"How's that, Ace, this café is good!" James said with a slight smugness.

"Wow, really, it's amazing, the lake is right out the window, I didn't know there was this café here for years, LeBron has yours." Liu Mang exclaimed.

"Haha, I love the comfort of Atlanta, so every time I visit, I look for something interesting here." James laughed.

James' social philosophy has become more comfortable after almost a year in the NBA.

In the face of Liu Mang, who is a traditional Chinese in his bones, who is not interested in drinking in the middle of the season, and has two girlfriends who are not interested in going out and fooling around, and whose personality is still a little jumpy, James also chose a jumpy way of speaking to cater to Liu Mang's hobby.

"In the future, I guess I'll come here if I'm fine, and there's a membership card here? Then I'll have to get one. Liu Mang said after seeing the membership card promotion on the table.

"Ace, do you like it here? I've already applied for a membership card, I'll give it to you, I've filled it up. James took out his membership card and handed it to Liu Mang.

"What's so embarrassing, I'll just make one myself." Liu Mang said that, his hand didn't stop, and he grabbed the membership card in his hand and squeezed it tightly.

James left a drop of cold sweat in his heart, this membership card that can be obtained by 'only' charging 2,000 US dollars, this guy is simply enough! James doesn't know what kind of character Liu Mang is, according to media reports, Liu Mang spent millions to buy a villa in Los Angeles in order to "please" his girlfriend, and the cruise money for the last party in Los Angeles was also paid by Liu Mang, but in this kind of 'small money', he can actually pick it up like this.

After a while, James' face was still full of smiles: "It's okay, I can't come to Atlanta a few times a year, next time I come, just call Ace and you to come along......"

……

On the first day of March, the Cavaliers arrived in Atlanta, and tomorrow the two teams will meet for the last time of the season.

James arrived in Atlanta in the morning, asked Liu Mang to go out for dinner at noon, found a café by the lake, the two ate some steak or something, and in the afternoon, the two athletes with the highest endorsement fees for Nike went to promote some of Nike's non-signature shoes.

Endorsement for Nike is not just for the signature shoes of each season to promote, if the signed shoes are signed, in a real sense, it is an additional 'honor', their endorsement contract is to endorse all of Nike's basketball shoes, and 90% of basketball shoes are not signed shoes.

Atlanta has gradually become one of the world's basketball cities, the basketball atmosphere here is getting heavier and heavier, and a large number of Asian fans choose to travel here, which has promoted the local economic development is one aspect, so that many basketball-related industries pay more and more attention to this is also an aspect, such as Nike has placed many new product launches in Atlanta.

In the afternoon, Liu Mang and James went to participate in the new product launch conference together, which attracted the attention of many Asian media and American media.

Isn't it said that Liu Mang and James are direct competitors to the first person in the future league? The relationship is so good, what are you doing! How do you want them to publicize it?

I can't bear it! I can't find anything to make up the news!

When it came time for the press conference after the publicity campaign in the afternoon, Liu Mang and James were interviewed together, and the media were ready to take the initiative to stir up trouble.

The reporter who took the initiative asked James: "Hello LeBron, Ace said that Wade is Jordan who is 5 centimeters shorter, and he is the best player in your rookie class, do you think Ace is right?" ”

Taken out of context, properly taken out of context, Liu Mang next to him was so angry that he almost interjected, but it was Schwartz next to him who pulled him to calm down.

James was very calm and smiled: "Dwyane is great, he is going to make the playoffs this year, I admire Dwyanne in this regard, and my goal is to make the playoffs with my teammates." ”

Schwartz patted Liu Mang under the interview table, meaning: You look at what people say, and then think about what you say.

Liu Mang was also surprised by James's 'maturity', what does it mean to be leaky? That's what it is!

Instead of answering the question of who is better, he talked about things from the perspective of the playoffs, ignoring the topic of who is better, and answering by making the playoffs, and even if he said that he wanted to make the playoffs, he didn't mean leading the team, but with his teammates!

