Basketball: Start with the nerve knife

Chapter 28: Making the Lakers Great Again
As soon as the game ended, Zeke Hearn yelled at Li Wan: "Dude, you are really great, keep it up, I look forward to your crazier performance!"

The Lakers broadcaster who is on every Lakers home night hasn't been this excited by a rookie in a long time.

Li Wan nodded with a smile, but his eyes were somewhat serious.His data performance in this game is not bad, but from Jeff's defensive strategy and the matchup with Gerald Wallace with the ball, he still exposed two problems.

The first question, as he has gradually gained a little fame, the coaching staff of other teams in the league have been paying attention to his game and conducting research on him;

The second problem is that his ability to hold the ball is not enough when he meets players with more physical fitness than him, such as Gerald Wallace.

It seems that it is necessary to study my own video, and spend more time on the off-ball running end.

This is the solution that Li Wanneng came up with.

His current progress is fast enough, but his foundation is too poor.Now that the regular season is coming, in these three to five days, it is impossible for his ability to hold the ball to increase by leaps and bounds.

Then you can only think more about how to better combine your strengths.

After playing two more preseason games on the 22nd and 24th, the Lakers finished all the games before the regular season.

The team's preseason record was 3 wins and 3 losses, which happened to be evenly split, and no one cared.

6场季前赛，李万场均上场28.6分钟，可以拿到16.5分3篮板2.5助攻以及1抢断。投篮命中率为43.5%，三分命中率为39.7%，罚球命中率86.6%。

Among them, he averaged 16.5 points per game, beating Kevin Durant and other favorites, ranking first in the 07 rookie class.

This performance made ESPN rank him No. 07 in the 4 session when predicting the "Best Rookie" in the new season. Li Wan is a rookie after the 4th place in the first round.His position is even higher than Mike Conley.

It can be seen how much attention his performance has attracted in the league's preseason.

After six preseason games, Phil Jackson found Li Wan again.

"As I said before, I will use you as the sixth man of the team in the new season. In addition, I can tell you clearly that 20 minutes is just the beginning, not the end. It’s your own, you know, "Soul Train" just provides a stage, whether you can become a star or not depends on your own efforts!"

"Okay, Coach Phil, I don't think I will let you down either!"

Li Wan expressed his attitude very confidently.

It's not that after finishing the preseason, he became blindly confident. He knew that the intensity of the NBA preseason was completely different from the regular season, and his test had just begun.

But this alliance has always been like this, the winner survives and the loser exits.

Li Wan is not afraid of competition.

Phil Jackson didn't say anything more, he re-emphasized these things, nothing more than expressing his position.

In the past two days, many media have gradually noticed that Kupchak is still accepting trade offers from other teams for Li Wan. They believe that the Lakers still have the possibility of trading Li Wan.Phil Jackson had to pick himself out.

Li Wan was quite excited to get this guarantee.

Of course, he himself will not be satisfied with the position of the team's sixth man. Whether it is from his personal goals or the tasks that need to be completed for system upgrades, the team's sixth man is just the beginning!
Arriving at the arena as usual, Odom handed him some newspapers as soon as he saw him.

"You're famous man, you now have a nickname, Trash Talker!"

Li Wan took a look at the newspaper. He knew the news. It originated from ESPN’s edited videos. They cut out all the conversations between Li Wan and his opponents in the 6 preseason games, and found that he was a "language master". I read Li Wan's conversations with his opponents on the NCAA field, and they were also outrageous. The level of golden sentences is comparable to "If it is better than basketball, you are really several times stronger", "The villain dies because of talking too much" and so on.

The nicknames "trash talker" and "dirty talker" spread like wildfire.

Unexpectedly, my first nickname after entering the NBA was actually this...

He didn't know how two words of trash talk caused such a reaction. There are many "trash talk" masters in the league, and I don't know how many of them got similar nicknames because of it.

Just because he's new?Or is it because of his status as a Chinese player?

After all, among the few Chinese players in the NBA, he is the only one who can chatter with his opponents endlessly.

In the end, Li Wan's conclusion was, who cares, this may have some impact on his image, and cursing is not a positive image.

But if he wants to rely on his face for food, he has already been a trainee, and he has been practicing for almost two and a half years now.

There is one less person in the locker room today.

After all six preseason games were over, the Lakers traded Maurice Evans for a small amount of cash.

Morris was in the shower when he got the news, and he calmly packed his dressing room closet.When Li Wan played brilliantly, he knew he was gone.

He had nothing to complain about losing to such a rookie.

Or he didn't get a chance to complain.

The name tag on his locker was removed by staff after he left.

There was no sign of Morris in the room at all.Even though Morris played 10 starts for the Lakers last season...

This is the NBA.

The other two rookies, Marcus Williams and Carl, both stayed on the team. They only partially guaranteed contracts, worth only about 20, and they were mainly used to fill the lineup.In addition, the team's drinking fountains also need someone to watch.

The Lakers officially confirmed the 13-man roster for the new season:
"Point Guard: Fisher, Jordan Farmar, Karl;
Shooting Guard: Kobe Bryant, Wan Li, Vujacic, Marcus Williams;

Small forwards: Luke Walton, Radmanovic;
Power forwards: Odom, Ronnie Turiaf;

Center: Bynum, Kwame Brown;”

The two vacated positions are Kupchak's preparations for subsequent reinforcements, mainly to give Kobe room for imagination.

This list unexpectedly caused a "war of words" in China.

Some "Li Hei" said that Li Wan can play, mainly due to good luck. When the Lakers had no guards, they were reused by Phil Jackson. Compared with him, Yi Jianlian was at the fourth position of the Bucks. competition is much greater.

But from this list, it can be seen that Li Wan’s competition in the Lakers is not small. The hardcore starters Derek Fisher-Jackson and Kobe Bryant are standing behind each of them. Jordan Fama Er and Vujacic, these are actually players competing with Li Wan for playing positions.

Li Wanneng won the position of the "sixth man" of the Lakers, not because "Li Hei" said that "Phil Jackson is useless", but because of his own strength.

Before the official arrival of the regular season, ESPN listed a strength ranking list, and the Lakers are currently ranked 16th.That is, eighth in the West, barely entering the playoffs.

Most ESPN experts are not as optimistic as the media in Los Angeles. They don't think "Little Shark" Bynum will usher in a qualitative transformation this season.

In addition, the sense of surprise that Li Wan brought was not enough to elevate the team to a higher level.

"He'll be a great rookie, but that's about it!"

They think the best-case scenario for the Lakers this year is to stay where they are.

Because ESPN is not optimistic, the Lakers shouted their slogan for the new season: "Make the Lakers great again!"

As soon as the slogan came out, the Lakers fans got goosebumps all over their bodies. This slogan is so morale-boosting, they can't wait for the opening game to start immediately, and then shout this slogan in the Staples auditorium!
　Wake up early two more, ask for tickets, brother cute! ! !

　
(End of this chapter)