the rest, only noise

Chapter 272: Here Comes the Digger
Chapter 271 Here Comes the Poacher

In the past few days, in addition to preparing his speech at the championship celebration, Louis is openly recruiting professional agents.

Outsiders will think that he is just filling the vacancy in his private team, but insiders can perceive important information from his actions.

Louie's contract is public, and everyone in the circle knows that he can jump out of the contract this summer.

But he won't necessarily jump out, because the Celtics are under a lot of pressure to renew this summer.

Bird is in a contract year. Although he made it clear that he will stay in Boston, if the Celtics want to keep him, they must offer the top three salaries in the league.

After completing the second MVP+FMVP season of his career, Bird can already be regarded as No. 1 in the league.

Retaining him is not only the wish of the New England region, but also the goal that the Celtics must complete.

Followed by the contract renewals of Lambiel, Sampson, Maxwell, Henderson and others.

Lambiel has played four seasons under a child labor contract, and now he has two championships in hand. He also has the qualifications of an All-Star, so he must be given a maximum salary.

After Sampson competed with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in the final, he averaged 24 points, 12 rebounds, 4 assists and 4.4 blocks per game, suppressing Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

This round of the series gave Sampson the reputation of the league's number one center.

Whether it is the No. [-] center or the sure-fire top five players in the league, they are all worthy of a salary at the same level as Bird.

Maxwell's contract was signed in the early 80s, and it was a big contract at the time, and now he is eager for a bigger one.

As Thomas' substitute, Henderson also played his worth.

So many people need to renew their contracts, and most of them are big contracts. If Louis jumps out of the contract and other clubs raise their prices, the Celtics may not be able to afford it.

Many clubs believe that Louis will not jump out of the contract.

Because the Celtics are a very suitable team for rookie coaches to brush up their resumes.

His debut season has achieved an unprecedented record, plus the championship and the title of the best coach of the year. If he is smarter, he should wait for the end of this contract before asking the price market.

However, Louie's decision to publicly hire an agent made it clear that he wanted to test his worth in the free market.

He has a bad reputation outside, but no team will go to a coach based on the reputation.

Pat Riley thinks he's the Celtics' anchor;
Jack Ramsey calls him 'the diamond' of young coaches;
Those coaches who opposed him were severely ravaged by him and the Celtics over and over again.

Even if he doesn't count his coaching ability, his scouting and scouting ability is top-notch.

On June 6, four days before the start of the draft, a lobbyist from New York came to his door.

The person who came was Billy MacLellan (Billy MacLellan), and he negotiated with Louis on behalf of the New York Knicks.

It's an old tradition for the Knicks to poach Boston's corner. At the beginning, Auerbach was almost poached by them with the largest management contract in history.

Louie's contacts in New York are not bad. Knicks management Sonny Webling is his friend, and general manager Dave Debusschell also has a few encounters with him.

It is that he and the local media are inherently at odds.

There is still a big relationship with Bernard King, the core of the team.

Knowing that there is such a big problem, they still want to poach people. It can only be said that the Knicks have no doubts about Louis' ability.

Louis' agent hadn't been selected yet, so someone threw an olive branch over.

Louis entertained McClellan seriously and took over the other party's contract.

This is a five-year contract, and the amount is so high that Louis didn't expect it.

5 million a year

If Louie signs this contract, he will probably become the most expensive coach in the league.

"You should know that I haven't announced that I will jump out of the existing contract. Although I can do it, I haven't done it yet." Louis put down the contract and said with a smile, "In other words, you are recruiting illegally. If I report to the league, guess how many draft picks you will be fined?"

The Knicks were struggling internally and externally, and Webling didn't want to continue running the team, so the team's owners, the executives at Gulf and Western Industries Inc., owner of Madison Gardens, were picking a true specialist to revive professional basketball in New York.

Webling seemed to expect Louie to jump out of his contract, so he recommended him to the top management.

That's why McClellan came to visit.

Hearing Louis' words, McClellan laughed and said, "You and Mr. Webling are good friends, so I don't think you would do that."

"You're right, but I'm really not going to talk about my future with someone I don't know well."

Louis said seriously.

McClellan did not expect that the largest coaching contract in NBA history would not impress this 24-year-old who should have been overblown.

"That is, if it is an acquaintance, you might be willing to talk to him about the future?" McClellan's reading comprehension is very good.

