Bishop of the Devil

When the physical examination was over the next day, Pippen took a look at his physical test data and looked blank. Is this really his physical test data? !

Is this really the physical test data of a 39-year-old man? !

Pippen felt that his physical test data a few years ago, when he was thirty-five years old, were slightly inferior to this data.

what happened? It seems that I haven’t done anything special this offseason...

Jordan was not far away, and Pippen walked towards Jordan with his physical test data.

"Michael, look at my physical test data, God, it's so unbelievable." Pippen looked surprised.

Jordan took a look at the results and looked confused. He was quite familiar with Pippen and had a good understanding of Pippen's situation. It was unlikely that such a piece of data would appear in Pippen's body.

"Is there any mistake?" Jordan asked doubtfully.

Pippen also had this feeling and took the physical test again, but there was no big change in the data.

"This is almost the same as my physical test data when I was 33 years old. God, what happened!"

"Michael, I take back what I said before. With my current state, I can be in the starting position and even lead the Buccaneers to the playoffs this season!" Pippen said quite confidently.

When Pippen was 33 years old, it was the 1998-99 season, which was his first season with the Rockets. He had just won his sixth championship ring with Jordan in the Bulls.

Although it has reached the end of its peak, its strength is still quite good. In terms of overall offensive and defensive strength, it can almost rank among the top five in the league.

Of course, I'm talking about pure small forwards here, not including those swingmen.

"Starting? Old man, Richard made the decision on this matter. I don't know what his plan is now, but since you are in such good condition now, I think he has no reason not to start for you."

"As for the playoffs, I talked to Richard before. We are going to mess up this first season and try to get a reliable point guard player in next year's draft." Jordan frowned and looked at Pippen said.

"Huh? Michael, you mean you have to listen to Richard now?"

"No, definitely not." Jordan waved his hand.

"I will discuss this matter with Richard later and I will inform you later."

…

"no!"

"Absolutely not!"

"There is absolutely no room for negotiation!"

Jordan just told Richard that Pippen was going to start, and Richard refused three times in a row.

Richard was not prepared to leave the slightest chance to Pippen.

Even Mourning and Richard were not prepared to let him start, but gave Milicic or Varejao a substitute position...

As for Payton, that's because the Buccaneers really didn't have a point guard to use, so they had no choice but to let Payton take the starting No. 1 position.

The Buccaneers now have many players on the forward and defensive lines. Even if Iguodala or Ariza are not mentioned, Richard would rather let Kapono start the game than let Pippen get the starting position.

"Li, why is this? Is it because of the conflict you and Scotty had before?"

"You should know that with Scottie's current state, he is fully capable of being a top ten small forward in the league. It would be a shame not to use him." Jordan said doubtfully.

"Michael, first of all, Scottie has no trading value at all. He is almost 40 years old. Do you expect any player to be willing to offer a big bargaining chip to trade him?"

"Impossible! No stupid team is willing to spend a lot of money to get a 40-year-old veteran. Even if it is just a draft pick late in the first round, no one is willing to offer it."

What Richard didn't say clearly, not to mention Pippen's toxic attitude, is that after leaving the Bulls, basically every team collapsed wherever he went.

It's not like other teams don't know about this. Unless they have a player like Jordan on the team who can suppress Pippen, who can control him if Pippen shows off.

A team in the rebuilding period will not want a 40-year-old veteran, and a team aspiring to compete for the championship will not want this time bomb.

Pippen is certainly very capable, but there are still issues with his character.

No one is perfect, this sentence is actually absolutely correct.

Those super giants in the Zongheng Alliance must have something wrong with them.

For example, Jordan is too domineering, Kobe is too paranoid, James is too hypocritical, Duncan is too stupid...

Well, there's nothing wrong with Duncan.

It is certain to recognize the strength of these players, but we cannot blindly ignore their shortcomings. If you really want to ignore them, it is typical...

Jokes are not nonsense, and changes are not nonsense. When Richard wrote basketball novels in his previous life, although some of them were novels, most of the things he said were not nonsense, but had evidence.

This may sometimes irritate the hearts of some fragile fans...

But Richard had a clear conscience. Shouldn't anyone be allowed to talk about what he had done?

Anyway, two blooms are enough...

…

"Moreover, Michael, you don't know the plan we have made. We are going to do well this season and focus on cultivating young players!"

"We are a new army, and veterans are not in our team building plan. Only those new talents are our hope for the future!"

"Don't mention this matter again, there's no way I can agree to it."

