When pride still matters

Chapter 195 Championship, but the temple is small
The 2003 draft ended successfully. Strangely, the most widely circulated photo was not only a group photo of this year's rookies, but also a photo of Yu Fei and various rookies.

When Yu Fei took a photo with James, he showed his thumbs up. Then, when he took a photo with Wade, he made a "2" gesture. When he came to Anthony's side, his gesture was a "3".

It looks like he's ranking this draft class in his own way.

The Bucks also successfully selected Zaza Pachulia and Udonis Haslem with the 29th pick in the first round and the 29th pick in the second round respectively.

The day after the draft, as expected, another surprise happened.

Every year, ESPN's Bill Simmons writes a "Draft Diary" giving his thoughts on the draft.This is his signature series of articles.Last year, he angered Yu Fei with his disparaging and uncomfortable jokes about Yao Huang.

This led to them bickering with each other over the next year.

Of course, Simmons is a true fan and admitted he misjudged Yao when his friends thought Detroit would regret passing on Anthony at No. [-] overall.

In the article, he reflected on the mistakes he made last year: "I really think my friend is smarter than Joe Dumars, and any basketball fan can make better choices than him. Then again, I He is also the person who once wrote such a passage: 'Many years from now, we will remember 'Yao Shuan defeated Jay Williams', just like we remember 'Bowe defeated Jordan' and 'Traylor defeated Nowitz Key', 'Carroll over McHale and Parish', 'Aguirre over Thomas' and every other big draft-day mistake in NBA history.' The lesson remains the same: I'm an idiot."

This made Yu Fei slightly change his opinion of Simmons.

However, a person who likes to offend others, like those assholes who think talk shows are the art of offending, will always make the same mistakes.

When James was the No. 16 pick in high school, commentator Mike Dirick said: "LeBron lives with his mother Gloria. Gloria sacrificed a lot. After she gave birth to LeBron when she was [-], Living on their own and on relief and food stamps, and now they're here and their lives are going to be completely different, it's a great American story."

Simmons commented on this: "Who are the parents who support each other, work hard, raise their children and send them to school? Since when did the DNA lottery drawn through the unprotected X life become a A sacrifice?"

Yu Fei's first reaction was: It's so well written.

Then, he got angry. How dare you say that to my little brother?
When people in the James camp criticized Simmons' article, Yu Fei also expressed his own opinion: "I think BS has never learned its lesson. Some things cannot be joked about. Just like I also hate BS, but I would never joke about Len Bias, Reggie Lewis, or the Curse of the Child."

Questioner reminds: "You did mention these things."

"That's what you're talking about," Yu Fei said seriously, "I just wonder if Boston Sports has encountered so many tragic accidents because they have too many people like BS."

This move deepened the impression that "James is my little brother".

Is there a more reliable big brother than Da Fei?When you are bullied, you immediately come to your aid and bite others. What more could you ask for?

James was not affected off the court. For him, this was just a small thing.

A week later, he headed to New York to vacation with Jay-Z.

Yu Fei himself has other things to be busy with.

Once the draft is over, he has a busy summer schedule.

First, in July, Yu Fei will restart negotiations with Reebok.

As Reebok's biggest player, he currently has an endorsement fee of US$1 million a year, which is obviously not in line with his worth.

They need to re-sign.

If everything goes well, Yu Fei will also shoot commercials for the third generation of "The Chosen" and record his first documentary.

If these things can be done within a month, he will go to Asia to expand his influence like last year.

It seems that he has almost no time to practice.

But Yu Fei had already made arrangements for this.

No matter what activity he does or which country he goes to, his requirement is to have at least three to four hours of training time every day.

For NBA teams, the management battle has officially begun.

This year is a big year for the free market, and there are many All-Star players whose contracts have expired.

The one who attracts the most attention is undoubtedly Jason Kidd, the league's best point guard in the past few years.

He and the Spurs have been flirting with each other for a year. Now that David Robinson has officially retired, the Spurs have the most abundant salary space among upper-level teams, and they can sign Kidd naked.

For Kidd, he only had to make a simple choice to get rid of the immature Kenyon Martin and the aging Dikembe Mutombo.

Although Kidd took that step in his previous life, he quickly retracted it.

If he joins the Spurs, it won't be as simple as moving from a 49-win Eastern Conference team to a 60-win Western Conference team.

He was the best player on the runner-up team last season. He believed that he could not win the championship independently, so he chose to join the championship team that defeated him head-on last season.At the same time, he was also the second in the MVP voting in the 2001-02 season, teaming up with the MVP winner.

Do you know that as the No. 1 opponent at the top, what will Durant do in the future to surpass this?

