The Way of Basketball: Never Talk Shit to Him!

The game ended.

Vujacic stood with his hands on his hips, looking dejected, his shoulders slumped like a defeated rooster, no longer as spirited as when Su Wan had first come onto the court in the second half. As the buzzer sounded, his stats froze at 19 points, 5 rebounds, 5 assists, and 2 steals, a very comprehensive performance. However, in the final moments against Su Wan, he only managed 2 points, 1 rebound, 1 assist, but with 3 turnovers. Su Wan, during the same period, went on a tear with 15 points, 4 rebounds, 3 assists, 2 steals, and 1 block, completely dominating him.

Beaten in performance, and the game lost as well.

Trailing by 10 points in the last 10 minutes, the Cavaliers, with Su Wan's performance, managed to stage a comeback victory 86 to 80, securing the "opening victory" for the Summer League.

Brandon Malone couldn't stop smiling, chuckling as he watched Su Wan walk towards the sideline.

What can you say about this game?

His feelings were like riding a roller coaster.

The first half plummeted to rock bottom, the second half soared to the clouds.

Coaching Su Wan was really too thrilling!

"Well done, kid, you have clearly adapted to this league!"

Luckily, he had mastered the way to get the rookie to perform, which was to praise him, praise him hard.

"Uncle!"

"Uncle!"

"Uncle!"

Even the audience of just three to five hundred people at the venue erupted into a unified chant.

Su Wan's final performance had thrilled them.

The tickets for the Summer League weren't expensive, with front row seats around 60 US dollars. To witness such a "one-man show," what more could they ask for?

Acquiring so many "nephews" all at once would normally have Su Wan raising his hands high, responding warmly. But at the moment, he looked half-dead, staggering towards the bench.

As the final whistle blew, the system prompt immediately echoed in his mind:

"Ding, the game has ended, 'The zone' mode will now automatically exit."

Then, he felt a huge wave of fatigue wash over him; his body felt hollowed out, legs weak, shoulders that couldn't seem to straighten, and every step he took felt like his calves were tied to sandbags weighing a thousand pounds.

He had only been in "The zone" mode on the court for about 10 minutes.

Why did he feel more tired now than after running a "half marathon"? Was "The zone" so draining physically?

Thinking about the limit-pushing movements he just made, especially the series of actions after getting hyped up, he suddenly felt that the rapid energy consumption was not without reason.

Still so young, not knowing restraint!

Malone also noticed Su Wan's fatigue, but he wasn't surprised.

The first time was always like this.

Enjoy it while it happens, followed by a moment of haze afterward.

"Ding, calculating the host's earned zone points for this game!"

"Ding, congratulations to the host for gaining 25,000 zone points!"

"PS: Zone points can be used to increase potential value on the host's attribute panel. The higher the potential value, the more zone points required!"

"Ding, the host's attribute panel has finished loading; the host can view it (The system panel is only visible to the host)."

Su Wan sat down on the bench, reached for a towel to wipe his sweat, the system's prompt sounds continuously echoing in his mind. He silently summoned the panel, and indeed, a virtual screen appeared in his mind:

"Host: Su Wan; Nationality: Huaxia; Age: 19 years and 21 days; Height: 1.98 meters; Weight: 92 kg;"

"Body Attributes:

Upper Body Strength: 65 (75); Lower Body Strength: 64 (78); Core Strength: 70 (85); Coordination: 65 (80); Speed: 70 (78); Cross Movement: 68 (80); Explosive Power: 78 (85); Jumping: 84 (85); Physical Fitness: 60 (75); Injury Resistance: 75 (75);"

"Offensive Attributes:

Field of View: 50 (70); Dribbling: 55 (60); Passing: 53 (60); Breakthrough: 57 (68); Layup: 58 (66); Dunk: 59 (70); Finish at the Rim: 50 (67); Close Shot: 54 (68); Mid-range Shot: 52 (64); Three-point: 52 (62); Free Throw: 70 (80); Post-up: 45 (65); Off-ball Movement: 52 (70);"

"Defense Attributes:

Defensive Rebound: 55 (65); Offensive Rebound: 50 (63); Off-ball Single Defense: 64 (73); On-ball Defense: 65 (78); Help Defense: 70 (79); Steal: 55 (74); Block: 45 (60); Pick and Roll Defense Awareness: 70 (78);"

According to the panel's description, of the two values following each ability, the first value is Su Wan's current ability value, and the second is Su Wan's potential value in that area.