This language art has embarrassed Liu Mang, a guy who has inherited Chinese language art for thousands of years.

This guy is a genius!

The media were a little frustrated, James, a rookie, didn't get in!

That can only be aimed at Liu Mang, the reporter asked according to the question that he had prepared for a long time: "Ace, you have created the best record since the new century, are you confident to maintain this record and trample O'Neal and Duncan under your feet?" ”

James's language art seems to be very useful, Liu Mang almost blurted out something to do, but Xiao Zhan Zhan seems to have such a high emotional intelligence, as a senior, how can he be so mentally retarded and led by the nose by the media?

Liu Mang thought for a while and said: "Stepping on the championships of the past five years and three MVPs? Brother, I haven't won a championship yet, and when I get at least four championships, it's still possible, it's just the regular season, our goal is the playoffs, and that's how the regular season stands. ”

Liu Mang was arrogant in the end, and he couldn't suppress his pretending to be forced.

However, this answer, even if Liu Mang pretended to be forced in the end, also made the reporters very frustrated.

This guy has been with James for a long time! The reporter was completely struck and must not interview these two guys next time when they are together!

……

……

It was the next day, the game day between the Hawks and the Cavaliers.

After a day off, the Hawks came to their home arena to face the visiting Cavaliers.

The Cavaliers are now very "open-minded", with no hope of the playoffs at all, and they are not close to 40 wins this year, and they cannot enter the Eastern Conference playoffs.

The Cavaliers are now 25-34 with 23 games left, and it would be touching to win 10 games left, let alone 40 wins, so the Cavaliers are very relaxed, there is no record pressure, just cultivate a winning culture after having James, and they don't have to be rotten, and they can't be completely rotten with James, because they can't be rotten like they did with Ricky Davis.

Therefore, the Cavaliers players, who did not have psychological pressure, came to the Hawks' devil's home court, and they were not afraid because of the frenzied atmosphere on the spot.

The Devil's home court is mainly to psychologically suppress the teams with ideas and enthusiasm, suppress their self-confidence, and hit the morale of the opponent, while the barefoot Cavaliers who are not afraid to wear shoes are just like the Hawks in Liu Mang's rookie season.

And one more thing, today Rashid Wallace is not playing, the Eagles' home atmosphere is just inertia, there is no such absolute frenzy that is driven by Rashid Wallace.

Before the game, the Eagles' veteran players from the first two seasons went to greet Newbell to congratulate him.

After the All-Star Weekend, because of his experience in playing in a strong team and because of his partnership with Liu Mang and others, Newbell, who is more conscious and energetic in playing, has secured the position of the main small forward in the Cavaliers, averaging 10 points, 5 boards, 2 assists, 1.6 steals and 1.2 blocks per game this season, so that he got a 4-year 15 million contract extension from the Cavaliers.

Because Newbell is in the Cavaliers, James and Liu Mang have a good relationship, just like Liu Mang is very popular in Philadelphia, James is also very popular in Atlanta, in addition to the entrance ceremony because of the Devil's home court, the away team gave a lot of boos, when the Hawks players went to Newbell to catch up, James took the initiative to greet and hug the Eagles players, the cheers on the scene rang out again.

After greeting and catching up, Liu Mang returned to his own half-court shooting hothand and observed the strength of the opponent's lineup.

The five starters played on the big screen.

"Zaidrunas Ilgoskas, Ability Rating 82, Offense 83, Defense 80, Three-Point 55, Shooting 81, Layup 87, Speed 70, Power 93......"

"LeBron James, 20.8 points, 6.5 rebounds, 5.3 assists per game, 84 ability rating, 90 offense, 70 defense, 60 three-pointers, 65 shots, 90 layups, 85 passing, 92 speed, 8......5 power"

Every time Liu Mang saw James, he felt unreasonable, and his progress was so fast! This is really a monster who has the potential to become a top star in the second grade, and people are more popular than people!

This rookie season is not over yet, and it has already averaged 20+6+5 per game!

