By Devon Birdsong | Pounding The Rock (PtR), 2025-10-31 22:59:28
由生成式人工智能翻译，译文内容可能不准确或不完整，以原文为准。
我25岁那年，厄尔·威弗 (Earl Weaver) 去世了。
对于认识他的人来说，他死于一艘加勒比海游轮上这件事，多少有点令人啼笑皆非。尽管我现在已找不到那句引言，但我记得至少有一位他的前队员曾面色沉重地开玩笑说，正是这种放松要了那个一向极度紧绷的男人的命。他曾对一名试图让他冷静下来的裁判野蛮地反驳道：“放松是死人才干的事。”
然而，每年的这个时候，我都会想起他。棒球赛季的结束与篮球赛季的开启，两者碎片化的交织总让我感到些许伤感。
在德克萨斯，我们真正只有两个截然不同的天气时段：夏天的三种变奏（暖、热、更热）以及橄榄球赛季。
不过，在我生命的大部分时间里，这都是我一年中最喜欢的时光。棒球是我第一个爱上的运动，篮球紧随其后似乎也顺理成章。每年的这个时候，空气中都弥漫着一种特别的气息，在这段被当地人称之为“三周之秋”的短暂而振奋的喘息期里尤其如此。
这种感觉像是苦尽甘来，如同久旱之后的一场绵长细雨。
圣安东尼奥马刺队开季的五连胜也是如此。
有趣的是，我从不知道究竟是什么会触发我对威弗的思绪。每次都不尽相同。会是格雷格·波波维奇 (Gregg Popovich) 吃到赛季的首次驱逐吗？会是新秀维克托·文班亚马 (Victor Wembanyama) 与凯文·杜兰特 (Kevin Durant) 的殊死对决吗？会是一场溃败，或是一场胶着到窒息的比赛？
事实是，这些都曾触发过我的思绪，甚至更多。但今晚，是米奇·约翰逊 (Mitch Johnson)。
要弄清楚何时以及如何按下球队身上的“按钮”，是件很难的事（尤其是作为一名球迷）。即便是那些履历光鲜的教练，也常常对此感到束手无策。我想这就是为什么当他们看到自己不懈训练和教导的球队打出糟糕表现时，常常会表现得怒不可遏。
他们怎么能这么打？！我们刚刚才演练过！[配上一脸困惑的表情]
我想，这也是为什么我对篮球教练和棒球主教练如此着迷。一个NBA赛季有82场比赛，而MLB的比赛数量几乎是其两倍。这两个领域的教练所经历的职业体育比赛比地球上几乎任何其他项目的教练都多，因此，他们也面临着更多的不确定性。
无论一支球队多么稳定和出色，在这两项运动的历史上，都从未有过全胜的赛季，将来也绝不会有。这两个赛季都为失败提供了太多机会，无论是在竞技层面还是人性层面。
于是，教练们按下按钮，拉动杠杆，在严厉与安抚两种姿态之间交替切换。在训练和战术之外，他们的武器和工具是人类的情感。而他们运用这些工具的方式，则将他们区分开来。
在菲尔·杰克逊 (Phil Jackson) 身上，有一种仁慈的邪教领袖气质。在帕特·莱利 (Pat Riley) 身上，则是一种圆滑而精明的黑手党头目风范。而在波波维奇身上，则是军事化的精准与秩序。
这三位都是战术天才，他们成功的丰富性和适应性广受赞誉。
在恰到好处的时机叫暂停，为了给阵容带来精准的补充而进行换人，出人意料的边线球战术和定位进攻被精心地保留到最关键的时刻。所有这些（理所当然地）吸引了媒体的目光。
然而，最让我着迷的，始终是他们没有做的事，以及他们选择不做这些事的时候。
厄尔·威弗，在很多方面，就是一位由他“不做什么”来定义的教练。
在小联盟摸爬滚打了十多年后，威弗确信自己知道什么管用，什么不管用。他曾在无数破旧、质量低劣的棒球场打过球也执教过，这些知识是他通过艰苦的方式获得的。
他从未以球员身份进入过大联盟，许多棒球界人士过去（至今仍然）认为这几乎注定了执教的失败。但作为一名小联盟主教练，威弗赢下了很多比赛，并在此过程中学到了一些诀窍。
在小联盟级别赢球很难。你总是在不断地轮换球员（比大学教练更甚），总是乘坐最廉价的交通工具旅行，并且总是在处理一个在质量和稳定性上都不断波动的阵容。小联盟球员要么年轻，充满未经雕琢的潜力，要么年长，怀揣着遥不可及的梦想。第三类则是为那些两者皆不沾边的人准备的。
威弗被迫熟悉名单上的每一位球员，以及他们的优缺点。在那个电脑还使用真空管和晶体管的时代，这可不是一项小成就。
在体育数据分析标准化之前的几十年，他 painstaking 地记录了每位球员的对位情况和成功案例。在这个级别，优点凤毛麟角；而弱点比比皆是。可以理解，威弗只想用强项去对抗强项。因此，他只会安排那些在对抗特定投手或在特定情况下表现出色的球员上场，甚至偶尔会将表现更好但结果更差的球员放在板凳上。
1979年，在大联盟，他在短短162场比赛中使用了140套不同的首发阵容，这一纪录直到2016年才被A.J. 辛奇 (A.J. Hinch)（以及太空人队的数据分析部门）打破。
到2015年，MLB球队平均每个赛季会使用128套不同的首发阵容。
当他在1968年作为临时主教练接手金莺队时，这种一丝不苟的做法看起来近乎疯狂，尤其是与他公开表现出的性情相比。
