Conquer America, Start with a Boxing Champion

"Wow, Link's punch was too strong, almost knocking Clinton's chin off."

In the office, Tiffany clenched her fist and hit her chin, then she uttered an "ah", and her chin also became crooked, turning into a crooked-mouthed girl.

"Okay, go play somewhere else, I still have to work."

Seeing that Link won and was not injured, Evaka pushed the computer away and continued to browse emails.

"Okay!"

Tiffany held the computer, leaned on the sofa to play online games, and chattered.

"Tiffany, do you like acting very much?"

Evaka shouted.

"What?"

Tiffany looked up.

"If you like making movies, you can go to acting school first, and it's not bad to be an actor in the future."

Evaka suggested.

"No! I went to the crew to play zombies because it's fun. If I go to acting classes, it will be too painful. I don't want to make trouble for myself."

Tiffany shook her head repeatedly.

Evaka looked at her, shook her head helplessly, and said nothing more.

After a while, Tiffany received a call saying that a crew needed new zombies, with a salary of $20 per hour, and asked her if she wanted to come. Tiffany jumped up immediately, put down the computer, hurriedly said hello and ran away.

Ivaka rubbed her forehead and continued to deal with work.

——

After the boxing match, Link successfully won the IBF light heavyweight champion challenger title. The next match will directly face IBF champion Chad Dawson.

Professional record 24 wins and 24 KOs in 24 fights.

Originally, the champion challenger match was a second-level match and was not as attractive as the champion challenge match, but because the participant was Link, this match also attracted the attention of many boxing fans.

The PPV sales in North America were 1.24 million copies, with a total revenue of about 93 million US dollars, and the revenue from online live broadcasts was about 42 million US dollars. Counting the peripheral income such as tickets, hotels, casinos, and advertising sponsorships, it was about 45 million. The total revenue of this match was as high as 180 million US dollars.

Link's personal income in this match is about 56 million US dollars, which is 40% more than the last time he fought Beirut Shumenov in Hong Kong Island, and not much worse than the fight against De La Hoya at the end of last year.

Judging from his income, his influence in the boxing world is undoubtedly greater.

In the past, when he was not famous, his boxing matches were mainly promoted and hyped by promotion companies, which often cost hundreds of millions of US dollars.

Now he is a world superstar, a public figure with world-class influence.

Every time his match is scheduled, the mainstream media in the United States will take the initiative to report related news and help promote it, because his match itself is a very valuable big news, and there are audiences willing to pay for reporting such news.

This is the benefit of becoming a top boxer. After becoming a top boxer, the media all over the world will help with publicity and promotion for free.

Ali and Tyson both received such treatment in the past. They were sought after by the media all over the world and became boxing legends.

In the 1990s, there were top boxers Roy Jones Jr. and Mayweather. In terms of strength and record, the two were no worse than Ali and Tyson.

However, due to the changes in the international situation, the United States' international influence declined after 2000, and American boxing was no longer sought after by the world.

Foreign media are not interested in this kind of news and boxing stars.

The two do not enjoy the free promotion resources of foreign media, and their global popularity is far less than that of Tyson and Ali.

As for Link, he is a top superstar, a playboy, with a lot of gossip, and has a great influence on the world. The media is profitable to report his news and is happy to report his boxing matches.

The increase in free media resources has also led to Link's increasing influence in the United States and even in the world, like a snowball.

Correspondingly, his competition income will also increase.

In addition, there is another reason.

Since last year, many of his games have been held abroad, and he only fought one game with De La Hoya in the United States.

There are fewer games in the local area, and the audience is more interested. This is also a kind of hunger marketing.

If the first four games this year are all held in the United States, the cost of tickets, PPV, etc. for each game will be as high as thousands of dollars, and even hardcore boxing fans cannot afford this expense.

This is also one of the reasons why he often competes overseas even if the prize money is not much.

"Link, Nike's marketing department sent me a cooperation agreement. First, they invite you to be the spokesperson. The initial price is 150 million for five years. In addition, they also submitted a cooperation plan to create a new sports brand with your name. After the new brand is launched, you can get 5% dividends from sales every year."

In the office, Franco handed over a document.

Link flipped through the contract and saw that this cooperation method was similar to the Jordan Brand sneaker brand co-founded by Nike and Jordan, and the Yeezy brand founded by Adidas and Kanye West, which used the fame of celebrities to sell goods.

The more products under the brand are sold, the more celebrities earn.

The 5% sales dividend given by Nike is not bad, which is similar to the dividends Jordan gets from Jordan Brand every year.

