The atmosphere was very awkward, but that was okay. It was just training, so it didn’t matter whether it was awkward or not. Just practice and you’re done.
Zhang Hao hadn't seen Garnett for a long time and thought they would have a lot to talk about when they met again, but when they were alone, they didn't start chatting... The main reason was that he ruined the atmosphere. During the training process, there was nothing else except the sound of the ball hitting the basket, the floor, and the hands.
There are many things to talk about, such as after the draft, after joining the team, etc., but there is almost no communication.
However, Zhang Hao thinks this situation is normal. He would only think it is abnormal if Garnett became enthusiastic.
After the extra training, Zhang Hao returned to the apartment to take a shower and sleep, and another night of non-stop work began.
Enter learning mode again.
He did not continue the simulation training of the turnaround jump shot. What Alvan Adams said to him made him decide to rethink the issue of positioning.
Indeed, he had previously simply considered himself as a shooter and the last-pass option.
"Let me take another look..."
Zhang Hao took out the "Position Master" and prepared to study the movement route again, changing the angle and putting himself into the situation in another way.
The same running route map, the same running analysis, the same running details on the TV screen... Looking at it from a different perspective, Zhang Hao seemed to have discovered a new world.
Originally, Zhang Hao didn't want to read the book "Position Master", videos and other things anymore, but now, he has found the joy of learning again.
After a night, when Zhang Hao woke up at 6:30 in the morning, he recalled what he had learned the previous night and couldn't help but sigh: "To reach the pinnacle of an industry, I still have a lot to learn!"
In terms of positioning alone, he thought he had reached the top, but now he realized that he was just getting started.
But he knew that what he considered to be getting started and what others considered to be getting started were two different concepts.
…
The team training ended at 11 a.m. on October 24. There was only one training session this morning, so it ended early. At 5 p.m., there was the last pre-season game to be played.
"Axl, do you think we can win more than 30 games in the new season?" Kenny Anderson reached the last preseason game, and suddenly he felt unconfident.
30 wins is the record the Nets achieved last season with two stars, Kenny Anderson and Coleman. Although the record does not live up to their averages of 17 points and 9 assists and 20 points, 10 rebounds and 3 assists per game, their lineup is not as good as last season.
What Kenny Anderson wants most is to get rid of the title of "Coleman's little brother".
As soon as Coleman left, the Nets were seen as the favorite for the No. 1 pick, which was simply hard for Kenny Anderson to accept.
But he also knew that even if they gradually developed a positive and aggressive mentality in the preseason, it would be unlikely to win too many games. Therefore, Kenny Anderson had a small goal, which was to win more games than last season.
A very practical goal, a higher goal, not to mention others, even Kenny Anderson himself feels it is unrealistic.
However, Kenny Anderson would not say it so directly when other teammates were around. Only when he was alone with Zhang Hao could he not help but ask.
Zhang Hao, who watched the Warriors and Cavaliers play in the finals for many years in a row in his previous life, felt that the Nets were so humble...
Even though the Lakers' record was so bad, Lakers fans were still shouting for the Lakers to be the championship every day, and they actually won the championship.
How can you not have dreams?
In Kenny Anderson's expectant eyes, Zhang Hao responded: "I think we can win more than 30 games. Let's set a goal, the playoffs?"
The Celtics, who were ranked eighth in the Eastern Conference last season, had 35 wins. If the goal is to exceed 30 wins, Zhang Hao said this, and Kenny Anderson thought it was normal.
Compared with other rookies he has partnered with, Kenny Anderson feels that Zhang Hao is much more pragmatic. After hearing what Zhang Hao said, he also had expectations.
Maybe they can really return to the playoffs?
After finishing lunch while chatting and taking a nap, Zhang Hao received a call from Chaoting TV at 1:30 and came to the stadium for an interview.
The content of the interview was very simple. It analyzed the team's situation, etc., talked about the goals, and the high school rookie showdown between Zhang Hao and Garnett was quite interesting. After the interview with Chaoting TV ended, several American media came for a group interview.
The interview process was uneventful. When domestic reporters interview foreign affairs, they often do not target anyone and may even embellish the situation. Naturally, they will not find fault with Zhang Hao.