在当时许多人看来，威弗似乎古怪无常，喜怒不定。他痛恨裁判，常常因为他们在小联盟执法时的某些具体判罚而对他们怀恨在心。他以满口脏话而闻名，以至于许多记者放弃了等待他说句干净话的时刻，干脆直接从他的引语中删掉脏话。他甚至与自己的投手争吵，其中包括未来的名人堂成员吉姆·帕尔默 (Jim Palmer)。
然而，在暴躁和咆哮之中，隐藏着一个敏锐而体贴的头脑。
在小联盟执教时，他的投手常常因为控球精准度问题而无法升上大联盟。他通过要求他们避免投向好球带的边缘，转而依赖球速和旋转的变化、击球手的技术以及内野防守来解决这个问题。这极大地减少了保送并增加了好球数。多年后，帕尔默承认这让他成为了一名更好的投手。
作为一名失败的棒球运动员，威弗对那些能力有限、特点鲜明的“功能型”球员也怀有同情心，他经常将那些只展现出某一项突出技能或在特定情况下表现出色的球员招入队中——这些球员是别人不想要或看不到其价值的。
结果，他的球队阵容异常深厚，整个名单上的球员都能在关键时刻做出及时贡献，而且他的球员们都非常忠诚。威弗也以同样的忠诚回报他们，即使是在严厉驱策他们的同时，也常常顶住反对意见，在他们经历长期低迷时将他们留在队中。
因此，他的球队5次赢下100场以上的比赛（相当于NBA赛季的60胜），4次闯入世界大赛（如果算上他退休后的那一年，就是5次）。
没人能理解这个身材矮小、脾气暴躁、烟不离手的男人是如何做到的。尽管他在某些战略重点上确实领先了时代约一代人，但威弗对自己贡献的评价却出奇地谦虚。
“主教练的工作很简单。在一个赛季的一百六十二场比赛里，你要做的就是别把你家管理层去年十二月做的那些聪明事给搞砸了。”
当我看着马刺队在与迈阿密热火队的比赛中艰难取胜时，正是这句引言深深地印在了我的脑海里。
这是一场拉锯战，充满了这支NBA最年轻阵容之一的球队所表现出的不稳定性，而他们的对手是一支由天才老将和执教奇才埃里克·斯波尔斯特拉 (Eric Spoelstra) 组成的球队。
失误当然有，但没有前几场比赛那么多。有过被对手的身体对抗和强硬打压的时刻，但马刺队拒绝让自己变成一支跳投大队。
比赛的潮起潮落令人心惊肉跳，每当一支球队取得领先，又很快被拖回到泥潭中。我好奇，一个人怎么能忍受在场边近距离观看这样的比赛。
就在那时，我开始观察米奇·约翰逊。
约翰逊看起来既不抱歉也不慌张。他显得很平静，甚至比上赛季还要沉着。他充满自信，并且无论比赛顺境逆境，他都将这份自信传递给了球队。当然，他偶尔也会做出一些犀利的战术布置（包括一个来自凯尔登·约翰逊 (Keldon Johnson) 的复古锤子战术），但大多数时候，他都让球队保持着一种平衡。
他让管理层煞费苦心组建起来的球员们，自然地经历他们的起伏。他让文班在巴姆·阿德巴约 (Bam Adebayo) 和热火队的大个子们面前克服他个人的难关，给了他职业生涯最长的上场时间，而不是用上场限制来娇惯或保护他。他相信，凭借球员们付出的努力，他们的投篮命中率终将回归均值。
“主教练除了‘按按钮’还能做什么？他不用上场击球、跑垒、投球或接球。他手下有二十五名球员，就像有二十五个按钮，他要决定每天使用或按下哪一个。那个最常按对按钮的教练，就是赢得最多比赛的人。”
退役很久之后，厄尔·威弗仍然坚信，糟糕的球员能成为最好的教练。这种看法无疑带有偏见，但它让我想起了篮球作家查理·罗森 (Charley Rosen) 曾经讲过的一个关于杰里·韦斯特 (Jerry West) 的故事。
在进入管理层并进一步巩固其传奇地位之前，韦斯特曾尝试在NBA执教。据他的球员们说，韦斯特每次第四节开始时都会用同样充满激情的话语激励大家：“记住，这是你生命中最重要的一场比赛。”
对于韦斯特这位完美主义的传奇人物来说，这或许是事实。但对于普通的NBA球员来说，不可能每场比赛都是他生命中最重要的一场。一个赛季有82场比赛，你必须知道如何调整球员的节奏，以及如何接受失败。
你必须知道你的球员是真的状态不佳，还是只需要一些东西来点燃他们。你必须知道该把谁放在什么位置，而这些原因甚至可能与数据无关。
尽管厄尔·威弗痴迷于数据和情境分析，但他在这方面却非常出色，有时他会因为一名球员的热情、幽默感或抗压能力而将他排入阵容；他信任个体身上那些最基本的东西：意志、训练和斗志。
这也是格雷格·波波维奇——同样未能以球员身份取得成功——所擅长的事情。
而米奇·约翰逊——在球员生涯失败后曾在NBA的小联盟执教——似乎也具备这一特质。
多年来，波波维奇坚称他绝大部分的成功是以不搞砸一件本已很好的事情为代价的。如果说有什么不同的话，那就是约翰逊似乎已经完全掌握了这个概念。这并非小事，但话说回来，小事往往意义重大。
马刺队展现了坚韧、耐力和永不放弃的精神，而球队永远是其教练的写照。
马刺队5胜0负，米奇·约翰逊也是。
赛后观察