But there is a provision in the contract that after cooperating with Nike, he cannot endorse other clothing brands.

This is not feasible.

He also endorses Dior men's clothing. At the beginning of the year, he also signed a contract to endorse CK underwear and GUESS jeans. The annual endorsement fees of the three brands add up to about 30 to 40 million.

If he cooperates with Nike, he will have to give up these endorsements, which is not cost-effective.

The contract given by Nike is not a lifetime endorsement.

The brand is also in a dominant position in the cooperation and can end the cooperation at any time.

Just like after Kanye West got into trouble, Adidas immediately announced the end of cooperation and stopped producing Yeezy products, and Kanye's net worth also dropped from more than 1 billion to hundreds of millions.

Link thought about it and told Franco that giving up endorsements for other clothing brands would not work.

If Nike really wants to cooperate, either modify the contract or increase the endorsement fee and sales dividend. If they don't agree, forget it. He doesn't lack this endorsement fee.

Franco said he understood and would continue to discuss with Nike.

——

After the game, Link also had a break. He and Evaka returned to the villa in Miami Gardens to stay temporarily and spend a short vacation.

No need to care about boxing matches, movie box office, or weekly new album sales.

Every day, I spend time with Evaka in the villa, playing with cats and dogs, sunbathing in the garden, fishing on the deck, practicing shooting at the shooting range, playing golf at Thompson International, and watching the Heat's Big Three lose to Nowitzki at home.

After playing for a few days, Evaka had to return to Los Angeles to handle work. Link went to Nashville halfway, spent a day with Alexander and Cynthia, and bought a lot of gifts that Taylor thought were useless, and then returned to Los Angeles to work.

The MTV Video Awards opened in late September, and he was invited to attend as an award presenter and presented the Video of the Year Award to Katy Perry.

Link Music singer Mars won the Best Male Singer Video Award for "Just the way you are", and Justin Bieber won the Best Music Video Information Award for "U smile".

Lana Del Rey, Wiz Khalifa and Little Round Face were all invited to attend the awards ceremony, but failed to win. Ariana Grande and Charlie Puth, as new music stars who debuted this year, were invited to perform on the MTV stage.

After MTV, Link continued to promote his new album "Love is gone".

In the fifth week of release, the US sales volume was 183,000 copies, ranking second on the Billboard album chart.

The champion was the new rap album "Watch the Throne" jointly released by Jay-Z and Kanye West, with sales of 395,000 copies in the first week.

"Watch the Throne" snatched the championship throne of "Love is gone", which attracted a lot of media attention. "Billboard" joked that Jay-Z and Kanye had avenged their revenge with the new album.

Although "Watch the Throne" sold well this week, the lead single "Otis" ranked sixth on the singles chart, and the previous songs were all songs from Link's new album.

On streaming platforms, the popularity of songs from the album "Watch the Throne" cannot be compared with "Love is gone".

The best-performing "Otis" has the same weekly playback volume on iTunes as "Remember Me", which ranks 12th in "Love is gone".

After comparison, the media had to sigh that Link is very powerful.

When he debuted in 2009, he was suppressed by Lil Wayne, 50 Cent and others. He was forced to leave the Grammy Awards for the first time to protest. At that time, Kanye was disdainful to talk about Link in public, saying that he was afraid of Link's popularity.

Only more than two years have passed, and Link has grown to a very high position in the music industry.

The main song jointly launched by Jay-Z and Kanye West, the two kings of the rap world, is not as popular as the top ten songs in Link's new album.

In addition to the high quality of the songs in Link's new album, it is also because he is more famous.

In a commentary, the New York Post called Link "MJ's successor". It also said that MJ died in 2009, and Link had invited Link to a concert before J died. Link also wrote a "divine song" for MJ after his death. Link and MJ are both world-class pop culture idols.

The newspaper believes that it is appropriate to call Link MJ's successor and that he is the number one in the European and American pop music scene today.

Other media have different opinions on this.

The Chicago Tribune believes that Link's current influence is indeed very large, and he can be called the number one in the European and American pop music scene, but he is not at the level of MJ. Considering that he has been in the industry for less than three years, his global influence may not be worse than MJ in a few years.

This is worthy of recognition.

The newspaper refuted that MJ is a pure singer and musician, and his fame is mainly due to his influence in music.

However, Link's fame is more complex, including music, boxing, movies, sports, and Internet celebrities. Without any of these, Link would not have the current fame.

Therefore, it is not appropriate to call Link the "MJ successor". Link is Link, a new "pop culture idol" born in the new era.

