CHAPTER 1301: CHAPTER 526: STARTING WITH AN 8-GAME WINNING STREAK!

Starting the season with a 1 home 4 away 5-game winning streak, on November 4th at noon, Zhang Yang, preparing to return to Charlotte with the team, received good news. He defeated James and received the ’Luxury Week of the Opening Season’ Eastern Conference Player of the Week award for the period from October 27th to yesterday.

In the Western Conference, the ’Luxury Week of the Opening Season’ Player of the Week was awarded to Nowitzki, with a record of 4 wins and 1 loss, averaging 25.2 points, 7.8 rebounds, 4 assists, and 1.4 blocks. His shooting percentage, for a shooting-style big man, was impressively high at 51.1+42.6+100, with all of his first 30 free throw attempts of the season being perfect.

The opponent he defeated was Duncan, who averaged 17 points, 10.8 rebounds, 3 assists, and 2.8 blocks while leading his team to a 5-game winning streak.

A winning streak plus an award should have meant double the joy, but upon returning home and seeing the news... the direction in which some media outlets spun things made him feel like he had swallowed a fly.

He immediately called the video editor, instructing him to edit footage of every Cavaliers game from the season start to before their matchup with the Bobcats on the 23rd... Promising a cash tip of 100 US dollars per game, the editor, who had initially said that some games did not need editing, immediately responded, "Do you need preseason footage? I can find it!"

In his first 5 games of the season, Zhang Yang averaged 30.2 points, 5.2 rebounds, 3.4 assists, and 2.6 steals, with a record of 5 wins and 0 losses; he defeated James, who averaged 28.8 points, 7.2 rebounds, 8.6 assists, and 1.8 steals, leading his team to a 4-1 record, to earn the Player of the Week award. There was seemingly nothing wrong with this.

However, some media outlets singled out his 5 games for separate analysis: scoring 35 points against the Miami Heat, 13 points against the Pistons, 23 points against the 76ers, 53 points against the Bucks, and 28 points against the Magic. Then they calculated his average without the 53-point outburst against the Bucks, saying that without that explosive game, his average points would no longer surpass James. They argued that his performance was not as consistent as James, and therefore, he shouldn’t have received Player of the Week just based on better records. Instead, it should go to the truly stronger and more consistent performer, like how Nowitzki defeated Duncan in the Western Conference.

Meanwhile, he averaged only 2 turnovers per game, less than half of James’s average of 4.1 turnovers. His average of 2.9 fouls per game was also lower than James’s 3.4. Against the Pistons, he played only 16 minutes before calling it a day... which that portion of the media conveniently failed to mention.

Zhang Yang originally thought that he had seen enough of such things, yet he didn’t expect these keyboard warriors to constantly refresh his understanding...

After venting over more than a thousand US dollars, Zhang Yang calmed down, realizing that sometimes James really had it tough too.

This year, James has been humble enough, no longer popping champagne before the season like in the previous two years, claiming he would bring a championship to Cleveland. He has been playing very well, achieving a 50%+ shooting percentage for the first time in his career at the start of the season, with a three-point shooting percentage reaching 36%, averaging two three-pointers per game, a career high. Especially on defense, he can guard positions 1 through 4. Although his one-on-one defense against all-star level and above players is somewhat loose, against normal stars or in help defense, he’s incredibly strong. His efficiency almost allows him to compete with Howard for the Best Defensive Player.

Zhang Yang believes that after several years of being hammered in the playoffs, James genuinely intends to keep a low profile this year, but such things are not something a superstar with their kind of popularity can decide on. The media pushing behind them will direct their path.

Just like him and Yao Ming, in the public eye, they are merely ’superficially polite’ but privately dead to each other, yet only through frequent family interactions can they avoid being affected by such rumors. However, even so, they still want to compete with each other, even more eager to defeat one another.

He and James do not have much personal interaction. Their competition on the court... Zhang San’s focus has never been on how to become ’the most loved athlete by the media and fans.’ He truly doesn’t believe he’s in a competitive position with James. The environment James is currently in won’t pose much of a threat to him come playoff time.

Yet even so, he often gets swayed by the media, finding James unappealing. He figures that for James, this is likely a frequent occurrence.

This kind of excessive praise, Zhang Yang believes, might have another effect on James — feeling like he’s already excellent enough, so when he loses in the playoffs, he’s not to blame. Initially, it might be self-deception for comfort, but gradually it becomes reality.

However, in this timeline, the impact on James seems to be smaller in this regard. Although his technical progress isn’t particularly rapid, it’s evident that he continuously strives to make up for shortcomings. Even though it was slightly delayed, with his years aged 19 to 22 somewhat being wasted during his rookie period, it’s not too late to mend the fence after the sheep are lost.

Primarily, in this timeline, the Eastern Conference is very unfriendly to James. After 2007, the landscape changed. Their Bobcats won the championship, Howard came of age, and the Magic started achieving results, the ’Little Giant’ made waves in the East... With a bit of bad luck, James might not get past the first round, forced to improve.

...

After two days of rest, the Bobcats kicked off a 4-game home stretch by pounding the Brooklyn Nets with a 131-93 win, followed by a 97-92 comeback victory over the Trail Blazers in the final quarter, and then a 116-91 thrashing of the Toronto Raptors.

The Brooklyn Nets started with a 6-game losing streak, being the only team at the start of the season without a win. Even the Wizards managed to beat the Warriors once; it was blatant tanking without even trying to disguise it.

During the offseason, Zhang Yang saw that the Nets practically gifted Carter to the Magic, even throwing in the shooting-talented power forward Ryan Andersen, and immediately knew that the Nets were going to tank in the new season.

Leaving high trade value Odom, aiming for the number one draft pick, lowering the total salary cap... The Nets’ owner might as well have ’Sale of the Team on the Rise’ written on his face.