This is Francis in the CBA debut, although the game only enough time left for him to move the ball to the front court, but the scene is still cheering a lot of people, the bleachers waved around the white inflatable stick overflowing with satisfaction - this is the NBA level of dribbling, but it is also a very important part of the game, the game is a very important part of the game, the game is a very important part of the game. It was NBA-level dribbling! The crowd swarmed around Francis after the game, and it was only with the help of the staff that he was able to make it through the crowd and back to the locker room.
This is the first time I've ever seen a game in my life. I have no choice but to put away my 300 sets of tactical notes and put on Francis again. Francis, once on the field, will participate in an offensive and defensive transition, but the bottom of the foot mixed garlic, came up to fall a heel.
This is the first time he fell in China, next, he will have to fall in the game again three heels, four minutes to see the boss fell four heels, more or less worth the price of admission, the stands enthusiastic voice began to go down, but the happy laughter gradually grew up, as if a few days later, the Basketball Association to Beijing's home court issued 10,000 yuan of the game order fine and they have nothing to do with the same.
Another 2 days, Beijing visited Dongguan, the game itself is very high quality, and the visitors eventually won by 2 points over the defending champion Guangdong Hongyuan, but all this has little to do with Francis, this time his main performance was 6 minutes of layups to take 2 points, and the first two jump shots out of the game were Zhou Peng and Dong Hanlin fanning away. 21st century in the first ten years of the Chinese Internet is in the stage of rapid development. In the first decade of the 21st century, China's Internet was in a phase of rapid development, and these two clips quickly spread throughout the network, and people's interest in Francis was even more intense, only that the point of interest has begun to shift. In this game, Francis also to the referee erected the middle finger, this move triggered anger, you can be big, but you can not play, this is the basic bottom line, the basketball association is quite tolerant of people, to Francis and Beijing sent a "serious warning" punishment, and tasked the Beijing Shougang for its criticism and education.
In fact, we all know that Francis, in addition to the Chinese fans familiar nickname "F boss", there is also a foreign nickname called "privilege" (Franchise), this time to China, Francis also showed the big foreign aid The privilege is, in addition to a variety of self-translators and other requirements, his 2 years and 2 million dollars of top foreign aid contract, is fully guaranteed, which and other foreign aid can be dismissed at will non-guaranteed contract is very different. But this signing can actually play what effect, Shougang side and ordinary fans are not much difference, the same heart is not bottom, Shougang vice president Yuan Chao said: "Some of our impressions of him also stayed only in the previous year, not clear about his recent physical condition."
Min guide is a little more blunt: "I admit that we have the ingredients of gambling, betting that he can recover the state."
Even so, the signing was a snap, and soon enough, the nation and Shougang were now aware of Francis's current physical condition: everyone saw his swollen, aged face and his staggering figure on the court, and the most frightening speculation among the many opinions was whether the dude was drinking or using drugs?
December 26, Beijing and Jiangsu's game in the first half, Francis has been sitting on the bench dozing, halftime, Min Lu Lei's meaning, let Francis first follow the physical fitness division out to pull physical fitness, but Francis with a rather Iverson style attitude categorically refused: "I need to be the game, not training. "
The second half of the game, Francis did not appear. In fact, after this ball, Francis on this and the Beijing team lifted the contract, as for everyone is particularly concerned about the guaranteed contract, Yuan always advised friends from all walks of life do not worry too much about the IQ of the Shougang club, "We only paid half a month's salary, we are willing to automatically terminate the contract, there is no such thing as tearing up the contract." Beijing intends to give Francis half a month's salary, but Francis said clearly "do not want", he is so want to go.
From December 14th arrived at the capital airport to December 26th left, Francis brilliant, and hasty and go, in the CBA 13 days left traces of four appearances totaling less than 13 minutes to get 2 points, 3 rebounds, 3 fouls, 4 turnovers, 4 heel 2 free throws. His nickname has also become "Foyun", his signing has become the most important piece of warning signs in the history of the CBA attraction, which at that time still triggered a lot of discussion, roughly from the beginning of the memories of the watery years of life to the present mockery of what is called stupidity, the bad traffic is also traffic, lack of good basketball circle as long as the list of Yao Ming will always be worth mentioning, the CCTV is the most important part of the CBA, the CCTV is the most important part of the CBA. CCTV Su Xiao what is the people's delightful wealth code, they also made a small documentary on Francis' performance in these 13 days, it looks like a review of Zhou Qi's NBA journey as interesting.
Francis' lone goal of the CBA trip
It was the end of Francis' basketball career, and in all the discussion about the finale of Francis' China story, one of the most interesting starting points was in line with Yuan's guidance: when was the end of the reigning F Boss that we remember?
