Liu Xiu did not expect that the game of torture would become the last group activity for the 11 remaining members of the Trail Blazers' 2005 championship team.

The next day, on the morning of November 24, the league officially approved the transaction, and in addition to Varachio, Delfino also left.

After bidding farewell to their teammates, the two left the hotel and headed to the airport together. The boss informed them that they would be sent away on the Rose Bay Prison.

They often quarreled over football matters. After all, they came from Brazil and Argentina, the kings of football countries respectively. This time they were traded away together, but to different teams. Both of them were quite reluctant to let go.

They often quarrel about football, and they always need to find information about the other's favorite football players and teams to attack each other. Over time, they know more about the other's favorite players and teams than the other, and slowly become close friends.

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After being traded, they actually had a hunch that their playing time this season would be more than what they should have given their current strength.

Varejao was sent to the Rockets by the Trail Blazers in exchange for DeShawn Stevenson of the Magic. He was quite satisfied with this new club. In order to get him, the other team sent away Joe Smith and replaced Bill Darren.

Feila learned that the new club had the idea of ​​​​training him to become an interior defensive gate next to the talented high school student Bynum, and he actually got a better development opportunity.

Of course, having averaged 6.4 points, 4.9 rebounds and 0.9 blocks in 17 minutes per game, it was difficult for him to replace the 24-year-old Stevenson alone, so he also paired up with Delfino.

Compared with Varaijo, who has the potential to become a first-class player, Delfino is worse. He averaged 5 points, 2.2 rebounds, 1.1 assists and 0.9 steals in 18 minutes per game, and was let go by the Magic.

The Trail Blazers used these two players in exchange for DeShawn Stevenson and the Rockets' 2006 second-round pick.

The Magic sent DeShawn Stevenson for Carlos Delfino from the Trail Blazers, the Bucks' 2006 first-round draft pick from the Rockets, Joe Smith, and acquired David...

Wesley has a garbage contract worth more than $5 million left this season.

The Rockets sent two draft picks and two players in exchange for Varejao.

After the details of the transaction were announced, the Rockets' operations blinded people's eyes.

Joe Smith, a high-quality mid-level contract, the Magic made money.

David Wesley is of little use to the Rockets. They grabbed Alston, the street ball king who is suitable for selling tickets, from the free market for 8 million in two years. There is no room for David Wesley, but for the Rockets,

As far as the Magic are concerned, they have a reliable backup point guard, although the salary is a bit higher.

Moreover, the Magic earned more than 10 million US dollars in annual salary by relying on salary space, and also received a first-round pick from the Rockets as compensation, making a huge profit.

It is said that Trail Blazers owner Paul Allen also wants to take over the contract, but unfortunately they have long run out of salary space and can only watch high-quality mid-level power forwards like Joe Smith go to other teams.

Careful netizens discovered that the Rockets chose this transaction for only one purpose - to reduce the total salary by US$10.22 million. Now the total salary is only US$37.92 million, ranking second to last in the league. The Bobcats only have more than US$33 million.

The salary is lower than them.

However, although the Rockets' transaction is blinding, it is not surprising.

By sending away Francis and Yao Ming, the Rockets now have a lot of intermediate assets, most of which are positive assets, such as Desmond Mason, Darius Miles, Danny Granger...etc., etc.

The main thing is that they have a lot of draft picks in the future!

The new star player Richard Hamilton averages 20+ per game, and the core Andrew Bynum he plans to cultivate has outstanding talent, but the age difference between the two is too great, so Richard Hamilton is also on the Rockets' trade shelf.

What the Rockets are worried about now is that they have too many high-quality assets. If they want to trade with other teams, they have to lower the price. Being able to exchange for some real, cheap long-term assets is their top priority.

There are rumors that the Rockets traded down their draft picks and wanted to give away Joe Smith because Bynum, a talented high school student, was going to be led astray by Joe Smith.

The Trail Blazers' deal has received pretty good reviews. Everyone knows they want to trade and the direction they want to strengthen. There are many teams like the 76ers who want to pay a high price to earn money from the Prison Team.

To think that they actually brought in the Rockets, the team they had quarreled with, and successfully completed the recruitment of defensive players on the front and back lines.

But then the media broke the news that DeShawn Stevenson was just a backup option for the Trail Blazers, while Maurice Peterson of the Toronto Raptors and Ryan Gomez of the Celtics were the Blazers.

The team's first choice.

…

Before the new players arrived, the media began to sow discord. Liu Xiu paid tribute to these media, which was really dedicated.

Once you get used to this kind of thing, it won't matter. As for whether the legendary James Terminator with perverse personality will lose his temper because of this, we will wait for later.

Putting aside favors and only talking about business, Delfino is like an all-round poor man's version of an outlaw. Defensively, he relies on skills, but he doesn't have as good a physical condition as an outlaw, and his skills are not as good as an outlaw's.

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Whenever Delfino takes the rotation, his strength at the small forward position plummets. There is no change at all, he just becomes weaker.

Now we have a brutal defensive player who relies on his body for defense and is good at confrontation, which greatly optimizes the lineup structure.

Delfino was upgraded to DeShawn Stevenson at the cost of Varejao, who was already on the trade list. The problem of the bloated center position was solved, and Mourning could take off his suit and play.

!

After this three-party trade, the characteristics of the players available for their prison team have become more diverse!

New players can't come yet. Varejao and Delfino went to the airport to move back to Portland. Fortunately, although Fred Jones and Mourning were not on the active list, they have been traveling with the team on away games. Tonight's 12

The activation list of people can be assembled.

The civil war in the Northwest Division is not very friendly to the Trail Blazers.

Seattle, which has the best living environment, does not have them in consecutive away games this time.

