Chapter 508 - Change in Los Angeles Lakers Team 6 (1/2)
”The Los Angeles Lakers team also played an excellent game, all the players performed well, but unlike the Seattle SuperSonics team, the focus on the attack was Shaquille O'Neal, Kobe Bryant, Rick Fox, and Jake Smith.”
”Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant played an excellent game, Rick Fox has also been surprising and making more than 14 points in the last games, and Jake Smith was once again the highlight of the game.”
”Jake Smith played very well in that game and managed to score 35 points and 9 assists even with Gary Payton defending against him, Jake Smith showed all his skill in that game and also defended well against Gary Payton and made him miss many attacks.”
”Yes, Jake Smith played that game really well, even though it looks like he got fewer steals and rebounds than in other games, that's normal thinking that Gary Payton was defending against him.”
”Jake Smith had the advantage in that game because of his three-point shots that helped the Los Angeles Lakers team to win and also play better than Gary Payton, but that is also his credit for training for so long to get that average hits on three-point shots.”
The game ended with the Los Angeles Lakers team winning once again, Jake was happy because he knew that in the past the Los Angeles Lakers team had lost that game, now he wanted to win as many games as he could this season.
Jake thought that when he entered the NBA he was very good at defense after training for several years in his imagination training and playing at university, but in that game, he realized again that he was still far from being a great player in defense.
Jake had already realized this when he played against Kobe Bryant, even though he could defend well and prevent the opponent from making some points, he couldn't really prevent the opponent from making points in mid-range shots.
Of course, Jake knew it must be natural, after all, Kobe Bryant and Gary Payton were two of the best players in NBA history and Jake was just a rookie in the NBA, but what made Jake think so was his system and physical statistics that it was what helped him most to get the steals in the games.
But this game was important for Jake to realize that he still had a lot of things that he needed to improve in order to be a great player, Jake still had to improve his skills and statistics and also play better when he got more experience.
After all Jake knew that even when he had all the skills in the SS rank he would just be on a par with the best NBA players, so he still needed to improve a lot to be able to beat them.
After that victory, the Los Angeles Lakers team had a lot of time to rest because they would have to travel to Denver, Colorado where they would have to play the next game.
It would be the second game of the Los Angeles Lakers team in Denver, Colorado to play against the Denver Nuggets team the second game as a visitor, the first game was very difficult for the Los Angeles Lakers team to win and Jake was the main responsible for the good advantage on the scoreboard at the end of the game.
But in that game Jake did not know if things would be like this again, the rumors of the possible dismissal of Coach Del Harris just increased and so Coach Harris did not seem to be very happy with this situation.
The players made the trip on the team plane during the night and when they arrived in Denver they immediately went to the hotel to rest for the game the next day, the players were not so tired because they were able to rest a few minutes in the last games with the substitutions of Harris coach.
So the next day Jake woke up completely rested and ready for the next game, that day the players heard two rumors that could be good things, but one of that news could be bad for the team.
One news that was certainly good was that Robert Horry was recovering well and maybe in 3 more days he could play again, the Los Angeles Lakers team was missing Horry in the team's defense and also in the attack.
The other news was that maybe the Los Angeles Lakers team could sign 5-time NBA champion Dennis Rodman in the next few days, Jake knew it could happen, so he naturally also knew what could happen in the future.
Jake naturally respected Dennis Rodman, who was an important player in the 5 NBA titles he won, but his personal behavior was something Jake did not agree with and even found it difficult to understand.
Jake played professional basketball and still ran marathons because he loved doing it and didn't mind trying harder to do it, but Dennis Rodman, who also said he loved basketball even with his talent, still did a lot of things wrong.
Jake thought that Dennis Rodman could actually be an important player for the Los Angeles Lakers team to win the NBA title this season if he played seriously and worked hard in every game to win he could help a lot.