basketball player

Chapter 561 Chapter 559: The expectations of two people

Henson is in a very good mood today. In Detroit and at the Palace Stadium in Auburn Hills, the Pistons scored 3 points with 20 players.

Even so, the Pacers still won the game.The Pistons' offense played well today, but the defense was as rotten as ever.Therefore, the fans saw a hearty scoring battle today.

In the end, the score of 121 to 115 also fulfilled the overall tone of the game.Unknowingly, the Pacers have won another wave of 6 consecutive victories.

Of course, the reasons why Henson is in a good mood don't stop there.Just half an hour after the game, Raptors general manager Ujiri called Henson.Half an hour after the phone call, NBA officials conveniently announced the news that the Pacers and Raptors had reached a deal.

Kevon Looney and Pascal Siakam swapped clubs, and this unremarkable deal went unnoticed by anyone.After all, the "weight" of these two insiders is a bit off.

Rooney is a small substitute for the Pacers, Siakam, and many people don't even know who this guy is.

This kind of small transaction usually doesn't get much attention from other people.After all, no one expects this deal to make the strength of the two teams soar.

But Henson will work hard to make the best of this humble deal.You know, Chinese coaches never do anything meaningless.

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Winters in Indianapolis have been extra cold this year.But such a temperature is not worth mentioning for Siakam, who has lived in Toronto for a long time.

After all, in the icy and snowy northern Toronto, the extreme low temperature in January can even reach minus 1°C.Compared with Toronto, the severe cold of Indianapolis is simply nothing.

Following the crowd and walking out along the passage, Siakam was not disturbed by anyone.The lad wasn't wearing sunglasses, he wasn't doing any camouflage.But few people know that he is an NBA player.

This is the difference between the bottom players and the top players. How many people know a player who has never played a few minutes in the NBA?
As he walked, Siakam was thinking in his head.He didn't know if it was a good thing for him to be traded to Indianapolis.

After all, the strength of the Pacers is well known.After yesterday's victory over the Magic, their record on the season has turned into a terrible 32 wins and 3 losses.People are speculating whether the Pacers can win another 70 wins.And 60 wins is nothing to them.

With such a strong team, it must be more difficult to enter the rotation.What's more, is it the "monster" Antetokounmpo who has appeared in the Pacers' fourth position for a long time?

If Siakam can play in the NBA in the Pacers, it must be the best.But if he can still only play NBDL, Siakam will undoubtedly be very disappointed.

Just as the Cameroonian guy was thinking, he had already reached the gate of the airport.But as soon as he reached the door, Siakam froze.

Because he didn't expect that the head coach of the Pacers, Henson Joe, would come to pick him up in person.
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Siakam is not very talkative, this is Henson's first impression of this child.

In a taxi, Siakam clutches his pants nervously.His eyes were attracted by the street scene of Indianapolis and kept looking out of the window. Of course, maybe he was too embarrassed to meet Henson's eyes. ,

"How do you feel here?" Henson broke the silence again. Several times before, Henson failed to open Siakam's heart.

"Everything is different here, and it makes me feel dizzy." Siakam smiled restrainedly, his hands still neatly placed on his thighs.

"You will like this city, at least, the winter here is much better than Toronto."

"Well, yeah." Siakam smiled, then turned his gaze out of the window again.

Henson shook his head, the people in his team really have very different personalities.There are both funny guys like Stephenson and introverted players like Siakam.

Seeing that the pleasantries were useless to Siakam, Henson decided not to talk nonsense, but decided to get straight to the point.

"I know, you want to play in the NBA. But to be honest, your current ability is not up to my standard."

Finally, after Henson finished speaking, Siakam stopped looking out the window.

"Coach, I will follow your arrangement, I"

"No, you shouldn't listen to anyone. You should tell me that I'm going to fucking work hard to meet the standard, you have to put me on the fucking field! Aggression and confidence, Pascal, you should be aggressive and confident on and off the court."

Henson interrupted Siakam roughly, and then said several dirty words in a row.

Siakam felt the difference of this Chinese coach for the first time.

"You're not up to my standards yet, but if you work hard, I promise, you'll get the opportunities you deserve. I didn't bring you to Indianapolis to be a mascot. I know you have desires and beliefs in your heart. I know that you carry the expectations of another person. Whether you can gain a foothold in the NBA depends entirely on whether you work hard enough."

