It's been a long time since anyone's feelings about Russell Westbrook topped out at "mild interest" — it would be like feeling mild interest toward an avalanche¹. But this is someone at TD Garden in 2010, watching a confounding new talent and wondering where he might take him. Surely someplace fun and in no way dangerous to one's reason itself!!

很长一段时间以来，任何人对拉塞尔威斯布鲁克的感受都达到了“温和的兴趣”——这就像是对雪崩的感受一样。但这是2010年在TD花园的一个人，他看到一个令人困惑的新天才，想知道他会把他带到哪里去。肯定有一些地方很有趣，并且对一个人的本身而言没有任何危险!!

Almost everyone thought that Westbrook, Durant, and James Harden will form an unbreakable core that will dominate the NBA for a decade or more, but still there were very little chance to see what could possibly stop them.

几乎每个人都认为威少、杜兰特和哈登将会形成一个不可动摇的核心，统治NBA10年甚至更长时间，但是仍然几乎没有机会看到什么可能阻止他们。

Maybe he was ... too good? Anyway it started to seem like he was taking shots that should have gone to Durant, and he missed a lot of them, and even though he'd make up for it by, say, shouldering his way through three defenders² and drilling a seemingly suicidal jumper with three hands in his face and 16 seconds left on the shot clock, it was concerning.

也许他…太好了吗?不管怎么说，看起来他投了很多原本应该给杜兰特投的球，而且他投丢了很多球，尽管他可以弥补，比如，在距离一个回合结束还有16秒的时候，他用肩膀顶着三名防守队员，在三双手顶着他的脸的情况下，完成了一个看似自杀式的跳投。这很令人担忧。

In national discourse³ of Russ, a thread of mistrust began to uncurl, like poison in a water glass. Sportswriters in Oklahoma started writing columns telling him to tuck in his Engineered Garments interview cuirass and buy some lenses for the librarian glasses.

在对Russ的全国性讨论中，不信任的气息开始弥漫，就像水杯里的毒药。俄城体育记者开始写专栏吐槽威少采访时的奇装异服和佩戴的像图书馆老奶奶那样的眼镜。（讽刺的意思）

Then Durant left for Golden State. Westbrook re-signed, and at that moment, everything changed, at least for Thunder fans. OKC fans had spent the better part of a decade worshipping KD and not fully trusting Russ, only to realize they'd gotten it exactly backward.

然后杜兰特去了金州勇士队。威少重新签约，在那一刻，至少对雷霆的球迷来说，一切都变了。雷霆队的球迷们花了近十年的时间来崇拜KD，而不是完全信任Russ，结果却发现他们已经完全落后了。

After losing Harden in 2012 and then Durant in 2016, Thunder fans were starting to worry that the early success of the franchise⁴ was a mirage⁵. Add to that the general feeling in Oklahoma that the state always gets overlooked, and you can see how Westbrook's decision to stick with the Thunder resonated not just athletically⁶ but culturally. To put it simply: He made Oklahoma feel like it mattered.

继2012年失去哈登和2016年失去杜兰特之后，雷霆球迷开始担心球队早期的成功只是海市蜃楼。再加上俄克拉荷马州的普遍感觉，这个州总是被忽视，你可以看到威斯布鲁克坚持留在雷霆队的决定在体育和文化上都产生了共鸣。简而言之:他让俄克拉何马州觉得自己很重要。

NBA

The MVP season was, in many respects, the pivotal moment of modern Westbrook fandom. Westbrook was playing unforgettable basketball, and it was clear that OKC was never going to make a deep playoff run with him using the ball like that. The result was an apotheosis⁷ of pessimistic euphoria like nothing people ever seen in sports.

在很多方面，威少的MVP赛季都是其现代球迷圈的关键时刻。威斯布鲁克打了令人难忘的篮球比赛，但很明显，由于威少的打法，雷霆队永远也不会在季后赛更进一步。结果是一种悲观的欣快感的神化，就像人们在体育运动中从未见过的那样。

It was euphoric because we were thrilled to see what Westbrook could do now that he was fully unleashed⁸. It was pessimistic because we knew deep down that it was a sports version of the Charge of the Light Brigade. It was dramatic and frustrating⁹ and silly and extreme, like everything involving Westbrook.

这是令人兴奋的，因为我们很高兴看到威斯布鲁克在完全放开的情况下到底可以做什么。这是悲观的，因为我们内心深处知道，这是一个体育版的轻骑兵冲锋队。这是戏剧性的、令人沮丧的、愚蠢的、极端的，就像所有涉及威斯布鲁克的事情一样。

In a way it ran counter to the whole purpose of basketball, if the purpose is to win championships, but what image would you rather remember, Westbrook fighting the ocean single-handedly or Harden technically¹⁰ not traveling on yet another stepback 3?

在某种程度上，这与篮球的整体目标背道而驰，如果目标是赢得总冠军，但你更愿意记住的是威少单打独揽，还是哈登没有走步的后撤步三分球技术?

There are undoubtedly¹¹ more contradictions to come, but at this point, it feels as though every previous layer of Westbrook fandom is operating simultaneously¹². The wild heat of the MVP season has cooled off a bit — his scoring is down 10 points per game, which clearly represents a concession¹³ to basketball sanity¹⁴ — and even though Paul George is very, very good, I think most Thunder fans have come to terms with the fact the team as presently constructed will never be a serious contender.

毫无疑问，还会有更多的矛盾出现，但在这一点上，感觉好像威斯布鲁克球迷的每一层都在同时运作。MVP赛季的狂热已经冷却了一些——他每场得分下降了10分，这显然是对篮球一种理智的让步——尽管保罗·乔治非常非常优秀，我认为大多数雷霆球迷已经接受了这样一个事实，即雷霆目前的阵容永远不会是一支强有力的竞争者。

And Russ still means the world to Oklahoma. Rooting for Russ means rooting for someone who will do more than you thought was possible but will ultimately let you down; who will transcend¹⁵ basketball as we know it yet shoot 63 percent from the foul¹⁶ line and finish with the fifth seed in the West; who will brick an endless series of pull-up jumpers and then do something face-melting when the game is on the line, or when it isn't on the line, or when no one is paying attention at all.

对俄克拉何马州来说，Russ仍然意味着整个世界。支持Russ意味着支持一个人，他会做比你想象中更多的事情，但最终会让你失望;谁将超越我们所知的篮球，但仍有63%的罚球线出手，并以西部第五的成绩结束比赛;谁会在比赛进行到关键时刻，或者根本没有人注意到的情况下，连续不断地干拔跳起，然后做一些让人颜面尽失的事情呢？