revenge on Jokic, and it was not until his brother, who was more rewarded than Jokic, also came down to support his brother, and Morris barely swallowed this evil breath.

In stark contrast to such Jokic, his teammates see him as low-key and humble, high enough to ignore Embiid's stripped-out MVP trifecta, and undistracted to follow the higher eternal glory - the championship, and a few horses in his hometown of Sombol. This big child of more than 250 pounds, when interacting with young fans, accidentally bumps and will make them laugh with shame, and since he has his own child, he has an additional "daughter slave" identity. However, after winning the championship, he still said like a philosopher: "I don't know if children should look up to me, they have their own life path to follow." ”

But on the other side of the story, Jokic becomes the protagonist of the NBA arena almost every year. From the "tough foul" against Cameron Payne in 2021 to the "black hand" against Suns owner Ishbia on the sidelines this year - but both sides of these two conflicts let go of their previous suspicions after Jokic was no longer "on top", but the beam formed with Big Morris that year not only did not soften, but even rose to the "stubble" at the family level.

Jokic clashed with Suns in this year's playoffs, but the two let go of their feud in Game 2.

Being more thoroughly examined by the world because he stood at the top of the pyramid, Jokic is such a contradictory community. In fact, by extension, from Divac and Peja, who have put Serbia to the top of basketball in the world, to the individual project leaders represented by Djokovic, Serbia's sports superstars always give a similar impression - playing smart, flexible, ingenious, and even a little bad; But at the same time, there is always a trace of insecurity that is not easy to express, mixed with the stubbornness of retribution, which may be related to the experience of this generation of Serbs in the past 30 years.

Digging into their spiritual core is not denying, but only proves that man is a creature of history and the environment.

Paradoxical body: friendly and close but no friends, each for his own master but no enemy

This sounds like a mouthful, but it is Djokovic's best summary of the cruelty of competitive sports.

Not long ago, when asked about his relationship with "Heavenly King" Federer, Deyo did not say those scenes that can never be wrong. His answer was somewhat surprising: "We are never friends, and opponents cannot be friends; But we were never enemies, and I always respected Roger (Federer). The same applies to him and Nadal. It's just that the Serbs and Spaniards, who are more angular than the mild-mannered Swiss, have pinched each other on and off the field for nearly 20 years, and they all turned into tears and warmth at the retirement match of Fei Tianwang.

Boris Becker, who has been Deyo's coach for many years and has the same distinctive personality when he was a player, also sees the contradiction and diversity of personality in Deyo. "On the pitch, he's like a machine, a calm, intelligent competitor who always wants to win games. Off the pitch, he's an amiable and lovely person. He will give you his last shirt if you need it. ”

Deyo respects Federer, but also believes that there are no true friends in the arena.

It's actually not hard to understand. The friends you make in the arena of competitive sports, brothers who are destined to be connected by blood, and family members who get along day and night. But if you want to say that for many years each is the master, and even saber rattling, it will inevitably breed hatred, and that is also a big mistake. For the Serbs, the real feeling of hatred is reserved for the aggressor, brought about by plunder, bombing, blockade and killing.

Making the world on and off the field clearer will make you more sober and save you a lot of trouble. "Cannon" Roddick, who was also known for his straightforward personality, listed a series of injuries during the 2008 US Open to satirize his "fraud" and "fraud" (this move is comparable to the "cough door" of Janway vs Nowitzki in the 2011 NBA Finals), but in the end, Deyo only slightly pouted and did not expand the situation, after all, he was the winner on the court. Later, Kyrgios of the "post-95s" dared to be angry with Deyo unabashedly, and deliberately asked "who is Deyo" when listing the GOAT in the tennis world; But Deyo always smiled lightly when he was an elder, a senior or a player with a higher realm.