- 尽管他的投篮数据确实不尽如人意（三分球6投1中），但朱利安·尚帕尼 (Julian Champagnie) 在整场比赛中都贡献了出色的防守。他牢牢限制住了热火队的后卫，并做出了敏锐的轮转换位，他的稳定性让斯蒂芬·卡斯尔 (Stephon Castle) 得以进行一些关键的即兴发挥，最终贡献了四次抢断。是的，卡斯尔本身就是一名防守悍将，但任何球队的成功都离不开集体努力，这也是为什么尚帕尼以全队当晚最高的正负值结束比赛。像这样的比赛至关重要，因为它们让尚帕尼确立了自己投篮之外的价值，并证明了他几乎可以被安插在任何位置，并成为一个净正向贡献者。在一个德文·瓦塞尔 (Devin Vassell) 和凯尔登·约翰逊都出现了一些防守失误的夜晚，知道这一点总是好的。
- 至于瓦塞尔，我仍在密切关注他是否会出现状态裂痕，但我必须说，他看起来已经很大程度上恢复到了2023年签下那份合同时的自己。他似乎也致力于命中远投，并在投篮选择上更加高效。如果他能将这种状态保持整个赛季，对手将很难在低位包夹文班，而我们已经见识过文班在一对一中能造成多大的破坏。
- 天啊，我简直无法用言语来形容凯尔登·约翰逊本赛季迄今的表现。在我曾对他能否在没有三分球的情况下胜任第六人角色感到绝望之后，约翰逊正化身为塞思·库里 (Seth Curry)，三分命中率高达54%，投出了54%/62%/82%这样惊人的三项数据。虽然我怀疑他能否一直保持如此火热的手感，但即便稍有下滑，他仍将是联盟中最具威胁的板凳得分手之一。甚至在防守端，当对位其他球队的替补时，他也表现得很好。这真是一道令人欣慰的风景，因为我一直很偏爱他和他的标志性热情。为好样的喝彩。
离场音乐 – 今夜主题曲：
Eye of the Tiger by Survivor
点击查看原文：What we learned from the Spurs win over the Heat
What we learned from the Spurs win over the Heat
Earl Weaver died the year that I turned 25.
That he died aboard a Caribbean cruise was a source of some amusement for those who’d known him. Though I can no longer find the quote, I recall at least one former player somberly jesting that it was the relaxation that killed the man so uniformly intense that he once savagely retorted to an umpire (who was trying to calm him down) that “relaxing is for dead people.”
And yet, every year around this time, I find myself thinking about him. There’s something about the fragmentary mingling of the baseball and basketball seasons, with one ending while the other starts up, that feels poignant to me.
In Texas, we really only have two truly distinct periods of weather: the three different variations of summer (warm, hot, and hotter) and football season.
For most of my life, though, this has been my favorite time of year. Baseball was the first sport I loved, and it seems fitting that basketball followed shortly after. There’s something in the air at this time of year, during the brief yet invigorating respite that natives frequently refer to as our three weeks of Fall.
It feels earned, like a long, soft rain after a drought.
And so too does San Antonio’s five-game win streak to open the season.
