Just about half a month ago, I saw an interesting short video officially launched by League of Legends.
In a somewhat dim tone deliberately adjusted by the makers, Gordon Hayward, dressed in a green jersey, fell heavily on the maple floor and wailed, while Hayward on the other side manipulated a hero in League of Legends called the Barbarian King to launch a rapid impact on the sword demon. Subsequently, two parallel worlds alternately occupied the phone screen at a speed that I felt a headache, sometimes in reality Hayward angrily pressed the remote control to block the sound of espn twitter, and sometimes the barbarian king got up from the ground.
Eventually, the Barbarian King swung his sexy sword at the Sword Demon with the zeal of the Bull Demon King rushing towards the Iron Fan Princess, while Gordon Hayward slowly stepped out of the shadows and prepared to shoot in a very standard posture.
If my shallow impression of the game does not deviate from my memory, this hero who resembles the Bull Demon King named Tedamir, the producer positioned him as "fearless of torment, endless life".
Very interesting publicity, very beautiful meaning.
Just before writing this article, I posed an interesting question in my private WeChat group, "Counting from the back to the front, what do you think are the injuries and illnesses that may have changed the NBA landscape?" ”
"Kd's Achilles tendon!" "I have a knee injury." "Cousins Cousins! "18 Thighs of Mount Paul of the Western Decisive Heavenly King!" "Yao Ming! "Bogut"...........
I combed through the messy list and finally found one thing, even though their memories go back to Sampson and Wharton, even if someone flipped through 10 years of Perkins and 08 of Bynum, and even had the half-joking response of "Simmons reimbursed the rookie season", and no one tried to mention the landing that made the quick loan center instantly quiet on October 8, 2017.
In that instant, I distinctly remember Reggie Miller and his Tnt colleagues looking at each other and muttering, "How fast... One season, that changed? ”
Today, the chain reaction induced by this deal may be even more exaggerated than we think.
The Celtics' heyday ended with Bird's 4-of-17 in Game 6 of the 1988 Eastern Conference Finals, and the all-powerful legendary Larry was made like a burn-out trumpet Anderson by Rodman with a back injury, and McHale's limp knocked the last nail on Boston's glory. We all know that the Green Dynasty, which has been continued by Havlicek and Dave Cowens since the time of Ohabah, Kusi, and Russell, and once again by Bird, McHale, Chief, Dj and Angie, has truly come to an end, and is about to usher in a reconstruction for an unknown amount of time.
In 1997 they were infinitely close to getting Duncan but ultimately failed, and anthony Walker and Paul Pierce spent several years together. After one night, Paul Pierce learned to shoulder the expectations of the entire city, from a player who wanted to ask him every night whether he had just woken up from an all-night hangover to a "truth" as we knew it, and then It was Angie who set out to form the Big Three, and Boston regained its crown after twenty years.
However, Garnett's injury and the rapid aging of the thirty-year-olds have made this gamble fail to recover the expected return when the chips are first assembled. Bradley and Isaiah Jr. supported Boston for the next decade, but the 2017 Eastern Conference Finals back-to-back defeats made us know that this was the limit of the combination. Then, Tatum and Brown ushered in a new era for Boston, with Angie successfully bringing in Irving and Hayward in the offseason, and then, that injury.
From the history of the future, the young legion led by Tatum and the weakest Cavaliers in recent years did their final moments to grab the seventh, losing only one hand to LeBron for 48 minutes. Hayward, who has returned in the new season, has lost the standard and majesty of an All-Star, and the youngsters who came outside the Finals last season are desperate to know how many pounds they have, and the voice of "why give him so much time" began to appear in the locker room.
Horford was too quiet, Irving couldn't hold down the locker room, Stevens couldn't find a balance between not hurting Hayward's pride and young player ambitions, and a lot of small frictions eventually turned into a torrential rain that extinguished the flames of Boston's second revival. It all ended so quickly, and after the 2019 openers 76ers vs Celtics, I thought it was the beginning of a reenactment of the '80s saga, a reflection of the next five years in the East End, but it turned out to be the final season of one of the teams.
What if Hayward wasn't injured in the opener?
What happens if Hayward leads the team to the finals?
What if Hayward hadn't been in a state slump due to injury, what if the young players hadn't had an overly strong desire to replace him?
Maybe a lot of the rising flames won't burst out and ignite gasoline everywhere, maybe this team is still safe, maybe Angie will push for the Davis trade more firmly with Hayward, maybe Irving won't go to Brooklyn, then Durant won't go to New York.... I can say 10,086 maybe, from this point of view, Hayward's injury carries a sense of fate with a butterfly fluttering its wings. And a year later, people even forget that this injury may have killed the birth of a great team in the cradle and changed the future of many people, after all, the protagonist of this story can only average more than 20 points in the playoffs and regular season after the comeback.
Why should people remember him again?
This isn't the first time Hayward has faced heaven's charade.
In the days when genetic mutations were not prevalent, doctors who watched Hayward's birth had no reason to think he could grow to 2 meters. Looking at Hayward's parents, the blunt assertion is like an iron net hanging down from God, framing the limits of this child's fate.