Richard's attitude was quite resolute. He couldn't give in on this matter. Once he gave in, Pippen, who would taste the benefits in the future, might be able to take advantage of him.

Richard would not leave this opportunity to Pippen.

Maybe if he is allowed to start this time, next time he can rely on his old skills to interfere with the team's lineup construction. This is something that Richard will never tolerate.

If that's the case, what's the point of Richard, the boss?

…

Seeing Richard's extremely determined attitude, Jordan felt a little unhappy.

In his opinion, although he and Richard had agreed that Richard would be solely responsible for the team's lineup issues, at least Richard had to save some face for himself...

Pippen was his little brother, and now he's asking for a starting position. From Jordan's point of view, it doesn't seem to be a big deal.

If I were Richard, I'm afraid I would have agreed to this matter. Anyway, the team is going to be in trouble, and training new people, when can't we train...

Jordan is not Richard. He does not have Richard's persistence in certain aspects. Otherwise, he would not have made any achievements in the management.

It can be said that in terms of team lineup construction, Jordan can't keep up with Richard even if he tries to flatter him.

…

"Li, why don't you think about it again..." Jordan had no choice.

If he really doesn't give Pippen any chance to start, he will look ugly in front of Pippen...

Now he regrets the promise he made.

That is to say, Richard is fully responsible for the team's lineup construction...

He didn't expect that Richard would be so decisive and insist on his principles.

If he had known this, he might have allowed himself some authority, even if it was just the authority to arrange the starting lineup.

"No, Michael, this is what we agreed before. I won't give in. You can make Scotty give up." Richard was not prepared to leave any favors for Pippen. .

Jordan sighed and left Richard's coach's office with a somewhat ugly expression.

…

"BOSS, if you ask me to say that you should have found the opportunity to take charge of the new army on your own, I feel that similar things will definitely happen in the future." Miles was in Richard's office and heard the conversation between Jordan and Richard. , said with a smile.

Miles has a very clear positioning of himself, that is, he is one of Richard's own people.

He is a direct descendant of Richard...

So seeing this happening, he couldn't help but think about the problem from Richard's perspective.

Richard nodded and said nothing more.

Of course he wanted to take charge of the Pirates alone, but the conditions before were not mature.

The first was that the league was planning to find a black man as its boss, but he did not meet the conditions at least on this point. The second was the funding issue. At that time, it was difficult for him to directly come up with $300 million in cash.

Unless it was to sell the iron, but the price was too high. He had to sell most of the stocks in his hands, which would make Richard lose countless dollars.

…

"What? Did that kid really say that?" After hearing Jordan's description, Pippen's face turned red, and he was obviously a little angry.

He felt that this was Richard's humiliation and contempt for him, and for a moment he wanted to go to Richard to settle the score.

"Scotty, calm down, this is not a bull, don't do anything excessive."

"You are not young anymore, just treat yourself as a retired player with the Pirates..." Jordan sighed and said.

Pippen was stunned. Is this still the Michael Jordan he knew? !

A few years ago, if such a thing had happened, shouldn't he have taken him to fight with the other party? Why are you so cowardly now? !

It seems that experience will change a person's personality, which is absolutely true.

Jordan has not had a very smooth life these past few years. As a Wizards manager, he failed to achieve any results.

Being a player on the field in person did not allow the Wizards to achieve any decent results.

This experience, coupled with his increasing age, has made Jordan's behavior more stable.

Just as Pippen thought, if Richard had rejected Jordan so unhesitatingly a few years ago, Jordan would have gone crazy on the spot.

"Well, Michael, we might be getting really old."

"Now it's the world dominated by those young people..."

"Why……"

Pippen sighed, his words were quite provocative.

Jordan must have felt uncomfortable after hearing this, but he didn't say anything more. He just sat with a gloomy expression, not knowing what he was thinking.

…

In the blink of an eye, the training camp, which lasted less than a month, was over. Richard was quite satisfied with the training results. Whether they were players selected for the expansion or newcomers, the training intensity was very high, and their attitude and enthusiasm were also very good.

As for veterans, the training intensity is definitely not as intense as that of newcomers...

Mourning and Payton don't train very intensively, but they come to training camps every day and try to pass on some experience to the newcomers as much as possible.

Milicic and Varejao, under the guidance of Mourning, at least improved their defensive awareness a lot and learned a lot.

As for Iguodala and Ariza, under Payton's guidance, their outside defensive awareness has also improved a lot.

These two newcomers will later be players who are good at defense. Now with the guidance of a top perimeter defender like Payton, they will definitely enter their peak period faster.