On October 29, 2000, the Spurs ended all 8 preseason games of the season, in these 8 games the Spurs achieved an "excellent" record of 2 wins and 6 losses, and in these 8 games, the Spurs' main players played very little playing time, Meng Xu and Mario Eli, Sean Elliott did not participate in all 8 games, David Robinson and Avery Johnson only played in a few games at home, and the playing time was also very short, Duncan participated in all 8 games, But a game only lasted about 10 minutes. Almost all of the 8 preseason games were played by Derrick Anderson with a bunch of benches and undrafted rookies, and in these 8 games, Derrick Anderson also scored 22 points, 6 rebounds, and 5.5 assists with 20+5+5 statistics.

Finally, after the preseason, the Spurs cut several role players and narrowed the final roster to 15, and the Spurs' idea of finding a backup center was stillborn. In the offseason of this season, many teams in the league have sent a request to the Spurs to trade Meng Xu, and since the end of the Olympic Games, this trend has intensified, facing the 3-man package of the American team, 27 points in a single quarter, 48 points in the game, 9 assists, 11 rebounds, Meng Xu's future has greatly exceeded people's expectations of him, this is definitely a player with the potential to become a supergiant. But without exception, these trade requests were rejected by Popovich. Among these trades, the most persistent are the three teams of the Celtics, Pacers and Trail Blazers.

The most infatuated with Meng Xu is undoubtedly the Celtics, since the regular season last season, the Celtics have been seeking the possibility of trading Meng Xu from the Spurs, until yesterday, it was the 8th fax sent by the Celtics to the Spurs, this time the Celtics' offer was directly All-Star forward Antoine Walker and 10+6 per game backup center Vitaly Portapenco. Meng Xu's performances in the playoffs this season and the Sydney Olympics have proven that Larry Bird has an excellent vision, and Meng Xu's ceiling may be even higher than Larry Bird.

The Trail Blazers' pursuit of Meng Xu is also tireless, and in the clash between Meng Xu and Pippen in the Western Conference Finals last season, Meng Xu's outstanding performance also left a deep impression on the Trail Blazers' owner Paul Allen, so the Trail Blazers have sent multiple trade requests to the Spurs in the offseason. And the fax of the trade request sent by the Trail Blazers to the Spurs is directly to use Steve Smith and Jermaine O'Neal to add next year's first-round draft picks in exchange for the Spurs' Meng Xu and Shaun Elliott and future draft picks. Even the head coach of the Trail Blazers, Mike Dunwiley, personally called Popovich, and the two All-Stars were picked at random. In the face of the conditions offered by the Trail Blazers, the management of the Spurs was already in the spring, but they were said by Popovich: Do you have money? I went back.

Compared with the Trail Blazers Celtics, the best conditions are undoubtedly Larry Bird's Pacers, after losing the Finals last season, Larry Bird resigned as the head coach of the Pacers, but he continued to serve as the vice president and general manager of the Pacers. The Spurs could have given all the garbage contracts to the Pacers, but even with such generous terms, Popovich finally turned it down without hesitation. Because in Popovich's heart, ten stars are not worth a supergiant, Meng Xujia Duncan is likely to create a combination of more than one dynasty, and this season's Spurs are very likely to create a dynasty and era of their own, in this case, Popovich will not trade out the core players of the team anyway, even if it is Sean Elliott, Popovich persuaded him to play another season.

"Greg, the regular season is about to start, but our team's tactics for the season haven't been decided yet, aren't you in a hurry?" In the video room, Popovich was watching the game video with several assistant coaches, and the videos I watched today are the Bulls in Jordan's post-3 consecutive period. Looking at Popovich with a calm face, Mike Budenholzer is now a little anxious, the regular season is about to start in two days, but the Spurs have not even started basic tactical training.

"Mike, the most important thing about coaching the game is to be static, so that the opponent can easily understand you, so as to catch your weaknesses and make targeted arrangements. And David is a year older this year, and he was injured in the playoffs, so his playing time and game form this season will definitely not be the same as last season, so this season we have to abandon the two-tower strategy. And the Lakers are a lot better than last season, and it will be difficult to rely on a combination of inside and outside tactics this season to beat the Lakers, so we should look for another way out. In the playoffs last season, David Robinson was injured and reimbursed, which also gave Meng Xu the opportunity to take the position, and Meng Xu's outstanding performance in the playoffs also gave Popovich the idea of setting him as the core, fortunately, the Spurs' previous tactics have always been the dual core of David Robinson and Tim Duncan, but the combination between Meng Xu and Duncan, two different styles of players, has never appeared in the history of basketball before, the closest is the combination of Magic Johnson and Abdul-Jabbar, but compared with Magic Abdul-Jabbar, Duncan and Meng Xu are very different, so in order to make the two achieve a seamless connection, Popovich is also racking his brains this offseason.