******
In February 2006, Magic player Francis was traded to New York, and Orlando got second-year forward Ariza and old man "Penny" Hardaway.
Even from the perspective of the time, you could hardly say it was a big deal. 28-year-old Francis had a rough time in Orlando, ending his three-year All-Star run in his first year with the Magic, and although the team's record was poor, Francis averaged 21.3 points, 5.8 rebounds, 7 assists, and 1.4 steals per game at the top of his game. The next year had led O'Neal and pennies in 1995 to kill the Finals Brian Hill returned to the coaching staff, the magic will be from last season's third fast break team shifted to the league's seventh slow team, Hill emphasized the conduction of the ball, refused to 1V1, but he did not mind the 20-year-old Howard on the court for the back of the training, so the spearhead of the target is very clear, the coach wants is Francis less singles.
Francis took it all in stride, because it's nothing more than a rehash of his life in Houston, and he made light of the fact that he dropped his shots to a career low, except that Howard isn't Yao Ming, and his old buddy Mobley was sent away by the team a long time ago, so along with the number of shots, there was a drop in Francis's enthusiasm for the game, and in the 46 games he played for the Magic this season, Francis's averaged numbers were Only 16.2 points, 4.8 rebounds, 5.7 assists, 1.1 steals, but 3.4 turnovers, and the conflict between the two sides completely broke out in mid-January against the Seattle Supersonics in a game at the end of the magic has fallen behind by 26 points, Hill sent Francis to re-enter the game, the latter refused to, the club is decisive to give a ban on punishment.
After the incident, Magic manager Ortiz spoke sheepishly: "I look forward to the Francis that used to play with passion and love. I don't expect less from him, and neither should he himself."
But the entire league knows the Francis that once was isn't coming back, at least not to Orlando. The Lakers asked and toed the line, and they tried to send Odom for Francis, which might have stabilized Kobe's rhythmic heart. Of course the Lakers weren't the only contenders for Francis, as the Rockets tried to "dramatize" the return of the former Foo Fighters to Houston, Seattle was willing to give up point guard Ridnour, and the Nuggets were willing to give up Nene and Earl Watson, though naturally, they were more interested in getting rid of Kenyon Martin.
Yet it was when the Knicks made their move that the Francis trade really moved from the fog of rumors to the real world.
It turns out the Magic didn't want anything. They didn't want any long contracts, they weren't going to want Odom's four-year, $51 million contract, they weren't going to want a script from the Rockets or a big contract from the Nuggets, and on a matching basis, the Knicks took what pleased them the most: Ariza's expiring, minimal rookie contract and Penshi's similarly expiring, $15.75 million contract.
Then the Knicks got Francis, and the rest of his three-year, $48 million contract. Getting Francis was just the last piece of the Knicks' ever-expanding payroll for the 2005-2006 season, the last hand in a year of divine maneuvering by general manager Thomas "The Smiling Assassin".
Before Francis was in place, New York's roster was filled with names like Marbury, Quentin Richardson, Malik Rose, Jalen Rose, Jamal Crawford, Eddy Curry, Rodgers & James and their big contracts, and even better, the team took the NCAA and NBA double champion coach Larry Brown, who has been wearing glasses and a kindly, gentle face for the past five years. The head coach, who has a kind face and wears glasses for the past five years, has led the team to the Finals three times and beat the luxury battleship F4 Lakers to get the 2004 championship.
Leading a Piston like that can win the championship, and now they also came to another luxury battleship, is not to take off? At least in the eyes of the Knicks owner Dolan and smiling assassin, he constructed this lineup worthy of the word luxury, the most important evidence of which is that this year the Knicks payroll is up to 124 million, exceeding the salary cap of 74.5 million, exceeding the luxury line of 62.3 million.
The old Brown himself is quite satisfied, as a native of Brooklyn, to coach his hometown team is no less than a homecoming, he affectionately called the Knicks as his "dream job".
The dream woke up too soon, the Knicks won only 6 of the opening 24 games, including a disastrous average loss of more than double-digit 7 consecutive losses, Marbury's average score for the first time in 8 years fell to below 20 points, the number of assists is also a career low 6.4 times, in fact, the entire Knicks on the no one can send a decent assists, the second-ranked assists Jamal Crawford, who contributes elegantly to every game, the number of assists, the number of assists, the number of assists, the number of assists, the number of assists, the number of assists, the number of assists, the number of assists.
As the season progressed to the 2006 All-Star break, things still hadn't taken a turn for the worse for New York, whose record had become 15-38, having just lost 17 of their last 19 games, and whose team sat at the bottom of the Atlantic Division. The players have turned the Knicks payroll into a joke book with one over-the-top garbage performance. Yet the Smiling Assassin remained stoic before the trade deadline, "I must say I'm still more than happy with the team as it is, and there's no need to be proactive in making a trade."