It’s funny, I never really know what’s going to trigger my musing about Weaver. It’s never the same thing twice. Will it be Gregg Popovich, earning one of his first ejections of the season? Will it be a rookie Victor Wembanyama dueling with Kevin Durant to the death? Will it be a blowout or an impossibly tight game?
The truth is, it’s been all of those, and more. But tonight, it was Mitch Johnson.
It can be hard to know (especially as a fan) which buttons to push with a team, and when. Even coaches with glittering resumes are often at a loss when it comes to that. I think that’s why they so frequently appear apoplectic at the appearance of shoddy play from the teams that they ceaselessly drill and teach.
How can they be doing this?! We just went over this! [Insert look of bewilderment]
And I think this is why I’m so fascinated by basketball coaches and baseball managers. There are 82 games in an NBA season. The MLB nearly doubles that number. Coaches in both arenas are subjected to more games of professional sports than just about any other coaches on planet earth, and as a result, they are subject to more degrees of variance.
There are no undefeated seasons in the history of either sport, no matter how consistently great the team is, and there never will be. Both seasons offer far too many opportunities for failure, on both a competitive and human level.
So, coaches push buttons, and pull levers, and alternate between demeanors of ferocity and reassurance. Outside the realm of training and schematics, their weapons and tools are those of human emotion. What distinguishes them is how they use them.
With Phil Jackson, there was an air of benevolent cult leader. With Pat Riley, that of a slick and shrewd Mafioso. With Popovich, military precision and order.
All three were strategically gifted, cited for the variety and adaptability of their successes.
Timeouts called at precisely the right moment, substitutions made for just the right addition to the lineup, surprising inbound and set plays calculatedly held back until just the right moment. These were all the things that (deservedly) drew media attention.
