The Golden Age of Basketball-Chapter 153 - 51 I Have 2 Hands

Drexler had spent the morning practicing shooting with Gan Guoyang, and after a brief rest at noon, they preserved their energy for the evening’s game.

Feeling a hint of fatigue from not getting enough sleep, Clyde asked Gan Guoyang, "How long have you been keeping up with this routine of early rising and training?"

Gan Guoyang said, "Ever since I started to play basketball in 1981, I’ve never stopped."

"You didn’t start playing basketball until 1981?"

"Yes," Gan Guoyang thought, If only I had traveled back two years earlier, I could have started playing sooner.

"About the same as Hakeem, he started playing basketball at 16 too. You both are monsters."

"Don’t compare me with him, he’s one of my defeated opponents."

Drexler knew about Gan Guoyang’s competitive nature and didn’t say much more, but in his heart, he believed Olajuwon was no worse than Gan Guoyang.

After the season started, Rookie of the Year Olajuwon also put on a dazzling performance, scoring 24 points in his debut game, and on November 1st, he scored 25 points with 13 rebounds and 6 blocks against the Kansas Kings.

As of yesterday, November 10th, the Houston Rockets had secured a seven-game winning streak and were currently at the top of the Western Conference, with the Rockets looking bright for the future.

In the afternoon, the NBA officially announced last week’s best player, and Gan Guoyang, due to leading the Trail Blazers to consecutive victories and scoring over 40 points in two games, successfully received the first Player of the Week award of the season as a rookie.

At that time, Player of the Week wasn’t separated by conference, but was selected from all players in the League, so this honor held a great deal of prestige.

Before the evening game against the Golden State Warriors, Gan Guoyang received congratulations from the League, with David Stern himself calling to offer encouragement.

This was Gan Guoyang’s first direct interaction with David Stern; he hadn’t attended the draft, so he hadn’t shaken hands with Stern onstage.

As for the future prominent but controversial Commissioner of the League, Gan Guoyang was still unsure about his impression of him—anyway, Fleisher grumbled about this old rival every day.

But given Fleisher’s status and power, anyone who could keep him complaining must not be an easy character, certainly a tough one.

Before the game against the Warriors, Gan Guoyang and Larry Smith chatted on the sideline.

In high school, Gan Guoyang had often sneaked into Warriors’ practices, learning a lot from Larry Smith and Bernard King.

It was especially Bernard King’s guidance that laid the foundation for Gan Guoyang’s offensive skills; his techniques with subtle movements, small spaces, quick turns, and high release points influenced Gan Guoyang’s entire career.

Advancements and enhancements in Gan Guoyang’s offensive techniques were developed based on King’s methods, forming a distinctive style.

More than two years had passed, and the Warriors had undergone significant personnel changes, a team once full of hope quickly disintegrated due to the owner’s reckless decisions.

In the summer of ’82, the Warriors did not keep King, letting him go to his hometown New York Knicks, and the lineup they had previously built began to collapse.

Mid-season, World B. Flynn was traded to the Cavaliers, and this summer, Joe Barry Carroll suddenly didn’t feel like playing anymore and ran off to the Italian league to bully weaker teams.

The core trio had been cleared out, the championship coach Attles was out of a job, and the team, with Purvis Short at its core, embarked on a lengthy rebuilding journey.

Larry Smith was one of the few old guards still remaining with the Warriors, having gone from a rookie in 1981 to an old hand with five years in the League.

He maintained plenty of energy and desire for offensive rebounds, and despite some injury troubles, his condition was quite good this year.

Before the game, he joked with Gan Guoyang, claiming he would grab at least five offensive rebounds at Memorial Coliseum; Gan Guoyang told him, for every offensive rebound you get, I’ll give you a hundred US dollars in cash.

During the game, Gan Guoyang ended up with 22 rebounds, 20 of which were defensive, not allowing Larry Smith a single offensive board.

This game became the only one in the 1984-1985 season where Larry Smith didn’t grab an offensive rebound.

In every other game he played, he managed to snatch at least one offensive rebound—even in a game where he played only 4 minutes before getting injured, his sole contribution was an offensive board.

After the game, Larry Smith said Gan Guoyang still owed him money as tuition for the techniques he had learned at the Warriors back in the day, but Gan Guoyang settled the fee by treating Larry Smith to dinner.

At home, the Trail Blazers easily defeated the rebuilding Warriors 110:95, immediately regaining footing after their loss to the Lakers and raising their record to 8 wins and 1 loss, ranking second in the Western Conference just behind the Rockets.

However, this game further exposed the Trail Blazers’ weakness in perimeter defense, as Purvis Short scored 48 points against Vandeweghe’s defense. Although he couldn’t help the Warriors withstand the Trail Blazers alone, allowing a player to score that high on one’s home court was still not a matter of pride.

This wasn’t the first time this year Vandeweghe had been dropped high scores by opposing small forwards. Not long ago, when the Trail Blazers played against Vandeweghe’s former team, the Nuggets, English dropped 45 points.

Vandeweghe’s pressure on the defense against his matchups was too little.

The sharpness of his offense and victories temporarily overshadowed his defensive issues, but Ramsay had already taken note of this, so in the game against the Warriors, he increased Jerome Kossie’s playing time.