Liu Mang has become more urgent to be promoted to a top star after playing this season, otherwise he will be suppressed by a sophomore player, which will be too embarrassing!

James's progress is indeed terrifying, in the original history, he averaged 27+7+7 per game since the beginning of his sophomore year, which stunned those veteran stars, and it really looked like the next Jordan.

This time, because of the additional pressure brought by Liu Mang's existence, and the Cavaliers have less Boozer, he must grab more rebounds, score more points, and improve faster, he only exceeded 20.5 points in the last month of this season, and now he is almost 21 points per game, and the rebounds are almost one more than the original, which makes Liu Mang's sense of threat deeper!

It's just that James's helpers are really not very good, except for the quasi-first-class level of Big Z, who may barely be able to occasionally rely on the overall strength of the Eastern interior to get into one or two All-Stars, and most of the others can't even reach the starting level.

The other three starters, small forward Newbell has an ability rating of 72, and the average level of the starters is a little higher, and the 29-year-old Newbell is already at the peak of his career; Trading Ricky Davis for short power forward Eric Williams, who was traded for the Celtics, has an ability rating of 69 and is less than average for starters; The shooting guard is a second-round pick of the 96 Golden Generation, and Jeff McGinnis, who got it from the Trail Blazers, has an ability rating of 67.

James, who took over the Cavaliers who have experienced a perennial mess, is indeed unlucky to come to this ruined team, but he must face all this with a smile, because he is a representative of a new generation of American basketball players, and he cannot show his frustration with this situation.

Liu Mang feels that this is completely the Cavaliers' own problem, two years ago Ricky Davis was pushed out as the boss, and then asked him to immediately play a rookie as a deputy, how can that kind of change in mentality be changed back all of a sudden, otherwise James has a quasi-first-class star outside helper, the Cavaliers may not be much worse than the Heat, and the current wins are only six or seven short, but these six or seven wins are enough to make the Cavaliers miss the playoffs.

……

After the February game was over, after forcing the Heat to win 50 by one vote, the Hawks were forced to start a rotation in March, facing another 16-game schedule this month, two back-to-backs, and no rest days of more than a day.

In order to get the first record since the new century, and the two-month schedule is the most difficult in the league after the Lakers and Rockets, and the regular season record is more important than those two teams, so he has been playing very tired, even Raheem, who has been absent from the past seven years for a total of 10 games, is also showing fatigue and has to take a turn.

And in March, it is the most terrifying schedule for the Hawks, the top five teams in the West will come to Atlanta to challenge the Hawks this month, and the Pacers and Pistons will come to Atlanta, a total of seven difficult games, so the Hawks have to have a large-scale rotation when they play the other nine games.

In addition, the playoffs will start next month, and although the regular season record is important, the playoffs cannot be delayed for 68 wins.

Fortunately, this month, the Eagles have a total of 12 home games, and only 4 are away games, which is also excellent for the players to recover their fitness.

The starting lineup sent by the Hawks in this game is Liu Mang, Prince, Barnes, Boozer, and Ratliff.

Seeing Raheem and Rashid Wallace in suits, Liu Mang knew that the burden of this game was heavy! Ratliff may not be able to play for long, so he has to settle the game quickly while Ratliff is guarding the inside!

The Cavaliers fielded a starting lineup of James, McGinnis, Newbell, Eric Williams, and Big Z.

It was another "indistinguishable" jump ball battle, Big Z and Ratleaf came to the middle circle to jump the ball, Big Z relied on his height advantage and barely won the jump ball from Ratlief's head with a matchbox bounce, and the Cavaliers attacked first.

Dealing with James, Liu Mang decisively closed the door to prevent Barnes and Prince from attacking, Liu Mang guarded McGinnis by himself, and magnified the move to bite Xiao Zhan Zhan! Boozer went to mark the slow-moving big Z's mid-range shot, Ratliff stayed under the basket alone, Eric Williams and Newbell saw Ratliff the block king and coaxed, the two did not shoot from the middle to long range, Ratliff covered the sky with one hand to guard the basket, Newbell has a three-point shooting rate of 10.3 percent this year, and has played 200 games so far in his career and has made 16 three-pointers, Eric Williams has a good shooting rate, 33 percent, but this year he has made a total of 30 three-point shots, that is, only 10 have been scored, The two ran on the outside and ignored them, and when they got to the basket, they were covered by Ratliff, and they were overwhelmed by the Hawks' defense!

