The Lakers won the mid-season championship, the current momentum is ferocious, there is a trend of rushing out of the West, the Lakers are definitely not afraid of the Nuggets now, if the two sides meet again, it is really difficult to say whether the winner or loser, after all, the Rockets have studied the Nuggets thoroughly, nothing more than forcing Jokic to play alone, cutting off the connection between him and his teammates, the Lakers' forward defense is much better than the Rockets, they can refer to how the Rockets beat the Nuggets, since the Rockets can do it, there is no reason why the Lakers can't. As a sworn enemy in the same city, the Clippers have also shown signs of strength recently, defeating the Warriors, Nuggets and Jazz successively, and a wave of 3 consecutive wins has shown us the strength of the Clippers.
Especially against the Nuggets, the Clippers won the defending champion of the full lineup, in this game, the Clippers fell behind by 15 points in the first quarter, and then caught up in the second quarter, and in the second half, George, Leonard and Harden took turns to exert their strength, and the Clippers finally staged a big comeback. Looking back on this wave of 3 consecutive wins, the Clippers are gradually on the right track, mainly because they have solved the compatibility problem of the Big Four, what should be done?There are three main points, the first is that Wei Shao's bench playing time has been compressed, and Tyronn Lue can now see it clearly, Harden and Wei Shao cannot be on the court at the same time, otherwise the Clippers will definitely lose points, so Lu wants Harden to play more with the bench lineup.
The result is that Wei Shao's playing time is gradually decreasing, in fact, there is no way to do it, the two have equal organizational skills, but Harden's advantage is that he has three-point ability and will not be emptied, so naturally Wei Shao has to make sacrifices, especially when he falls into a stalemate in the final quarter, Wei Shao tries not to play, not that he doesn't play well, but because when he is there, Harden doesn't know what to do at all. Fortunately, Wei Shao is a very generous person, after the game with the Jazz, Wei Shao said that he would not care about his playing time, as long as he can win, he is willing to play for 10 minutes, so the Clippers won the bet, and there was no internal contradiction caused by compressing Wei Shao's playing time.
Whether it is Leonard fans or Harden fans, they should apologize to Wei Shao, Wei Shao is often criticized when he is not performing well, thinking that he should not play, but from another point of view, without Wei Shao's willing sacrifice spirit, the Clippers will not be able to win, and will only become the laughing stock of the whole league as they did at the beginning of the season. Looking at the second point, Tyronn Lue adjusted his tactics and re-emphasized the importance of Leonard's leader, after Harden joined, George was the player with the most shots from the Clippers for a long time, and the scoring was also the highest on the team, giving us the feeling that he was more like a leader, and Leonard was the second leader, which led to the Clippers' record of losing more and winning less.
George's stability is not as good as Leonard, handing the ball to the small card, this is the way the Clippers should win, so the last three consecutive wins, Leonard's shots have increased significantly, against the Nuggets 23 in 14, George is 13 in 8, there can only be one leader, if Leonard and George still can't tell each other, then it is difficult for the Clippers to win. Finally, Harden's role is also changing, the beard only needs to do two things, the first is to hand the ball to Leonard after holding the ball over half court, the chemistry between the two is gradually heating up, and secondly, Harden himself has to attack more, don't hesitate, because the beard is willing to score, easy to attract bags, and will also create more comfortable scoring opportunities for Leonard.
Leonard's best state is quite good, the second time against the Nuggets cut 31 points, 34 points against the Kings, 41 points against the Jazz, the more Leonard scores, the stronger the Clippers will be, speaking of which you have to complain about Harden, I believe many Clippers fans have seen that Harden's dribbling rhythm is too slow, basically 6-7 seconds to pass the half, sometimes 8 seconds of time, and so on to Leonard's hands, Xiaoka has to hard singles in order to save time, if it is passed out, there will be less than 3 seconds left in the hands of others, and he can only be forced to shoot, which is why the Clippers often have 24-second violations on the offensive end, and Harden himself is too slow。
It's a pity that Harden seems to be still in the dark, and there is no sign of change, after all, whether it is the Rockets, the Nets or the 76ers, Harden plays like this, his rhythm has always been slow, and he has adapted, and now let Harden suddenly change, it is difficult in a short period of time, but for the Clippers, Harden must speed up, and he can't change it, otherwise the Clippers' offense is easy to stagnate, unless Leonard is in a ferocious state, and all kinds of singles can't be prevented, but what if the small card also feels bad?With Harden's rhythm, then the Clippers are prone to offensive problems, and I hope Harden can recognize his shortcomings and raise the speed as soon as possible.