What always fascinated me most, though, were the things that they did not do, and the times that they declined to do them.
Earl Weaver was a coach who was in many ways defined by what he would not do.
Having toiled in the minors for over a decade, Weaver was convinced that he knew what did and didn’t work. He’d both played and managed in a legion of run-down/lower quality baseball stadiums, and he’d earned his knowledge the hard way.
He’d never made it to the majors as a player, something that many within baseball were (and remain) convinced all but guarantees managerial failure. But Weaver had won a lot for a minor league manager, and in the process, he’d picked up a few tricks.
Winning at the minor league level is hard. You’re constantly cycling through players (even more so than college coaches), constantly traveling at the lowest fare, and constantly dealing with a roster fluctuating in both quality and consistency. Minor leaguers are either young and full of untrained promise or old and full of unattainable dreams. The third category is reserved for those who never had much of either.
Weaver was forced to be familiar with every player on the roster, and their weaknesses and strengths, which was no small achievement at a time when computers still had vacuum tubes and transistors.
Painstakingly, he documented each player’s match-ups and successes decades before the standardization of sporting analytics. Strengths were fewer and farther between at this level; weaknesses abounded. Weaver, understandably, only wanted to face strengths with strengths. As a result, he would only set lineups with players who excelled against certain pitchers, or in certain situations, even occasionally benching better players with worse outcomes.
In 1979, at the major league level, he would use 140 different lineups in just 162 games, a record that wasn’t broken until 2016 by A.J. Hinch (and the Astros analytics department).
By 2015, the average MLB team used 128 different starting lineups in a season.
It was a meticulousness that seemed an insanity when he took over the Orioles as an interim manager in 1968. Especially in contrast with his public demeanor.
To many at the time, Weaver appeared to be endlessly quirky and temperamental. He hated umpires, often bearing grudges against them from specific instances of officiating back in their years in the minor leagues. He was famously and profusely profane, to such an extent that many reporters gave up waiting for a clean moment and simply removed the swear words from his quotes. He even feuded with his own pitchers, including future Hall of Famer Jim Palmer.
Amidst the temper and the tirades, though, there was a keen and considerate mind at work.
Managing in the minors, his pitchers had often fallen short of the Major Leagues due to issues with accuracy. He solved this by demanding that they avoid throwing at the edges of the strike zone, relying instead on changes in speed and spin, the batter’s skills, and the infield. This had the effect of greatly reducing walks and increasing strikes. Years later, Palmer conceded that it had made him a better pitcher.
A failed baseball player, Weaver also had a soft spot for the limited and niche athlete, frequently adding players to his team that displayed only one standout skill, or excelled in specific circumstances — players that no one else wanted or saw the value in.
As a result, his teams were unusually deep, receiving critical and timely contributions all across the roster, and his players were loyal. Weaver matched that loyalty even as he drove them hard, often keeping them on the roster against objections and through extended slumps.
As a result, his teams won 100+ games (the equivalent of a 60-win NBA season) 5 times (one shy of the record), and made it to the World Series 4 times (5 if you count the year after he retired).
No one could understand how this tiny, irascible, chain-smoking man had done it. And while he did anticipate several strategic points of emphasis by a generation or so, Weaver remained surprisingly modest about his contributions.
“A manager’s job is simple. For one hundred sixty-two games you try not to screw up all that smart stuff your organization did last December.”
It was this quote in particular that stuck in my mind as I watched the Spurs struggle their way to victory against the Miami Heat.
It was a back-and-forth affair, full of inconsistency from one of the youngest rosters in the NBA, up against a team of talented veterans and a coaching genius in Eric Spoelstra.
There were turnovers, sure, but not as many as in the past several games. There were moments of being beaten down by physicality and toughness, but the Spurs refused to let themselves be turned into jump shooters.
The ebb and flow were nerve-racking, as each team surged into a lead, and then found themselves pulled back down into the mud. I wondered how someone could stand watching it in court-side proximity.
And that was when I started to watch Mitch Johnson.
