Chapter 941 940. Playoff Progress

Envy, envy, jealousy!

But McGrady's fighting spirit has been completely aroused!

A little different from the other players on the Hawks, McGrady is still tepid even when he is resting. He doesn't have the feeling of suppressed desire like other players, which makes Liu Mang feel a little strange.

At this time last year, even the 42-year-old Stockton was very excited.

McGrady is not without fighting spirit, but just a little tepid.

Liu Mang can tell at a glance that he has never won a playoff game and has no such drive as other players.

Moreover, because he is strong and only 25 years old, he is not as worried about the future as veterans, nor does he want to shine in the playoffs as young people do. He doesn't even have so-called grudges to motivate him.

This guy, just like his personality traits that are digitized by the system, is too "uncontested"!

Liu Mang thought about himself. He wanted a lot of things in the regular season, such as the scoring champion, MVP, first team, and the best defensive lineup... This is a bit difficult. In short, he wants a lot.

McGrady, after playing for a whole season, found an assist king as his goal.

And because the Suns were not used to the looser standards of referees after the All-Star Weekend, Nash's assists became unstable, and the Suns could not adapt to the rhythm of the playoffs.

This made Stoudemire, a player with great ambitions, start to plan to practice mid-range shots and more face-to-face techniques, and develop towards the face-to-face version of his former idol, Tim Duncan, the flying devil version of the late 1990s.

Some people need to experience failure before they start working hard, which is already good, while some people simply let it go after failure.

But those with better talents, like Stoudemire, can see their own shortcomings and take the initiative to improve.

Although Stoudemire did not improve as fast as Yao Ming in the first two years, Yao Ming was a player in the best team in his second year, but the environment of the two teams was different. Stoudemire played with Marbury, and the team atmosphere was extremely bad. He was not even regarded as the core. The core of the team's inside line was Shawn Marion, a top star who could score 17+10 in his second year.

But Stoudemire went from being a rookie who could only eat dunks to being able to face the basket and cut into singles in his sophomore year, and now he has become the highest-scoring power forward with an average of 26 points per game.

After March, the Suns' offensive efficiency declined slightly, and their average points per game have been surpassed by the Hawks, who averaged 111.6 points per game and the Suns' 110.9 points per game.

Nash's average assists per game were also surpassed by McGrady. Because of the decline in offensive efficiency, his average assists per game fell to 11.7, and McGrady firmly occupied the advantage with an average of 12 assists per game.

McGrady's talent is really good, and he has transformed himself into an organizer. Although his ability to organize offense is still under development, McGrady has won the assists king.

This makes McGrady's non-competitive character particularly prominent, and there is a feeling that he is getting more and more casual when he won the scoring title in the 2002-03 season.

It's not that McGrady's performance has declined, but it gives people the feeling that he can't find the goal to pursue.

So Liu Mang brought his own championship ring to stimulate McGrady.

The championship ring really hurt McGrady's self-esteem.

When he was trash-talking with Kobe before, Kobe said he had three championships, and McGrady could only respond that he had the scoring title and was about to win the assist title.

In NBA history, there are only four players who can win the championship in the season of winning the scoring title, including George Mikan, the basketball god of the ancient NBA, Michael Jordan, the basketball god of the NBA, Shaquille O'Neal, the most dominant center in history, and Liu Mang in front of McGrady.

If someone else wins the scoring title, it means no championship.

That is, Kobe is too proud to mention the honor a second time, so McGrady won the argument.

But that incident was like a thorn in McGrady's heart, but he didn't care about so many things, so it didn't hurt him.

But now that thorn was punched by Liu Mang, and the thorn pierced McGrady's heart.

The players who can win the championship in the season of winning the assist title are only Bob Cousy, Jerry West, and Magic Johnson.

McGrady wants to be the fourth!

It's not that McGrady didn't have the drive to win the championship before, but he didn't want to wear the championship ring so urgently and tell Kobe that he also had one. Now that Liu Mang has opened up the scars of the past, McGrady's drive is completely different!