Since the beginning of the finals, Popovich has been looking for a tactic that can achieve the fusion of Meng Xu and Duncan, Duncan can say a little bit, Duncan's tactical adaptability is far better than Meng Xu, but Duncan's own tactical system characteristics, and destined to play his greatest role only with him as the tactical core. And Meng Xu's tactical system currently seems to be a breakthrough point, but the Spurs' current interior line is very crowded, and it is difficult to play Duncan's role if Meng Xu breaks through. So this offseason, Popovich went through almost all the tactics, and then overturned the feasibility of using them in the Spurs one by one, and finally Popovich still wanted to try it with a triangle offense, after all, this is a tactical system that once fused the two supergiants of Jordan Pippen together.

Mike Budenholzer nodded, did not speak, but continued to watch the video, different levels, see different situations, for Popovich's "obsession", Mike Budenholzer has nothing to do now, in the eyes of Mike Budenholzer, as long as Meng Xu can be trained to become a player like Reggie Miller, then in addition to a few qualified role players, the Spurs will be a favorable contender for the championship in the next ten years, and three championships in 10 years are more conservative statements. But Popovich has to pursue a historical combination like Abdul-Jabbar and Magic, and Popovich's ambitions are far more than 3 championships, so for Popovich's goal, Mike Budenholzer is shocked and admired, but he just doesn't know if Popovich can succeed, don't get to the end of the chicken and egg fight.

Since returning to the Spurs, Meng Xu's training has basically been carried out alone, and during the long offseason, many players will choose to travel, eat and drink by the way, and when they return to the team, their bodies have already been out of shape, and some even eat small belly, so as soon as these players return to the team, they are greeted by a large number of slimming exercises, so Meng Xu naturally can't practice with them. Because of this, at lunchtime, seeing that Meng Xu had extra meals in addition to lunch, many players in the Spurs team were also drooling with envy. After almost a month of weight gain, Meng Xu's weight has also successfully increased to 93 kilograms, and it is still a real muscle, although it is still a lot worse than those muscle sticks in the team, but Meng Xu's physical confrontation ability has been greatly enhanced.

After a day's training, the first thing Meng Xu did when he returned home was still to enter the system space for additional training, because in this month's time, Meng Xu did not train with his teammates, especially those new teammates, in terms of tactical cooperation, and the first game of the regular season with the Pacers will start tomorrow, so today Meng Xu also spent a lot of points to simulate a San Antonio Spurs this season, and played a game with the Los Angeles Lakers this season. This season's Lakers are among the top 20 legendary teams in the system.

"Meng, your breakthrough and vision, as well as the accuracy of passing and passing are very good, but you are a little worse in the timing of the pass, only accurately foresee the next run of your teammates, or use your own pass to guide your teammates to run, so that you and your teammates can perform better, instead of simply waiting for your teammates to appear vacant and then pass the basketball to him, I suggest you learn a passing skill as soon as possible." The Lakers, who are both in peak condition for O'Neal and Kobe, are much better than their Spurs in terms of cooperation and personal ability, so in this simulation game, the Spurs finally lost to the Lakers at the peak of the system with a score of 90-107. And after the game, Popovich in the system also made a little suggestion to Meng Xu. It can be clearly seen that the Popovich in front of him is much stronger than the Popovich in reality now in terms of temperament and on-the-spot ability, but the gap in strength is too big, and one of the five strongest head coaches in Anna's mouth system is also lacking in skills.

"Thank you, Coach." After Meng Xu smiled at Popovich in the system, what he thought in his heart was, there are not enough points, if there are enough points, I will also change to a passing skill, after winning the bronze medal in the Olympic Games, various rewards also brought more than 2,000 points to Meng Xu, but barely made up 3,000 points, and Meng Xu was all pointed to the tactical system of breaking through the ball.