James watched Prince and Barnes come together, and a sentence almost spewed out in his throat.

Don't go too far!

Yesterday he called himself a brother, and today he dealt with his buddies like this?

It's too much!

In the face of the two of them, Barnes alone is hard enough to deal with the guy who constantly makes physical contact, and Prince ......

James's best outside pitcher helper McGinnis was stared at by Liu Mang, and the Cavaliers did not have a good tactical system, blocking and dismantling without the ball was basically equal to blind blocking, and head coach Paul Silas had not had time to formulate the team's offensive system, when he first took over the Cavaliers, because he chose a high school student, although James was very famous, but two years ago there was just a Kwame Brown, before the regular season began, the Cavaliers did not determine whether to continue to mess or start to rebuild immediately, ready to see first, This is the main reason why the Cavaliers have not improved as quickly as a whole this year.

In general, it is still a big problem for the management!

Sandwiched by Prince and Barnes, James was treated at the level of Kobe Bryant and Maddy, and James's passing heart couldn't be suppressed and passed to the empty Newbell.

Newbell received the ball in the middle distance, feeling cold in his heart, he had been teammates with Ratliff, and knew how strong this guy's ability to block under the basket was, so he hesitated for a moment and made a mid-range jumper......

"Bang ......"

Liu Mang immediately retracted to the basket and grabbed the defensive rebound.

Raheem and Rashid Wallace are not there, Liu Mang is more active in grabbing rebounds, and with the advantage of arm span and bounce, he can grab rebounds, and he has averaged 3.7 per game this year.

After Liu Mang grabbed the rebound, Ratliff didn't move, and stood in the three-second zone, because Liu Mang won the rebound and counterattacked directly!

Liu Mang rushed to the front court quickly, the only thing the Cavaliers could keep up with was James, when James retreated to the middle line, he tried to block Liu Mang, but although the current James attitude is good, but the defense is really urgent, and it is an average level, in fact, until the 08 Olympics before James, the defense is average, Liu Mang made a feint James and pounced, and then Liu Mang changed direction and threw James behind him, and the speed soared to 99.

James can't catch up if he wants to!

Liu Mang rushed to the front court and gently dunked the ball into the basket, without a strong dunk or anything, to avoid affecting the feel, although the opponent is not good today, but you can't be blind, you have to be very focused!

James looked at Liu Mang's completely different expression from the previous two fights, and James felt as if he had been pricked by a needle.

It's a brother who said yes! Don't be so serious!

James has seen Liu Mang's expression like this, and he only had it when he played the Nets!

However, James was still a little happy in his heart, which proved that Liu Mang attached great importance to him.

The Eagles scored first in the next city.

It's the Cavaliers offense again, James received a Newbell serve and pushed over, this time he learned well, saw Prince and Barnes directly preparing to pinch the action, just after half the court began to accelerate, don't look at James's current body is a little thinner than Barnes, but it's all muscles, and it's explosive, when James accelerated to the three-point line, Prince and Barnes sandwiched over, but they couldn't stop it!

James rushed into the inside, and James, who was fully sprinting, Ratliff could only retreat, this guy was too fast and too fierce, even if he pulled it down, he had to pay for the foul, and James who was fully sprinting couldn't stop it.

James rushed to the basket and responded with a one-handed dunk to Liu Mang.

Liu Mang returned to the basket to prepare to receive the serve, and when James yelled to return to defense after dunking the basket, Liu Mang clapped his hands and said to James: "Very good, very good, it's my next." ”

Seeing that Liu Mang had no expression, James wondered when he retreated: "What does this mean?" ”

Then, James knew what Liu Mang meant.

