The Fifth Point Guard

In the autumn of 1950, the NBA was just four years old, but it began to decline.

Podoloff, the first president of the NBA, and Walter Brown, the president of the Boston Celtics, agreed to select the best players from the Eastern and Western Conferences (at the time, there were only 11 teams in these two districts in the NBA) halfway through the season. A rivalry match.

On March 2, 1951, Brown, the president of the Boston Celtics, provided the Boston Garden Arena for free to host the first All-Star Game.

The NBA All-Star Game began in 1951. This was the suggestion of Husker Cohen, the then head of public relations at NBA headquarters.

Initially, Cohen was just trying to imitate the National League All-Star Game. Baseball's All-Star Game is scheduled to be held in the middle of each season, so the NBA All-Star Game has followed this habit.

Now, the annual NBA All-Star Game has become a holiday event for basketball fans around the world.

The Los Angeles All-Star Game will last for three days.

February 14th is the Rookie Challenge.

February 15th is the Shooting Star Game, Skills Challenge, Three-Point Shootout Contest and Slam Dunk Contest.

February 16th is dinner, the East-West All-Star Game.

The participating lists for the Eastern and Western All-Star Games are as follows.

Eastern Conference All-Star starters:

Center: Ben Wallace (Detroit Pistons);

Forwards: Vince Carter (Toronto Raptors), Tracy McGrady (Orlando Magic);

Guards: Shentong (Cleveland Cavaliers), Allen Iverson (Philadelphia 76ers).

Eastern Conference bench:

Kenyon Martin (New Jersey Nets), Ron Artest (Indiana Pacers), Paul Pierce (Boston Celtics), Jason Kidd (New Jersey Nets), Michael Reed ( Milwaukee Bucks), Jermaine O'Neal (Indiana Pacers), Baron Davis (Charlotte Hornets).

Western Conference All-Star starters:

Center: Yao Ming (Houston Rockets);

Forwards: Tim Duncan (San Antonio Spurs), Kevin Garnett (Minnesota Timberwolves);

Guards: Kobe Bryant (Los Angeles Lakers), Steve Francis (Houston Rockets).

Western Conference bench lineup:

Shaquille O'Neal (Los Angeles Lakers), Brad Miller (Sacramento Kings), Andrei Kirilenko (Utah Jazz), Peja Stojakovic (Sutter Lamento Kings), Sam Cassell (Minnesota Timberwolves), Ray Allen (Seattle SuperSonics), Dirk Nowitzki (Dallas Mavericks).

From a lineup perspective, the Eastern All-Stars are dominated by outside stars, while the Western Conference is dominated by insiders.

On the Western Conference starting list, "Shark" O'Neal was once again pushed to the bench by Yao Ming.

This time, he did not complain like last season that most of Yao Ming's votes came from China. Instead, he gathered strength to explode in the game.

With much attention being paid to it, the first event of the All-Star Game, the Rookie Challenge, kicked off on Valentine’s Day, February 14th!

Don’t underestimate this year’s rookie competition, it can be said to be star-studded.

Yao Ming and James, the two most favored No. 1 picks, will directly compete against each other in the game.

Last year's top rookie, Amar'e Stoudemire, is also on the sophomore team.

In addition to James, the first-year team also has names such as Anthony, Wade, and Bosh that shine.

Yao Ming, Stoudemire, Boozer, Ginobili, and Jaric started for the second-year team.

Kaman, Anthony, James, Wade, and Hinrich formed the first-year starting lineup.

What, you don’t know who Jaric is?

Then we need to do some popular science.

Jaric's full name is Marko Jaric. He is 2.01 meters tall. He is a Serbian and can play as a double guard. He was selected by the Clippers with the first overall pick in the second round of the 2002 draft.

Okay, let’s focus on Jaric’s Victoria’s Secret supermodel wife, Lima.

Lima was once called the sexiest woman in the world by the media. She was also the model with the longest contract contract with the Victoria lingerie brand. Her appearance fee ranks third among all models in the world.

Some media broke the news that the price of a set of underwear in Lima is higher than Jaric's annual salary.

However, when Jaric was doing things, he would definitely not fold his underwear respectfully and put it at the foot of the bed. He would definitely untie it and throw it away, and then dance to his heart's content.

The income gap between the two makes most people not optimistic about this marriage.

Since teammate James and future national teammate Yao Ming were present, Shuntong, who did not have a game that day, still came to the scene to watch the game.

He came with Wagner, the team's go-to guy.

When the game was about to start, the first-year team arranged for James and Yao Ming to jump the ball, which made Shentong and Wagner laugh.

"LeBron is humiliating himself. There is such a big height difference between the two of them. Even if it is a joke, it should not be done like this." Wagner said with a smile.

STO has a different view.

"I think LeBron is going to win."

"Why?"

"intuition."

As a result, James indeed grabbed the ball.

Not long after the game started, Yao Ming received a pass from his teammate and used his special skill "turnaround jump shot", scoring the first 2 points for the sophomore team, which also saved the face of losing the jump ball in the opening game.

However, "Little Emperor" James immediately broke through to the frontcourt with the ball and responded with a mid-range shot.

After that, Yao Ming got the ball inside and assisted Boozer. The latter cut the ball and dunked with both hands.

Anthony received an assist from James and then completed an alley-oop!

At the beginning of the game, Yao Ming and James had great momentum to compete.

Wagner said: "Shen, why do I feel that these two people are in conflict with each other?"

Shentong replied: "When the number one scholar meets, he is extremely jealous."

Wagner said: "They are also your teammates. Are they also competing to see who is your strongest partner?"

Shentong looked at Wagner.

Clear thinking

The first quarter of the game belongs to the first grade.

James and Anthony frequently connected and performed various explosive dunks.

Two-handed slam dunk, breakthrough dunk, alley-oop.

The first-grade team gradually opened up the score and set off the first wave of emotional climax among the audience.

After replacing the substitute players, the second-year team began to perform.

Layups from Boozer and Prince tied the score at 22-22.

Then Stoudemire began to exert force.

In 10 minutes of the second quarter, he scored 10 points, 3 rebounds and 1 assist. His performance was very good.

Prince's defense of James and consecutive mid-range shots allowed the second-year team to open the point difference to 13 points.

At the end of the first half, the sophomore team led the first grade team 72-59.

In the second half, although James performed a wonderful performance of throwing and dunking in front of Yao Ming, the point difference between the two teams has been around 18 points.

At the last moment of the game, due to the huge point difference, both sides stopped defending and allowed the other team's players to perform to their heart's content.

James' dunk performance made people regret that he did not participate in the dunk contest.

In the end, the second-year team defeated the rookie team 142-118.

Stoudemire made 17 of 23 shots in the game and 2 of 4 free throws. He scored a game-high 36 points and was elected as the MVP of this game.

Yao Ming tried his best, scoring 6 points and 5 rebounds on 3-of-4 shooting.