"Greg, what's wrong with Meng today?" Looking at Meng Xu, who has a very strong desire to attack on the court, assistant coach Mike Budenholzer can't believe his eyes now, in this morning's training session, when he proposed to formulate singles tactics for Meng Xu, this guy still twisted and pinched, with an expression that I was not interested in scoring, and now this kind of madness after arriving on the court, even Mike Budenholzer was startled, is this still the Meng Xu who is known as the perfect team player?

"Perhaps, what we feared most happened anyway." Since watching the Olympic Games Chinese men's basketball team against the United States, Popovich and Mike Budenholzer have been worried that after Meng Xu returns to the Spurs, he will do the same as in the national team, and he will hold the ball alone if he doesn't agree, this kind of behavior will definitely not be allowed in the Spurs that rely on teamwork, even Duncan's ball-holding singles are limited, and the Spurs have the soil for superstars to survive, but there will never be superstar singles tactics. That's one of the reasons why Popovich chose to experiment with a triangle offense with the Spurs, both to fuse the two superstars while also limiting their singles.

"Maybe it's all Stern's fault." Since Jordan's retirement, the NBA league's ratings and influence are getting lower and lower, perhaps also related to the Spurs' style of play, and the ratings of the Finals for two consecutive seasons are also getting lower and lower.

Not only that, but now there are rumors that the league is also preparing to continue to launch the "four major scoring guards" and "four small and small forwards", in an attempt to use quantitative changes to cause qualitative changes. In this case, as long as it is an ambitious player, he will not let go of this opportunity. Although Jordan has retired, the league is still full of talent in the shooting guard position, Ray Allen, Iverson, Kobe Bryant, Vince Carter, and even Tracy McCready, who has changed from small forward to shooting guard this season, are all talented young people. Compared with the scoring guard, the competition for the position of small forward is much smaller, and now among the young small forwards in the league, there are also Anfernee Hardaway, Grant Hill and Tracy McCready are better, and Tracy McCreddy has changed his position this season to play point guard, even so, with Meng Xu's data last season, it is a fool's dream to want to catch this express train, so in this case, Meng Xu must change his playing style a little, At least double the number of points scored from last season to have any hope of being in this squad.

"Coach, do you want him to calm down?" Steve Cole on the side also took the opportunity to advise Popovich that no player in the Spurs would dare to ignore his teammates and play such a crazy single to Meng Xu on the court, even Tim Duncan. If you keep rushing inside, it's okay to say that at least you can drive your teammates a little bit, and by the way, you can do a few kills or something. And Xiang Meng Xu's current singles way of controlling the ball for more than 10 seconds, and then pulling out his hand directly outside the 3-point line, is completely a single with a tumor to the extreme, the opponent who feels good is afraid, and the teammates are afraid when the hand is not good, and the situation on the court is like this now, Meng Xu made all 3 shots after the opening, and after the Timberwolves called a timeout, he hit the iron twice in a row, the best two inside lines in the league, David Robinson and Tim Duncan can only wait to grab rebounds under the basket now.

"No, I said I would give him a quarter, and after the official timeout, replace Tim and David." Popovich waved his hand, knowing that this would be the case, the ghost would formulate a singles tactic for him, and now he is in a dilemma. In the second half of the first quarter, let him play enough, and then I will honestly come back to the bench, and let him stay in San Antonio for the next few away games.

"Every superstar has the means to adjust their feel and offensive state, break through a few times if they don't shoot, wait until they feel the feeling is restored, shoot a few times, repeatedly, so no matter how bad their hand is at a certain stage of the game, when the game is over, you will find that their overall shooting rate is in an acceptable, or very good range, of course, unless they are possessed by the iron god in a certain game, in this case, no one can save them. And you, now while increasing your offensive means, also learn to adjust your game and shooting percentage, which is the first step on your path to superstardom. Slapping the basketball below the center circle, I thought back to what Anna had said to herself before the start of the season. After Sam Mitchell began to defend himself, Meng Xu hit two consecutive dry shots, so Meng Xu also gave up the idea of continuing to pull on the outside, and instead wanted to break through the Timberwolves' interior line.