Liu Mang advanced to the front court with the ball, and singled Newbell with the best outside defense of the Cavaliers outside the three-point line, and Liu Mang was too familiar with Newbell's defense.

For Liu Mang's singles, Newbell is more familiar!

Is it time to retreat and prevent a breakthrough? Or do you want to defend against three points? Or an anti-stop-and-go jumper? The more you know about Liu Mang, the more painful Newbell's defense becomes!

Although Liu Mang is not omnipotent, his individual singles are too comprehensive!

Liu Mang suddenly accelerated to the right, and Newbell, who was in a panic, subconsciously took a few steps back, and Liu Mang immediately retracted and took three steps back to throw off the sniper......

Continuing the hot three-point feeling of the last game, Liu Mang hit a three-point sniper shot!

5 points in a row!

It's the Cavaliers' offense again, James continues to choose a strong break, this move is really incomprehensible, there is no Raheem in the mid-range defense, Barnes and Prince are both single-defense types, the two are very effective in the face of singles with the ball, in the face of James's rampage play, not as strong as Raheem when he was there, and James broke into the inside layup.

The Cavaliers started the game with a tight bite, 4-5, and didn't let the score break the gear.

But when it came time for the Hawks to attack, Liu Mang used Newbell to be scared by three points, let Boozer come out to block and dismantle, and then went down to the inside, Newbell and Eric Williams both rushed to Liu Mang who rushed into the basket, and Big Z also blocked it in advance, Liu Mang attracted the three-person sandwich, and immediately distributed it to Boozer who cut in after blocking and dismantling from the left side of the basket, and Boozer received the ball and easily dunked to score two points.

Liu Mang and James began to fight against Biao!

James, who has been playing in the NBA for almost a season, is more and more able to take advantage of his physical advantages, has a high ball quotient, and after finding a way to score, he has been choosing to accelerate in the middle line and attack the basket after forcibly squeezing two defenders, the power of this move is really incomprehensible, after the game started, he shot 6 of 8 shots, in addition to being interfered with by Ratliff to two times without shooting, it also caused Ratliff to score 2+1, and also scored 13 points in a row at the beginning, and the potential of the superstar was fully revealed!

Coupled with attracting more and more defense, James also got 2 assists in the first half of the quarter, helping the Cavaliers score 17 points in seven minutes!

At the beginning of the game, the Cavaliers' offensive efficiency was bursting!

But the Eagles' side of the scoring has not stopped, and James understands what Liu Mang's words mean.

After Liu Mang dunked a basket at the beginning and scored a three-pointer, he attracted a lot of defense, and then began to cooperate with Boozer to block and dismantle, and began to create opportunities for his teammates.

After Liu Mang scored 5 points in a row, he sent 5 assists in a row! forced the Cavaliers to choose a single defense again, so Liu Mang faced Newbell's defense and fired again with a three-point shot!

In seven minutes, Liu Mang scored 12 points, 5 assists and two rebounds to help the Hawks lead the Cavaliers by 7 points to 24-17!

This oppressive nature makes James feel overwhelmed!

He has already tried his best to break through against the two defenders, and he has only played seven minutes in the interior against Ratliff, who is ready to make up the defense in advance, and this kind of breakthrough against the defenders has been ten times! More than he usually plays all games like this!

The tempo of both teams is too fast, and since the Eagles' side of the defense is not as oppressive as usual, the tempo is very fast! There are many shots, and the score is frighteningly high.

……

After the official timeout, the Eagles began to make substitutions, Liu Mang and Jason Terry came on, and the lineup of Barnes, Muhammad, and Kwame Brown came on.

On the Cavaliers' side, James continued to play, averaging 41 minutes per game in his rookie year, and James was not easy, without Ricky Davis, Boozer was not on their team, James had to play better to have a chance to win, James brought Kevin Ollie, Newbell, Diop, Tony Barty to the court.

