(The original text was published on May 9. The author is Rohlin, Melissa of Fox Sports. The content of the article does not represent the translator’s point of view)
After a game between the Lakers and Pelicans ended in March, Reeves glanced at his cell phone and then lost his heart.
A post he posted on Facebook a long time ago was dug up and forwarded crazily on the Internet. “I saw SportsCenter pushed my post.” Reeves said in an interview with Fox Sports, “My heart wants to curse the Street!”
As early as 2012, 13-year-old Reeves released a facial expression package with a picture of Kobe shrug with five championship rings in the background, with a piece of text on it: “When I want to be quiet, I will set my mobile phone to LeBlanc mode without ringing. Haha.” (No Ring, No Ring, No Ring. At that time, James was still 2 months away from winning his first Championship)
Now Reeves and James are staying in the same dressing room. As a super star, James has always protected Reeves under his wings, so Reeves decided to tell him the slightly embarrassing news himself. “I called James over and told him, ‘look, I said bad things about you in 2012, when I am Kobe fans. ‘”Reeves, 24, said,” James just smiled.”
James doesn’t care about this kind of thing.
Since Reeves left the University of Oklahoma in 2021 and signed a two-way contract with the Lakers as a drop draft, he has now established a strong relationship with James on the court. This relationship has deepened further this season. Reeves has become a rising star in the Lakers, injecting a booster to the Lakers who are eager to get promoted, he won more respect from James, the league’s popular King.
After Reeves recovered from his hamstring injury on February 7, he helped the Lakers reverse the trend of the whole season and rushed from the 13th place in the West to the 7th place in the West. In the 23 games after the All-Star Game, Reeves averaged 17.6 points, which was significantly higher than the 36 games (10.8 points) before the injury.
In the series between the Lakers and the grizzly bear in the first round of this year’s playoffs, Reeves performed well, averaging 16.5 points field goal percentage 44.7% and hitting 34.4%. On Monday night, Reeves scored 21 points and 4 assists in the 15-shot 7, helping the Lakers pull the big score of the series against the defending champion Warriors to 3 to 1, holding three points.
Reeves grew up on a farm in Newark, Arkansas, where there were more than one hundred cattle. His growth surprised many people in basketball. But James didn’t. He appreciated this young man with the nickname “country Kobe” very early. This nickname was given to Reeves by a graduate teaching assistant at the University of Oklahoma, because the latter always spoke with a strong voice of the southern population and his tough character.
After the Lakers signed Reeves, James wanted to know him personally. Therefore, James watched the game video of Reeves University of Oklahoma, who spent the first two years of college basketball career at Wichita State University and transferred to University of Oklahoma in 2018. After watching the video of the game, James fell in love with this young man.
Reeves was fearless. No one would flinch from the defense, nor was he afraid to shoot shots. Reeves on the court is always running and doing all kinds of things that are good for the game. He can make the right decision on the court and respond correctly according to the game situation.
But Reeves firmly believed that James helped himself take the game to a new level.
Some words James said to Reeves recently have been remembered by rifsming. “We played a game of holding the ball to block and dismantle. At this time, I had already thought about passing the ball to James.” Reeves recalled a match with James’s partner, “it would never be a bad decision to pass the ball to James, but at that time, the opponent’s defensive way was to let me break through the attack basket, or play tactics for people other than James.”
“James came up to me and said, ‘Don’t give me the ball deliberately, I will find some ways to influence the game and do what I should do. So just be yourself and read the defense correctly. ‘”Said Reeves.
These words are easy to understand, and Reeves really remembered them. These words opened some shackles in his heart, allowing him to let go and be himself.
In fact, Reeves thinks that if he didn’t have a partner James in the past two seasons, he wouldn’t have grown into such a player. “He (James) must know that he is not an ordinary person,” Reeves said, “but sometimes he doesn’t understand how important his words are, he can really light up the heart of a team or a person through a few words.”
Shortly after Reeves joined the Lakers dressing room, he felt that James was very close, whether it was the way they looked at the game or the world. “I think this starts with IQ and ball dealer.” Reeves said, “I think we are very similar in all aspects. It is very easy for both of us to play and analyze games in the right way. I think that’s it. He is the greatest player in history, but in the final analysis, he is also an ordinary person, very humorous, often joking, and our personalities get along well with each other.”
Reeves and James have different backgrounds and are in completely different stages of life, but they have developed a seemingly unlikely friendship, which is obviously felt by the teammates around them. They often play with each other in the dressing room. Every time Reeves passed by James, he would make a cry of goat to show his respect to James, the greatest player in history. Similarly, for James, he and rives got along very happily.
As a reporter interviewing Reeves for this article, James kept interrupting and shouting in the dressing room, “one-on-one interview with Reeves!” Reeves chose to ignore these voices at first, until finally a burst of laughter broke out in the dressing room, and he couldn’t stand it any more. “Buddy, point the camera at him (James)!” Reeves said that James giggled at this moment and then stopped shouting.
The chemical reaction between the two has spread to the stadium, and Reeves has become an excellent helper around James.
In the series G1 against the grizzly bear, Reeves scored 23 points in the 8 of 13 shots, including 9 points in the fourth quarter, helping the Lakers win 128-112. In the series G4 that the Lakers won 117-111, Reeves scored the highest 23 points and 6 assists and 4 rebounds.