Henson said, pointing to Siakam's heart with his finger.He said that Siakam's heart went up, yes, he still bears the expectations of another person.

In 2014, Siakam from Africa chose to join the University of New Mexico to start his basketball journey in the United States.

In October of that year, when he was preparing for his first game in college, a bad news came suddenly.Siakam received a call from his eldest sister, Lesa, that his father had passed away.

Two weeks ago, Siakam's father was injured in a car accident and eventually died of his injuries.His mother refused to let Siakam return to Africa, telling him it was his father's last wish.

Before his death, his father hoped that Siakam would continue to play in the United States and fight for his dream.At first, Siakam disagreed, but after thinking it over, he knew his parents were right.Since then, Siakam's heart has ignited a raging fighting spirit. He wants to fight for his dreams, not only his own dreams, but also his father's dreams.

Since his father has always hoped to have a son who plays in the NBA, he must fulfill this long-cherished wish for his father.

Therefore, Siakam will work hard for this.Even when he was playing in the development league, he would practice extra late into the night by himself.He wanted to prove himself to his father, and he carried the wishes of two people on his back!

"I know, you're a good player, Pascal. But I know it's useless because no one else does. And what I'm going to do is get you ready and surprise those bastards who used to look down on you! As long as you work hard according to my training plan, believe me, Pascal. It won't be long before you're going to be a star, not just an average NBA player."

Henson continued to launch an "offensive". Before that, Henson had studied Siakam carefully.So it was not difficult for Henson to motivate this uncomplicated child.

Siakam's eyes widened. Since coming to the United States, no one has ever described him as "you are an excellent player".

In fact, before participating in the 2016 NBA draft, Siakam has always been a very confident player, and in his eyes, his technical level is strong enough. He feels that his outstanding performance in college will definitely be appreciated by many teams.

It's just that Siakam miscalculated this time. Although he tried out for many teams before the draft, he was not selected by the Raptors until the 27th place.

As a rookie in the NBA, Siakam tried out for various NBA teams at the time, and he was extremely impressed by his trial training with the Raptors.

At that time, Siakam, who was still warming up on the sidelines, saw that Labissiere and Poeltl, who were predicted to be higher than him, had appeared on the training ground.Siakam naturally doesn't think he is worse than them. He is still thinking about dunking Labissier for a while, and then giving Poeltl a big cap.

Just as Siakam walked onto the training ground with confidence, a coach stopped him.

"Oh, sorry," said the coach, "Poeltl and Labissiere are trying out individually, and you're going to try out with the others."

To put it bluntly, Siakam is not a key observation object for the Raptors at all.At that moment, Siakam felt inequality, and anger.

At that time, Siakam was very angry, but he couldn't do anything about it, so he turned that anger into energy, and in the next team trial training, he blew up everyone else around him.

The reason why the Raptors selected him may be that he blasted other trial players in a training matchup.

But this training match was precisely Siakam's dissatisfaction with the Raptors, because the Raptors did not try out for him alone at the time, which made Siakam very angry.

After entering the Raptors, Siakam still did not receive attention.After playing in the NBA for a few minutes, he was transferred to the NBDL.If it weren't for being traded this time, Siakam probably would have been forgotten by the Raptors management.

Because of this, Siakam's self-confidence now is far less than that of college.And he lacks self-confidence, it is difficult to play aggressive on the court.

But just now, the Chinese coach said "You are a very good player", which greatly encouraged Siakam!

"I will listen to your arrangement, coach. You let me train, and I will train non-stop. You want me to play, and I will try my best to catch every rebound. In short, I will work hard for you." Siakam's eyes were firm, and in just a few minutes, Henson successfully narrowed the distance between Henson and Stanley.

"Fine, actually, I've got your training plan. Maybe it's going to be lonely, maybe you still can't play for a long time. But trust me, Paschall. When this is over, you're going to shine in the playoffs."

"How do you want me to train? Coach."

"First of all," Henson raised the corner of his mouth, "I need you to strengthen your three-point shooting practice."

"Three-pointer!?" Siakam was shocked. He didn't know what kind of monster he would be made into by Henson.

(End of this chapter)