"1 meter 88, this kid should be so tall."
We should know what a white defender under one meter nine means in the sport in the twenty-first century. So, this story probably shouldn't have been what we saw a long time ago.
However, because of the love of basketball and the influence of the atmosphere of Indianapolis, this child who was destined to grow tall still went to basketball. He learned to dribble, learned to remember the position of his teammates as he moved at high speeds, played Contra and Halo with his father, and then went to the court to practice free throws together. This project with affection and eager expectations was trained by the pair with a nice name, Steve Alford. [1]
[1]: One of the best free throwers in NCAA's history, and they came from the same place.
However, there are some things that at the time didn't seem like hard work could change, even if you curled up in a quilt all night and prayed to God.
"You work hard, we also see your excellence in the eyes, you may be able to become a very good high school basketball player", "Forehead, child, unless you can grow to six feet instead of five feet, you may be able to impact professional basketball, otherwise..."
For those who want to climb to the top of professional sports and make a career out of it, basketball seems to be less attractive at this moment than tennis, or even a professional esports otaku. Hayward and his sister competed in the Indiana Tennis League as a doubles mixed doubles player, forming a team with their friends that would earn enough money at the Halo esports Tournament.
Do you still want to stick to basketball? Would it have been harder for Hayward, who was in high school at the time, than to get up from the floor in Cleveland?
I don't know the answer to that question, but we do know the ending of the story, where Hayward's mother, Jody Hayward, finally blocked the idea he wanted to switch to tennis and bluntly urged him to run all the way toward his dream until he hit the south wall.
Hayward did so, and the south wall was broken.
The 5'11" kid eventually grew to 6'8 and eventually became the Hayward we knew. This impact on the south wall turned the noose that hung down in fate overnight into a pendulum of trial determination. Old Hayward looked up at his son who had made his choice at a height of 5 feet, and could only interpret this as a gift from God.
Coach Kendrick anticipated what would happen in the future, a player who had been practicing long-range shooting, control and organization since childhood as a defender suddenly had the physique of a forward line, and the sight lost because of height would eventually focus on them again.
Hayward did just that, averaging 18 points, 8.4 rebounds and 3.6 assists at the end of his high school career and was named Indianapolis Player of the Year. The most remarkable moment for him came in the final 2.1 seconds of the 4A tournament, when Brownsburg trailed Marion by one point and Hayward stepped forward to grab the opportunity similar to jordan had grabbed when he was wearing North Carolina, completing the winning layup before the timer sounded.
By the time high school was over, Gordon Hayward's five words meant so much more than before. Along with the promises of scholarships from several universities, there was the Bulldogs' Brad Stevens coach who rang all day — "I was completely mesmerized by that kid." We knew how good he was, but Hayward himself didn't seem to know, and I was very, very much looking forward to getting a call from Indianapolis in the office, really. ”
In the end, the Bulldogs, who won the gordon scramble, started Hayward's freshman season with a 19-1 result, and a year later, when Stevens sat in front of Hayward, who had just won The Rookie of the Year, he was already talking about higher levels of talent and the gradually clearer future.
Taylor, Thompson, Miller and Hayward were selected for the U19 tournament in the United States, and he was constantly given new expectations, appearing in the list of the "most anticipated college students" in the United States and in the press, constantly dragging the bulldog step by step to the highest hall of the ncaa crazy March with elite competitions.
Will Gordon Hayward remember the choice he made under the influence of his mother, and the "5'11" assertion that almost made him give up?
Gordon Hayward University's brightest moments stayed in the final 3.6 seconds of facing Duke. Duke center Zubeck conceded a second free throw, which Hayward grabbed, quickly crossed the half, threw the shot that determined the title, hit the rebound, and bounced out in front of the basket. The Pit Bulldog's championship trophy fell a few inches away, and Gordon eventually left the college arena.
After the story, we are very familiar with it.
This is a brief summary of the story behind Gordon Hayward and what Hayward went through before he became known as Hayward. In the process of reading the material and writing about it all, the 5'11 argument, the rumor that Hayward wanted to go to tennis in high school, and his smooth rise in college, produced a wonderful contrast.
There are no slums, no wars, no separation of relatives or some earth-shattering ghost story meeting, these are written in gordon Hayward's official website in plain English like all students who fill out the major after the college entrance examination. But that year, before Hayward's height showed signs of breaking the ceiling, how determined did the $10 million All-Star make, leaving his best time for the "1.88m white guard," a model that didn't look promising, and abandoning the more conservative and seemingly more advantageous tennis?
Jody Hayward said, "Make a choice and keep going."
I can't predict the future recovery of Gordon Hayward as a generalist, or the end of the story of Boston, the ancient capital of basketball, but one thing should be certain before the start of the 2020 season.
Standing up from the floor of the quickloan center and the shadow extended by that injury may not be more difficult than making a white guard who already knows that he is up to 1.88 meters tall to continue to insist on professional basketball. It was like the unbelievable look in Hayward's 5-foot-11 eyes after looking up at his son
After all, God has already taken care of you once.