Free Web NovelChapter 409: Chapter 133: Backfired Flattery
"He should be called Little Olajuwon," Charles Barkley said on TV.
The VIPs at courtside nodded in agreement.
As for the rosters, while the San Antonio Spurs were powerful, the Indiana Pacers were just incredibly balanced and exceptional.
The Pacers had no weak links at any of the five positions, and their bench rotation was stronger than many teams’ starting lineups.
Few teams in the entire league could compete with a frontcourt lineup of Foster, Tony Battie, David Harrison, Slade, and Little O’Neal.
The Spurs had an all-time great in Duncan, but Little O’Neal was on the cusp of being considered a superstar in his own right.
Foster and Tony Battie were definitely better than Muhammad and Nestorovic.
On the perimeter, the trio of Su Xi, Artest, and Jackson was already the best in the league... and their chemistry was incredible. If the league hadn’t cracked down on defense this season, they would have been even more dominant.
The game continued, with both teams going back and forth.
After picking up a technical foul, Bowen toned it down a little.
Thanks to Duncan’s stellar play and Ginobili’s slashing drives, the Spurs gradually closed the gap.
With 4:36 remaining in the game...
Ginobili hit a three-pointer, tying the game for the Spurs. The entire arena erupted.
Ginobili was simply magical. He possessed tremendous offensive talent, limited only by his stamina—and tonight, his stamina was excellent. He was displaying the same dominance he showed when playing for his national team.
In fact, he was always considered the X-factor capable of swinging the game.
Even though the Spurs had tied the game, the Pacers, led by Su Xi, remained calm and steady, never rushing.
The Pacers weren’t some reckless young team; they were battle-hardened. They were the defending champions.
Though only a sophomore, Su Xi knew exactly how to control the flow of the game.
He brought the ball past half court and ran a pick-and-roll with Tony Battie. Driving hard to the basket, he pulled up just outside the restricted area and gave a convincing pump fake, drawing Duncan over on help defense.
The moment Duncan lunged forward, Su Xi threaded a deft pass right between his legs. The ball shot through to Little O’Neal, who caught it and immediately rose for a powerful slam... BOOM!
He slammed the ball through the hoop.
But just as he slammed the ball home, Bruce Bowen charged in and shoved him, sending Little O’Neal crashing down from mid-air.
THUD. He threw out his left hand to break his fall.
But the force of the impact was too great, and his left wrist bent awkwardly.
Little O’Neal cried out in pain from the floor.
Bruce Bowen instinctively held up his hands, feigning innocence.
But a second later, Tony Battie threw a punch, landing it squarely on the bridge of Bowen’s nose.
He tackled Bowen to the ground, pinned his arm with a knee, and started raining down punches.
All hell broke loose.
The arena was in an uproar, but the court itself was strangely calm.
The Spurs players didn’t try to pull Tony Battie off; they were afraid of getting involved. The notoriously dirty Bruce Bowen was now their sacrificial pawn.
Seeing that Tony Battie had the upper hand, Su Xi spread his arms to hold back an eager Artest and Stephen Jackson.
’Let Tony handle it. He’s a pro at this.’
It took all three referees quite some time to pull the two apart. Bruce Bowen was on the ground, howling and twitching.
Tony Battie got to his feet, his face covered in bloody scratches from Bowen’s fingernails.
It was a gruesome sight.
And yet, he was smiling.
The lead official ejected both Bowen and Battie without hesitation.
Before leaving the court, Battie patted Su Xi’s shoulder. "Jack, I told you. Your job is to win the game. Leave the dirty work to me."
"I’ll be in the locker room waiting for your second Finals MVP trophy."
With that, the towering man strode into the players’ tunnel without a backward glance.
Meanwhile, the team doctor helped Little O’Neal back to the bench. Little O’Neal’s hand was in excruciating pain; the doctor’s initial diagnosis was a fracture. But Little O’Neal refused to go to the hospital. He sat on the bench, watching his left forearm swell before his very eyes.
Little O’Neal was an introverted, even somewhat shy person, but you would be dead wrong to think that made him weak.
He may have been a finesse player, and maybe he picked his spots, but who in the league could really call themselves "tough" in front of him? Everyone in Indiana knew he liked his women plus-sized, a testament to his determination to establish a powerful, physical presence in the paint.
During the brawl, the TNT cameras locked onto David Stern. His expression was one of pure, unconcealable fury.
David Stern had been working tirelessly to cultivate a more upscale image for the NBA. He didn’t want it to become a thuggish league; he didn’t want games to need content ratings. He wanted to attract more middle-class families to the arenas.
Brawls like this were exactly what he despised, especially in the NBA Finals.
He was furious. He believed the lead official had botched it; if Bowen had been ejected earlier, the brawl could have been completely avoided.
As everyone was still reeling from the brawl...
...many were already starting to see the bigger picture, especially when TNT caught a shot of Popovich, who couldn’t hide the smile in his eyes.
So far in the fourth quarter, the Pacers had lost four key players: Reggie Miller, Little O’Neal, Tony Battie, and Foster, who had left earlier. And this was all despite the Pacers still holding a two-point lead.
How could the San Antonio Spurs possibly lose tonight?
"It looks like Reggie Miller and Little O’Neal are both injured, and Foster was hurt earlier. Add Tony Battie’s ejection to the mix... who do the Pacers even have left to play?"
Charles Barkley said, "The San Antonio Spurs are playing so dirty."
He looked disgusted. Like any normal person, he hated seeing these kinds of dirty tactics, especially in a championship series as important as the Finals.
But Popovich had gotten his wish.
He now had a greater advantage than at any other point in the Finals.
"I think the Spurs could even stage a huge comeback in the Finals," Kenny Smith said. "If Miller and Little O’Neal’s injuries are serious, and if Tony Battie gets a further suspension, there’s a huge chance the Spurs can turn this series around."
"Do you really think so?" Barkley asked Smith.
"Absolutely. It’s a strong possibility."
"Well, that’s a relief."
...
The VIPs in the stands also began to worry for Su Xi and the Pacers. As people in the business, they detested the Spurs’ behavior. Trading one Bruce Bowen to take out so many of the Pacers’ stars—was a victory won by any means necessary really worth it?
But disdain was one thing.
A victory still went down in the history books, and a championship title wouldn’t be diminished.
"We might have come too early," Mike Dunleavy said, turning to Jordan with a joke.
Jordan raised an eyebrow. "This is the moment that will test whether Little Sheep Su Xi is truly a superstar," he said. "And whether he was worth all the trouble we went to."
Mike Dunleavy thought it over and nodded repeatedly.
They were skeptical.
The other team executives and owners were also a bit worried.
Only the Knicks’ master-and-servant duo remained supremely confident. Isaiah Thomas even said loudly to James Dolan, "James, it’s time for Jack to step up again. Believe me, he’s about to kill this game."
"When Tony Battie was walking off the court, the look in his eyes told me everything. The Spurs are dead."
Isaiah Thomas said confidently, as if no one else was there.
Everyone shot him sidelong glances. The surrounding Spurs fans glared at him as if he were the enemy.
James Dolan agreed wholeheartedly. "He’s the player I handpicked, after all. A game like this is nothing! The first time I saw him in Madison Garden, I saw his entire future. He was born to dominate the NBA."
The two went back and forth, even laughing out loud.
The executives next to them looked at the pair as if they were a couple of real geniuses.
’No wonder those two ran the Knicks into the ground,’ they thought. ’They used to be an NBA powerhouse, and look at them now.’
’Are they trying to recruit Su Xi with this act?’
’All that bootlicking is just going to backfire.’
...