If the starting lineup Cavaliers still have a little bit of strength on the offensive end, such as Newbell and Eric Williams cutting in the air when James breaks through, helping James draw a little defensive attention from the bottom of the Ratleaf, allowing James to open the game with 6 of 8, then Diop and Tony Barty ...... It's completely negative.

The two have almost no sense of running at all, and they have no shooting ability, and James's style of play is really tiring, and it is obvious in the second half of the first quarter! James continued to force the attack defense of Liu Mang and Barnes, this time James didn't even have an outside pitcher helper, Liu Mang could go to the pinch, James could still force Liu Mang and Barnes to rush into the interior at first, but even if he rushed into the inside, seeing Kwame Brown, Muhammad and even his own teammates Tony Barty and Diop crowded under the basket together, James didn't know how to play, his teammates were too blind! How do you open up the space!

But if they had that awareness, Tony Barty wouldn't have been given up by the original team, and Diop wouldn't have been so physical, still the No. 8 pick, averaging 2 points and 3 rebounds per game in his third year of career.

James hit the iron with a few strong hits, and the Cavaliers' offense was finally cut off!

And Liu Mang's side, throwing his arm into the air, when the team's rebounds were slipping, he tried his best to grab every defensive rebound, and received several rebounds in the second half of the first quarter, and counterattacked when he won the rebounds.

Liu Mang and Jason Terry's backcourt double-wave combination, began to keep chasing three points, you throw one into the continue to throw, if you can't throw in, change to another person to throw, the other three try their best to grab rebounds, and if you can't grab it, you have to raise the speed.

Originally, the Cavaliers wanted to send two towers to suppress the excessively fast rhythm on the court, but even Big Z and Ratliffe couldn't lower the tempo, and these two guys who were in the third and fourth centers on other teams were completely burdened!

The Hawks went on a 16-6 scoring blaster for five minutes late in the first quarter!

40 points in a single quarter!

The Hawks led the Cavaliers by 17 points at 40-23 in the first quarter!

The Cavaliers scored 23 points, which is basically not far from their season average of 93 points per game, which means that the Hawks have not really limited the Cavaliers' offense.

But the Eagles' own offensive side, exploded!

Liu Mang had 18 points, 5 rebounds and 6 assists in the first quarter! Liu Mang, who was completely focused today, carefully studied the Cavaliers' offense and defense before the game, and took advantage of the Cavaliers' weaknesses to help the Hawks play almost the best single-quarter game of the season!

In addition to finding opportunities to constantly trigger skills, Liu Mang didn't use any small tricks, there was no need for the knights, and he also used double attacks with respect for James, and there was nothing else to focus on defense.

But that's it, Liu Mang's performance was so terrifying that he didn't expect!

If it's 18 points and 6 assists, this is okay, 18+6 in a single quarter is really amazing, it's not too much, and there are a lot of people who can get such data, but there are still 5 rebounds, and the single-quarter game is almost complete James's full-game performance!

The first time he played against James, Liu Mang teased James like that, and James fought so badly that he didn't feel too much panic.

But today, James looked at Liu Mang, who was using his strength to play this kind of performance according to tactics today, and the whole person was not good!

This guy is terrible!

Compared with the last time Maddie scored 8 three-pointers in a row with contemptuous eyes, Liu Mang is no worse than Maddie with the pressure of James this time!

Of the six "Jordan successors", James has already played against all five others.

and Kobe Bryant's complete disdain, the Lakers are too strong, the Cavaliers are completely unstoppable, and Kobe's pride is different from only playing for a few minutes and resting; It's also different from Carter's mentality of riding a big Z dunk and dancing back to defense and telling him to let him come and play too; is different from Maddie's contemptuous two games in which he scored more than 40 points in one game and scored 8 three-pointers in a row without taking him seriously at all, and leaving a casual attitude of "Ace is still stronger"; It's different from Iverson's comeback and using speed to transfer him who was still playing point guard to be honest.

Liu Mang looks extraordinary!

Today's Liu Mang makes James feel very different!

Even if he counts himself, James feels that Liu Mang is the most distinctive among the "Jordan's successors"!