When pride still matters

Chapter 313 Join forces with the overlords of the Eastern Conference

2005年5月15日，雄鹿在克利夫兰以24分的优势大胜骑士，大比分4比0将其淘汰出局。

For those who have been following this series, this is not a surprising ending.

Under normal circumstances, James would be able to leave with a smile on his face.

Because he averaged 32 points, 8 rebounds and 9 assists per game against the top favorites in the Eastern Conference. Even if he is swept, who can say that his future is uncertain?

But Yu Fei on the opposite side averaged 45 points, 11 rebounds and 10 assists per game, which is a bit hard to say.

TNT's loudmouth Charles Barkley smiled and used himself as an example: "When I was still in Philadelphia, everyone thought that I was similar to Michael, but I got less support, so Michael started playing against us in one round. He averaged 43 points per game in the series. However, today's Frye is even more exaggerated, but considering that he faced a basically undefended team, I can understand his performance, but I don't know if LeBron can understand?"

Yu Fei averaged 45 points per game, plus a 70-point night in the first game, a 50-point massacre, and a 4-0 sweep.

Let James' bloody crown words no longer be a joke on paper, but a real thing.

Even James' close friends admit that there is a gap between the performance of the two sides in this series.

Fortunately, the gap is closing rapidly.

Randy Mims put forward a compelling theory: "If LeBron and Frye switched teams, the Bucks would still win."

James was noncommittal.

Rich Paul said: "The top priority is to let the team know that they have to build a more competitive team for you. It is not enough now."

James agrees with this.

He can spend a summer narrowing the gap with Yu Fei, but the team's configuration must be improved, otherwise it will be impossible to surpass Yu Fei and the Bucks.

If in the next few years, he reaches the same height as Yu Fei but loses the game because of the team's strength, it will be unacceptable.

The day after the season ended, the Bucks began preparing for the Eastern Conference Finals and were always paying attention to the heated semifinals between the Heat and Pistons.

The Cavaliers, or Cavaliers owner Dan Gilbert, has officially ended his first season as owner.

I have to say, this year has been a lot of fun.

But now that the fun was over, Gilbert knew he had an important job ahead of him.

LeBron only has one year left on his contract with the Cavaliers. If LeBron does not re-sign in the summer, he will become a restricted free agent after the upcoming 2006-2007 season.

Gilbert wouldn't let him go anywhere else. However, he is well aware of LeBron's close friendship with Jay-Z, who recently purchased a stake in the New Jersey Nets. This made Gilbert realize that Jay-Z, like other NBA owners, wanted to lure LeBron away from Cleveland.

Therefore, the day after the Cavaliers' season ended, Gilbert offered James a five-year fully guaranteed contract worth $8000 million.

James didn't want to leave Cleveland. He had already settled here, but Yu Fei's shocking 2+1 short-term contract made him study the collective bargaining agreement more.

From a pure profit perspective, the 2+1 short-term contract allows Yu Fei to become a free agent three years in advance and obtain more future benefits.

From a career perspective, James has seen through the Bucks' active operations last summer their anxiety about the potential possibility of "losing Yu Fei."

This kind of anxiety made the Bucks basically not think about saving money and spend as much as they could within the salary cap, so they grabbed Kwame Brown and Raja Bell, plus several lucky drafts, which made them in the After experiencing the trough of last season, it quickly burst out with vitality and re-emerged at the top of the Eastern Conference.

Although the relationship between James and Yu Fei cannot go back to the past, this does not prevent him from learning from each other in many aspects.

Yu Fei cut off the agent's power.

James went a step further and fired agent Bob Goodwin, an agent he had no control over, and hired an agent willing to bend to his will, Leon Rose.

Yu Fei opened his own marketing company, and James followed suit and asked Maverick Carter, one of the Four Horsemen, to leave Nike to start a company focused on building his own personal brand and controlling external marketing publicity.

现在，于飞2+1的续约合同带来的收益让本来打算中和一下，签个“3+1”的詹姆斯无限向“2+1”倾斜。

Therefore, when James' team asked the Cavaliers for a "2+1" contract extension, Gilbert's white moonlight filter towards James shattered.

God bless Cleveland?

No, God hates Cleveland!

The 2+1 short-term contract means that the Cavaliers may lose James in three years.

Three years later, in the summer of 2009, the urgency was too great.

Can they build a competitive team in three years for James to re-sign in 2009? Difficult, too difficult.

Gilbert hated the founder of "2+1" almost immediately.

How could LeBron learn bad things without Yu Fei?

There are bad people in the alliance!

The contract extension between the Cavaliers and James is at an impasse, but everyone knows that as long as it drags on, the Cavaliers will eventually compromise.