Then they got Francis, and the Smiling Assassin told the media in a "you didn't think I had this in the bag" pose: "This deal not only makes us a better team now, but it also takes care of the future. Now we get an All-Star in Francis and we don't lose any future assets."
Indeed, the Knicks didn't lose any future assets in the deal, as they finished losing them long ago in the Eddie Curry trade - the first-round picks they offered for Curry and his beloved burgers later turned out to be LaMarcus Aldridge and Joakim Noah.
The elder Brown showed enough anticipation in the face of the impending Francis that he even compared the combination of Marbury and Francis to that of Frazier and Monroe. This kind of analogy is often later used for the kind of backcourt stacked two ball-carrying superstars but still able to win a championship team, such as Paul and Harden, and for example, Willow and Harden, what will be and Harden, is not in the scope of this article. Anecdotal evaluations of such combinations are always prone to polarization, with the honest Maddie cliché: "I don't see how these two go together, they both need to have the ball in their hands all the time." The wily middle-aged Pat Riley, who just took the Heat's head coaching position from his love interest, offered an awkward and unassuming blessing for the deal: "I think New York is about to turn the corner, and they're bursting at the seams with team talent."
A little problem, Francis and Marbury are in the season before the reunion of the larger slippage, with the two to analogize Frazier and Monroe more or less seems a little evidence, the only thing is sure, these two season annual salary combined to reach $ 30.22 million, only the Bucks backcourt of Kidd and Carter combined $ 30.28 million than they are higher than the money to talk about New York bones.
In short, at the time, the old Brown still had no choice but to come up with this kind of old Knicks fans most enjoyable allusions to suggest how he will be reasonable with Francis and Marbury, in his future blueprint, Francis defense is better, "he has enough size to defend the No. 2 position, the speed to keep up with the No. 1 position", in the On the offensive side, Marbury will play more without the ball, and Francis will become a more major ball carrier, the division of labor is very clear. Marbury's own response also gave the old manager face: "People say I and Francis can not match, but forgive me I dare not agree, we know how to play, I'm willing and able to make any changes to win the game."
The deal coincided with Francis's birthday, and his agent dedicated the deal to his patron as a birthday present: "Happy Birthday Steve! Is there a bigger stage than Madison Square Garden Arena? Here comes Showtamer!"
Francis himself has a positive attitude, talking about the trade itself, he believes that "change is always good", talking about the cooperation with Marbury, he said "we will solve the problem", talking about the reason why the Knicks in the previous performance, his conclusion is that the team is not united enough. The conclusion is that the team is not united enough, "and I'm the one who can bring everyone together."
It's as if going to New York will bring back the "old Francis".
It's not easy.
In the remaining games of the 2005-06 season, Brown did not throw Francis and Marbury in the same trenches, he was still pondering how to use Francis, since Francis can defend two positions, so should he be a 1 or 2 good? Which leads to the question: should Steve Monroe-Francis be the starter or the backup?
These two questions about Francis, but the old Brown in this season on the nature of basketball is a small part of the thinking, he set out in this season the league's most 40 sets of starting lineups, the prestigious Madison turned into a basketball proving ground, the real Brown movement in the luxury division slowly unfolded, and finally they got 23 wins and 59 losses, the worst record in 40 years. .
A simple calculation, after the arrival of Francis, this New York won 7 more games, and lost 21 more games, his own output is 11 points, 3.5 rebounds, 3.5 assists, appeared in 24 games did not have a score of 20 points. One thing Francis wasn't wrong about was that the Knicks' problem was indeed a lack of unity. This year Frye had just become drafted by the Knicks, and the state of the team put the young man in a state of confusion: "Everyone just clocked in to work, came over to practice for an hour and then did the birds and the bees, and didn't say much of a word. We are not a team." Fortunately, there are veterans Antonio Davis and Malik Rose from the side of enlightenment: "The real NBA is not like this."
Francis of course should know what the real NBA is like, when he was the boss of the Rockets, the training ground is equally sociable, his treatment of Yao Ming is enough to explain a lot of problems, each punching the clock to go to work and leave work of course should not be the norm in the NBA, but rather a problem, only in this Knicks, he himself is not the one who solves the problem, he is just naturally melted The Knicks are not the one to solve the problem, he just naturally blends in as part of the problem.
Boss Dolan was so unhappy with the team's performance this season that he made the decision to ask Brown to leave. Thomas should have been the next head coach selection, but Dolan felt very unnecessary: "Since this team is your hands to build, might as well love qing you personally on the field it."
