Champion Creed
Chapter 426 - 426 164 This is your champion's curse!

426: 164: This is your champion’s curse!

The distance to MVP?

(Asking for monthly votes!)_3 426: 164: This is your champion’s curse!

The distance to MVP?

(Asking for monthly votes!)_3 And today, he even held Payton to just 11 points.

Roger’s improvement had become impossible to ignore.

After that shot, the SuperSonics had no chance left; the fourth quarter turned into garbage time, and eventually, Magic triumphed with a 104 to 88 victory.

Under Roger’s dominating performance, Magic won even more easily than last season!

Everyone thought that the gift Roger gave to George Karl was the stats of 29 points and 10 rebounds in just three quarters and this humiliating defeat.

However, after the game ended, with live cameras watching, Roger had someone bring out a bottle of red wine from the locker room, which he then presented to George Karl.

“Here’s your Christmas gift, George.

Have a taste,” Roger said.

George Karl was somewhat surprised, having not expected Roger to actually have a gift prepared for him.

This was a bottle from Roger’s own brand, which currently had two versions of the True 14 label wine.

The regular version was called “Champion’s Blood,” and there was a more luxurious collector’s edition named “Dynasty Feast.” One was designed for volume sales, and the other to elevate the brand’s prestige.

The bottle George Karl received was “Champion’s Blood.”

George Karl accepted Roger’s gift, thinking Roger was just seizing the opportunity to promote his wine brand, so he didn’t think much of it.

After all, he did love red wine, so why refuse it?

But it was only when Roger did an interview that people understood his real intent.

“I wanted to compensate Coach George Karl for the wine he wasted celebrating our so-called disintegration on Christmas Eve.

Moreover, this is the only chance he’ll have to taste Champion’s Blood.”

As everyone knows, George lacks the champion’s gene.

Even if he becomes a coach with a thousand wins one day, it’s still highly likely he’ll never win a championship, at least not while I’m in the league.

He loves to talk about some ‘championship curse,’ but a lifetime without a championship is his own curse!

“Face it, he’s just not cut out for it,” Roger stated.

To Roger, basketball was a dusty battlefield, and many principles of the battlefield could be applied to basketball—leadership, courage, strategy, power…

What was different was the stakes; life was at stake on the battlefield, while on the basketball court, it was dignity!

The loser’s dignity was naturally trampled upon!

Roger mercilessly humiliated George Karl as punishment for his Schadenfreude during Magic’s troubled times.

George Karl, after learning what Roger said in the interview, was so enraged that he smashed the bottle of wine Roger had given him to the floor during a press conference, only to embarrassingly discover that the bottle didn’t break.

It was apparent that Roger’s wine brand invested sincerely in packaging, ensuring that even if you didn’t drink, considering the state of security in America, you could definitely buy a bottle as a means of self-defense.

George Karl’s bottle-smashing act turned out to be unexpected advertising.

Seeing the bottle intact, George Karl was instantly infuriated, his face flushed red: “He cannot decide whether I can win a championship!

Nobody can decide that I can win a championship!

Jim Gray was right, I really want to see what that arrogant fool looks like when he fails!”

Regardless, Roger had achieved his goal.

He had made George Karl lose face and had effectively promoted his wine brand, a feat far better than spending millions of US dollars on advertising.

But the hottest topic after the game was not George Karl or Roger’s wine.

The next day, “Sports Illustrated” once again chose Roger for the cover.

The title posed a question of great interest to many: “In his fourth professional season, with fully evolved defensive and organizing abilities, just how far is a more dominant Roger from his first MVP trophy?”

First the championship, then the scoring title.

Now, even the MVP was within Roger’s reach, a prize he might snatch from Jordan’s hands.

Indeed, the stake of the basketball court was dignity.

Michael Jordan, who, out of dignity, made the team send Roger away.

At that time, he could never have imagined that it would cost him even more.

“Sports Illustrated” headline steered people’s attention towards the MVP, seemingly warning all MVP contenders to be extremely cautious when facing Roger.