The Whip of the God of Basketball

In June, the hot weather began to come to the North American continent. Students began to take vacations. Some units took high-temperature vacations. Major professional sports events in the United States also began to enter the long offseason. People began to have a lot of time and nowhere to spend it. Therefore, The peak travel season has arrived.

Hoover Dam, located at the border of Nevada and Arizona, is one of the famous man-made attractions in the United States. This giant arch dam, started in 1931 and completed in 1936, irrigated and protected hundreds of thousands of hectares of land in Arizona. Moreover, because the construction of the dam gathered a large number of workers, workers who had nothing to do after get off work began to enjoy gambling, and some small casinos began to rise. As a result, it eventually grew into the bizarre gambling city of Las Vegas. It can be said that the Hoover Dam is the mother of Las Vegas. It not only promoted the formation of Las Vegas, but also provided water and abundant electricity to the city.

When night begins to fall in the Nevada desert, Las Vegas, 60 kilometers away from the Hoover Dam, begins to have colorful nightlife. Summer is the peak season for the entire casino, and guests from all over the United States and even the world will go to this casino city. , let your desires and money be fully displayed here.

The Hoover Dam, as majestic as a giant, began to become deserted. Tourists who had seen this great building seventy years ago during the day drove back to the hotel in Las Vegas with satisfaction, where there was a waiting for them. Great night. The dam shrouded in darkness became rugged and silent under the illumination of dots of ornamental lights.

The originally raging Colorado River became gentle and calm after being blocked by the dam. The road first built to repair the dam wound around the Colorado mountains. A high-end Mercedes-Benz S-Class car circled along this road. Directly through the main body of the dam. With most of the cars gone, this solitary car seemed very special. When it arrived at the parking lot, there were only a few cars around, and the rest of the space became empty.

"It's already so late, what are you doing here?" A staff member who managed the parking lot walked to the car with a bright flashlight and shouted to the people on the car. Although the Hoover Dam is open for tours at night, the Nevada is very cold, and the typical inland climate makes it cool down very quickly.

At this time, two tall men in black suits got out of the car, one black and one white. They looked stern. One of the black men glanced sideways at the administrator. The administrator could tell at a glance that the two men were from Las Vegas. Casino security personnel at the MGM Grand Hotel wear "MGM" badges on their chests.

Then another person got out of the car, wearing an ordinary coat, a pair of trousers, and somewhat disheveled black hair. His face could not be seen clearly in the dark, but judging from his clothes, he looked like an ordinary person.

The administrator didn't ask any more questions. He turned off the bright flashlight with a "pop" and ran back to his security room. He knew that the security at the MGM Grand Hotel was not easy to mess with. Those who tried to cause trouble or cause trouble in the casino would be punished. Some people would even disappear forever. Some of them fell to death on the Hoover Dam or drowned in the Hoover Dam. In the black gorge.

I don’t know how this guy offended the casino in the hotel, whether he was a cheater, a debtor who didn’t acknowledge the debt, or some other bad thing. This guy looked like a Puerto Rican who would cause trouble. But no matter what, tonight there will be another corpse accidentally falling to death near the Hoover Dam... The administrator thought in his heart, he has seen too many such things after working here for twenty years. You must know that 117 workers lost their lives during the construction of the dam. This is a veritable dam of death.

Under the leadership of two sturdy men, the guy who came out later followed slowly along the road towards the dam in the dark night. Hoover Dam is a typical arch dam. The curved dam body is like a tile embedded in the hard and solid andesite and breccia mountain. It relies on a perfect mechanical structure to block 19.6 billion cubic meters of Colorado River water.

The three people slowly walked onto the dam body. On one side was the calm water of the Colorado River, and on the other side was a huge drop of 221 meters. The night shrouded the dazzling high drop, but the Colorado River sparkled under the moonlight, glowing with crystal-clear brilliance.

When he walked to the middle, the man following him took out a cigar from his pocket, while the big white man in front put his hand into the inner pocket of his coat. If the administrator saw it, he would definitely think, this guy It's over, they're going to take out their guns and kill him here!

But no, the big white man took out a lighter from his pocket and wanted to light a cigar for the person behind him.

"No, don't use a lighter, it will smell of kerosene. Change the matches...don't tell me you didn't bring any matches." The person behind him said to the two big men in a cold voice. It seemed that he was not afraid of these two guys at all. , and it doesn’t look like he was coerced to come here at all.

"Yes! I've brought it, I've brought it!" the black man on the side said immediately, and took out a long match from his pocket. The white man also stepped forward, helped the black man cover the flames caused by the match with his hands, and came closer. Cigar smoke, slowly light it.

A little red star lit up in the dark night. The wind on the dam was very cold. Even if they wore coats, the two big men felt like the wind was blowing into their necks. However, they stood motionless in the wind with no intention of leaving. He didn't say anything, as if he didn't want to disturb the smoker's thoughts.

After the cigar burned a little, the man turned around and asked the two of them: "Do you like watching professional sports games?"

The two looked at each other and nodded, but neither of them spoke, as if they were afraid of this smoking guy.

"What do you like to watch? Basketball? Baseball? Or football or ice hockey." The smoker continued to ask.

"I like watching football, I'm a Pittsburgh Steelers fan." Black said.

"I like baseball...I am a fan of the Atlanta Braves. Basketball is also okay, I like the Philadelphia 76ers." White said.

"Are you from Atlanta?" the smoker asked again.

"No, I'm from Philadelphia. I later worked in Atlanta and finally found a job here." The big white man said with a wry smile. In just a few words, he revealed the bitterness of a man who was working hard to survive.

"Do you know the 76ers' big trade in 1982?" It seems that this big white man who likes basketball is more interested in people who smoke.

"I know...even though I was only 10 years old that year, my dad was an avid 76ers fan. The whole of Philadelphia was crazy about the 76ers that year, just because of the arrival of Moses Malone. Even though it was only for one year, he achieved great things. He won the 76ers and made Philadelphia a success. To this day, my dad still has a piece of Malone’s jersey at home that he grabbed during the team’s championship parade.”

What they are talking about is the signing and transaction with the Philadelphia 76ers in 1983. They snatched regular season MVP Moses Malone from the Rockets through sign-and-trade compensation, and created a 65-17 record in the following 1983 season. The team lost the best record in the history, and then won the championship with a shocking 12 wins and 1 loss in the playoffs, creating a legendary season.

After saying this, the three people fell into silence again, and the smoker fell into deep thought again. The cigar was burning little by little. The wind on the dam became stronger and stronger, and the two security guards couldn't stand it anymore. Finally the black man asked: "Mr. Leon...please, can we go back? It's really too cold here."

The man who has been smoking cigars is Fox Leon. During the offseason, one week before the draft, he spent his last free time in Las Vegas before the busy schedule.

However, when he went to the MGM hotel casino to try it out, he was quickly discovered by the casino's security personnel. Then the casino general manager personally implored Leon to show mercy and offered him $50,000 in MGM hotel money. Spending gold card. Leon did not embarrass the casino people, he just made a request and wanted to see the nearby Hoover Dam. At this time, even if Leon wants to go skiing in Alaska, the casino will try its best to accommodate him, let alone just a trip to the Hoover Dam, which is 60 kilometers away.

Soon two security personnel were asked to escort Leon to the Hoover Dam, and they had to protect him all the way without slacking off at all. As a result, the two of them did not expect that this famous basketball coach named Fox Leon, a big gambler in the casino, would stand on the dam and smoke for an hour, not knowing what he was thinking.

After listening to the black man's words, Leon turned his head and said: "Go back, no matter what, I want to take a gamble."