Louis said: "You can say that."

He literally put "I don't know you, ask Webling to tell me" on his face.

Having said that, McClellan knew he would have nothing to talk about.

His biggest hole card is this contract that should not be rejected.

But Louis easily refused.

The number on the contract doesn't seem to be what he values, he wants more, and that's not something he can decide.

Therefore, Louis wanted to meet someone with a bigger weight.

It must be able to make a reliable promise before the negotiation can continue. If not, he would rather put himself on the free market as an auction item.

After McClellan left, Louis suddenly remembered that he might have done something that could make Versailles frequent in the future.

New York paid me $220 million, but I turned it down because the level of lobbyists was too low. It's a pity when you think about it.

Sounds good, right? So does he.

But the story didn't end there. Before Louis had time to tell Li Xuanbing that he had rejected a contract worth $220 million, the Knicks called again.

This time, it was Sonny Webling, Louie's desired "acquaintance," on the phone.

"Since I've come here in person, Coach Lu, as a landlord, you should treat guests to dinner, right?"

"Sonny, you know what, you were the first American to let me treat you to dinner. I thought you Americans liked the AA system."

Since Weblin is coming, Louis will definitely give him face.

If it weren't for Webling, he wouldn't have had the chance to invest in Oracle.

In investing, even if you know what to invest in to make money, if no one leads you in, you can only watch the money fly away.

Webling brought Louis in, so he changed money into money through a little bit of investment, and his worth increased little by little.

This is why he categorically rejected New York's largest coaching contract in history.

Money is of course a good thing, but for some people who have lost their basic economic needs, money is only one of the good things, and there are things that are more attractive than money.

On June 6, there are still 16 days before the draft will be held.

Louie took a restaurant in Boston.

Webling asked him to treat him, but did not say where.

There are only a few places in Boston, and it is difficult to eat delicious food, so Louis simply found a Chinese restaurant that he often visited.

When Webling learned that Louis had set up the negotiation venue in a Chinese restaurant, he often ridiculed him.

"Let me put it this way, what you're doing is like putting a $1000 lead character in a movie with a $10 million budget."

What's this?In the future in China, there will be a lot of strange things in which the main characters with a salary of 5000 million will be stuffed into TV dramas with a budget of 1.6 million.

With their professional ability, they have no audience relationship, so they can only continue to produce low-quality movies/TV series, why?

Louis waited for a few minutes, and Webling arrived as promised.

But he didn't come alone, he also had a companion.

His companion is burly, and he was definitely an athlete when he was young. After retiring, he didn't gain weight and looked very capable.

He has white hair and looks like a mental villain in an Italian gangster movie who provokes the protagonist in the first 10 minutes and then gets fucked to death.

"Dave, are you here too?"

Dave DeBusscher, the Knicks legend and current general manager, came together with team chairman Weblin, symbolizing the high importance the Knicks' entire basketball department attaches to recruiting Louie.

During this time period, they should be anxious about trying out rookies, worrying about the operation of the offseason, and worrying about how to adjust the conflict between Slip Floyd and Bernard King.

Now they are dispatched together to lobby Louis in Boston.

De Buschell said calmly: "Sangnifer pulled me here, he thought it would better show our sincerity."

"Indeed, I have seen your sincerity." Louis said, "Please take a seat."

They sat down, and the two obviously hadn't had much Chinese food and didn't want to appear too tender, so they ordered General Tso's chicken like veterans.

In fact, people who like to eat Chinese food will hardly order General Tso's chicken, a dish that Chinese people do not know at all.

Louis didn't tell the truth, and ordered a fried noodle and a large dumpling with a smile.

This is definitely a strange thing, not to mention that Webling is worth eight figures, Louis and Debuschel are both worth millions, and they actually gathered in a Chinese restaurant to have a cheap lunch and talk about millions of contracts.

"Louie, tell me about your request." Webling smiled, "Don't worry, as long as it's related to basketball, we will never have any questions."

"This is not in a hurry."

Louie opened a bottle of Coke.

"Would you like a drink?"

"No, be careful if you drink too much of this stuff and you won't be able to have a baby."

Louie didn't bother to say that he was a father-to-be.

He filled himself a glass and looked at the two most powerful people in the Knicks basketball operation department: "I would like to ask you two, why did I jump from the Celtics with unlimited prospects and join the Knicks?"

(End of this chapter)