One Year Left to Play-Chapter 142 - 45: Born Leader

No special effort was made to advertise this event, but Xu Jicheng had seen the content of Zhang Hao’s interview.

Zhang Hao mentioned wanting to help the Chinese Men’s Basketball Team make a mark on the world stage, but he didn’t reveal his deeper sentiments, like paving the way for future players, during the interview.

Xu Jicheng felt a deeper and more complex emotion toward Zhang Hao, this big kid who just graduated high school at the age of 18. Thinking back to when he was 18...

All in all, this emotion is called respect!

Because such extremely difficult things might be expressed as dreams at certain moments, but they are never just talked about casually all the time.

But this kind of self-deprecating casual comment said in private, Xu Jicheng felt genuine respect for it. Combining his previous fondness, it elevated from admiration + expectation to respect!

"Aix, I believe you will definitely succeed! Effort is surely rewarded," Xu Jicheng expressed something he didn’t even believe in; he didn’t believe in the words themselves, but at that moment, he chose to believe that Zhang Hao’s efforts would definitely succeed.

Zhang Hao wasn’t that fired up and shook his head, saying, "Effort doesn’t necessarily guarantee success, but for me, I must try; without trying, there’s sure to be no success."

Zhang Hao honestly didn’t care much about media evaluations or what those hostile teammates would say. He just wanted to seize the opportunity for himself.

Delivering a good performance is just that simple; his goal is to seize the opportunity for the team to value him.

Chaos also has its advantages; he realized during this time that the Brooklyn Nets’ frontcourt players really aren’t that great, except for Almon Gilliam’s strong scoring ability. The other frontcourt players don’t have anyone who can score autonomously. In terms of capability, apart from Almon Gilliam, even those who have played for a few years aren’t necessarily much better than him. In fact, he already counts as one of the better frontcourt players for the Brooklyn Nets.

The core purpose is to survive longer.

It’s just that basketball is his hobby; when it comes to motivation, he’s never lacking!

During a chat, Zhang Hao noticed the equipment jointly set up by Guangdong Sports and the American Cable TV Station, saying it’s a joint production, but it’s essentially the league inviting the American Cable TV Station as a technical guide for filming.

The footage to be shot is the first full team training match this afternoon.

Everyone paid attention to this; at 11:30, Randy Whitman arrived at the training ground, and all the players had already gathered.

Randy Whitman, always straightforward, came to the players and said, "The training match will be at 3:30 in the afternoon.

Kenny, Greg, Khalid, Aix, PJ, you are the starters for Team A;

Chris, Kevin, Vaughn, Almon, Jason, you are the starters for Team B..."

The internal training match was already decided when the whole team gathered; the tactical training in the past few days was for this.

Butch Baird divided the two starting lineups, and the other 5 contracted players and 5 training camp contract players were spread across the two teams. The characteristics of the starters are clear: one is a fast-break lineup, the other a set-play lineup, while the substitutes are different, with both sides having either athletic or technically skilled players.

A part of the Brooklyn Nets players doesn’t worry about their performance in the training match, as a total of 12 players don’t worry; they have guaranteed contracts, but the team still has three players on non-guaranteed contracts who can be cut at any time. This training camp is an opportunity for those players, though the likelihood of displacing these players is small. Yet, it does put pressure on those with non-guaranteed contracts.

If it turns out that a training camp contract player performs well and continues to perform well in the following preseason games, replacements would be a normal occurrence.

However, Randy Whitman holds little expectation for such a situation.

Perhaps some players who haven’t locked a contract but are capable might choose weaker teams to compete for an official contract, but the Brooklyn Nets have never been the choice for such players.

The players take the season’s first training match very seriously.

Especially those experienced players know that with a team like the Brooklyn Nets, there might only be one training match during the training camp.

And this one game is quite likely to determine the opportunity for performance in the preseason.

Zhang Hao is also very excited; finally, it’s time to play a game!

This is still only the second match he has played after "leveling up," and he’s been eager to go!

As an off-ball shooter, he’s not great in one-on-one situations. In team training, if the tactics involve him, he will have chances to show, but in other tactical parts, his chances are limited, just like when he joined the tryout.

He still remembers Scott Collins’ words, "Only in real games will be his time to shine!"

Moreover, he’s very eager to use the training match to test the results of his long training.

Just as Zhang Hao was very excited and looking forward to the afternoon’s training match, the subtitles came!

"Special contract player Zhang Hao’s NBA rookie season training camp has begun, marking his first full team practice with the Brooklyn Nets.

The start of a professional career should be brave and proactive, mission: Launch Trigger."

"Launch:

Goal 1: Zhang Hao must strive through his training camp and preseason performance to start in the opening game of the regular season, achieving the highest score in the game.

Goal 2: If Zhang Hao does not start in the opening game of the regular season, he must score the highest among all substitute players in that game.