Chapter 51: Blitzkrieg Tactics

  "Sam, have you seen this newspaper? That Chinese team actually gave a 3-year $5 million contract to a player who has never played in the professional league!" Anthony Pillar said discontentedly, holding up a newspaper in Sam Mitchell's home.

  Anthony Peeler, 92 draft 15th pick, came to the Timberwolves last season and quickly became a mainstay. Due to injuries, he only played in 30 regular season games for the Timberwolves, averaging 13 points, 3.5 rebounds, and 3.8 assists per game. In the playoffs against Payton and Van Exel's SuperSonics, the Timberwolves were able to push the series to 2-3, with Peeler being one of the most important contributors. He averaged 16.2 points, 7.6 rebounds, and 3.5 assists per game in that series. With Marbury and Garnett struggling collectively, he, along with Terrell Brandon and Sam Mitchell, supported the Timberwolves.

  He was already unhappy with Zhu Fang's abandonment of Ma Zhi, and even more dissatisfied with the contracts given to Stephon Jackson and Leandro Barbosa.

  "Sam, you're not unfamiliar with that Canadian, are you? How we bullied him last season, a defender so bad, although he's good at shooting, do you think he's worth $5 million? What about our salary?" Anthony finally got to the point.

  Sam Mitchell was here when the Timberwolves were founded in '89, and with Terry Porter gone, he's now the most senior player on the team, so the Wolves' old guard looks up to him.

  "Sam, I think Anthony is right, the Timberwolves can't go on like this. We should have a showdown with the boss. This team was supposed to be promising, but now it's been messed up by that Chinese guy and has become fragmented. If we continue like this, will the Timberwolves end up at the bottom again?" Chris Kattan chimed in.

  Sam Mitchell was thinking that he had some say in the Timberwolves, but he was afraid that he couldn't shake up Zhuang Fei's position. If he really forced his way out, he was afraid that it would make this already chaotic Timberwolves even more chaotic, which was something he absolutely did not want to see. He loved the Timberwolves.

  Sam Mitchell sighed, shook his head and looked at the other players before saying: "I don't like what he's doing either. Like you guys, I think we're going to struggle this season and finishing last is a real possibility. But I hope you guys won't do anything rash now, give that Chinese guy some time to prove himself."

  "Now that we've gone through these few deals and lost several key players, our strength has already become very weak, so now we can't afford to mess around even more, do you understand?"

  Sam Mitchell stood up, patted Anthony Peeler on the shoulder and said with a smile: "Anthony, I know you're not happy with Kevin, but I hope for this season you can put aside these prejudices."

  Zhuang Fei knew that some of the old players on the team were very dissatisfied with him, he was very clear, even during team training, some of last season's old teammates would gather together and ignore Nash and these newcomers, even Garnett was also excluded by them.

  But Zhuang Fei was like he hadn't seen it, the training continued as usual, because Zhuang Fei had instructed these players to keep training during the suspension, so their physical fitness and state were not bad, which also saved Zhuang Fei a lot of trouble, and he directly jumped from physical reserve to tactical training.

  From 8 am to 12 pm, and then from 2 pm to 6 pm, for a total of eight hours, Zhuang Fei was instilling the tactical concept of rapid counterattacks in these players. Moreover, throughout the day, these players were training on fast off-the-ball runs and interchanges.

  If this goes on for a day or two, these players can still tolerate it, but if they continue to train like this, even the most patient person will feel bored and tired. Among these players, except Nash, everyone else is getting more and more annoyed, because except for Nash controlling the ball, everyone else is running and cutting, all revolving around Nash.

  Whether it's veteran players or new players, they are all tortured by the single training of DeAntoni and Zhu Fei. Even Zhu Fei's loyal Stephon Jackson often can't muster up his spirit during training.

  Minnesota winters can be cold, Zhuang Fei gets up at 6:00 every day and goes to the team's training hall at 7:00. He is also one of the first people to arrive at the training hall.

  However, sometimes when Zhuang Fei arrives, D'Antoni will come immediately, and the two have a good understanding. Now, among Zhuang Fei's coaching staff, only these two are specifically responsible for training the team, while Stephon Green is temporarily unable to be used.