Kossie played for 23 minutes in the game, the longest single-game playing time since he joined the team. His offense wasn’t good, but on defense, he had one block, one steal, and countless times of active defense, which was a stark contrast to Vandeweghe’s sluggishness.

Ramsay tried to use this internal competition to ignite Vandeweghe’s defensive enthusiasm, but Old Van was a gentleman of a pleasant and easy-going nature. Even if Ramsay scolded him in training or during a game, he would just laugh and say he would definitely do better next time.

Vandeweghe came from an athletic family; his father was Ernie Vandeweghe, a player for the Knicks in the 50s, his mother was Miss America, and his uncle was All-Star player Mel Hutchins. Unlike Kossie, who came from poverty, he lacked some combativeness.

Off the court, he got along very well with the team; in the game, he was a silent assassin, precisely completing his shots and fast breaks, easily dropping over 20 points each game.

He never got into conflicts with opponents on the court and basically would have no violations throughout a season’s worth of games—he had been in the League for five seasons and hadn’t even committed a single technical foul.

Unlike Gan Guoyang, who got two technical fouls after only five games, one for arguing with the referee about a foul call in the game against the Supersonics and another for elbowing Rambis during the game against the Lakers.

Off the court, Vandeweghe and Drexler got on particularly well. One loved to sleep in, the other hated to play defense; indeed, birds of a feather flock together, unlike Gan Guoyang, who was strictly self-disciplined in training.

Of course, their relationship wasn’t bad. In the years to come, Drexler would be Gan Guoyang’s top gossip provider, sharing many secrets of the NBA players’ small circle. They just couldn’t be the kind of buddies who hung out together every day.

After trying Gan Guoyang’s one-day routine, Drexler chose to give up. His physical condition was good enough, but he still couldn’t handle it.

On the night of the 11th, Drexler didn’t have much of a noteworthy performance when he came off the bench against the Warriors. He attributed this to a lack of sleep.

He decided to train in shooting with Gan Guoyang and Vandeweghe in the future, and he would try not to be late in the morning, but getting up to exercise at dawn was still out of the question.

On the night of the 13th, the Trail Blazers hosted the Dallas Mavericks at home. During the pre-game preparation meeting, Ramsay asked Vandeweghe, "How do you plan to defend Aguirre tonight? How many points do you plan to let him get?"

Vandeweghe said, "I plan to offset Aguirre’s scoring with my shooting."

"Well, you’re quite clever, so you’d better score 40 points tonight!"

Vandeweghe smiled and didn’t say a word. Ramsay sighed and said, "When you played under Larry-Brown, it wasn’t like this. You were very active on defense at UCLA, right?"

When Larry-Brown was mentioned, the smile on Vandeweghe’s face disappeared, and he said, "Good thing he isn’t the coach of the Trail Blazers... otherwise, I wouldn’t have agreed to come to Portland."

Vandeweghe had gone through a nightmarish season at UCLA during his senior year after the team’s coach changed to Larry-Brown. Of course, that year his statistics were the best they had ever been.

His highest scoring, most rebounds, most blocks (0.6), and also most fouls. After the season ended, Larry-Brown recommended Vandeweghe to the Nuggets, who picked him in the draft.

So while they got along well off the court, Vanderweghe didn’t want to play for Larry-Brown on the court; it was too restrictive.

"Well, I might have to call Larry and get some advice," Ramsay said.

Just then, Gan Guoyang, who had been tying his shoelaces, stood up and said, "I can take care of Aguirre. Just let Cheche focus on scoring and fast breaks, everyone should do what they’re good at on the court."

Ramsay glared at Gan Guoyang and said, "You’re going to deal with Aguirre? Then who’s going to guard Sam Bowie?"

Gan Guoyang held out both hands and said, "I have two hands, the right one will take care of Aguirre, and the left one will take care of Bowie."

Ramsay crossed his arms and sighed, "I should send you to run for president this year, with your gift of the gab that needs no preparation, not even Reagan could beat you!"

Though he criticized verbally, Ramsay actually agreed to Gan Guoyang’s defensive plan to have him wrongfoot Aguirre in the game.

It seemed that Dr. Jack still wanted to collect more observational samples.

[...Gan was an extremely competitive person with particularly high demands for defense. On the court, he would direct everyone to defend, pointing out each person’s defensive flaws. He was already a commander upon entering the League. But Gan never complained; even when the defenses of people like Cheche and Parkson were heavily criticized, he never blamed them off the court. Not because they were seniors; even years later, when he became the oldest player on the team, he never casually attacked the rookies for their defense and game attitudes.

Gan always led by example; he would take on the most formidable arrows of the opposition from the center position to the small forward position. The point guard and shooting guard positions would be handled by Clyde. He would inspire everyone with his defensive passion, so much so that even the defensively laziest Cheche would often be influenced to fierce play.

In November 1984, Reagan won the election easily, his campaign slogan being "The welfare system is broken, and I’m the man to fix it." If Gan were to run for election, I think his slogan would be, "The defensive system is broken, and I’m the man to fix it." And he did just that.]

————Published in 2011, ’Dr. Jack On Winning Basketball’ by Jack Ramsey and Neil Waller, excerpt.