The system also specifically explained:

100 points and above for "Historical-level Superstars";

90~100 for Superstar to Super Star;

80~90 for All-Star to Superstar;

70~80 for Main Player to All-Star;

60~70 for rotation player to Main Player;

50~60 for NBA Water Dispenser Manager to rotation player;

That is to say, Su Wan's current physical attributes are roughly at the level of a rotation player to Main Player.

His offensive and defensive attributes are much worse, basically fluctuating between Water Dispenser Manager to rotation player.

Before opening the attribute panel, Su Wan was mentally prepared. The original host had fought with all his might in the first half and was still outmatched by Vujacic. This had already indicated the original host's strength. But even when Su Wan saw these values, he still let out a sigh in his heart:

Too tragic!

The original protagonist was a breakthrough expert in the CBA, but his breakthrough ability in the NBA turned out to be just that of a "Water Dispenser" manager—a rotation player level.

Other abilities were even more pitiful to look at, all being in the 50s. Barely reaching the level of a "Water Dispenser" manager.

Big brother, you're at least the CBA Finals MVP!

This is too...

But when you think about it, so many perimeter players in the CBA who got the Finals MVP, which of them have ever established themselves in the NBA?

What's even more tragic is that Su Wan had no future.

With the potential value on this attribute panel, even if he realized them all, Su Wan would just be an NBA rotation-level player.

Getting to play about ten or so minutes per game, averaging 3, 4 points, and 1, 2 rebounds and assists each, that's already the limit. How long he can hang around in this league still depends on his relationships, the head coach's favor, and the general manager's affection.

A greater likelihood is ending up like Yi Jianlian, spending his prime years back in the CBA.

However, when he flipped to the last page of the system panel and saw the quietly lying 25,000 points of zone value, Su Wan's dejected mood dissipated.

"Do you want to spend 5000 zone points to increase 1 point of breakthrough potential value?"

Su Wan casually clicked on one of the abilities, and the upgrade prompt popped up. He tried clicking on a couple of other abilities and found that, as the system said, the higher the potential value of an ability, the more zone points it required to improve.

Having confirmed this, Su Wan's gaze fell on "Physical fitness."

His current attribute panel was too abysmal to look at.

His only reliance was "The zone" mode.

At the same time, the zone value was also closely related to Su Wan's performance in "The zone" mode.

And the duration he could maintain "The zone" mode on the court was directly linked to his physical fitness.

So, "Good zone points should be used on the cutting edge," and raising the potential value of physical fitness was the most cost-effective move for him at the moment.

"Do you want to spend 12000 zone points to increase 1 point of physical fitness potential value?"

12,000 points?

Su Wan seriously doubted he had heard wrong.

That's insanely expensive!

He obtained a total of only 25,000 zone points from this game.

All spent after a couple of clicks?

As it turned out, Su Wan was overthinking it.

He still had 13,000 zone points left.

Because after clicking once, he didn't have enough zone points to upgrade his physical fitness again!

This was even more burning than Genshin Impact!

What on earth was the calculation for these zone points?

Somewhat insatiated, no, just after starting it was over, Su Wan closed the attribute panel and asked a staff member for his game statistics:

15 points, 4 rebounds, 3 assists, 2 steals, 1 block.

Since he didn't score in the first half, all these statistics were gained in "The zone" mode. Although Su Wan's math wasn't as good as Jiang Ping's, he could still handle simple addition and subtraction.

Adding these numbers together equaled precisely 25.

And the zone points he obtained from this game were a thousand times this number.

In other words, the zone points Su Wan could get from each game were the sum of his statistics gained in "The zone" mode, multiplied by a thousand.

It seems that his path in basketball was going to start as a remorseless "Data Brush!"

What Su Wan didn't expect was that in the summer league, which was ignored even by dogs, there were reporters waiting to interview him.

As it happened, he needed to do something in front of the camera.

"The zone" mode needed the opponent to trash talk him to activate.

Apart from some egomaniacs and "trash talk addicts," no one would trash talk a rookie for no reason.

Unless...

The rookie's personality was so flamboyant that people couldn't help but want to trash talk him.

——————

"Congratulations, Su, despite some setbacks, you still secured the win. Your performance in the second half was stellar. How are you feeling right now?"

"A 10th overall pick defeating a 27th is nothing out of the ordinary. I've tried to be happy, but failed."

"Okay, second question, your performance in the first half wasn't that good. What allowed you to adjust and put on a radically different display in the second half?"

"That guy kept trash talking me all game, that was his biggest mistake of the match. No one can trash talk me, not even God!"

"One last question, since being selected by the Cavaliers, have you spoken to LeBron James over the phone?"

"No."

—— "ESPN Fast Break" report by Erin Andrews.