As night fell on the 11th, Totoro hastily finished dinner in his apartment, walked out of the house at about 5 o'clock, and walked to the Toyota Center Arena, which was only 10 minutes' walk from his apartment.

My Neighbor Totoro's heart was very bumpy, although he knew that this day was not very far away from him since he crossed over, but it wasn't until he saw the brightly lit Toyota Center in the night, and the enthusiastic fans who surrounded him early in the morning, that Totoro knew that he was not quite ready for this moment.

He's about to make his NBA debut, he's about to fulfill his childhood dream, he's going to play on the NBA floor!

Well, the last thought is too unambitious, Paul is still working hard for the West Finals, he has just stepped on the floor of the preseason and is excited to be like this, and he still has a long way to go.

Houston is famous in China, but it is only a second-rate city in the United States, the Rockets and the Grizzlies they played against today are not giants, and the preseason did not attract too many reporters to come here.

However, Totoro still encountered a few Chinese media outlets, the Rockets' games have been a regular on CCTV broadcasts, and Houston is about to become a home base for Chinese journalists.

After politely answering a few questions, Totoro quietly walked into the home team's locker room.

It's not that there is no one here, but none of the old players came, they all knew that as long as they came an hour and a half early at the start of the game, Da Yao also told Totoro about it, but today Totoro just felt a little excited, and couldn't help but come over 3 hours in advance to prepare.......

"Hey, brother, hello, my name is Marc Gasol, I just finished the Olympics in Beijing, and I like China very much."

Gasol Jr. was a fool who had come three hours earlier in addition to himself, and when he saw Totoro, he immediately smiled and greeted him, communicating with him in his half-baked English.

"Hello brother, you have done very well in the Olympics, I appreciate your tough style of play, you will be the best basket protector in our team."

There is an old Chinese saying called "don't hit a smiling person when you reach out", and Gasol Jr. has always had good football and is very low-key off the court, so Totoro naturally won't give him face.

"You can call me Mark, we're teammates on the same team from now on."

Gasol Jr. said very enthusiastically that foreigners have a habit of meeting unfamiliar people who only call Mr. Jia by name and not by name, and when he asks you to call him by his name, it means that he really regards you as a friend........

"Uh, that, then you can too, you can call me a cat, you're right, we're all rookies, and from today onwards we're going to work together to get ahead in the NBA!"

My Neighbor Totoro hurt again at this time because of the name.

Nimama, it was not good to have a name at that time, but I wanted to give the name of Totoro, the pit father.

As China slowly becomes a big country in the world, Chinese is slowly circulating internationally, and more and more foreigners are learning Chinese.

Now his name is only "Long" and "Mao" in the eyes of foreigners, but one day foreigners who are familiar with Chinese will interpret the true meaning of his name.

It's okay to see a living person call you "Dragon.Sir" in the future, which still sounds quite domineering, but if you see an acquaintance call you "Cat", then TM is not friendly.

cat has the meaning of evil woman in addition to the meaning of cat, and it also has the meaning of ** in some American local slang, isn't this just looking for scolding?

The most important thing is that when more and more Chinese people know the word Totoro, it is estimated that it is the same stalk as the little giant's dynamic embarrassment.

"Okay, MAO, we must help each other!"

Little Gasol, who has a simple personality, didn't notice Totoro's disgusting expression of eating half a catty of flies, and reached out and patted each other's shoulders in a friendly way..........

The two chatted passionately for more than an hour about the outlook for the new season, of course, most of them were Gasol Jr. talking there alone, but Totoro always had a word without a word.

This can't be blamed on Totoro for not being polite, in fact, the Chinese are also very puzzled, please, brother, we just met, is it really good for you to get acquainted like this? Could it be that crooked nuts are all innate, and they can't be nagged?

An hour later, the veteran members of the Rockets also came to the locker room.

Some of them wear headphones, some carry large backpacks full of snacks, in fact, the atmosphere in the NBA locker room is not very oppressive, and the players are very relaxed, as long as you play well on the court, even if you turn the locker room over, no one cares about you.

Yao Ming's locker is the middle of all the lockers, Artest and Randolph's are on either side, next to the president and David Lee's, and then Totoro's wardrobe.

From above, you can see the status ranking of a team now, the little giant is the well-deserved core, and Totoro is a rookie no matter how good he has performed before, and it is already very good to be the fourth person in the team, after all, he has not even played a NBA regular season game.

However, this is not the ultimate goal of Totoro, at the end of this season, Totoro does not have the luxury of replacing the core position of the little giant, but the team's second-in-command is definitely in his stated goal.

After that, Adelman also came to the locker room with the coaching staff, and after a few casual words of nonsense, he took Da Yao and Artest to the pre-match press conference.

An hour later, alerted by staff, the Rockets walked out of the locker room and ran to the player-only tunnel into the Toyota Center.

"Roar!"

"Rocket, you're the best!"

"Championship, this year our goal is to win the championship!"

"Kill those Memphis and let them know whose territory this is!"

When it comes to the Toyota Center, the home of the Rockets, the arena is certainly not as luxurious as the Staples and Madison Garden venues.

But when it comes to the atmosphere on the court, the level of fan fanaticism in Texas is definitely the highest in the league, and since the last playoff and the Utah Jazz's dirty series, the Rockets fans have become even more violent and vulgar.

Last year, they had a chance to break into the second round of the playoffs, and in last year's regular season they played an astonishing 22 consecutive wins, and everyone regarded the Rockets at that time as one of the favorites to win the championship, but who knew that in the playoffs, Da Yao was injured before the playoffs, and then Alston was strained by Oku, Landry was knocked out of a front tooth by Boozer, and under the Jazz's "fierce" defense, the Rockets, who were already out of lineup, became injured again, and were finally eliminated from the playoff stage by the opponent 4-2.

So this year, when the Rockets' predominantly men returned in an offseason, fans were still looking forward to the team.

It's just that the Rockets team has changed a little too much now, and the other players are fine, but for Totoro, a nobody who can replace their soft wheat alone, there are still some discordant voices from the fans on the spot.........