……

……

"Ace, I have signed Monta Ellis and David Lee. Ace, are you sure they can play well in the future? Well, I believe in your vision, Ace, but why don't you recommend these two to the Hawks?"

"We already have Jason, a player like Ellis. Lee doesn't match our style. He is a traditional inside player. By the way, has Paul been signed?"

"Chris is still talking. Because you have a relationship with Dwyane, Ace, the chances of signing him are very high. But it's a pity that none of the four young players from North Carolina have been signed. They became popular too quickly." Schwartz said and took a sip of coffee.

From the end of the NCAA regular season in early February to the end of the NCAA finals on April 3, he was busy observing college students everywhere and contacting everywhere. He actually signed a popular rookie. Channing Frye, a mature senior center at the University of Arizona, was signed by Liu Mang's company.

When an agent is busy, he is busy as a dog. In the past two or three months, Schwartz has not returned home once. He travels all over the United States every day. Although he has signed many agents and scouts, he still has to go in person when a slightly famous college player wants to sign.

But when the work of competing for university resources is completed, he is immediately idle. Except for Paul who is still hesitating whether to play another year in the NCAA to challenge the championship, all other work is finished.

So Schwartz came to Liu Mang's house early in the morning on the 13th, which was the morning of the game between the Hawks and the Spurs to discuss work.

Liu Mang remembered that Channing Frye retired until 2019. Except for the rookie contract, his annual contract was above the middle class. If nothing unexpected happens, the company will have a stable total income of more than 20 to 3 million US dollars in the next ten years, which is not bad.

Generally speaking, players who often change agents are players with great commercial value. They will choose to change agents because there are no other players with commercial value under the same agent. The main reason is that the commercial value cannot be better developed, not because the contract signed with the NBA team is not good enough.

Most players have little commercial value. They only need an agent who can get a big contract. So ordinary players basically have the same agent throughout their careers.

As long as Schwartz has Liu Mang, he will not worry about the commercial value. Schwartz became a popular agent because of Liu Mang. Before the outbreak of the North Carolina Four, the top five picks were Andrew Bogut, Deron Williams, Chris Paul, Raymond Felton, Channing Frye, and Charlie Villanueva.

Bogut's agent is Australian. Deron's agent has long been decided to be Bob McLaren. Villanueva is not favored by Schwartz. The remaining Felton and Frye Schwartz successfully grabbed one.

As for Felton, because he has already contacted Paul, he has no time to fight for it.

"North Carolina's four youngsters?" Liu Mang thought his teacher was going to do something stupid again when he heard this. "I can guarantee that the money they make combined is not as much as Chris alone."

"Haha, I think so too. Chris is too talented. Ace, I think he will be your biggest enemy in the future." Schwartz always has a unique vision.

"Maybe... I like the number 58 very much. Jeff, can you suggest that Chris wear this jersey?" Liu Mang suddenly had a bad taste.

"No. 58? This number is a bit ugly! I don't think Chris will agree. Maybe if I say this, he will refuse to sign with us. By the way, Ace, why do you want Chris to wear No. 58?" Schwartz didn't understand.

"Uh... I just think it's a good fit for him..."

"Uh, let's not talk about this, I'm afraid Chris will be scared away by you. Ace, who are the Hawks going to pick this summer? I remember that the Hawks still have their first-round pick, and there is also a second-round pick from the Jazz, probably two picks at No. 30 and No. 33."

"That should be the case, but the team has the idea of ​​trading next year's draft picks. I don't know what specific picks we can trade for, but I think we will reduce rookies and young players in the summer, so we don't have to think too much, we have too many young players..."

...

After chatting with Schwartz for two hours about work, Liu Mang mainly gave advice. Schwartz was in charge of the company's operations and financial revenue.

Liu Mang wanted connections, and Schwartz wanted money and the sense of accomplishment of developing the company. There was no conflict in the interests they pursued, so Schwartz has become famous now and has no conflict of interest with Liu Mang.

