From sparring to superstar

Chapter 120 118. You seem to be very good at blocking shots
There were rumors before that Li Ao's agent asked Hook for an average annual price of tens of millions of dollars, and the person in charge of Hook left the meeting angrily.

After being exposed, Li Ao was ridiculed for being too greedy.

O’Neill’s 5-year 1500 million dollar sneaker endorsement made the brand want to cry. The money earned in 5 years is not enough for O’Neal’s one-year endorsement fee.

Later, O'Neill went to create a fashion brand 'Dunkman' series of sports shoes. Instead of focusing on basketball shoes, they sold very well. Victoria Adams of the Spice Girls, who later became Mrs. Beckham, took a fancy to its brand value and brought it into the entertainment industry.

After Iverson was selected as the No. 10 pick, he got a 5000-year, $1999 million endorsement contract on the second day, with the clause of a career contract. After winning the scoring title in 30, Iverson’s agent had the foresight to fear that Iverson would go bankrupt after retiring. He got a 100-year trust fund of $55 million per year from Reebok, which could only be cashed out after Iverson turned [-].

After Kobe played the summer league in his rookie season, he won a 6-year 4800 million dollar sneaker endorsement contract, breaking the highest single-year endorsement fee that Iverson had just set.

The highest single endorsement contract of an active player is Penny Hardaway, with a career endorsement contract worth $8400 million.

Of course, these "tops" do not include Jordan's direct share of 6% of AJ's sales.

These people have not received tens of millions of endorsement fees, Li Ao actually opened his mouth like a lion!
Crazy isn't it?

Who knew that Hook suddenly changed his mind and said that he was willing to continue talking with Li Ao.

People were still confused at the time, but then they understood. News broke that the Clippers had been sponsored by more than a dozen florist brands in a few days. On the Forbes Sports Team Value List, the market value of the Clippers doubled at that time.

In the preseason, after Li Ao showed his ability to adapt to NBA games, many people were already discussing his endorsement fee, waiting for the first NBA endorsement contract with an average annual level of tens of millions since Jordan.

It was time to wait, but I didn't expect that Li Ao didn't sign a contract with Hook. AJ gave his dad a backstab, and directly sent a sky-high endorsement contract with an average annual price of 1400 million US dollars!

At this price, Iverson and Kobe can be won together!

For a while, no one was discussing tomorrow's game between the Clippers and the Lakers. They were all discussing the endorsement income of Li Ao, Kobe, and O'Neal.

...

After seeing off Liam's father, Li Ao, Liam, Vivian, and Schwartz opened a bottle of champagne to celebrate.

Liam looked at Li Ao who was holding the contract in his hand, and complained: "So I can't bear to let go of that contract, don't hold it, the money has gone to my foundation."

"Look at you sour, [-] million, do you have it?"

"Wait for old man D...cough cough, after he retires, I will have plenty of money!"

"You were looking forward to your uncle's early death. I will convey your words to him when I meet him in two days."

"I'm talking about him retiring and giving me his position after careful consideration! Don't talk nonsense!"

After making a fuss for a while, Li Ao put away the contract.

When he heard that the sneaker endorsement is expected to exceed [-] million, he thought about "productizing" him.

Later, I made a calculation with Schwartz and Liam, and planned to entrust Liam's family foundation to open an investment company to complete it. The team's salary can't be helped, but the endorsement fee can be operated in this way to avoid tax reasonably. This signing is in the name of the foundation.

Li Ao did not expect to get such a high endorsement fee.

He always thought that if he could get up to three to five years, $1000 million a year, that would be a lot.

Schwartz will occasionally disclose the contact with the brand side, but he only talks about whether it is going well or not, and how the progress is, without mentioning the amount of money involved in the contract.

I didn't expect this guy to be so greedy, and he made 0.98 million in one shot!
Both Schwartz and AJ conducted research on the florist market, and both found a surprising situation—florists are particularly obsessed with 'foreign brands', especially 'high-end foreign brands', and their spending power is amazing.

In fact, it is not AJ backstabbing Hook, it is the result of negotiation. Hook is unwilling to pay so much money because they also have a lot of relatively low-priced products.

However, since AJ was established, it has focused on high-end products and can sell at a high price.

"Your agent's vision is really poisonous. Our internal price bottom line is to give you [-] million yuan. He directly hit our bottom line."

