As the new season is approaching, the media rankings that we love to see are here again.

The Eagles, who were only ranked 12th last summer, are now in the top five on all major media lists this time!

The Lakers are undoubtedly ranked first in all major strength lists. Except for the Bulls who lost Jordan in 1993, Jordan and Pippen in 1998; the Mavericks who lost most of their main force in 2011; and the Cavaliers in 2016, almost all of them

The defending champion started the second season after winning the championship and was ranked first in the strength rankings.

What's more, the Lakers, who just won three consecutive championships, have retained the core lineup of Fisher, Kobe, Robert Horry, Reagan Foxx, O'Neal, Brian Shaw, and Devin Brown. This lineup is theirs.

The seven core members who have remained on the team for the past three years, no matter how others change, these seven players of the Lakers have not changed.

Moreover, this year's Lakers team has attracted more attention than before. It is true that Wang Zhizhi was banned from the national team because of the so-called "treason" incident, but he went to the Lakers, the most watched basketball team in the world, and the domestic media could not ignore him.

With the existence of the Blue Association, it is impossible to block the Lakers no matter how hard it is, and it is said that the new chairman Wei Yuan and Li who are about to take office have the idea of ​​​​recalling Wang Zhizhi to form the "Big Three" of the national team next summer. Cheng Lanxin is about to step down.

The National Basketball Association did not take a position on the domestic media reports that Wang Zhizhi joined the Lakers, which means it acquiesced.

Although the Lakers retain their core lineup and are one year older, the man who made the iron is one year older, so the Lakers are still considered the most popular team to win the championship next season.

The Kings are also recognized as second in the strength list. The fourth quarter of Game 6 of last year's Western Conference Finals is still being discussed nonstop, and is regarded as the team most likely to defeat the Lakers in the new season.

The Hawks and Spurs are neck-and-neck in the battle for third place on all major lists. ESPN has always disliked the Western Conference's top teams. The Hawks ranked third over the Spurs. Sports Illustrated, which favors Los Angeles, ranked the Spurs.

In third, the Eagles were fourth.

Last year's Eastern Conference playoff champions, the Nets, were ranked fifth.

Liu Mang looked at this strength ranking list and felt like he had been fed another mouthful of poisonous milk, the kind that was forced into him.

The Eagles started their training camp early and were the first team in the entire league to start their training camp. The Spurs and Pistons both started their training camp only one week earlier, but the Eagles' training camp has already started for a week. The person who said he wanted to come to the Eagles

Until the boss's seniors come, no one knows where they are.

Not only could the Eagles not be contacted, but domestic companies that wanted to endorse this famous first-class star couldn't find anyone, so Muhammad and Ratliff took advantage and got endorsement contracts worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.

.

Just like the Rockets players, the Hawks players have also begun to enjoy the dividends brought by Liu Mang.

As for Raheem and Jason Terry, two very popular players, they have signed some endorsements just after last season. Raheem, a second-team player, doubled his endorsement fee in the summer.

Nike gave him a new five-year endorsement fee of 20 million U.S. dollars. The endorsement contracts signed with several Chinese companies have also reached nearly 30 million soft sister coins per year. Taken together, they are as much as Nike’s endorsement fees.

about there.

The Eagles' early training this time has become somewhat dispensable.

Without Glenn Robinson, the team cannot conduct collective tactical training. He must be one of the team's main offensive points.

…

…

Without Glenn Robinson, the Eagles can only practice defense and small-scale coordination.

In fact, this is quite good. In addition to Glenn Robinson, the Hawks' cavalry company of Liu Mang, Jason Terry, Raheem, Newbell, and Muhammad are still there, and they can continue to hone cavalry tactics.

However, in addition to the regular cavalry company combination, coach Kruger also tried to intersperse two players with excellent physical fitness, Barnes and Prince. Prince's three-point shooting rate made the Eagles players stunned.

Liang, this accuracy is almost catching up with Kukoc!

Moreover, Prince is young and can run. Unlike Kukoc, who can only play in positional battles, he fits the Hawks' style of play so well. He can even play power forward in small-ball tactics! In addition to being a little thinner and lacking in experience, this

The guy who was selected with the No. 21 pick in the first round in exchange for Kukoc is really pretty good.

It was the end of another day of training, and of course Liu Mang had to continue training.

Seeing that his overall ability is constantly improving, his progress in shooting is relatively slow, which makes Liu Mang a little worried.

Liu Mang's comprehensive ability used to be low, only over 60, mainly because he couldn't keep up with his strength and couldn't compete well, so he could only focus on scoring, so his overall strength was low.

But now his strength has been greatly improved, and his inside scoring and mid-range scoring have improved significantly. When the confrontation comes up, his ability value has skyrocketed by 11 points this summer, reaching 75.

In this respect, Liu Mang is the same as other talented rookies who have made rapid progress after their first season.

Just like James, he started at 75 in his rookie year and reached 85 after the rookie season. Then after one summer, he directly broke 90 in the second season and became a top star.

What is even more similar is that Brandon Ingram, who was drafted by the Lakers in 2016, initially struggled against him. In his rookie year, Ingram played like a second-place import, but in the second year he became a quasi-first-class star.