In the United States, there has been a lot of news about popular teams these days. The game between the Nets and the Timberwolves still attracted a certain amount of attention due to the matchup between two high school rookies. It is good enough to have a section reporting on it. Zhang Hao's performance in the past few games has been mainly stable, without any explosive points.
"We will be broadcasting live when you go to Detroit to play the Pistons on November 1st. Come on!"
Xu Jicheng has now become more motivated at work, and he exudes full of energy.
live streaming!
Zhang Hao originally thought that he was not the kind of player who could broadcast live, but now he found that he was...
He felt so excited listening to the live broadcast!
In North America, the Nets are scheduled to have only three games broadcast live nationwide in the new season, one of which is the regular season opener against the Pistons away from home.
These days, national live broadcast resources are scarce. Generally speaking, unpopular teams will only have two national live broadcasts in a season, the regular season opener and the final game. The league's schedule is also formulated along this route. From November 1st to 3rd, there will be five games each day. During these three days, all 15 opening games of the 29 teams will be broadcast live.
The weak team is the supporting role. Even if the supporting role is broadcast live across the United States, it is used to set off the strong team. The Nets are also one of the supporting teams.
Thinking of this, Zhang Hao's excitement faded a little.
"Hey, who made us weak?"
…
In the evening, the last preseason game between the Nets and the Timberwolves started.
Originally, Zhang Hao thought that the showdown between him and Garnett, two high school students, would be spectacular... at least they would be competing on the same field and each showing off their own style, but the actual situation was uneventful.
Garnett only got 13 minutes of playing time in the last preseason game. Timberwolves star Christian Laettner played 37 minutes and Gugliotta played 36 minutes. The total playing time in the interior was 96 minutes, of which the two brothers accounted for 73 minutes. Backup center Andrew Long also played for 10 minutes.
Unlike the first six games in which Garnett played for at least 25 minutes each time, when Christian Laettner only played for a dozen minutes each game, Timberwolves head coach Bill Blair only gave Garnett 13 minutes of playing time in this game.
The intensity of the last preseason game is no different from that of the regular season. It is a game to test the results of the preseason running-in. Naturally, Laettner has to return to his normal playing time.
7 points, 3 rebounds, 1 assist and 1 block, this was Garnett's performance tonight.
13 minutes of playing time, this performance is very good. Looking at the strength, Laettner is indeed stronger at the moment. Garnett's ability rating of 78 is quite outstanding at this age, but Laettner is at his peak with an ability rating of 84.
Laettner played for 37 minutes and scored 21 points, 9 rebounds, 2 assists and 1 steal.
Gugliotta also did well, scoring 17 points, 11 rebounds, 1 assist and 2 blocks.
Isaiah Lyles, the Timberwolves' theoretically most capable shooting guard, also scored 18 points tonight.
But the Timberwolves only scored 89 points in the whole game... It’s not that the Nets’ defense was so good, but that the Timberwolves were so bad that it was unbelievable!
Zhang Hao looked at the data and ability evaluations of Lyles, Laettner and Gugliotta. Lyles' ability evaluation was 83, Laettner's ability evaluation was 84, and Gugliotta's ability evaluation was 83. The performance of these three brothers leading the team was so bad!
But when he saw the name of the opposing team, Zhang Hao suddenly didn't find it strange anymore.
As for the Timberwolves, no matter how good the star players' statistics look, it does not represent the results. Last season, didn't these three brothers help the Timberwolves select Garnett?
The Timberwolves seemed to have no desire to win. When Garnett was on the court, his teammates did not cooperate with him very well. There were two shots when Garnett had no choice but to shoot alone. Zhang Hao could see that Garnett wanted to connect the team, but no one paid attention to him.
Zhang Hao recalled Garnett's statistics since the preseason. Among this rookie class, Garnett is the only rookie whose statistics Zhang Hao pays attention to in every game. Garnett's assists seem to have been on a downward trend.
Is this my rookie season being targeted by veteran players?
"There shouldn't be any doubt about this."
While paying attention to Garnett's performance in the preseason, Zhang Hao also noticed the news about Garnett. McHale praised Garnett every day, and it was obvious that he wanted to train Garnett as a core. How could Laettner, who played in the same position, be happy?
