Since the super rookie's appearance in the NBA League, Zion has averaged 25.7 points, 7.2 rebounds and 3.7 assists per game, shooting 60.4% from the field and 33.3% from three-point range.
However, Zion has played a total of 85 games since entering the NBA league in 2019, with an attendance rate of about 38% so far, and there is no specific comeback schedule this season, the Pelicans are naturally still in the mire, and Morant, who is not divided in the first season, has now grown into an All-Star starter & Super Popular Guard & Also the leader of the competitive team.
Mention the fat tiger Zion, who has disappeared for a long time, I believe many people will think of the former Blazers center Auden, and both of them are high-talented shows that have played difficulties in the first three seasons.
Looking back at Auden's career, as an NBA player whose heyday level is likely to stay in the NCAA era, he was able to press all the internal lines of the same class to be named in college and rub on the ground, and the personal draft power could suppress Durant, the Du Xiaoshuai of the year, and was elected without suspense.
After Entering the NBA, Auden's first year was directly recuperated, the second and third seasons did not play much time, and after the third season, he was completely reduced to a sick number, and then he was eliminated by the NBA. To recap, Auden's attendance in the first three seasons combined was 34 percent.
Judging from the appearance rate in the same period, fans can't help but worry that Zion will follow Oden's path and become the next him. This is unlikely, and the author will combine sports medicine and player style strength in this article to analyze it for your reference.
First of all, let's talk about Auden's problem, Auden is lucky, in fact, unfortunate. As a traditional interior lineman, Auden had a very good static physique at the time, his round-trip ability as a big man was very good at the time, and his low-post skills and rebounding skills matured very early, which together were enough to make him dominate in college and make people infinitely imagine his future in the NBA.
The problem, however, is that while God gave Auden talent, it actually took some of his stuff. Auden is born with long and short legs, originally one side of the knee is unevenly forced, Auden was in the inside of the play with his general physique, originally the wear of the knee is quite large, which is actually doomed to Auden's road in the future is difficult to walk, but at that time everyone saw his bright side.
What's even more tragic is that the college medical team did not help Auden find this problem, and when Auden came out with an uncomfortable knee injury, everyone may think that it was just fatigue fighting, and Auden played a lot of games with injuries.
In the summer vacation when he became a champion waiting to play for the Blazers, Auden's knee was actually almost to the limit, and it was during this period that he found that his knee was swollen and painful, and he had to undergo arthroscopic minimally invasive surgery and directly recover from the rookie season for a year.
Lengthy recovery doesn't solve Oden's problems, and the Blazers have always been at the lower level of the league in surgery and rehabilitation for the Interior Giants. After the first major knee surgery, Auden's knee entered a state that could be used to compete, but it softened a little, which led to his unevenly injured long and short feet being more serious, and the hip injuries and knee injuries were more serious in the direction of complete irreversibility in the long run.
Looking back on Auden's career, his peak in the NBA was probably a year and a half from 2008 to 2010. During this time, he can average 10 points, 8 rebounds and 2 blocks in a world averaging about 22 minutes per game, shooting 58% from the field.
Converted to PER36 data, he was able to achieve an efficiency of 15 points, 12 rebounds and 2.5 blocks at that time. However, Oden at the time would have received 4.3 fouls in his early 20s. On the one hand, it is because of the long-distance battle, and on the other hand, it is because Auden is actually a bit unable to jump up and defend. After hitting the Rockets and Brooks in 2009 and hitting his operated knee, Auden essentially said goodbye to his NBA career. Because between 2009 and 2012, Auden underwent five more surgeries on his knee, mainly with constant injuries and constantly cleaning up small bones.
What bothers Auden is his long and short feet and serious knee injuries, and the situation on Zion's side is not particularly good, but it is not particularly optimistic at present. The problem that bothered him the most at the moment occurred on the fifth metatarsal bone of his right foot. In the offseason of the previous year, Zion reported a fifth metatarsal fracture, a minor surgery, and an 8-week break, and the start of the new season was almost on the field, continuing SHOW TIME.
However, after the recuperation period of the first surgery, Zion was already practicing to prepare for the new season when his fifth metatarsal was fractured again. The problem was that it was offseason, and it was only the practice level of intensity that broke Zion again.
Before the last season, Zion didn't have a similar injury history in that position, and what happened last season (Zion's second season)?
In the first season, Zion still played in the traditional energy type four, making a living under the basket, bouncing off opponents by physique and explosiveness, and wreaking havoc on the basket. In the second season, the Pelicans felt that this level of talent, of course, was to play more with the ball, so they cut the ball brother's ball, let him practice fixed point three points, the free ball was given to Zion to play the big forward, repeatedly rushed the basket outside the three-point line, Zion really got it, in the ultra-high BMI body, with rare explosive power, and with two shots of IN&OUT disguised dribbling, Zion's meat tank-like explosive cut was difficult to be blocked, and personal data soared. The shooting percentage is also surprisingly high.
The problem is that after such a high-consumption season of impact, only one season later, Zion's fifth bone will not work. From the perspective of sports medicine, the problems of the fifth metatarsal bone are mostly caused by excessive pressure when pedaling, and the blood supply in this area is small, and the base of the fifth metatarsal bone and the backbone connection are difficult to heal, and the follow-up is easy to recur.
If there is a problem with the fifth metatarsal bone, it will affect the ankle in the long run, after all, it is easy for athletes to transfer their strength in order to accommodate the metatarsal bone. For this injury, there should be many Chinese fans who are deeply impressed, because Yao Ming's first major injury in the NBA was a problem in this place.
Back in the middle of the 05-06 season, Yao Ming suffered a major injury to the fifth metatarsal fracture of his left foot during a game against the Jazz, and was implanted with a steel nail in the relevant position after the operation. Prior to this, Yao Ming's season attendance was 82, 82, 80 games, and his body was still relatively slim, and he was agility in the middle and early stages of playing, and the most serious injuries he had suffered before were brow fractures and paronychia.
Since then, Yao Ming's season attendance rate has been 48 and 55 games, and then in the summer of 2009, he did arch flattening in order to make the weight bearing area of the calcaneal and metatarsal bones larger and make the old injuries of the previous toposkeles less affected. Unfortunately, after all kinds of efforts, Yao Ming's NBA career extension effect is limited, or early retirement.
The first major injury that resulted in a long-term truce was the same fracture of the fifth metatarsal bone; the two also faced a choice in weight management. So, judging by the first major injury and solution, Zion is more like the risk of becoming the next Yao Ming than the next Auden.
Therefore, the choice in front of Zion and the Pelicans team is actually more obvious, either to let Zion give up the ball-holding style of play, return to the energy-based four-position play of the first season, and reduce the loss of his running and ball-holding offense with a large weight; or, it can only make Zion lose weight and lose weight significantly, in order to continue to play the big forward who holds the ball stream. From the current point of view, it is certain that no matter how it changes, Zion is expected to struggle a little after his comeback, and it will be difficult to play last year's data.