After losing to James in 2012, he applied for a trade and designated the Heat as his next home.Except for this, the modern NBA cannot find a more disgusting, shameless, and terrifying "giving in".

Now, everything is different.

Duncan and Kidd have no grudges other than an MVP competition.Duncan did not defeat Kidd in the finals, Duncan was defeated by Yu Fei, the Spurs were not even a championship, and the Nets' internal potential was empty.

Kidd knew better than anyone that by staying in New Jersey, he would get nothing except a good reputation.

But what if you join the Spurs?

Duncan's role alone is much greater than that of Martin and Mutombo combined. What's more, the Spurs also have a complete runner-up team - although David Robinson has retired, he has long been no longer decisive. player of.

Once desire overcomes belief and there is no excessive influence of public opinion factors, then many things will become logical.

On July 7, ESPN broke the news: “Jason Kidd plans to sign with the San Antonio Spurs!”

Marc Stein of ESPN wrote an impromptu column: "The question now is, which Eastern Conference team can give Milwaukee a little test next season?"

Bill Walton seemed to be worried that the pressure on the Eastern Conference teams was not strong enough, so he wrote in the column: "In addition to Jason Kidd, there are many influential insiders entering the free market this year. If the Bucks can sign With one of them, their greatest weakness is no longer a weakness.”

Wharton is right.

In addition to Kidd, the free market also includes Jermaine O'Neal, P.J. Brown, Brad Miller, Karl Malone, Juwan Howard and Alonzo Mourning.

The Bucks are interested in Brown, Malone and Mourning.

Brown is the best choice. As a super blue-collar center who is based in the league on defense and rebound protection, his arrival can make the Bucks have no blind spots.

But Brown is still young, and he has not yet reached the age where he wants a championship without money, so when he proposed a long-term contract with an annual salary of tens of millions to the Bucks, the defending champion could only say goodbye to him.

Followed by Malone, he averaged 20+9 per game in the Jazz last season, and his strength should not be underestimated.

However, although Malone wants the championship, he prefers the Lakers because he doesn't like Yu Fei.

"Frei is the most influential player in the league, who wouldn't want to play with him?"

"I do not want."

Karl Malone remembers Yu Fei saying that his MVP award in 1999 was as good as Gwyneth Paltrow's Oscar-winning performance.

Although Yu Fei later added a few words, Ma Long remembered them all.

And, no matter how you look at it, a restored O'Neal can definitely make the Lakers the strongest team in the league again.

Last season's failure was just a small probability event composed of many accidents for OK. The Bucks and Spurs' luck has run out.

Malone was determined to go to Los Angeles, and soon he reached a verbal agreement with the Lakers.

As for Mourning, although he also wanted a championship, he had no interest in playing in a small market like Milwaukee. All the Bucks' free market goals fell through, and they had to start dreaming.

I hope Pachulia and Haslem can grow into strong basketball leaders within a year to share the pressure on the outside.

If the free market cannot be strengthened, it can only ensure that internal strength is not lost.

Among the Bucks' main rotation lineup in the playoffs, except for Tyrone Hill who chose to retire after the season, only Anthony Mason has an expiring contract.

Among others, Yu Fei still has two years of rookie contract, Ray Allen signed a 1999-year, $6 million long-term contract with the Bucks in 7000, which will not expire until 2005, and Christian Laettner Contracts worth nearly 600 million per year will not expire until 2005. Players like Devin George and Michael Redd have just completed one year of their new contracts and there is no need to consider renewing them.

The only one who is about to expire is Latrell Sprewell. As the highest-paid player in the Bucks, he has two years left on his contract, and the last year is a player option, which means that his Contract renewal should be on the agenda starting from next season.

While the Bucks appear to be thriving, the NBA's major partners aren't so optimistic about the league's future.

This can be seen from the new television broadcast contract signed by the NBA. Today, each major league's broadcast contract is getting larger and larger, but the NBA's new broadcast contract receives less money than the previous one.

This results in something that has not happened since the introduction of the salary cap system - the salary cap for the new season is lower than the previous season.

Last season, the NBA's salary cap was $4200 million, but this season it is only $4000 million.

With the luxury tax on the line, most hopeless teams will control their spending.

The Bucks made a lot of money last season and paying the luxury tax isn't a pain for them -- unless the amount is too big -- but the low appeal of a small market makes it difficult for them to replenish quality veterans.

George Karl once wanted to recruit Gary Payton, but because the Bucks could not provide a starting guarantee, Payton set his sights on the West.

As a result, the Bucks had no more thoughts. They announced that they would renew Anthony Mason's contract with a two-year, $2 million (second-year team option) contract, and then fell silent in the free market.

(End of this chapter)