San Francisco – Chris Paul has gathered a career in the Hall of Fame without athletics of the Hall of Fame, largely due to its incessant competitive nature and its cunning basketball mind. On Saturday night NBA The challenge of skills, however, Paul’s Games games, along with his teammate Victor Wembanyama, cost them a lot.
The Spurs team, composed of Paul and Wemby, was first in the competition and released its strategy to reduce their time. After passing the rebound and a chest step through a moving goal, both players had to shoot a triple from the wing, a jumper from the elbow and a triple from the corner in front of a rotating wind mill. After three lost attempts, players can advance to the next obstacle.
Wembanyama was the first to leave, and when he reached his first triple, he simply threw the three balls from the shelf to the edge without even looking. He did the same for the free and triple of 3 points, making it clear that he and Paul felt that this strategy would reduce his time.
When Paul was, the crowd was modern to his strategy and began to boo the lack of a genuine effort. Paul is no stranger to being booed, but this has to be the first time it happened during the skills challenge.
Shortly after its turn ended, it was announced that the Spurs team was disqualified for not making a “valid effort” in its jumping shots. Later, Paul was seen on the sidelines receiving an explanation from an NBA representative, who presumably confirmed that, in fact, they had avoided the rules. Later, Wembanyama He said the plan was his idea.
“If they were not disqualified, I think we would probably have done the same to be honest with you,” said Donovan Mitchell of Team Cavs, who ended up winning the competition. “Play to win, I suppose.”
Mitchell’s teammate, Evan Mobley, exceeded the limits with a flat -legged leg jumper in his first round, but left the plan after he did not get the desired results.
“I feel that my first round tried to do something similar, but I made it look like a real shot,” Mobley said. “But that didn’t work very well, so I changed my strategy.”
We have seen the players give one effort less than optimal in the challenge of skills before, last year, the Timberwolves star of the Minnesota, Anthony Edwards, a right, shot their triples with their left hand, but we have never seen such a shameless effort to manipulate competition to win.