In this way, Mr. Yo, who has frequently "been on top" during the playoffs over the years, is still in the young and vigorous state of Deyo 10 years ago. But this year, it is particularly obvious that the personality has ushered in a qualitative transformation with the same skills. After being sent off for pushing and shoving with Suns boss Ishbeia, he handed a ball to the other party with a smile before the next game, hugged him cordially, released his previous suspicions, and claimed to ask Ishpeare to help him pay a fine of $25,000. In the finals, the past of pushing down Big Morris and causing a "brother fight" 2 years ago has been revisited, but don't forget that Butler, who took the lead in blocking the door, is still there. But the teacher is very clear, paying no attention to these details that may cause distraction in public opinion.

The so-called eyes will be rewarded, all remain on the field; And the life off the field belongs to oneself, and it does not necessarily have to be shown.

The war-torn years brought fear but also fortitude

Deyo once told of a young past: "One day, I was alone in the woods and met a wolf, and I felt a deep fear. But later, he stared at the wolf for ten seconds, but suddenly felt some kind of "soul connection".

This is a real wolf in Deyo's childhood memory, and Serbian young people of that era may have an abstract wolf in their hearts, that is, war.

"I grew up with a different environment than many players, I came from a country without a tennis tradition, my family had no funds, and I had a childhood with war." "No one in my family played tennis, and they had to ask a lot of tennis experts if I really had potential, and then they believed and supported me with all their heart," Deyo said. My mother brought all the family together, and my father was the strongest man of faith I have ever met. "

War first brought fear and trauma, and then, after finding that dwelling on it was useless, it internalized into a tenacious force.

Serbs, born in the 1970s and 1980s, who were born before Mr. Jojo, have a first-hand experience of the catastrophe that this land experienced in the last decade of the last century.

In 1999, when the then Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was bombed by NATO for more than two months, Deyo, who was in Belgrade, suffered the same as Divac and Peja in the United States on the other side of the ocean. Deyo often woke up at 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning because of unexpected shells, and then hid in the damp and smelly bomb shelter with countless victims, seeing that his good youth could only be spent in chess and cards, and some teenagers even began to take drugs or engage in other illegal activities. The self-disciplined Deyo saw all this, but he knew better that he had to win the championship and succeed.

Peja and Divac are the Serbian duo of that Kings' team.

Divac and Peja were already teammates in Sacramento by then. After his rookie season, Peja could not return to his homeland, and Divac, as a big brother, although he paralyzed himself every day with prayer and cigarettes, he also had to comfort the young and casual and crying Peja: "It's okay, the war will always end." But after a brief mental sink, Divac resolutely returned to his homeland in the face of instability, and together with his wife set up a foundation to help his fellow citizens displaced during the war, and the couple adopted an orphan who had lost both parents.

Also that year, in the "Belgrade Derby" match of Red Star vs Partizan Group, extreme fans fired rockets into the stands, resulting in the death of an 8-year-old boy. In the nearly 80 years of mutual pinch history, from the historical evolution of "former Yugoslavia→ Serbia → Serbia", in addition to becoming the star-making factory of national football, it also always warns people that the creator of war is not only extraterritorial aggression, but also may be the extreme ideology of "their own people". When sport becomes a vehicle for hatred, the damage it does is immeasurable.

"Belgrade Derby" often became bloody.

Fortunately, for Divac→ Peja→ Deyo → teachers, who have been a generation of Serbian sports people for almost 10 years, these lucky people who have the opportunity to stand on the spires of their respective fields and "open their eyes to the world", sports are not only an escape from the smoke of war, but also a shaping of national spirit. When the wolf in your heart gazes at you but does not destroy you, as Deyo felt back then, fear is internalized into indomitability and tenacity.

New generation: A truly fighting nation is one that holds high the flag but does not drown in trauma

Mention Serbia, and his predecessor, Yugoslavia. The story of Boban's kick sparking a civil war is a topic that cannot be avoided anyway.

In 1990, at the Maximir Stadium in Croatia, Red Star representing Serbs played a national derby against Dinamo Zagreb, representing Croatian. Before the match, fans on both sides had already begun to pick quarrels and provoke trouble, but the local police did not manage it, which led to the tense atmosphere between the two sides further escalated due to the high confrontation of the game. The players of the two teams were almost hand-to-hand combat during the match, with flying tackles and elbow strikes appearing frequently, but the referee was indifferent. At this point, the Croatian fans at home could no longer bear it, storming the pitch and chasing the Red Star players. And the Serbian fans immediately began to fight back, picking up everything they could around them and smashing at the Croatian fans. The two sides fought for an hour before the police launched a crackdown, but they mainly targeted Croatian fans.