  "What's wrong, still worried about the players' condition?" The two started chatting in the training hall, and the players hadn't arrived yet. Zhuang Fei saw that De An Dongni had a furrowed brow, and smiled as he said this.

  "Right, Zhuang, you think we're being too impatient? The run-and-gun tactic isn't a complicated one, it's just about running and shooting. Running is mainly controlled by Nash, but shooting is more difficult. Although the run-and-gun tactic encourages players to shoot quickly, it's not about shooting recklessly. The key is to find the best shooting opportunity in the shortest time possible, which is quite challenging. This requires players to have good off-ball movement and cutting ability. Although it doesn't require the complexity of the triangle offense, it demands much faster speed and frequency. This is a challenge for the Timberwolves players who have never played this tactic before."

  Especially when the team doesn't have enough training time, it's even more difficult.

  So, Zhuang Fei would formulate such a devilish single training mode.

  As he watched his teammates become increasingly agitated and impatient, De'Aaron Fox couldn't help but feel a little guilty.

  "Mac, what level do you think these players can reach before the February 5th battle for gold?"

  De An Dongni thought for a moment and said with concern: "Maybe only 30% of what I want can be achieved"

  "So can 30% let the Timberwolves defeat the Nuggets?" Zhuang Fei asked again.

  "Beating the Nuggets shouldn't be a problem, after all they're not strong, but to have competitiveness in the NBA is very difficult. You know this year's games are extremely dense, during the competition there's basically no opportunity for systematic training, so 30% isn't enough for us to enter the playoffs." DeAntoni looked at Zhuang Fei seriously, wanting to see something from his face, but what disappointed him was that Zhuang Fei didn't have any emotional fluctuations, as if he had already anticipated his answer.

  At 7:30, the players all arrived one after another. The new day's training continued to start. What surprised these players was that today's training no longer required endless running. Zhuang Fei had them play a confrontation match to test their results.

  "Nash and Garnett's coordination is really beautiful, their short-range blocks are very threatening" D'Antoni praised on the sidelines, as soon as he finished speaking, Nash assisted Garnett with an alley-oop again.

  Is this the passing realm of people following the ball? Zhuang Fei looked at Nash's back and thought, but at this time Nash was not as free to receive and send as in later generations. Although he could also pass such a ball, there were many mistakes, and sometimes the timing was not right.

  "But apart from Garnett, Nash and Pierce, Stephon Jackson's coordination was very limited, these people didn't have tacit understanding" DeAntoni continued. Zhuang Fei also nodded in agreement. Pierce and Jackson both need the ball, but Nash also needs the ball, which creates conflict, so it's urgent to let Pierce and Jackson practice their ability to play without the ball.

  Basketball games are not about piling up stars, otherwise the Dream Team would never have lost. This is especially true in the NBA, where each team's strength is similar, and it all comes down to who can integrate their players more successfully, allowing them to play a bigger role.

  Training ended, Zhuang Fei returned to his own home, came to his own room, opened the Wang Chao system. The Wang Chao system had long since changed, Zhuang Fei was now level 20, and the system also had an additional system store.

  Zhuang Fei opened the store, skipped over equipment and medicine, and came to the third store, the scroll store. Soon, Zhuang Fei found one from among hundreds of scrolls.

  Team Synergy Training Accelerated Scroll (Advanced)

  Item Description: Using this item, the host team's synergy training experience is doubled (advanced tripled) for a period of one month.

  But when he saw the price under this scroll, Zhuang Fei retreated again. This is a total of 1500 dynasty points, and now Zhuang Fei only has 14500 dynasty points in total. Moreover, it's really hard to judge how effective this thing is. If it really helps the players train for the Thunder Battle tactic, he doesn't mind spending these dynasty points. But if it doesn't have any effect? Wouldn't that be a huge loss?

  It seems to be about team cohesion from the description. In a sense, cohesion is close to teamwork, and there is also a degree of cohesion in team strength.

  Should he buy it or not? In the end, Zhuang Fei gritted his teeth and bought one anyway.