So Thomas became the new head coach of the Knicks, the team's condition is indeed greatly improved, they won 10 games in the 2006-07 season than the previous year. Francis, besides being sidelined for almost 40 games due to injury, finally solidified his position and rebounded with nine 20-plus point games, the most iconic of which occurred on March 11, when the Knicks visited Washington.
Francis, a kid who grew up in the Silver Spring suburb of Maryland and rose to prominence at the University of Maryland, had his grandmother in the stands every time Francis played in Washington, D.C. (Maryland and D.C. have a geographic relationship similar to that of Hebei and Beijing, with the Silver Spring suburb understood to mean Yanjiao, Langfang, or Wuqing), and this time was no different, except that now Francis was no longer the The top draft pick who refused to run to Vancouver, he's 30 years old, has played eight seasons in the league, bounced around three teams, and doesn't know where his future lies.
But this night he didn't disappoint his grandmother and more than 100 friends and family in the stands, facing the Arias-Butler-Jamison version of the Troika Wizards, who will soon be the Little Emperor's stepping stone in the playoffs, Francis played 39 minutes, chipped in 26 points, 7 rebounds, 3 assists and 1 steal on 8-of-19 shooting, and although there were also 7 turnovers, he was better than the side that played 44 minutes on 4-of-15 shooting 15 points, 2 rebounds and 5 assists of Marbury, the state is still a lot better, he even cut his shooting fingers in a dunk with too much force.
More importantly, at the end of the game, the team is still behind 2 points, he dribbled across the half-court under the close defense of Antonio Daniels, the time is only 1 second left is not a problem, the cut finger is not a problem, around the Daniels is not a problem, the career only 2.9 shots three-point shooting rate of only 34% is not a problem, and even just missed the 2 +1 to equalize the score of the team on the brink of extinction! It's not a problem, either, as far as getting the damn three-pointer in?
Not a problem.
The lights came up on the inbound, and Francis jumped up into the stands and nodded frantically with open arms to the Washington crowd, announcing that the Francis that was once Francis was back, if only for a moment, as if he'd ever done it at the Toyota Center Arena. The moody Capitals reacted sparingly in the stands in the face of the Wang-style goal, but the voices of Francis' 100-plus friends and family poured into their ears as promised. Teammates quickly drowned him out, with Nate Robinson this time managing to jump on the back of the shutout without being thrown off, and Marbury trying to squeeze into the crowd, which he walked away from after one attempt.
Francis ran up into the stands and hugged his grandmother tightly, saying, "Winning is good after all."
Francis finished off the shutout, the Knicks won the game, and by the way, they're eighth in the East, and everything looks pretty good, if you compare it to last season.
And their biggest obstacle to the playoffs happens to be the Magic, who sent Francis away a year ago. Someone Thomas how he sees the team's playoff prospects, the smiling assassin smiled and said, "Hopefully the regular season is over after this one."
Unfortunately, there are still 19 games in the regular season, the Knicks lost 15 of these 19 games, although Francis renewed the team's life with four consecutive games of 20 +, but in the end, the Magic managed to coast to become the eighth in the East, and Ariza is their most important bench strength. Francis, on the other hand, appeared in 14 of the final 19 games, and he played just 44 games for the Knicks all season, no other way to go from 28 to 30, from one bad team to another, and the next slice of bread that landed on the front end followed, as severe knee tendinitis and other injuries, large and small, found their way to the doorsteps, embracing Francis and the rest of his destiny to remain healthy for the rest of the year And on the days he started, he still looked like he had a fighting chance, but the stat sheet ending with 11.1 points, 3.3 rebounds and 3.7 assists doesn't lie.
The Knicks in Francis' two years had another nickname, the Titanic. Francis was thrown into this luxury cruise ship by fate, the role he played in it, neither meat silk, nor Jack, he did not even enjoy a moment of pleasure, but also did not leave any impressive handprints on the huge ship, he ended up in the icy ocean deep blue fear of a rapid fall into the water, you can hardly even say that he was a victim of the Knicks that year, that happened to the Knicks. happened, and Francis happened to be in the middle of it.
Next, as with all athletes or people in their 30s, the story of Francis began to accelerate, he was traded to the Blazers in 2007, and then cut, when he still had some suitors, and ultimately Francis chose to return to the Rockets, counting on being treated gently he was traded by the Rockets to the Grizzlies a year later on Christmas Day, a starting point that he was reluctant to go to, but still became a part of his career. The starting point, or the end of his NBA career.
Two years later, another Christmas, Francis once again left the court packing home, but this time the end of his career is Beijing Shougang. When Francis left, Marbury was also playing in China, and 2 years later, he joined Beijing, and the next thing you know, there were 3 CBA championships and a bronze statue that still doesn't know if it's been removed.