"Entertainment Weekly" also recognized Link as the number one in the European and American music scene today, and called him "one super and four giants" together with Lady Gaga, Adele, Taylor Swift, and Katy Perry, or "one king and four queens" in the music scene.

Hong Kong's Apple Daily listed Link and Lady Gaga as "one emperor and one queen", and Adele, Katy Perry, Rihanna, and Taylor Swift as "the four great singing queens".

The British Guardian commented that Link and Adele are the representative male and female singers in the European and American music scene today.

Link doesn't care too much about these comments, whether good or bad. He will become proud and complacent if he cares too much about the praise from the outside world.

Paying too much attention to negative comments will make him feel constrained in doing things.

"Love is gone" was released in the United States for five weeks, with cumulative sales of 3.62 million copies, and it also became the fastest personal album to break 3.5 million copies in the United States.

Overseas, the cumulative sales in five weeks reached 10.617 million copies, becoming Link's fourth diamond record. His first album "The Fighter" has been on the shelves for more than two years, and the total sales also exceeded 10 million copies in August.

Link also became the first independent male singer of the new generation to have four consecutive diamond records.

In order to sell more albums, after returning to Los Angeles, Link participated in several album promotion activities in succession to increase the popularity of the album.

Universal Music once again proposed a world tour plan to promote the fourth album.

The appearance fee for each concert was increased to 1.8 million US dollars, 600,000 higher than the first time.

One hundred tours can earn about 200 million. Including other income and album promotion income, 300 million is not a problem.

Link did not agree. It is too troublesome to start a tour. He has a lot of work next year and has no time to travel around. Eva Ka is pregnant and needs people at home.

But he did not refuse. A tour can earn hundreds of millions of dollars, and it can also expand its own influence, increase the appeal of movie box office, and increase the prize money of boxing matches. There are many benefits.

His opinion is delayed, and the second world tour will be considered after the release of the fifth album.

Universal also agreed.

The promotion work of the album was busy until late September.

At the same time, the film "Captain America" ​​starring him also ended its release in North America and many countries overseas, with a North American box office of 252 million US dollars and an overseas box office of 245 million US dollars. The global box office is only 3 million short of 500 million US dollars, and is expected to enter the top ten in the North American annual box office rankings.

Link received a total salary of 28 million US dollars afterwards, successfully joining the ranks of Hollywood's 20 million salary.

Another film he participated in, "Snow Flower and the Secret Fan", received a box office of 6.33 million US dollars in North America and an overseas box office of about 11.5 million US dollars after two months of small-scale screening.

The film invested 8 million and received a box office of about 18 million worldwide, barely breaking even.

But the reputation is average. Many media commented that this film, with Link, a super popular actor, only received a box office of more than 10 million, and the project itself has huge problems.

In the last few days of September, Link also shot a movie, which was the script "Buried Alive" that he had been holding for more than three years.

The movie is about an American truck driver who was attacked in Iraq. When he woke up, he found himself buried alive in a coffin. He had to use the limited props around him to find ways to escape the predicament.

Originally, it was planned to be filmed last year, but Link had too many things to do and had no time, so it could only be delayed until now.

The director of the movie was the original director Rodrigo Cortez, who is also a horror film director and has participated in the filming of several film projects of Lionsgate. He is a mature director.

The plot of "Buried" is simple, and no extra props, scenes, or actors are required. All filming work is only carried out in a few narrow wooden boxes. The filming workload is not large and the investment is not much.

The only difficulty is the performance. There is only one actor in the whole plot, and a few simple props such as a mobile phone, a lighter, a flashlight, a fluorescent stick, a knife, a wine flask, and a pen.

It is difficult to shoot well.

In order to give a better performance, Link lay in a closed wooden box for three days without communicating with outsiders to experience the suffocation, despair, and fear when being buried alive, and try to magnify it when performing.

During the filming, he also asked the director to adopt a high-pressure mode, and immediately stop if the performance was not up to standard, and try to pursue perfection as much as possible, and don't lower the requirements casually.

Rodrigo Cortez is also a very serious director, and he didn't treat him as a big star during the filming.

Every time he started the performance, he would interrupt his performance repeatedly, sometimes a hundred times, sometimes two or three hundred times, until he was numb and exhausted, and then announced the official start of filming, and told him that the buried person should not be too energetic.

The film was shot for six days, and the main scenes were initially shot. Including Link's salary of 1 million, the production cost was 2 million US dollars.

The original version of "Buried" invested 3 million and the global box office was more than 20 million.

Link is not sure how much box office the new version of "Buried" can get, but this script was finally finished after three years, and he also completed a long-delayed work, which feels very good.