When Meng Xu dribbled the basketball and began to accelerate, Sam Mitchell was also a little confused, this guy didn't play cards according to the routine, he shot well just now, why did he break through all of a sudden?

Although Sam Mitchell has rich experience in the game, after seeing Meng Xu's breakthrough intention, he immediately went to block, but in the face of the strange breakthrough method of serpentine breakthrough, Sam Mitchell was also powerless, and could only watch Meng Xu in front of him, after changing direction in a contrary direction that violated common sense, he left himself behind. After Sam Mitchell was passed by Meng Xu, Kevin Garnett, who was still fighting for the position with Duncan just now, immediately rushed towards Meng Xu.

Garnett's footwork is very good, and his defensive prediction is also first-class, but after Meng Xu's two consecutive changes of direction, he can only watch Meng Xu twist left and right to rush to the basket and score a layup.

"Your breakthrough posture is the ugliest I've ever seen, please can you change the breakthrough method next time." After Meng Xu made a layup, passing by Kevin Garnett's side, Garnett spewed a trash word at Meng Xu with a smile on his face. In the process of breaking through just now, Meng Xu's upper body leaned forward, his head was buried deeply, the center of gravity of his entire body was very low, and he was still pouting and dangling his buttocks.

"Kevin, it doesn't matter if you're beautiful or not, it's important to put the basketball in the hoop." Garnett's trash talk is also very famous, but fortunately, Meng Xu basically has no chance to be in position with him, otherwise he would have to compete with him.

After Meng Xu scored this breakthrough, he began to rush into the Timberwolves' interior line continuously, relying on this ugly breakthrough method in Garnett's mouth, he scored 6 points in a row, and Meng Xu scored 15 points in a single quarter in the first quarter, and at the same time, under Meng Xu's kind of cancerous style of play, the other players of the Spurs, including Tim Duncan, did not score a point, even so, the Spurs still led the Timberwolves by 6 points 15-9.

Before the start of the game, the head coach and assistant coach promised to play freely in the first quarter in front of all the players. And the two big men of the Spurs, David Robinson and Tim Duncan, are also very cooperative with Meng Xu now, and they also want to see how much Meng Xu can play freely, so the beginning of this game has almost become a game in which Meng Xu single-handedly takes on the entire Timberwolves team. Avery Johnson only needs to be responsible for dribbling the ball through the center circle, and he has nothing to do, and the rest of the Spurs players just need to wait for Meng Xu to shoot, and then prepare to grab rebounds.

And now Meng Xu is also playing very refreshingly, it can be said that it is the coolest game in his entire career, he can shoot if he wants, he can suddenly burst out, and he feels as if he is the master of the court. It's just a slight deficiency that this kind of constant singles with the ball is very physically demanding, just over 4 minutes have passed, Meng Xu is already sweating profusely, this is still the result of Meng Xu has deliberately preserved his physical strength on the defensive end, if this game is still like before, at the defensive end at the expense of physical strength, to assist in defense, I am afraid that now I have consumed at least one-third of my physical strength.

"El, is this kid a shooting paranoid?" Magic Johnson on the commentary bench was also stunned by Meng Xu's performance in this game, originally Magic Johnson was still thinking about when to point him out, but now it seems that there is no need for this at all, is the kind of team spirit he showed before all pretended? Thinking of this, the magician still shook his head, denying his own idea, his vision might be wrong, but Larry's guy would never be wrong.

"Erwin, I don't know very well, but the singles ability that Meng is showing now should be the top in the league." Not only Magic Johnson, but even Michaels can't believe that the No. 5 on the court now is Meng Xu, and this kind of paranoia about attacking the basket can only be compared with Jordan when he was young.

"Only a player who is invincible in singles will make the opponent feel afraid from the bottom of his heart, with Meng's current performance, he does have this potential, but I still hope that Meng can develop in the direction of the team, after all, basketball is a five-person sport, even Michael, without relying on his teammates, there is no way to win the championship." Magic Johnson At this time, looking at Meng Xu's back, his mood was also a little complicated, in the current NBA, the team is king.