The second stage of the 2024-25 CBA regular season continues, with news about the championship favorites Guangdong men's basketball team wanting to introduce new foreign players heating up. While Guangdong has confirmed that they will continue to look for new foreign players, their fourth foreign player, Les, has not been able to get playing time in recent games. Whether it was the home defeat against Zhejiang or the away victory over Jilin, Les did not get much opportunity to train. Many fans believe that at this stage, Guangdong is more inclined to use Zhang Haojia, Zhang Wenyi, and others rather than Les. Obviously, although Les has only been with Guangdong for a short time, he has also entered the countdown to leaving the team.
In the recently concluded round of matches, top-tier CBA foreign players such as Samner, Diallo, Brown, and Wells all delivered phenomenal performances, causing many fans to have significant concerns about Guangdong's foreign player choices. Shanxi, driven by the dual-core of Diallo and Goodwin, has become the hottest contender for the championship. Goodwin remains the strongest small foreign guard in today's CBA league, while Goodwin is the only remaining top-tier standard No. 3 foreign player in the league. Samner, Brown, and Wells are all explosive swingmen on offense, and Shanghai's Lofton is the top foreign player in the league who can handle offense, rebounds, and organization. At this point, Guangdong only has Morand who can be compared to them.
Looking at the CBA league, there are almost only Diallo who can play as a standard No. 3 position. Leaving aside swingmen like Samner, Wells, Ferg, and Brown who are less than 1.95 meters tall, there is only Diallo who is close to 2 meters tall and has shown super-strong performance among the frontline foreign players. After Liaoning, the defending champions, cut Shajuek, Beijing Shougang's Omot has not yet performed. Although Wims is still shining in his final moments with Shenzhen, his age is no longer sufficient to match the intensity of the playoffs. At this moment, there is only one frontline foreign player in the entire league with the standard height and wingspan of No. 3 position who has come out, which is Diallo. It can be imagined that it is by no means an easy task for Guangdong to find a qualified No. 3 position foreign player.
After Guangdong's search for new recruits such as Barton, Arms, and Les basically failed, many fans called on Zhu Fangyu to choose another foreign player who has proven himself in the CBA league. In this way, the only candidate who can suit Guangdong and has the ability to suppress first-line foreign players like Samner, Diallo, Lofton, Wells, and Brown is Bacon, the frontline powerhouse from last season's Shanghai team. Bacon's hard-solving ability is stronger than Samner, Lofton, Goodwin, and others, and his height and wingspan are more competitive than Diallo. Judging from the offensive end, Bacon is basically an "enhanced version of Diallo" and is a rare existence in the CBA league that can ignore the defensive system of all teams.
In summary, Bacon's personal contract value is almost "astronomical." Guangdong needs to cut at least two players, Bazley and Jilunwater, to free up enough salary space to bid for Bacon. Bacon is already Guangdong's last chance to win the championship at this stage and is also a big fish that many teams want to introduce in the front line.