This season is Bobby Portis' fourth year in the league, and while he's had a few games that were brilliant, he was known to more players and fans because of his grumpy personality. He clashed with teammate Nikola Mirotic during an intra-team training match last season, and he was later suspended for eight games before he was saddled with the title of a villain.
Bobby Portis was born in Little Rock, central Arkansas, where he developed this personality, where he and his mother played card games and talked trash. It seems that Portis hated failure, and after entering the team in high school, his wild personality was more intense. He was tough in the team's "tough man training", he often had some exaggerated movements, teammates were worried that they would get hurt and stay away from him when they confronted him, and the coach slowly got used to Portis's way. His high school coach Jon Coleman commented: "The average person doesn't take the initiative to provoke him, he's like a beast. ”
From the time he began playing basketball, Portis has been playing with this wild personality, and his fierce way of playing has made coaches and teammates admire him, but it has also brought him a bad reputation, and he has not relented but become paranoid.
In Portis's view, he has always been a villain on the pitch, and when playing in the AAU league, the referee warned his coach that it was better not to send Portis on the court, and these happened to be heard by Portis. During his clash with Mirotic, Mirotic's facial bones were shattered in two pieces by Portis, which had a bad effect on the Bulls, when players who witnessed it all began to move away from Portis. But Portis didn't care much about what he did, knowing that there were a lot of players and referees who didn't like the way he played. On February 7 of this year, Portis was traded to the Wizards.
His reputation as a villain also affected his game, with Portis being fouled by the opposing player in the final moment of the Wizards' game against the Hornets on March 8, but the referee did not whistle, and the team lost the game by one point. The game is important for the Wizards who want to make it to the playoffs, and he has been grumpy about it, and Portis has spoken out on social media. He said to the official referee: "I know I am not liked by the referee and the players, but you can't let us lose because of this, I was fouled twice without a whistle, and when the referee reports out, I can prove your mistake." ”
In a post-match interview, Portis said: "Obviously they don't whistle because of me, and if it were other players, they would definitely whistle." I knew that the conflict had made my reputation worse, but I was used to them doing this to me. ”
The referee's report acknowledged the foul and missed the verdict at the time, but the referee's opinion of Portis remained unchanged, and Portis said: "It's like if you do a bad thing, you will forever bear the reputation of a villain." ”
Let's go back to Little Rock to see how Portis grew up. His friends know very well what kind of person Portis is, the team loses Portis will cry because they can't accept reality, in fact, Portis's heart is also very sensitive,
His mother, Tina Edwards, gave birth to four children, with Portis being the oldest. In order to earn money, his mother worked a lot of work, and one day he came home from school to find that everything in the house had been thrown out, and for a long time he and his family could only live a life of displacement.
Marcus McCarroll, the coach of the AAU team he used to play for, said: "He had a lot of difficulties in his life as a child, but he survived, so he knew how to face the difficulties. His good friend Anthony Black said: "Several of our friends didn't have a very good time when they were young, Portis was much worse than us, as the eldest brother of the family he had to stand up and earn money to help his mother support the family, and his relationship with his father was not very good." If you also live in Little Rock, you'll know how difficult it is. ”
The bumpy experience from childhood is also one of the reasons for his character, life has always been difficult for him, so he cherishes everything now. In Black's view, the young Portis was just a tall man with no athletic talent, and his body was very thin. The coach told him to keep up with the defensive players and try to grab rebounds, and when he was eleven years old, he told Coach McRoller that he was going to play professional basketball, and the coach just smiled and didn't take his words seriously.
Coach McRoll said: "He was naïve at the time, he wanted to play but he didn't understand basketball very well. Portis's idea was questioned by many people, but he did not give up his goal. He created the character he wanted to be in the basketball game, a tall interior player of 6'10" and 250 pounds. In high school, Portis slowly made a name for himself, not only making a mcDonald's All-Star team, but also leading the team to four consecutive state championships. In his sophomore year, Portis became even stronger, beating nearly every player on the University of Kentucky team planning to enter the NBA draft, including Carl Anthony Downs, Willie Cowley-Stein and Devon Booker, who became the SEC Player of the Year that year.
Willy Cauley-Stein, who was defeated by him, said: "Although I was defeated by him, I admired him. He led the team to the final four that year and as an opponent I didn't want to touch him on the field again. In the 2015 draft, he was lucky enough to be selected by the Bulls in 22nd place, which motivated him to play better, Portis said: "I have a lot of energy in my heart, I want to prove my strength. ”
Portis' bad name was in Little Rock, when he beat an adult man to the hospital. In order to enhance the players' ability to fight, the coaches of his high school team would turn a blind eye to some fouls, and in a training match, an assistant coach deliberately knocked down Portis at the free throw line, and he rushed over and beat the assistant coach in anger.
Not very shocked when Portis' high school team coach Coleman heard he had injured Mirotic, Coleman said: "He's tougher than before, and he never backs down when he feels threatened." "Some people in Little Rock who know Portis have become accustomed to his behavior like this, but there are many people in the NBA who don't understand his approach, and there are many people who alienate Portis.
In a bulls-versus-Wizards game last season, Portis knocked Satoransky to the ground when defensive Wizards guard Tomash Satoransky made a layup, injuring Satoransky's head and minor concussion, when the referee directly gave Portis a second-degree malicious foul plus expulsion. Afterwards, Portis insisted that he was going for the ball, and that there was no basis for the referee to punish him for malicious fouls. Wizards head coach Scott Brooks said: "It's obviously a very dangerous move, he doesn't even understand some of the rules of basketball. Later, Portis was traded to the Wizards, and he didn't communicate with Satoransky about it.
In the past two seasons, Portis has been whistleblown four times, but in fact, Joel Embiid and Devin Booker have been blown seven times and six times in two seasons. Portis also knew that it was his bad reputation that brought him a bad blow.
Some time ago, when Portis was playing against his old club Bulls, he was sentenced to a first-degree malicious foul for too much defensive action, and he only had physical contact with Markkanen's face when defending Markkanen's shot, and he did not understand this decision, and he thought that this behavior was unintentional.
Portis said: "I just went to the ball, and after jumping up, I was a little out of control of my body, and there was no need to punish the criminal. If it was someone else, they might have done that, but the referee might not have fouled them, but I'm used to it, and many times the referee has made unreasonable decisions on me. ”
Caws' Cowley-Stein sympathized with Portis' plight, arguing that Portis had a lot of excessive penalties because of his bad reputation. He said: "I understand Portis's feelings, he is just labeled as an evil person, many people have an impression of him from that training match conflict, and under normal circumstances, as long as a person has done something bad, it is difficult to change people's impression of him." ”
Those who know Portis know what it means to get along with him, and he has become accustomed to imagining many people as his enemies, and it is in this way that he has overcome many difficulties.
"Everything I do is to prove myself, no matter what people think of me, I still play my own way, only then can I go further," Portis said. ”
Candace Buckner
Compilation: Sunny
<b>Biography</b>