Chapter 350: Rebellion below
The criticism and abuse from the outside world had no impact on the team, but instead formed a centripetal force of solidarity against a common enemy.
Before every practice, Yang Mo would clap his hands and say to his teammates: "Guys, did you hear that? Fans all over New York think we are bad kids. They think we will be worse than the Knicks led by Steve Marbury. Come on, let's do something fun."
"Come on, let's fight the whole world together!"
Yang Mo always kept this sentence in mind and constantly reminded his teammates. He enjoyed the feeling of being the enemy of the world. Under his leadership, the mob in New York gradually developed a team spirit and began to transform from a gang of hooligans into a disciplined team. Of course, their temperament still had a bit of banditry. The topic in the locker room was always whether the breasts of girls on the East Coast were whiter or the butts of Mexican women on the West Coast were more perky.
Yang Mo did not change this hooligan habit. Instead, he believed that the team needed this kind of rogue spirit, as long as there was no accidental shooting.
For Yang Mo, it was not very difficult to control these guys. Since he defeated Jeffries and Larry Hughes at the same time last time, no one dared to underestimate Yang Mo. Of course, there were some players who had their own ideas. Among them, Harrington and Chandler were the most emotional.
They are not dissatisfied with Yang Mo, but Yang Mo's arrival will inevitably weaken their performance. They were the two best players of the New York Knicks last season, both of them are forwards and have a lot of shooting rights.
But now, the New York Knicks' era of guerrillas has ended with Yang Mo's arrival. From now on, they will no longer be able to get such a high number of shooting rights, and they may even be traded because of their position.
This is the origin of the emotions in their hearts.
Yang Mo also caught on to this, but he didn't talk to them because he had no way to solve this problem. He still needed to observe, and if there was indeed a conflict, he would definitely put the names of these two people on the transaction list without any hesitation, without any unnecessary hesitation.
Because Yang Mo's goal is to lead the Knicks to win the championship, he is not here in New York for a social gathering. Sometimes, one has to be ruthless.
D'Antoni has been hesitating about Yang Mo's position in the team. His idea is to arrange Yang Mo at the fourth position. After all, Yang Mo is the most reliable rebounder in the Knicks. Although Milicic and David Lee have good physical hardware, they are far inferior to Yang Mo in strength and rebounding awareness.
However, Yang Mo's idea is to position himself as the No. 2 or No. 3. The starting lineup he arranged for D'Antoni is: Chris Duhon, Yang Mo, Wilt Chandler, David Lee and Milicic.
D'Antoni simply couldn't understand this lineup. He was born into a run-and-gun style, and the lineup proposed by Yang Mo couldn't fully unleash the speed advantage because of Milicic. His idea was to remove Milicic and replace him with Gallinani.
Regarding this disagreement, Yang Mo did not immediately ask D'Antoni to do what he said, but asked him to use more half-court offense tactics in the preseason. He still needs to test whether this lineup has a certain combat effectiveness in the game. After all, although Milicic is a genius, he has squandered more of his talent on eating, drinking and having fun. His love for basketball seems to be limited to the fact that basketball can provide him with a generous annual salary and allow him to pick up girls.
Yang Mo didn't like this guy who wasted his talent. As the runner-up in 2003, he ended up like this. Yang Mo really didn't have much to say to him. However , the day after Yang Mo held a party, he stuck to Yang Mo and enthusiastically called her "super yang". His words and actions were full of admiration.
Yang Mo knew without any guessing that this admiration for him came from outside the field.
After a conversation, he found that it was true. He was very envious of Yang Mo's quality in spreading gossip, and also briefly expressed his willingness to become good friends with Yang Mo, because he knew that Yang Mo was the owner of an entertainment company, had cooperated with many Hollywood big stars, and had countless third- and fourth-tier beauties under her.
After understanding what he meant, Yang Mo did not express much, but kept a suitable distance, ready to keep him in suspense for a while.
While the Knicks were undergoing tremendous changes, ESPN ranked the teams for the new season, and the Knicks were ranked 25th. Their comment was: A bad team could only become worse after getting a bad movie star.
This ranking was quickly reprinted by New York sports media, which cited classics to criticize Yang Mo and the Knicks.
To this, Yang Mo simply responded: "Twenty-five? I know!"
Anyone who knows Yang Mo would definitely know what this simple statement means.
At least the Knicks players could clearly see that Super Yang was more active in training their physical fitness. After a week of high-intensity training, most of their fatigue and fat left over from the offseason disappeared. At this time, the preseason had already arrived.
"Come on, guys, let's fight this bullshit ranking!"
In the first preseason game, Yang Mo appeared in front of his teammates in a suit and tie. Although he cheered for the team, he did not plan to play as he still needed to learn more about the team.
In the first preseason game, the Knicks' opponent was the New Jersey Nets, who were ranked 24th in ESPN's new season prediction rankings, just one spot ahead of the Knicks.
That night, more than 20,000 fans poured into Madison Square Garden. It didn't look like a preseason game at all, but more like... uh... a superstar's solo concert, because more than 80% of the audience were women, all wearing red cheering robes, looking very imposing. Their shouts were even more powerful, fully proving the status of New York in North America with their voices.
