On the field, Harrington released water on Milicic, because Harrington himself is not a good defensive player, so not many people can see the clues.

This kind of thing, Richard will definitely not go to the fanfare, if it is exposed, such a disgraceful thing will definitely make Milicic lose face.

……

By the end of the first quarter, the Buccaneers were five points behind.

There's no way, the offensive firepower of this lineup is a bit pitted, and the strength lies in the defense......

If all the players on the field are in their prime, then the offensive firepower must not be said, but now after all, they are old and small, and none of them are in their prime.

Although this game is mainly on the inside, Milicic's shy temperament is not embarrassed to take too many shots, and he made seven shots in the first quarter, which is neither too much nor too little, and it is difficult for most interior players in the league to get more than seven shots in a single quarter.

Milicic scored eight points on those seven shots, 3-of-7 from the field and 2-of-2 from the free-throw line.

The interior players of the European League, compared with the old black inside line in the United States, in addition to the advantages of team awareness and organizational ability, actually have obvious advantages in free throws, and most of the free throws in Europe are above the level of seventy percent.

And the local interior line on Lao Mei's side can reach a 70% free throw shooting rate, and I don't know if I can find one of the three.

7 shots in exchange for 8 points, the offensive efficiency is certainly not high, but Richard feels acceptable, anyway, improving Milicic is not a matter of one or two days.

As long as he can play confidently, he will definitely be able to greatly improve his strength in the short term.

……

At the end of the first half, the opponent replaced the main lineup, after all, it was only a preseason, and there was no need to die.

Richard's side also replaced the starters and other people, and replaced them with pure cannon fodder players......

In the end, the Buccaneers lost, which was expected by Richard.

Harrington and Jamison are not vegetarians, both of them are All-Star caliber players in their prime of life, and with Arenas, a very strong offensive backcourt, they played a 17-point advantage in just half a game.

……

In the next few preseason games, the Pirates rookies did not win a single game, and all of them ended in defeat.

This was a bad situation that Richard had never experienced before, but he was not too impatient, but a little happy in his heart.

After a few pre-season games, Milicic has a feeling of gradually integrating into the team, and in the face of teammates' jokes, sometimes he can respond a few words, although the response is more embarrassing, but it is still a lot better than before.

And he has become more active on the court, and in some offensive rounds, he can already start to take the initiative to ask for the ball.

Richard thought about it and gave Milicic a Kobe All-Star Light that he was not willing to use.

Milicic plays inside, and using Kobe's All-Star light seems to be a waste at first glance, but in fact, Richard is ready to develop Milicic into the kind of all-round power forward player in the future......

For example, Brother Thick Eyebrows, Kobe's All-Star Light covers almost all attributes, and when it is used on Milicic, it will definitely not be a loss.

In the end, the random result allowed Milicic to obtain Kobe's ninety percent steal attribute and mid-range shooting ability, which lasted for two years.

Such a result, Richard is quite acceptable, after all, this is already an upper-average result.

In the blink of an eye, the preseason schedule was over, and the Buccaneers welcomed their first game in franchise history on their home turf.

I have to say that Stern still gave the Pirates quite face, and this first game was directly arranged for the Pirates team's home court.

The Buccaneers didn't let the Buccaneers play away from home, and in the previous six preseason games, Stern also gave four home games.

This is certainly not to give Richard face, but to support the new army normally.

……

"Lee, we can't afford to lose any more, at least we have to win this opener, this is the first game in our team history." Jordan appeared in Richard's office with a bitter face.

The corners of Richard's mouth twitched, and he said that he seemed to want to lose......

The strength is indeed inferior to others, what can be done if you lose.

However, in this opening game, Richard is a little confident that he can win, because the opponent is the well-known rookie team Hawks.

The rookie team has been rotten in the past few seasons, and the result has not been too high, and the overall strength is far inferior to that of Richard when he first crossed over.

The rookie team arranged by the league for the Pirates must also be hoping to let the Pirates win the first game and get off to a good start.

"Michael, don't worry, the opponent is the Eagles, and we still have a big chance of winning."

'Of course, it's not impossible to lose, you have to look down on the results and know that this season we are aiming for a bad game. Richard said with a smile.

Jordan nodded, he understood the reason, but he still wanted to win the first game......

……

October 17, Charlotte City Coliseum.

Although the Pirates lost the previous six preseason games, tonight is the first game in team history, and there are still a lot of fans who came to watch the game, and the attendance rate is about 85%.

If we continue to lose tonight, then I am afraid that the attendance of future games will drop significantly......

Fans are so realistic, if Charlotte doesn't have the NFL Jaguars, then the fans will probably come to watch the game, but now that there is a more high-profile NFL to watch, why should fans spend money to watch the Pirates lose......

That's why Jordan made Richard have to win the first game.

……

The players of both sides have already started to enter.

Richard took a closer look at the Hawks' lineup, he really hasn't paid much attention to the Hawks in the past two years, and he hasn't paid much attention to this team since Wilkens left the Hawks.

The Hawks' starting lineup includes Fat Head Towalker, Grandpa Lu, Josh Smith, Childrides and Decker.

The lineup looks well-known......

At least Richard knew all of these people, and Josh Smith was the later Eagle King.

But now he definitely won't get the title of Eagle King, because he is just a newcomer, just entered the league this year, and was selected by the Eagles with the 17th pick in the first round.

Speaking of which, in fact, Richard was also quite interested in Josh at the beginning, and once thought of using the first-round pick that the Pistons sent to Nuan Nuan, and traded it up to try to get Josh Smith.

