"It's a great thing for us to have Steve on board, he's an NCAA champion and he's a great help to our team......"

As soon as Liu Mang arrived at the stadium on the morning of the 15th, he was surrounded by reporters and asked about the latest Blake deal.

Bucks fans generally gave Blake the last year of his rookie contract to the Hawks for free, which made many fans complain that the Bucks were unscrupulous in order to mess up.

Look at the Knicks, whether they are dead or not, even if they have no playoff hope, they are still fighting every game, and they have 17 wins, which is not much worse than the 19-win Heat, and they are far from the bottom three in the East.

However, Blake is in the final year of his rookie contract, and it is understandable that the Bucks let him go, Blake has partnered with Reed this season, averaging 11 points and 5 assists per game, and there is no contract close to the middle class that can't keep him.

Moreover, although the Bucks have only won 11 games this season, there is no shortage of performances to win against strong teams, and they have won less than 11 long games in half a season, which is ...... for them Too much......

The Bucks have been dreaming of getting a super center again since they acquired Kareem Abdul-Jabbar decades ago, but unfortunately Bogut didn't give up, and they had to do it again.

Blake was also a player in the 03 class, and was selected by the Wizards with the eighth pick in the second round, and after the selection, the Wizards gave the second-round pick a four-year rookie contract, which was regarded as a "missing pearl" at the time.

Blake's strength lies in his leadership qualities, he was a winner in college, reaching two finals in four years of college basketball, reaching the quarterfinals in all four years, and winning the NCAA championship in 2002.

Although his talent is limited, he was born in February 1980, and he was 23 and a half years old when he entered the draft in 2003, but leadership ability has little to do with strength.

If you are leading troops to fight, there will be a lot of trouble if too many people with strong leadership skills are concentrated in one team.

But basketball is different, a team has more people with leadership skills, and it is easier to adjust in terms of mentality.

As a core point guard who helped the University of Maryland win the NCAA championship, Steve Blake is an excellent leader, and Liu Mang has always wanted to partner with such a guard.

Except for Stockton, Liu Mang has never partnered with a guard with such excellent leadership ability.

Although Maddie and Jason Terry are strong, and Rondo is also good in controlling the field, when it comes to leadership ability, neither of them can compare to Blake.

After the interview, Liu Mang entered the stadium, and unexpectedly, Blake had already arrived early in the morning and was undergoing a team physical examination.

The Hawks are still not at ease about getting such a good point guard for free, and after the deal was made yesterday afternoon, the Hawks contacted Blake and asked him to come for a physical exam today.

Blake is also excited to play for a team that ranks in the playoffs and couldn't wait to get to Atlanta last night.

Liu Mang didn't bother them, and watched Blake's ability evaluation on the side.

"Steve Blake, Ability Rating 79 (Peak), Offense 77, Defense 78, Passing 83, Three-Point 84, Shooting 71, Layup 82, Speed 88, Power 84......"

The 27-year-old Blake is in his prime, which makes Liu Mang very satisfied with having such a backup two-way guard.

Although the ability rating is less than 80, it is more than enough for a substitute.

After watching the trial for a while, Blake's basic skills are very solid, his strength is not strong, and his physical condition is related, the solid basic skills laid in four years of college are still very good, he is skilled in passing and control, three points are steady, and his height of 1.91 meters can barely play a point guard.

Liu Mang watched it for a while and went to practice shooting, Blake's addition is very important for the relatively weak guard line, Maddie and Battier are mainly small forwards, and Granger is mainly small forwards and big forwards, and there are only Liu Mang, Jason Terry, and Rondo left in the guard line.

Liu Mang practiced shooting for a while, and his teammates, who had a day off yesterday, arrived one after another to start preparing for tonight's games against the Suns and tomorrow night's games against the Jazz.

Both games were not easy to play, and the Suns, Jazz, and SuperSonics fought for the fifth place in the West.

If it is sixth, it will have to meet the Spurs in the first round of the playoffs, and seventh will have to meet the Lakers, and fifth...... Playing the Nuggets, the difference is quite large.

After passing the medical examination, Blake came to the training ground to greet his teammates from the new team.

"Hey Flash, we're teammates." Liu Mang said as he shook hands with Blake.