Minneapolis is cold, Salt Lake City is not only cold but also racially discriminatory, Denver is even worse, not to mention it is a plateau.

But the Trail Blazers have had good luck in these three games.

The Jazz's core is too young and easy to bully; the Timberwolves' McHale has a good hand and has to give up. He was still competing for the championship last summer. After only one season, he is already competing for the No. 1 pick, and his overall strength is one of the best in the league.

Player case.

The Nuggets are also in trouble right now.

Tonight, the Nuggets can't play except Nene, who is out for the season, and Marcus Camby can't play either.

The small melon has now become a small bitter melon, more because of Canby.

That was an unexpected situation for Nene, but that was just for Camby. Last season, he did it for a show, but this year it became a pure data brush, because he has already received the contract, which is 40 million U.S. dollars in four years.

If nothing else, just starting the game with an average of 13 points on 45% shooting made Anthony want to burst into tears.

Forget about brushing up the data, at least it can still have some effect, but in addition to brushing up the data, Camby's glass man attributes have also reappeared this year. He missed 6 games in the first 11 games, and his attendance rate was less than 50%.

He started averaging 28 points, 6 rebounds and 3 assists per game! His shooting percentage was 47.1%! He couldn't lead the team even if his C was bleeding. After a 4-1 start, he immediately suffered a 4-game losing streak.

The Nuggets have won the past two games and are currently only 6-5, but they are still not among the top eight in the Western Conference.

Tonight, facing the Trail Blazers, who have a strong inside force, the Nuggets' two major centers are unable to play, and only Kenyon Martin, who has "left Kidd behind to prove himself," is left...

At 8 o'clock in the evening, the Trail Blazers' away game against the Nuggets started.

Randolph and Raheem exploded tonight. The two took turns to bully Kenyon Martin. The former played 20 minutes and scored 21 points, while the latter played 18 minutes and scored 16 points. Just the two of them, they won

It’s 37 minutes!

Liu Xiu led the team to attack based on the inside advantage, leading 24-20 in the first quarter, 29-24 in the second quarter, and the biggest advantage in the third quarter, 34-25. Although they fell behind 23-25 ​​in the final quarter, they failed to achieve a full win.

Fight, but it does not affect the victory already obtained.

Anthony made 14 of 29 shots tonight, including 0 of 2 three-pointers, plus 13 of 16 free throws, soaring 41 points, 10 rebounds, 2 assists and 2 steals. He took advantage of the fact that the Trail Blazers had only outlaws on the front line.

However, it was difficult to make up for the huge strength gap inside. Kenyon Martin played 27 minutes and only scored 9 points, 4 rebounds and 1 block.

The Trail Blazers relied on Randolph's 21 points and 6 rebounds, Raheem's 16 points and 4 rebounds, Mourning's 4 points, 4 rebounds and 1 block, Kwame Brown's 8 points and 14 rebounds, and Ray Allen's 22 points.

, Liu Xiu’s 14 points, 7 rebounds and 14 assists... defeated the Nuggets 110-94 and won 6 consecutive victories!

…

With 10 wins and 2 losses, the Trail Blazers became the first team to win 10 games in the new season, surpassing the current 8 wins and 2 losses of the Pistons, and temporarily topped the league list!

This is quite surprising. The Trail Blazers started the season so easily, but only managed 4 wins and 2 losses, which seemed to be stumbling. At the time, people thought that they were in the same decline as other defending champion teams.

It is very common for the defending champion's record to decline.

For example, the 2000 champion Lakers had 67 wins in the 1999-00 season, a historical record. However, in the 2000-01 season, they only had 56 wins. In the 2001-02 season, although there was a slight recovery, they only had 58 wins, except for the first championship.

, were not number one in the Western Conference. In the 2002-03 season after three consecutive championships, had Kobe not led the team to reverse the Warriors with 14 points in the final quarter in the final game, they would not have won 50 games that season.

The 2003 champion Spurs were also surpassed by the Timberwolves and Trail Blazers in the 2003-04 season; the 2004 champion Pacers only finished fourth in the Eastern Conference last season.

The Trail Blazers seem to be the same way. Although they have introduced Ray Allen, their lineup structure and playing style have changed too much. People estimate that even if their record is going to improve, they will have to wait until the lineup structure is adjusted.

But I didn't expect that their record improved before the lineup structure adjustment! A mighty 6-game winning streak, and they rushed to the first place in the league!

The opponent with 6 consecutive wins is obviously slightly stronger than the opponent with 4 wins and 2 losses.

With such an easy start to the schedule, the Trail Blazers only managed 4 wins and 2 losses, which made some media very excited. They made many comments that looked down on the Trail Blazers' performance this season, and were not optimistic about the role of Ray Allen's addition, saying that Ray-

Allen picked the wrong team.

Although these media outlets thought they might be slapped in the face, they didn’t expect the slap in the face to happen so quickly!

Trail Blazers fans are naturally extremely excited. They feel that since the summer of 2003, they have become the luckiest fans.

With such a good start, the team's lineup structure was adjusted smoothly, and Delfino was upgraded to DeShawn Stevenson!

Delfino + Varejao were exchanged for DeShawn Stevenson, and they also earned a second-round pick that was probably not too low. This transaction, even for those media who have been slandering them,

They can only talk about Varaijo's talent and future, but they have never pinned their future on a substitute center like Varaijo. They have completed reinforcements around Warden and created better conditions for defending the title.

They seem more important.

It seems that Trail Blazers fans can already see a bright future for this season...but surprises always come unexpectedly.

On the morning of November 25, the Trail Blazers returned to Portland after three consecutive away games, and announced bad news in the afternoon - Randolph suffered a fatigue strain due to overtraining and would need to miss one to two weeks.

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To be continued...