However, because there were really no chips in their hands, no one wanted to make a deal with the pirates, so this idea was abandoned.

In terms of style, Eagle King Josh and Elvis Gerrard have a lot of similarities, both play the position of a dual-energy striker, both are physically strong, both are strong defensively, and their offensive ability is relatively mediocre.

Although he is known as the King of the Eagles, Josh Smith has never averaged more than 20 points per game in a season in his career.

Tonight, Milicic could be up against Josh Smith, who plays as a two-way striker.

……

At the referee's whistle, soon the game began.

What Richard didn't expect was that it was not Josh Smith who was responsible for defending Milicic on the Eagles' side, but the fat head Towok.

This is a good thing that falls from the sky, Walker is completely a big colander, to prevent anyone from breaking out, I hope that Milicic can touch the light of the fat head tonight, and can explode well.

Sure enough, just after the opening, Milicic hit two goals directly and felt hot.

Walker may be really toxic, and when an average player encounters his defense, his offensive ability can be directly improved by at least 3 percent, which is quite metaphysical.

Since Milicic has a good hand, there is naturally no reason not to pass the ball when he is the main control Payton.

By the end of the first half, the Buccaneers had won by 11 points.

Richard looked at Eagles head coach Mike Woodson with some curiosity.

It stands to reason that as long as Woodson isn't a fool, he should have traded Josh Smith for Milicic.

You must know that in just half a game, Milicic has already scored 17 points, and if this game is played, Milicic may even cut a 30+ score.

And if Josh Smith is used to defend Milicic from beginning to end, with Milicic's current strength, it will be difficult to get 20+ points.

Isn't this Woodson Mo a fool? Richard wondered......

If Woodson had known that Richard thought so, he would have been angry.

To be precise, he was actually the coach of the Richard faction.

He entered the league in '80, but as a player, waited until he retired in '91, and played in the league for eleven years.

Although he has not been selected as an All-Star, his statistics are quite good, and he is a quasi-All-Star level player, and his career is quite perfect.

By '96, he had joined the coaching profession in the same year as Richard.

However, he certainly did not have such a good life as Richard, and he started as an assistant coach with the Bucks......

As a result, the assistant coach worked for many years, wandering a lot of teams, and waited until he joined Rick Carlisle's coaching staff to settle down.

This offseason, with the contact of Rick Carlisle, through Wilkens's relationship, he finally became a wife for many years and became the head coach of the Hawks.

Woodson's experience is actually not very difficult, and the head coaches of most teams are generally like this.

If you are lucky, you may be able to turn positive in two or three years, and if you are lucky, you will be able to work for seven or eight years like Woodson to become a regular, and if you are unlucky, you may not be able to turn positive for the rest of your life......

……

For Carlisle, Woodson is naturally quite grateful, and he is well aware of the relationship between Carlisle and Richard.

And I also know the significance of tonight's game for the Pirates, so I helped the Pirates without saying a word.

He is well aware of the benefits of joining the Richard faction, which will make him work longer in the head coaching position, so even if he and Richard do not have much intersection, he still lives as a Richard German coach everywhere.

Richard must not have expected that the Spurs coach had not yet taken shape, but his Richard coach had already begun to take shape.

It's normal to think about it, this year is Richard's ninth year in the NBA, and in the past eight or nine years, Richard has already produced many head coach-level figures.

Among them, there is a very capable head coach like Rick Carlisle.

These head coaches, in turn, develop their own assistant coaches......

It is equivalent to that Richard's faction has begun to blossom and bear fruit gradually, and it may not be long before Richard will become an existence like his grandfather, and half of the head coaches in the league are his apprentices.

Of course, it's a bit ugly to say that the disciples are apprentices, but the words are not rough, these coaches are labeled as the Richard faction, which will definitely be beneficial to their future development.

The NBA is a business league, and connections are not too important, and the two assistant coaches with the same ability must be the one with the most connections who is more likely to sit in the head coach position.

You may even be able to sit in this position even if you have poor ability, and you must know that being well-connected means that when the team wants to make a trade, there are more targets to choose from.

The same is true for players.

Why is the price of a West Lafayette player in the free agent market higher than that of other players? Roughly the reason is similar.

Needless to say, if the team really wants to win the championship, these West Lafayette players have a better chance than other players to help the team recruit great stars.

That alone is worth the extra price they have.

……

What Richard didn't know was that he, the ancestor of the West Lafayette faction, was actually a big family now.

There are some things, even if he doesn't open his mouth, there are people who will silently help, and the current Woodson is the best example.

"Doot toot!" The referee blew the whistle for the end of the game, and the Pirates finally got a hard-earned victory, winning the regular season opener after losing six games in a row in the preseason.

"Man, thank you." After the game, Richard walked onto the court and shook Woodson's hand to show his gratitude.

Richard is not a fool, people deliberately sell it to themselves, can't you see this?

"Coach Li, if you have the idea of trading in the future, I ask you to give priority to our Eagles, and we will definitely give you the most sincere price." Although Woodson is nearly ten years older than Richard, the seniority gap between the two sides is there, so his posture is relatively low.

Richard smiled and nodded, although he didn't have much in touch with Woodson, he was not a stranger to Woodson, knowing that he was Carlisle's assistant coach before.

"Okay, but I advise you to sell Walker, he's not a good player." Richard had already saved face for Walker.

Woodson smiled bitterly and nodded, of course he wanted to sell Walker, but how could it be so easy, Walker's super high contract and super low cost performance, there are really few teams willing to do this.