Lakers win the championship + Zhan Huang MVP!Midseason traffic explosion The new format is really a genius invention

The inaugural Mid-Season Championship ended with the Lakers' frenzied celebrations, the Purple and Gold became the first team in history to lift the Midseason Championship trophy, LeBron James won the MVP trophy, and the Midseason Championship ended in the most flowing way.

No matter how you look at it, this is a game that everyone is happy to be happy about-

For fans, they can feel the intensity of the playoffs in November and December, and even the excitement of the playoff series to grab seven.

In the league, the super traffic team Lakers won the championship, and James won the MVP, which is probably the result that the league wants to see the most from the perspective of event promotion and commercial interests. The alliance impressed the TV broadcasters with another innovation, and further laid the foundation for the subsequent signing of new sky-high TV broadcast contracts. In addition, the league will hold the semifinals in Las Vegas, the "casino city", laying the groundwork for the future expansion of the army to build a new team here.

For TV broadcasters, the ratings data are gratifying, and this time in previous years has always been the NBA's off-season.

For players, whether they can lift the trophy is a small matter, but getting a huge bonus is a big thing. The winner received $500,000 each, and the runner-up also received $200,000.

"Adam Shaw is a genius and the mid-season tournament will be a success," James has previously praised. As Lao Zhan said, the mid-season tournament is indeed a genius invention, and the league's initial attempts have exceeded expectations.

When the league decided to introduce a mid-season tournament format, there was not much resistance, but there were many people who were skeptical of the format. Everyone wonders what a difference can be made by changing the names of the games that count towards the 82 regular season games (except for the mid-season tournament finals).

Grizzlies guard Marcus Smart, for example, falls into the category of comments that are not polite: "Whoever cares about an extra trophy in the middle of the season, nobody cares about this trophy." ”

But once the mid-season tournament really kicked off, the buzz for the new format continued to grow. The imitation cup competition's group stage promotion system, small score system, single-elimination system after reaching the quarterfinals, and generous prize money make players significantly more focused and more intense when playing mid-season tournaments. The coach was noticeably more targeted in his pre-match set-up.

For example, on the final day of the group stage, the Celtics were obviously 28 points ahead of the Bulls, but 7 minutes and 34 seconds before the end of the fourth quarter, they replaced Jaylen Brown, Holiday and Horford.

It's not that the Celtics don't give the Bulls face, it's really because the size of the point difference is related to whether the Celtics can overtake the Magic to qualify for the first place in the group, and the amount of prize money, they need to win the Bulls by more than 23 points, and the Nets have to beat the Raptors but the group stage goal difference cannot exceed the Celtics. To achieve their goal, Celtic had to meet two major conditions. In the end, the Celtics won by 27 points, and the Nets "only" won the Raptors by 12 points, and the Celtics got their wish.

In the quarterfinals, the Lakers and Suns, the two sides played until the last second, and the intensity of the game was completely playoff level. Kevin Durant was injured and insisted on finishing the game, and the Lakers showed super defensive intensity. The Lakers played the Pelicans, and James turned on the long-lost "all-out Zhan" mode, dominating the game at both ends of the offensive and defensive ends. The Lakers played the Pacers in the finals, Anthony Davis made a "pupil of death" expression after the defense sent a block, and Ham formulated a defensive strategy based on the bag for Haliburton, and the Lakers will execute it in place.

Looking back at the Midseason Tournament as a whole, there are a lot of images that represent "playoff intensity." Durant said: "The intensity of the game is unbelievable, I wasn't a fan of the mid-season tournament before, but now I'm a huge fan of the format." ”

Vash, the league's executive vice president of basketball strategy and analysis, also said: "As they discussed, the intensity of competition in mid-season tournaments is significantly higher, both in terms of game results, in terms of point difference, and player participation. ”

Objectively speaking, it is not a trophy to motivate players to come up with a higher intensity, after all, the release of the mid-season tournament format does not affect the fact that the championship trophy has the highest gold content in June next year, and the NBA championship is still the highest pursuit of each team. It can also be seen from the comments of the players that the motivation to increase the intensity of the game in November and December is the generous prize money. From top stars like James to small names like Cornet, they're all aiming for prize money. There is a bonus stimulus, and the players are naturally willing to work hard.

The intensity of the game brings far more topics and attention than fancy floors. In previous years, the hottest time in the NBA was concentrated in the opening week, Christmas, the February All-Star Game, the trade deadline, the play-offs, and the playoffs. In November and December, the NBA lacked heat, there were too few focus matchups, some stars took turns off, and the media could only chase after the wind and make some trade rumors and traffic.

But this year is different, and the mid-season tournament has managed to attract more fans. According to statistics, the average viewership of ESPN and TNT is 1.5 million, an increase of 26% over the same period last year. Local TV broadcast ratings increased by 20 percent, with attendance per game last month reaching 18,206, the highest attendance in November in history. In addition, the number of video views on the NBA app and social media reached a record 3.9 billion in November.

"The launch of the Mid-Season Tournament was an experiment, because the new season came out and people were curious, and curiosity generated additional interest, so the format was destined to succeed from the start. Ed Desser, a former NBA executive who now serves as a media consultant, explained.

Are mid-season tournaments controversial? There are, like the fancy floors mentioned earlier. Many people complain that the visual effect brought by the fancy floor is not good. But don't expect the league to change, Shaw made it clear yesterday: "I'm in favour of colourful flooring, obviously we have to make sure the players are reassured that the paint we use is not too slippery, we've solved these problems, we have to make sure the players don't get distracted." ”

Previously, players complained more about fancy floors that were too slippery and uneven in some places, and if the league solved these hardware problems, the players would not object. According to Xiao Hua, "The Lakers and Pacers told me before the game that they appreciate this fancy floor, and the different colors of the court indicate that the game itself is very special. ”

Will the appeal of the mid-season tournament be maintained in the future, and will the novelty of the new format ever wear off?

These two problems objectively exist in the future, taking the All-Star Game as an example, the league carried out various reforms to the All-Star in order to increase gimmicks and spectacle, such as the captain selection system, such as setting a 24-point target score in the final quarter to pay tribute to Kobe Bryant. These reforms were successful at first, but over time they lost their appeal for various reasons, and the league has decided to resume the East-West showdown, with no more target points set in the last quarter.

Of course, these problems are only possible in the future, and for the time being the alliance can enjoy the initial success of the reform. As for the future, leave it to time. At least for now, we don't see the new format losing its appeal. After all, the big bonuses are there.

"The new format gives fans an extra reason to watch, except for the purists who don't like to see any changes. I don't see any drawbacks to the format anyway. Desel said.