Once the confrontation comes up, it becomes very difficult to stop.

Liu Mang's starting point was lower than James's, but after the confrontation, his improvement was just as ferocious. Even if he didn't rely on the bench gangster, he still had an ability value of 75.

But in this way, Liu Mang has become very "average". His layups, mid-range shots, and three-pointers are all over 80. The more average he is, the more versatile he is, the higher his overall ability value is relatively speaking.

This made Liu Mang feel a sense of crisis.

If you become more and more accustomed to your stronger body and play better and better, and you still have more than 1,100 skill upgrade cards, but you have not chosen to upgrade those new skills, otherwise you may become "all-powerful" and your ability value will suddenly drop.

Just reach the level of a quasi-first-class star, and then the bench gangsters will be ineffective.

Therefore, Liu Mang will not use those skill upgrade cards for the time being, and will continue to work hard to improve his shooting ability in the new season. After all, this is the foundation of his career!

Liu Mang knows exactly what he relies on. Whether he is drawing a foul or trying to break through, the threat of shooting is the most important!

So he doesn't care so much about first-class and semi-first-class stars. Ordinary stars should be evaluated as ordinary stars. The strongest ones are those who can exert their best abilities.

Sometimes you don’t need to be so versatile. The team doesn’t lack rebounds or assists. You don’t need to do so many things. Shooting is just shooting!

After the afternoon training, Liu Mang saw that his teammates were almost gone and continued to train on the training ground.

To his surprise, Liu Mang saw other people staying this time.

Three rookies!

"Why haven't you left yet?" Liu Mang asked strangely.

The three rookies were a little nervous when they saw Liu Mang coming, but Barnes was more courageous: "Sorry, did we disturb your training? Then let's go to the visiting team's training ground..."

"No, it's okay. You guys have practiced well. I just asked out of curiosity." Liu Mang felt that he should be very kind and kind, but when three rookies saw him, it was as if they had seen a ghost.

Liu Mang didn't know that, except for the original players of the Eagles, other teams had an impression of him as a new-generation player who was lawless, dared to fight with superstars, had a bad temper, and had a bad personality.

"When we had a drink with Vice President Mr. Moron-Willy yesterday, he asked us to learn more from you, Ace." It is said that calm and cold people are always calmer, Prince explained.

"You guys drink?" Liu Mang said with a frown. How can a rookie drink? What a world!

Liu Mang's question made the three rookies stunned for a moment. Drinking...is there something wrong?

They are all adults...

etc!

The three of them remembered that in the player's handbook, even if Liu Mang was one year old at birth according to the method of calculating age in some places, he was born in 1983, so he would be 20 years old...

When you ask Liu Mang out to eat, you can only drink juice, coffee, and milk. This is an "unspoken rule" among NBA players who are familiar with Liu Mang. However, the NBA is also a circle where face is important. They can fight each other and have disagreements in private.

, there can be gaps of hatred.

But most of the confrontation and hatred that can be openly discussed will not be revealed to the media, because they are in the same circle and can attack each other within the circle, but the entire NBA is still very united.

Just like basketball and football, basketball and rugby are still very united when it comes to the public level.

Therefore, the NBA All-Star and quasi-All-Star circles almost always laugh at Liu Mang for not being able to go to nightclubs or drinking. However, the outside world has not noticed this, otherwise Liu Mang will become a joke again.

How do we tell the little boss that the three of us are adults and can drink? Will this hurt the little boss's self-esteem?

The three rookies all realized this and looked at each other, so embarrassed!

Liu Mang looked at the awkward looks of the three people and suddenly thought that these three people seemed to be older rookies...

The atmosphere at the scene was extremely awkward.

Liu Mang took a look at the abilities of the three rookies.

"Carlos Boozer, ability value 73, three-pointer 56, mid-range shot 85, layup 86, speed 82, strength 87..."

"Tayshaun Prince, ability value 67, three-pointer 80, mid-range shot 69, layup 76, speed 89, strength 71..."

"Matt Barnes, ability value 58, three-pointer 67, mid-range shot 59, layup 80, speed 88, strength 82..."

Liu Mang didn't expect that Boozer was the strongest among the three rookies! He thought he was a little prince!

How on earth did Boozer end up being selected in the second round with such strength? Damn it! This is definitely a T1 rookie! In addition to not having the ability to three-point, his scoring ability inside the three-point line is definitely top-notch, and his speed

He has excellent strength and strong body. There are few players in the lottery who are better than him. Even in 2002, the big year of the draft, he is definitely a top ten rookie!

Liu Mang initially thought that Boozer was the type who accumulated a lot of experience after being drafted at a low pick. Unexpectedly, Boozer, who had just entered the NBA, already had the ability!

Comparing one person to another is really infuriating!

Prince is average and has the capabilities of an ordinary first-round pick at this stage.

Barnes...has good physical fitness, but really bad skills...

but……

"Ahem, since you are staying to train, then..." Liu Mang's eyes lit up, "Carlos, come and train with me!"

Liu Mang suddenly thought that Boozer seemed to be one of the new generation of evil spirits in the future! He could practice with him!

"Me?" Boozer asked in surprise.

Barnes and Prince are so envious of Boozer!
To be continued...