Li Ao thought of what Jordan said to tease him.

As for why it was $9800 million in the end, because the remaining $200 million was Schwartz's personal signing fee.

This is what Schwartz deserves. The hook killed 7000 million. He relied on his ability to pry 3000 million more from AJ. If it weren't for his vicious vision, AJ could only offer 7000 million, or 7500 million or 8000 million.

Li Ao thought of one thing and asked curiously: "Jeff, didn't you say that 1400 million a year is not the limit, and there is still room for growth in the future? Why not sign a short-term contract? 3 years or 5 years?"

Schwartz replied: "3 years is too short to sign at this price. I don't think there is much difference between signing for 5 years and 7 years. It is difficult for your sneaker endorsement price to continue to rise in a short period of time. Even if there is a market for florists, there are many other factors. If you sign for 5 years, you can renew or change brands after the expiration. The price should still be the same. But after signing for 5 years, after 5 years, it is very difficult to sign a two-year short contract and want such a high endorsement fee."

"Contract renewal in 07? Is there any special meaning?"

"Didn't we speculate before that the 08 Olympic Games will probably be held by your flower planting emperors? I went to find out later and found that this matter has a high probability of success. When the contract expires in 07, we can take advantage of the Olympic Games to bite the brands. They can only give us money willingly."

"Oh……"

Li Ao forgot about it!
Still, the agent who loses money is more sensitive!
His agent came close to putting 'I love penny money' on his forehead.

Li Ao now has another goal - signature shoes.

It is said that it will be prepared within 3 years. If he performs well enough and has enough fans, he will not be able to use it for 1 year. AJ will come up with a series of sneaker development plans for him.

But if the market expectations are not good, it will be three years, three years and three years, and the contract may not end.

Suddenly, Li Ao thought of another thing: "By the way, Jeff, you take me and Liam to drink, if someone finds out, will you stay in the trap?"

"..."

Schwartz really wanted to know why his boss had so many weird ideas!

wrong!He pointed at Vivienne and asked, "I'm not the only one who brought you to drink. Vivienne opened the wine!"

"No! You are talking nonsense, my Vivienne will not do such illegal things, she just came here."

"..."

Schwartz raised his hands in surrender, he lost!

...

The next day, Nov. 11, came the game between the Clippers and the Lakers.

At around 8 o'clock in the morning, Li Ao came to the Memorial Stadium, and his teammates congratulated him one after another. Odom, Big Q, O'Neal and others all expressed that they would treat guests to celebrate his upcoming signature shoes.

Why did Li Ao pay a sky-high price for the endorsement, but it was the three brothers who treated him?

As the saying goes, if one person attains enlightenment, the chicken and the dog ascend to heaven.

There are many domestic brands who want to take advantage of Li Ao's popularity, but when they inquired about Li Ao's endorsement fee, good guy, when he didn't sign with an NBA team, he got a minimum endorsement fee of 200 million dollars.

However, if Li Ao can't sign, he can retreat to sign a teammate who has a good relationship with Li Ao.

After many inquiries, I learned that Big Q and Li Ao have the closest relationship. Odom is the player Li Ao trusts and communicates with the most. O'Neal is rumored to be named by Li Ao.

So the endorsement came to them. Although the unit price was low, it couldn't support the large volume. After a wave of signings, their endorsement fee almost exceeded the NBA salary.

They wanted to thank Li Ao a long time ago, but they had no chance, so now they have it, and they helped Li Ao invite the whole team to have a dinner to celebrate signing the sneaker endorsement.

Li Ao wanted to treat the guests by himself, but he couldn't hold back these three people, and he didn't force it.

Anyway, he eats meat, and the people next to him can always drink soup, so it's good to accept a thank you.

As the saying goes, to promote kindness and hatred against Mimi, we have to give others the opportunity to thank.

After the preparation work in the morning, Li Ao went to the bank to remit a sum of money to his mother, and the matter of signing another big contract came to an end.

After the Pitt Charitable Foundation established the company entrusted by him, he seized some opportunities in his impression and bought some stocks for retirement.

At this stage, his focus is entirely on what he loves to do - play basketball!

...

At 7:40 in the evening, Li Ao took the lead to enter the stadium from the away player channel.

Playing an away game at home, this feeling is even more awkward than he imagined.

Let him come again unexpectedly - many fans are cheering for him!

