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Chapter 649 - 278. Bad Kid VS Fly Man_2

Chapter 649: 278. Bad Kid VS Fly Man_2

Zhang Yang looked at Felton and Rondo and asked, "Is there a difference?"

Rondo shook his head, and Felton said, "No."

Mike Miller: "..."

Felton: "Even though we train a lot, maintaining training every day like you do, Mike, and always the same training, I can’t keep up. I change up my training routines every day... Truly, you are the Three-Point King!"

Mike Miller, upon hearing ’Three-Point King’, waved his hands awkwardly: "Don’t mention the Three-Point King. I don’t want to recall last season at all; it was a nightmare!"

Felton: "But you really are the Three-Point King! Averaging 2.9 three-pointers per game, I heard it was because of your shooting performance that Michael agreed to trade Gerald to the Grizzlies."

Zhang Yang: "Is it because it was your first time not making the playoffs?"

Mike Miller: "Second time not making the playoffs. I was traded to the Grizzlies in February ’03. Before the trade, when I was with the Magic, we were eighth in the East. That year the Grizzlies didn’t make the playoffs... But the next year Hubie Brown and Jerry West turned the team into a 50-win team. I made the playoffs with the Grizzlies for three consecutive years. In the 05-06 season, the Grizzlies even won 49 games. Last season, we suddenly started tanking; I didn’t know what happened, and I became the core scorer."

Felton: "Isn’t that good?"

Mike Miller: "At first, I was actually excited. I always felt I wasn’t worse than those top scorers. They were just luckier, had more playing time, more shots than me. I thought ’My time has finally come,’ but after becoming the core scorer, I felt very disheartened..."

He sighed as he spoke, seeing that his teammates, except for Muhammad, were very curious, he figured he might as well share his unsuccessful experience with the younger teammates, mainly for Felton, Rondo, and Okafor, who, in his opinion, weren’t capable of being core scorers.

"Last season I got star-level minutes and shooting privileges. I played 39 minutes per game on average, the highest in the team, which I think ranked in the top 15 in the league. I could be like Jack, whenever I wanted to take a shot, the coach would arrange for my teammates to pass me the ball.

I shot non-stop every night, always looking for opportunities to shoot. But after a season, my shot attempts were still only the second-highest on the Grizzlies. Gasol was playing... not, he played lackadaisically, completely unmotivated, often unwilling to take shots actively. But even playing like that, his shot attempts per night were still higher than mine. I worked hard, nearly exhausted myself every night, and only managed to score 18.5 points, while he casually scored 20 points."

After Mike Miller finished speaking, the meeting room fell silent.

Muhammad thought of his first few years in the NBA when he only got five or six minutes of playing time per game, a stark contrast to when he called the shots during his student days, and felt very disheartened.

Hill couldn’t fully empathize, but he felt Mike Miller’s frustration and helplessness.

Felton, Rondo, and Okafor were wondering—could the same thing happen to me?

Zhang Yang was silent for two seconds, then said: "We in China have an author named Liang Xiaosheng who said there are three realms in life: accepting your parents’ ordinariness, accepting your own ordinariness, accepting your children’s ordinariness. Accepting the ordinary is not compromising with fate, nor is it being idle, but reconciling with oneself, clarifying what one is capable of doing, and how one should do it, so as not to live in pain because of overly high expectations of oneself."

Upon hearing this, Mike Miller laughed and said: "I like this saying. I often played unhappy before. I was the fifth overall draft pick but could only play a supporting role, come off the bench. I felt it was bad luck. After having an unsuccessful season as the core scorer last year, I let go. Now I’m back to my previous role, and I’m playing happier than before, than when I was the core scorer..."

Rondo and Okafor, the young ones, pondered these words deeply...

Felton blurted out a question: "Jack, which book did you mention? I want to read it! Is there an English translation?"

Mike Mick: "..."

I poured my heart out, lowered my pride to teach about failing, and did you even listen?

Zhang Yang: "I also don’t know if there’s an English translation, I’ll ask next time I go to the bookstore."

Everyone: That’s enough from you, boss! You too, Three!

...

At 1:30, the coaching staff arrived in the meeting room right on time.

After the meeting started, Carlisle gave an opening talk.

"Last night was our first real test against a strong team for the new season. Although we won, if it wasn’t for Mike and Jack scoring four consecutive shots to get 11 points at the last moment, we would have lost."

"We did a lot of things wrong on defense last night, side defenses, backups, we were always a step slow. In the coming period, we will emphasize this part in our defensive training."

"We also weren’t strong enough in our double team and help defense. Paul, Emeka, Rajon, you were too soft when fouling. You should be like Jack and Raymond; if there’s no choice but to foul, don’t be so gentle. Hit them on the arm like Jack and don’t let them get the shot off.

Bell, Marion, Diaw, did you guys allow them to get their shots off when you fouled? Next time we play against the Suns, I don’t want to see Stoudemire and Barbosa getting 2+1s that easily."

"We did well with our drives last night, and we need to maintain that, do even better. We need to perfect our high-low passes, and learn to draw defenders in the post and pass out to the perimeter more fluently..."