This annoyed Croatian player Boban, who was 21 at the time. When he saw a policeman chasing Croatian fans, Boban rushed up and kicked. The kick was captured on camera by reporters and published in the local newspaper the next day. For a time, Boban became a hero of Croatia, and the division of Yugoslavia began.

If the contradiction between Serbia and Croatia was only known to the locals, it was glaring in front of the world at the 1990 World Basketball Championship.

At that time, Croatia's independence movement was already growing loud, and the Croatian flag could be seen everywhere at the competition site. However, this did not affect the excellent performance of the Yugoslav team. With the excellent performances of Divac from Serbia and Petrovic from Croatia, the team made it all the way to the final and eventually defeated the Soviet Union to win the championship.

However, the contradiction erupted at the most glorious moment of Yugoslav basketball.

While everyone was celebrating the victory, a Croatian fan rushed into the arena holding a Croatian flag. Divac from Serbia was so furious, he threw a gun over the flag and threw it on the ground. This moment was recorded by photography and cameras around the world and disseminated around the world. At the same time, this also led to a break in the relationship between Divac and Petrovich. Since then, they have never been able to play for the same team again. Once brothers, now enemies.

Sorting out these two famous events in the history of world sports in chronological order, you can not only sigh at the collapse of such a sports power, but also feel the rewarding side of the Serbian character. This also led to the eventual division of Yugoslavia.

Subsequently, with the rise of the generation of young people born after the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia in various sports and becoming the new leaders in the world sports scene, the definition of "former Yugoslav player" is slowly fading out of the historical stage. The differences between Serbia and other ethnic groups in the memory of the previous generation should not be inherited by the new generation.

Deyo himself is a practitioner of this spirit, supporting and praising each other in public with top teams and players from Croatia, Slovenia and other countries. Before the 2018 men's World Cup final, when Deyo publicly expressed his support for the Croatian team, Croatian players, including Rakitic, went to his social account: "Thank you, legend. "Sympathizing with Doncic from Slovenia, and coldly appearing in the group photo of the Slovenian men's basketball party. Dragic did not shy away from saying that we were once the same country.

While other Serbian tennis players have complained that the government spends a lot of money on team games, while the more individual events are left to the players' own profits, the athletes themselves, especially the world's top athletes, are sometimes extraordinarily simple, respecting the strong and asking nothing else.

Deyo has not shy away from his friendship with players from other countries in the former Yugoslavia.

Of course, there are always people who are not used to it. Some of the extreme fans of the Red Star mentioned above, because of Deyo's close performance with Croatian sports, sent a rebuke: "We support you unconditionally, whether you win or lose, but you choose to support our enemies." But Deyo's performance was somewhat rewarding, and he visited Red Star matches several times to cheer on, and often took photos with fans.

This obsession actually has no reason. Today's young Serbians, although they may not have seen the cruelty of war like the generations of players such as Divac, Peja and Deyo, most of them have also grown up in the long process of homeland reconstruction and national integration after the disaster. In the course of the past 30 years, Serbs can also be called a true "fighting nation". However, the essence of the so-called "fighting nation" should be to devote ourselves to various constructive causes with the spirit of fighting, rather than drowning in the wounds, misunderstandings and hatred of victory.

So we are more pleased to see that people like Bogdan Bogdanovic of Serbia and Bojan Bogdanovic of Croatia feel very close because of the same surname when they meet in the NBA, regardless of those unfounded hatreds.

The Serbian sports people we have witnessed, and even the spiritual core of this nation, have also quietly changed over time. With all these heavy traditions, broken dreams, and hopes of rebirth, whether it is Deyo, who lifted the 23rd Grand Slam Gold Cup, or Jokic, who won the championship and FMVP glory, the Serbian dream they carry is not narrow, but more specific.