He's heard that there won't be too many Clippers fans in the game because of the big difference in ticket prices.

The groups who buy tickets for the Lakers games are mainly tourists, students, wealthy people, overseas students, and businessmen.

The group who buy tickets for the Clippers game is mainly working class.

In terms of ticket prices, for the same seat, this season, the ticket price of the Lakers is almost three times that of the Clippers.

Moreover, in previous years, the Clippers had low ticket prices and sales were not as good as the Lakers.

When Sterling was the boss before, the two games he liked the most every year were the two games against the Lakers. He set the ticket price for their home game against the Lakers at more than double the price of the tickets for the Lakers against them. He still has no worries about selling, but the consumers are Lakers fans.

In the past ten years, Clippers players hated playing the Lakers at home the most, and it was even more uncomfortable than away games.

So when he heard so many fans cheering, Li Ao's first reaction was that the Clippers fans got up?Spend so much money on Lakers tickets?

The actual situation is-the Lakers fans just like Li Ao, the most successful college talented basketball player in the Los Angeles University basketball circle in recent decades, based on their status as Los Angeles basketball fans.

With 33 consecutive victories and winning the NCAA basketball championship, he successfully entered the professional basketball world and immediately became a top player. Li Ao is already the pride of basketball fans in the greater Los Angeles area.

In addition to this, there is another reason-the Lakers fans did not take the Clippers seriously.

They don't think this same city team will threaten the status of the Lakers in Los Angeles basketball.

I even feel that the Clippers are just a temporary foothold for Li Ao.

After the players of the two teams entered the field, O'Neill took the initiative to find Li Ao to chat.

O'Neill sighed: "I didn't expect you to enter the NBA so soon, but your ability can be maximized in the NBA. College games will limit your performance, just like me back then. I was so strong, but my teammates were too weak. I can only come to the NBA to partner with better teammates."

"Whether I will be restricted or not is not important. The important thing is that I can't find my goal in college, so I can only play in the NBA."

"Vac, I didn't expect you to be more stinky than me."

"Each each other."

"By the way, why didn't you tell me if you want signed shoes, I'll sign you!"

"Can you afford the endorsement fee?"

"I can't afford it, but you can partner with me as the boss."

"Being a boss earns 1400 million a year?"

"Why do you only have money in your eyes? Don't you have dreams?"

"Give you [-] million or continue to be the boss of Dunkman, which one do you choose?"

"I want [-] million...hahaha..."

After chatting for a few words, Li Ao knew why the popularity gap between O'Neill and Kobe was so big.

This is fat, very eloquent, and nice to speak.

In O'Neill's view, although Li Ao's mouth was damaged a bit, it was a bit similar to the high school students he was familiar with, but the difference was that Li Ao was able to take a joke, and would just go back when he was damaged, while that high school student would get angry if he disagreed with him, and he couldn't communicate at all.

Chatting and chatting, the two talked about the matter of blocking.

O'Neill said: "You seem to be very good at blocking shots. I want to see tonight."

"I'm also thinking of hating you a few times today."

"You hated me? Hahahaha, what a joke, you just bully the old dream. If you want to hat me, you are dreaming, or wait to be hated by me!"

"I'm floating in the middle distance, can you catch me?"

"Do you dare to bet! See if you hit me or I hit you!"

"What to bet? How to bet?"

O'Neal thought for a while and said, "Compared with whoever caps the opponent less times, whoever will wear the opponent's jersey in the next game!"

Li Ao nodded: "It's interesting, I bet!"

After making a bet, the two said a few harsh words and returned to their benches.

For Li Ao, let's bet on this matter, if you win, you win, and if you lose, it doesn't matter much, and you don't take it to heart... But... the task came as soon as you returned to the bench!

"The bet with the shark:
Objective 1: The number of times the host blocks Shaq O'Neal in this game must be higher than the number of times blocked by Shaq O'Neal.

Reward: If you win the bet, you will be rewarded with 1000 achievement points for every shot you make against Shaquille O'Neal.

Goal 2: The total number of blocks blocked by the host in this game must be higher than that of Shaq O'Neal.

Reward: 1 bullet speed basic attribute point. "

Sharks are poisonous!

Li Ao didn't expect that a few words with the other party could actually trigger the task.

He retracted his previous thoughts, it doesn't matter what it means to lose, he will never admit defeat!
……

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(End of this chapter)