James' biggest advantage is that he is not the pioneer of "2+1", he is a follower.

Yu Fei was scolded for two years and paved the way for them to sign the same short-term contract.

Yu Fei, who is far away in Milwaukee, is not interested in James imitating him and seeking a 2+1 contract extension.

While they were waiting for the results of the game between the Bucks and Pistons, the American Basketball Association announced the selection list for the new US team.

Obviously, the humiliation of defeat in Athens has stimulated those in the American basketball circle.

David Stern hopes to use the next two major tournaments - the World Championships in Japan and the Beijing Olympics - to restore USA Basketball's reputation as the world's leader in basketball.

There are 22 people on the roster, which basically lists the elites of American basketball, and the first among them is Yu Fei.

Yu Fei's enthusiasm for participating in the US team has always been questioned, which is a black spot for which he is widely known.

A man who is willing to promote his social responsibility in prohibiting alcohol, but is unwilling to make American basketball great again in his professional field?

This time, Reebok prepared a plan in advance for Yu Fei to refuse the invitation of the US team.

Take it in three steps.

The first step was to be vague, not saying whether he would participate or not, but saying that he would focus on the playoffs.

When the season ends, it comes to the second step, and news of suspected injuries breaks out through the media.

The third step, of course, is to confirm the existence of the injury and tell the public that although Da Fei wants to defend the glory of American basketball, he is injured, so this honor should be left to others.

Yu Fei strictly followed the three-step plan formulated by Reebok. No matter how the outside world asked about the national team, his answer was "focus on the game."

This actually gives an answer to those who know him.

For Flying supporters, this is a drawback. Look at LeBron James. His patriotism is as high as the sky and deeper than the sea. Just a few months ago, James' mother Gloria was charged with including drunk driving. The day after the four charges including LeBron were formally convicted, James' team made a high-profile announcement: "LeBron will go to the national team to participate in training as soon as possible after handling his personal affairs. He is excited to join the Dream Team again. He has already Can’t wait to be a part of it!”

The beauty of publicity and marketing is nothing better than this.

In this case, who cares about James' mother's drunk driving?

Da Fei is the ambassador of prohibition? Why don't you play for the national team if you have such a sense of responsibility? Look at LeBron

In this matter, Yu Fei's team and Reebok executives were also surprised by his idea of ​​not playing for the national team.

It was obviously a beneficial and harmless thing, so why was Da Fei so disgusted with it?

And Yu Fei couldn't explain to them at all.

According to Yu Fei's thinking, he didn't want to play for China because he was overworked in the NBA. If he didn't take a good rest during the vacation, he might get injured. In addition, the national basketball team was too deep, and he didn't want to wade in this muddy water. .

Regardless of whether it is for public or private reasons, Yu Fei does not want to play any national team games.

Moreover, he knew that Xiao Zhan could not be proud for a few days. He remembered that the results of this dream team were not ideal.

However, no matter what, after the playoffs, it is the general trend for Yu Fei's camp and James' camp to go to war. James, who is in the challenger position, needs to seize all the black spots of Yu Fei to create a public opinion advantage for himself.

Actively participating in national team games is one of them.

Yu Fei was too lazy to waste time on this kind of thing. When he won another championship, this group of people would be quiet.

On May 5, another popular player, Dwyane Wade, who publicly expressed his intention to join the Dream Team, had a poor shooting touch against the Pistons. This was the result of the Pistons' relentless pursuit of him.

However, Yu Fei has already demonstrated to the entire league how to break the Pistons' defense.

Although Wade is not the kind of big core who has unlimited possibilities with the ball in his hands, he does have certain big core attributes. While his offense is explosive, he also has good passing vision, and the foundation of the Pistons' defense is to leave the field open. Some people who shoot inaccurately block the space along the way, making it difficult for one-on-one experts to exert their strength.

Compared to the Larry Brown era, the biggest decline for the Pistons is Ben Wallace.

The destiny of a stocky inside man is to only be able to live in his youth. This is especially obvious for the 32-year-old Ben. In this year's playoffs, he only averaged 1.2 blocks per game, and his threat at the basket is no longer what it used to be. The reverse increased the defensive burden on teammates, which ultimately led to the Pistons' collapse in Game .

4 is better than 2

The Heat ended the Pistons' dominance of the top half and officially qualified to challenge the Eastern Conference dominant Bucks.

"What's more exciting in the East than Frye vs. LeBron?" Mike Breen said after the Heat advanced to the Eastern Conference Finals. "Of course it's just Frye vs. Shaq. There's so much grudge, there's so much Hate, there are so many unpredictable factors. You just need to know that this is the meeting of the former overlord and the current overlord again. The only question is, will Dwyane Wade be the X factor that changes everything?"

(End of this chapter)