Johnson didn’t look apologetic or nonplussed. He looked calm, even compared to last season. He was confident, and he projected that to the team in spite of every upturn or downturn. Sure, he made the occasional sharp call (including a vintage hammer play from Keldon Johnson), but largely he kept things at equilibrium.
He let the players that the front office has painstakingly assembled work through their up-and-downs organically. He let Wemby work on overcoming his own personal hurdle in Bam Adebayo and Miami’s bigs, giving him the most minutes of his career rather than coddling or protecting him with restrictions. He trusted that shooting would return to the mean, in the work that his players had done.
“What else does a manager do but push buttons? He doesn’t hit, he doesn’t run, he doesn’t throw, and he doesn’t catch the ball. A manager has twenty-five players, or twenty-five buttons, and he selects which one he’ll use, or push, that day. The manager who presses the right buttons most often is the one who wins the most games.”
Long after retirement, Earl Weaver remained convinced that bad ballplayers made the best coaches. There was bias in that sentiment, undoubtedly, but it reminds me of a story that basketball writer Charley Rosen once told about Jerry West.
Before going into the front-office work that would further cement his legacy, West tried his hand at coaching in the NBA. According to his players, West would start every fourth quarter with the same passionate statement: “Remember, this is the biggest game of your life.”
For West, the perfectionist legend, this was the truth. But every game can’t be the biggest game of the average NBA player’s life. There are 82 games in a season. You have to know how to pace your players, and how to accept defeat.
You have to know when your players are really having an off night or just need something to ignite them. You have to know who to place where, for reasons that aren’t even statistical.
In spite of his statistical and situational obsessions, this was something Earl Weaver excelled at, sometimes placing a player in the lineup due to their enthusiasm, or good humor, or resistance to pressure; trusting something elemental within the individual: the will, the training, the fighting spirit.
It was something Gregg Popovich, who also never made it as a player, also excelled at.
And it appears to be a trait that Mitch Johnson, who coached in the NBA minors after a failed playing career, also has.
For years, Pop insisted that the larger part of his success came at the cost of not screwing up an already good thing. If nothing else, Johnson seems to have fully grasped that concept. It’s not a small thing. But then, the small things rarely are.
The Spurs showed grit, endurance, and a refusal to quit, and teams are always a reflection of their coaching.
The Spurs are 5-0, and so is Mitch Johnson.
Takeaways
- Though his shooting stats certainly left one wanting (1-6 from three), Julian Champagnie played excellent defense throughout the game. Keeping Miami’s guards in check and rotating sharply, his steadiness allowed Stephon Castle to do some critical free-lancing, to the tune of four steals. Yes, Castle is a defensive standout in his own right, but no team ever does anything alone, which is why Champanie ended the night with the highest +/- on the team for the evening. Games like this are critical because they allow Champagnie to establish his non-shooting value, and function as proof of concept that he can be slotted in just about anywhere and be a net positive. And on a night where both Devin Vassell and Keldon Johnson were suffering some defensive lapses, that’s always good to know.
- As for Vassell, I’m still monitoring him closely for cracks, but I have to say he looks much restored to the version of himself that landed that contract in 2023. He also seems to be committed to knocking down the long-ball and being more efficient with his shot selection. If he can keep this up for the length of the season, teams are going to have an awful hard time collapsing in on Wemby in the post, and we’ve already seen the damage he can do one-on-one.
- And boy, I cannot say enough about what Keldon Johnson is doing so far this season. After despairing that he would ever be able to settle in as a sixth man without a three-pointer, Johnson is channeling Seth Curry by shooting 54% from three, for a preposterous 54/62/82 shooting split. And while I doubt he’ll stay quite that hot, even a slight decline would still make him one of the nastier bench scorers in the league. He’s even performing well defensively, matched up against other benches. It’s a sight for sore eyes, as I’ve long had a soft spot for him and his trademark brand of enthusiasm. Score one for the good guys.
Playing You Out – The Theme Song of the Evening:
Eye of the Tiger by Survivor
By Devon Birdsong, via Pounding The Rock