After Schwartz left, Liu Mang was also ready to go to the stadium. There was a team meeting at noon, a training class in the afternoon, and a game against the Spurs in the evening. The Hawks coaching staff had already made sufficient preparations and played as a rehearsal for the finals.

Before going out, Liu Mang looked at the system. The superstar value was 121,196 points and the rogue value was more than 49.79 million points.

The superstar value prepared for the playoffs has been fully prepared after the All-Star Weekend, and the rogue value is about to break 50 million. When Wade and James are eliminated in the playoffs and make them feel real despair, Liu Mang thinks that breaking 100 million is not a big problem.

The star cards are now fully prepared. Next, when the season ends, you can get a third-year Jordan star card.

Although the role of star cards has gradually decreased as Liu Mang's own strength improves, the system is assisting him in cultivating Liu Mang's own strength, but the star cards of superstars such as Jordan, Kobe, Wade, and Nash are still very useful to him.

Everything is ready, just waiting for the playoffs to start!

Playing against the Spurs should be played as a playoff!

…

The playoffs are about to begin, the fans are already enthusiastic, and the NBA officials are also at their busiest.

The NBA headquarters in New York is now busy with the final planning of the playoff schedule, negotiations with major TV stations for live broadcasts, allocation of playoff referees, and negotiations with the owners of stadiums that are not their own teams... and so on. Of course, these things are handed over to his subordinates. After David Stern completed the work assignment, he drank black tea and browsed the website in the office in a relaxed manner.

David Stern is very insightful. He has seen that the future will be an era where channels are king and information communication is the mainstream. Although physical newspapers and TV stations are still the mainstream media, online media has occupied a large amount of traffic. Although he is a bit old, David Stern has learned how to use computers and surfs the Internet when he has nothing to do.

From the beginning of the month, T.N.T and ABC TV station's live broadcast previews have been warming up for tonight's game between the Hawks and the Spurs.

This time it was ESPN's turn to be depressed. They grabbed the live broadcast of the Hawks' regular season finale against the Pacers at home, but they didn't expect that no one paid attention to that game.

The Pacers have fallen behind the Wizards, 76ers, and Magic in the playoffs, and have fallen to tenth in the Eastern Conference, behind the Celtics. The top eight in the Eastern Conference have been determined, and the Hawks, Pistons, Nets, Heat, and Bulls are locked in the top five. The 76ers, Wizards, and Magic are competing for a spot, all wanting to play the Pistons, and none of them want to meet the Hawks and Nets in the first round. They are still actively striving for victory in the last two games.

People have ignored that the Pacers are the opponent of the Hawks' final game, and regarded the Hawks' game against the Spurs as the final game.

Originally, the Hawks' last game was arranged by the league as a warm-up game for the playoffs, but the current situation is unexpected.

David Stern never thought that he would put his expectations of boosting ratings on the Spurs.

But this game really attracted a lot of attention.

The main reason is that except for the Spurs being suppressed by the Suns at the beginning of the season and being beaten 113 to 91, they played better and better in the next three games against the Suns. In the second game, they lost 102 to 105, but they took the initiative in the third game and defeated the Suns with a high score of 124 to 118. In the fourth game, they beat the Suns by a big margin of 109 to 91.

This season, there are only four teams that have an advantage in the total score against the Suns. The Spurs are one of them. The other three teams are the Hawks, Rockets, and Mavericks.

The Spurs are the top seed in the Western Conference Finals, and the Hawks, who have a "similar style of play" to the Suns, are the top seed in the Eastern Conference Finals. And the Spurs played very well against the Suns, and people are looking forward to the game between the Hawks and the Spurs.

Browsing the webpage and watching the heated discussions on the Internet about what will happen in the game between the Hawks and the Spurs, David Stern felt that the world is really too wonderful. He never thought that there would be a day when the ratings would be pulled by the Spurs.

At this time, David Stern received a call...

One minute later, a shrill scream came from the president's office at the NBA headquarters: "Popovich! I will never stand with you!"