Blake wondered, he used to be an opponent, Liu Mang called him Flash, he could understand that Liu Mang mocked him for his slow speed, but now they are all teammates, why does Liu Mang still call him that?

"Ace, why do you call me The Flash?" Blake finally had a chance to ask.

Wade does not have the nickname Flash here in the United States, Flash is the nickname given to Wade by the domestic commentator, Wade's nickname is D-ade, D is the meaning of defense, Wade in the second year of the 04-05 season is known for his defense and got this nickname.

The nickname "Flash" on the American side was given to Blake by Liu Mang, of course, fans and the media treated this nickname with a ridiculous attitude.

"Uh......" This question is so embarrassing, Liu Mang was speechless all of a sudden, although a few years later, Blake used his strength to interpret what the Flash is in the face of the league's first quarterback, but now Blake is a slow guard, and the defensive end is usually to defend the quarterback or even some small forwards who are less than two meters tall to keep up.

Liu Mang thought about it, there is!

"I've always thought you look a lot like Barry Allen, with a small, thin ......," Liu Mang said without blushing or panting.

"Like?"

Blake thought of the comic character, who was indeed tall and thin with a small face...... But like? Blake still wanted to continue to ask, but the person who relieved Liu Mang came.

"Hello, I'm Rajon Rondo, and we're teammates from now on." Rondo greets Blake.

Blake saw Rondo's expression, and he didn't seem very friendly...... He doesn't remember offending this young man! When he was still with the Bucks, although Blake scored 16 points to help the Bucks win the Hawks, he and Rondo did not play against each other, and the opposite was Maddy......

Seeing Liu Mang and Blake chatting warmly, Rondo was jealous......

Originally, the Hawks had just one backup point guard for him, but now there is another one, and he is better than him, and the sense of crisis and Liu Mang's good attitude towards Blake, Rondo's vinegar jar has turned over......

They all got to know Blake, as well as Fetzel and Mark Madsen, who had a further medical examination immediately after Blake.

The rest of the two Hawks don't care too much, it's just a ten-day short contract, and Blake's side gets a little more attention.

Blake doesn't look skinny, his style of play is very tough, and his ability is like that, but the impression he gives to the opponent is very prominent, which is reflected in the fact that he is not intimidated no matter how strong the opponent is.

Maddy, Jason Terry and other stars who have played against Blake all admire Blake.

Blake joined the Hawks, and there was one more person who dared to throw the ball at a critical moment, and the shooting accuracy in the open position was good, and the Hawks were very happy on the outside except for Rondo, who felt a sense of crisis.

……

The 13-man rotation has been gathered for the time being, and two emergency tactical training sessions have been conducted in the afternoon, and by 5 p.m., with two hours to go, the Hawks and Suns will meet for the second time of the season, and the Hawks will start warming up after resting until 5 o'clock.

The Hawks are 25-13, the Suns are 23-18, and the Suns have already played half of the schedule and are now in sixth place in the West, with the same record as the Jazz and the Hypersonics, except that they have been twice by the new duo before and are ranked behind the Jazz.

There is pressure to have more motivation, after being blown by Liu Mang, in recent games, the Suns have been under the biggest pressure since the start of the season, before their record collapsed at the beginning of the season, and it was a month after the collapse, no one paid attention to them for a while, but Liu Mang helped them return to people's field of vision.

After all, the strength of the stars is there, and after other teams valued them and listed them as strong opponents, they made rapid progress and have become the No. 4 team after the Lakes and Bulls in the West.

And there is a little ...... Thomas Carter is awesome!

The knee pain that plagued O'Neal last season was healed by Thomas Carter when he played half a season with the Suns!

Except for a few breaks at the start of the season, O'Neill has not dropped a single game since the start of December.

In the past month, O'Neal has played an average of 23 minutes per game, scoring 14 points, 7 rebounds, 2 assists and 2 blocks, with excellent performance and high efficiency.

Nash is firmly at the top of the assists charts, averaging 12 assists per game in recent times.

Josh Smith's 22 points, 8 rebounds and 3 assists per game are also coquettish.

They gradually played the same level as they had come to expect from Josh Smith and O'Neal.

After the warm-up, Liu Mang studied the Suns' scouting report.

is really an opponent that Liu Mang is very interested in.