None of this surprised James. “From the first training match after we got him, I knew he could do this, and he couldn’t hold a two-way contract all the time.” James said in an interview after the series G1 against the grizzly bear, “I know these very well. I have been engaged in this sport for a long time and know what kind of players have high football merchants, I also know what kind of players are suitable for my game style, and I am sure Reeves will soon become such a player.”
After Reeves turned into a formal contract in last September, the salary this season was only $1.56 million. He will become a restricted free agent this summer, and his performance will make him get a rich contract. If the Lakers use Reeves’s Bird rights, they can pay it up to 50.8 million dollars in the next four years, and they also have the right to match any other team’s offer. If any team uses the Arenas clause (which stipulates that a restricted free agent who has played in NBA for one to two years, the salary of the first year of the invitation contract shall not exceed the middle class clause of that year. The salary of the second year will increase by 8%, and the salary of the third year will be greatly increased). Reeves can earn more. The Athletic website even predicted that Reeves’s potential offer contract was $98.6 million for 4 years, provided that The team attached great importance to him.
“I never thought about these things.” Reeves shook his head and said with a smile, “Obviously, I just want to play well in NBA as much as possible, but it is really a lot of money.”
When asked how he planned to spend his first generous salary, Reeves shrugged. So far, most of his life has lived in a small town with a population of less than 2,000, and he has to hunt, fish and fish in his spare time. “I don’t spend much money.” Reeves said, “I will save the money, so how to spend the money is really something I need to consider.”
Reeves is now a hero in his hometown. However, even though he played for one of the most popular teams in sports, the 1.96-meter-tall and 89-kilogram scoring guard said that he was rarely recognized in Los Angeles. “I really don’t look like an athlete.” Reeves said, “I am a bit like a skater, but someone will pass by me and then look at their friends and say, ‘Was that Reeves? ‘”
Reeves even sometimes tells others that you are mistaken. “I used to do this when I was joking with passers-.” Reeves said with a shy smile, “then when they stare at my face, I will tell them that they are joking. I am Reeves.”
Reeves has made it clear that he hopes to stay with the Lakers and fight for the team Kobe has been playing. Kobe Bryant was Reeves’s favorite player in his childhood and has been playing for the Lakers for 20 years.
Reeves has both confident and modest temperament, and his competition style also reflects his personality. In any match, Reeves is willing to be a star on the court or a helper around the stars. He was willing to take the initiative to accept physical confrontation and sacrifice his body without hesitation, such as G3 against the grizzly bear. Reeves felt that his face might have been beaten 3 or 4 times by his opponent in the whole match.
James was glad to see Reeves’s two-way contract turned into a two-year formal contract, which later became an indispensable part of the team. For a long time, Reeves was full of surprises. James, the 38-year-old super star, saw some lovely things from Reeves in his 20th season.
It is worth mentioning that James was interviewed after scoring 20 points and 20 rebounds against the grizzly bear G4. When asked to become the 20+20 oldest player in league history, he chose to talk about Reeves. “I just like to play with my teammates and bring them unprecedented experience.” James said, “This is the first round of playoff in Reeves’s career. When we discussed after the game, he said how much he liked this kind of game, this is the greatest thing he has ever participated in basketball. This kind of thing brings me a lot of happiness.”
Lakers coach Ham also appreciated Reeves very much. He watched Reeves become one of his favorite players in the pre-season because of his own playing style.
Reeves’s progress this season is obvious to all. He was good at shooting and changed the shooting angle. In the first 36 games of the season, field goal percentage hit 48.8% 3 points by 36%, and in the last 23 games of the season, field goal percentage hit 57.8% 3 points by 44.3%. Reeves also became one of the most outstanding outside defenders of the Lakers.
Lakers coach Ham witnessed the establishment of a special bond between Reeves and James. “I think this relationship only belongs to players who are really enthusiastic about basketball.” Ham said, “Reeves grew up watching James play. Now he has the chance to become a teammate with James. He is very happy. James also witnessed the young child’s continuous efforts in the competition and his continuous attempts to make progress in different fields.”
For James, seeing Reeves enjoying the joy brought by the competition is like taking a shot of strength in a turbulent season. Once Reeves hit a three-point goal in the second half of the fourth quarter of the game, roaring wildly, “I am that man!” James said in an interview that night that he was very happy for Reeves and hoped that he could come again. After that, in the first round of G6 key battle of the Lakers, Reeves broke into the inner line with the European step and completed an anti-basket. James and he competed the European step together and returned to the bench.
However, one of James’s favorite “Reeves moment” has nothing to do with his match. In a bull game last month, Reeves finished a one-handed throw against former teammate Beverly, and then made a gesture of “you are too young” towards the latter.
Why did Reeves do this?
Beverly made the same action after scoring against James’s defense in a match three days ago.
Reeves wanted to help James fight back.
“I will always support Reeves,” James said, “forever!”
After saying this sentence, James still did not forget to tease one of his favorite teammates.
“Although he used to love Comby more than me,” James said with a smile, “but I forgive him.”
Original: Melissa Rohlin
Compile: Li Taibai
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