104 to 89, the Nets relied on Kenny Anderson's 20 points and 7 assists, Charles' 6 points and 6 assists, Zhang Hao's 13 points, 6 rebounds, 1 assist and 2 steals, PJ Brown's 9 points and 11 rebounds, and Gilliam's 16 points to easily defeat the Timberwolves and win the last preseason game. The preseason record became 5 wins and 2 losses.
…
After the final whistle, Garnett was unwilling to chat with Zhang Hao.
Watching Zhang Hao play for 28 minutes tonight and watching Zhang Hao's teammates cooperate with Zhang Hao... comparing yourself to others makes you feel depressed!
Zhang Hao felt a little regretful, but he didn’t care anymore since the game was over. There was still a long way to go.
"Special player Zhang Hao has helped the Nets win 5 preseason games. Congratulations to the host for receiving the extra reward: 5 days of lifespan. Mission: Newcomer's participation has been completed."
"Remaining lifespan 374 days, available lifespan 373 days."
After exceeding the guaranteed 4 wins, he received a 5-day lifespan bonus. Together with the 1-day lifespan bonus for participating in tonight's game and the 2-day lifespan bonus for winning, Zhang Hao felt much more at ease as he saw that his lifespan had almost returned to a year.
Although there will probably be many places where my life will be at risk, I feel much more at ease at this moment.
From Garnett, Zhang Hao saw the harsh environment that he had to face as a rookie. Fortunately, he, Zhang, was doing well...
After three seconds of silence for Garnett, Zhang Hao also turned and walked towards the player tunnel.
What is a big deal to one person may not be as important to another person as whether their shoelaces are tied tightly.
Zhang Hao and Garnett took this game very seriously, but the result did not develop in the direction they expected. They were in mixed feelings, but the media and fans really did not take it as a big deal. They would just watch it if there was excitement here, and if there was nothing exciting to watch here, there would be more excitement to watch elsewhere.
During the time when Zhang Hao was slowly integrating into the team and enhancing his technical and tactical abilities, a lot of things happened in the league.
The most exciting thing at the moment is that during the preseason, Magic Johnson suddenly chose to come back, which disrupted the Lakers' trading plan, but the Logo man expressed his support for Magic Johnson, and the Lakers also supported Magic Johnson's comeback.
As for Malone, the fan who called himself Magic back then, started cursing when he heard that Magic had returned and the Jazz were going to play the regular season opener against the Lakers. The sentence "He shouldn't play basketball for the sake of others" did not lead to a counterattack from Magic, but a fine from the league.
Jordan didn't get angry like Malone did , but instead invited Magic to a fight in the finals.
This made the Magic unhappy again...
The media in Orlando began to concentrate their firepower on criticizing the Bulls. Somehow, several media outlets started talking about O'Neal being injured and unable to play in November.
In the end, something happened in the Orlando media that seemed quite strange to outsiders. They did not criticize Jordan, but instead criticized O'Neal for his lack of self-discipline, which led to their Magic team being looked down upon by Jordan.
The new regular season is coming soon and the league is quite lively.
However, all this excitement had no effect on Zhang Hao. Although he had not experienced these things in his previous life, he had heard rumors about them, so he did not pay special attention to them.
Compared with 20 years later, the information dissemination channels in this era are too closed. Apart from newspapers, television and radio, there are no other channels to obtain information from the outside world. Unlike in the future, if a girl asks where to buy cucumbers during a chat, the shopping platform will immediately push a bunch of massage equipment...
Apart from the inconvenience, Zhang Hao feels that this is quite good as it allows him to focus more on improving himself.
After completing post-match physical therapy and returning to the apartment, Zhang Hao carefully reviewed his games, training and other aspects since the preseason.
"Passing the ball, I have to practice this. It's too easy to make mistakes. The learning progress of catching the ball and turning around to jump shot is much faster than I expected. Cutting in, catching the ball and rushing to the basket... I have to practice more too. It's easier to find scoring opportunities if you can cut and shoot..."
Soon Zhang Hao planned his training schedule for the next few days.
Another busy day passed, and on October 25th, the first training day after the end of the preseason arrived.
The last few days of preparation, the regular season is about to begin.
Zhang Hao was a little excited when he thought about playing against Grant Hill!
Zhang Hao didn’t know how strong Grant Hill would be if he hadn’t been injured and reached his theoretical peak at the age of 27 or 28, but Grant Hill in his rookie year was already very strong!