Because O'Neal went to the Heat more than a year early, Stoudemire and Marion were exchanged for Josh Smith's rookie contract, and there is still a year of dividends to eat, if Josh Smith fails to make the All-Star team in the past two years, Josh Smith's next contract is a 4-year starting salary of 50 million and 10 million.

The Suns are also likely to be a constant rival in the future, after all, Nash's peak can be maintained until 2012 and he still has the strength of the assist king, coupled with Josh Smith, who is in better health and younger......

……

……

At 6:40 p.m., Liu Mang entered the court.

Yesterday, the Suns just beat the Heat, O'Neal scored a season-high 36 points, helping the Suns to their 23rd victory, beating the Heat 126-91, O'Neal let out a bad breath.

So neither Josh Smith nor Calderon visited the arena during the day today, and spent the whole day catching up on sleep.

Liu Mang and the Suns players simply said hello and chatted, they were all back-to-back, the Suns were still back-to-back games, but the Hawks did not have the advantage in physical strength, and the Suns won too easily yesterday.

At seven o'clock in the evening, the all-American live game began.

The Hawks of the Bombardment Brigade are online again after a day.

For the time being, the starters are still Rondo, Liu Mang, Maddie, Marion, and Kwame Brown, so use it first, and then let Maddie return to the guard line when a suitable starting small forward is found.

At the beginning of the game, the Hawks had the advantage, playing a wave of 9-4 starts, taking advantage of the Suns' center O'Neal who no longer had the two weaknesses of fast driving ability and slow defense, and the Hawks had a clear advantage in the first three minutes.

However, the Suns took advantage of Rondo's passing error on the Hawks' side to replace O'Neal and replaced them with the lineup of Nash, Raga Bell, James Jones, Josh Smith, and Dio, and neither team could prevent anyone.

The scoring of the two teams in this game was not as explosive as the last game when the Hawks played the Nuggets, mainly because the two teams played more organized in this game.

Rondo played well, in addition to scoring, he did a better job than Nash in passing, grabbing rebounds, and defense, and even if Nash worked hard, he couldn't prevent Rondo from breaking through, and it was difficult to move to limit Rondo's breakthrough, and Rondo used his breakthrough and the containment brought by Liu Mang's side after he just scored 56 points, and organized the offense well.

However, even if the defensive end has been well defended, the Suns point guard-power forward-center trio can pass the ball, and with Raga Bell and Barbossa, two shooters who can cut and shoot, the Hawks can't prevent it.

At the end of the first quarter, the Hawks led the Suns by two points, 29-27.

When it came to the second lineup, the Eagles fell to the bottom lineup.

Fetzel is quite useful, like a stone stake in the low position, O'Neill is difficult to squeeze into, but O'Neill is a full ten centimeters taller than Fetzel, and the small hook hand is slippery.

Although Liu Mang continued to play in the second quarter, he had more scoring opportunities, scoring 14 points in a single quarter while only scoring 5 points in the first quarter, and he could not withstand the positional offensive of Calderon and O'Neal's combination.

However, the bench lineup was not without bright spots, David Lee was substituted when Fetzer really couldn't guard against O'Neal, although the defensive end was still like that, but the offensive end worked well, turning and cutting inside the three-second zone twice in a row.

But in general, the Hawks lost the second and third quarters, and the Suns led by 12 points at 93-81 after the third quarter.

Although Liu Mang scored 17 points in a single quarter in the fourth quarter and his personal score increased to 51 points, he could not recover the disadvantage.

In the end, the Hawks lost to the Suns by a margin of 113 to 121, an eight-point difference.

Liu Mang scored 51 points, 7 rebounds and 3 assists, Maddie also performed very well, with 30 points and 8 assists, and Rondo had 4 points, 7 rebounds and 7 assists.

The defense against Nash was also good, with Nash only scoring 7 points and 13 assists.

But without Prince, Dio's side did not defend well, and Dior scored 33 points, plus O'Neal's 17 points and 9 boards, Calderon's 15 points and 6 assists, although the Suns did not guard against the Hawks, they scored more.

25-14, the Hawks lost again.

But there is good news, Liu Mang has reached the top of the scoring list......

averaged 30.3 points per game, only scored 17 points on Arenas's side, and after the average score dropped to 30.2 points per game, Liu Mang overtook him!