In order to give back to these enthusiastic fans, Yang Mo, who did not play in this game, sang a song before the game, so that they would not buy tickets and enter the stadium without seeing anything. And Yang Mo's singing was worth the ticket price for these New York fans!
There was no suspense in the game that night. The Knicks took the initiative right from the start. After all, under Yang Mo's training, their physical condition had been adjusted to a better level, while the opposing Nets team was still stuck in the offseason state.
The Nets were already a bad team, and their condition was even worse. Naturally, they suffered a crushing defeat and were slaughtered by the Knicks by nearly 30 points.
The preseason results are not important, and in fact, not many people pay attention to them. However, Yang Mo found two problems in the game. The first problem is that Harrington, who scored the most points in the game, was the least efficient one. He was always out of sync with his teammates. Jeffries and Milicic made Yang Mo's eyes light up. The two of them actually worked together on the defensive end, contributing a total of 25 rebounds and 7 blocks.
Yang Mo was not surprised that Jeffries was so active on the defensive end, because he had begun to transform since he slapped him that time. However, Milicic was a little confused. Why did he suddenly become so serious?
Yang Mo was puzzled and went to the second away game with this question. Yang Mo still did not play in this away game, and the opponent was the Spurs. In the game that night, Milicic was listless and was beaten by Duncan. He had no enthusiasm at all. The team also lost the game.
In the next games against the Rockets and Mavericks, he was in a desperate state.
But in the fifth game when they returned to their home court and faced the Bobcats, they were in great form again and completely dominated the Bobcats' inside line.
Could it be that he has special experience in beating bad teams?
Yang Mo couldn't help but guess so.
But in the next home game against the Lakers, he was still extremely brave, turning the tide in the restricted area guarded by Gasol and Bynum, and scored 21 points and 12 rebounds in the game, which was simply astonishing.
Yang Mo was very excited after watching Milicic's performance: If this guy can really maintain this state tonight, the inside problem will be solved. After all, David Lee is also a very good inside player. With himself and a group of forwards as assistants, it is possible to enter the playoffs, and even make it to the second round.
But what is this guy so brave for? Does he only like to play at home?
Yang Mo was confused and could only guess this.
Just when he was extremely surprised about Milicic, D'Antoni made new changes in the seventh preseason game. He directly intervened in Milicic's playing time and put all his focus on building a running and gunning camp.
Yang Mo was very dissatisfied with this and went to D'Antoni to argue with him after the game. However, he got a difficult answer. D'Antoni told him directly: "Yang, the day before yesterday, David Lee, Harrington, Chris Duhon, Gallinari, Nate Robinson, Harrington and Chandler came to me and asked me to resume the run-and-gun style immediately. Otherwise, they would passively fight back."
When Yang Mo heard this, he subconsciously became a little flustered, but more angry.
To be fair, these players are indeed particularly suitable for running and gunning, which is why D'Antoni recruited them all last year. However, in Yang Mo's plan, running and gunning tactics are not the survival tactics. Because he always feels that in today's playoff atmosphere that emphasizes defense, a running and gunning team cannot enter the finals.
D'Antoni told Yang Mo that the names covered almost all the Knicks players. Yang Mo had to face up to this huge force. If it was not handled properly, once this crisis exploded, it would definitely bring disastrous consequences. Yang Mo thought for less than 30 seconds and had to compromise. He answered very straightforwardly: "Okay, we will play run-and-gun from now on!"
In this situation, Yang Mo had to compromise, because everyone from the head coach to the players were born for running and gunning. Although Yang Mo was the boss of the team, if he broke with all of them, the consequence would only be the team falling apart and everything would be over.
After Yang Mo compromised, he immediately walked into Isaiah Thomas' office, wrote down all the names D'Antoni had mentioned before, and said, "These people can all be put on the trading shelf. It would be best if they can be cleared out before the All-Star Game starts."
When Isaiah Thomas saw the list, he was subconsciously shocked and asked, "Get rid of all these people? Are you sure?"
"Sure." Yang Mo nodded confidently and said, " You should also prepare yourself and take office after the All-Star Game. D'Antoni is always a time bomb. This time, it is very likely that he and all the players are playing this trick."
"What trick?" Isaiah Thomas said puzzledly.
"Today D'Antoni told me that these players came to him and forced him to quit, saying that the team must play the run-and-gun tactics, otherwise they would all passively fight back." Yang Mo said calmly; "Since they want to leave, we will grant their wish and let them all go."
"Well, okay. I'll contact the managers of other teams and see how to set up a trade plan." Isaiah Thomas nodded immediately. He admired Yang Mo's ruthlessness. He said that if someone kills someone, he will kill him and not leave any survivors.
Coming out of Isaiah Thomas' office, Yang Mo heaved a sigh of relief. The only way now was to follow the run-and-gun gang led by D'Antoni. Try to have a not-too-bad record against these guys before the trading window opens. You can't just fall out now, right?
In the last preseason game, Yang Mo still did not play, and chose to cheer on the sidelines. At the same time, Milicic was beside him. Milicic was declared DNP by D'Antoni before the game started, and he was very upset about the inexplicable ban from the game. Yang Mo could only comfort him from the side, and it was not easy to point it out directly. If he knew that he had become a victim of the team's line struggle, he would definitely find it more difficult to accept.
There is no way, this guy can only endure it for half a season. After all the transactions are settled, Yang Mo will definitely promote him.
