The Rockets emerged to win the championship and become the eventual winner, while the other giants in the league naturally had relative losers. Pen ~ fun ~ pavilion www.biquge.info

Although the Pistons lost the Finals, it is also an acceptable result to become the champion of the East, not to mention that this is only the first year of the Five Tigers' gathering, and the team will inevitably give these players affirmation and support.

After a second-half slump and a crushing playoff loss, the Kings are determined to reassemble their starting lineup.

The Timberwolves, who have the best record in team history, are determined to build a team around the original three-headed monster and fight for another year. But they have a lot of salary pressure, Minnesota is a poor country and the ball market is relatively poor, but they handed over the fourth highest salary in the league of more than 70 million.

Even worse was the Dallas Mavericks, where Cuban paid for two big names, Jamison and Walker. Dallas' total salary reached more than 79 million, the third highest in the league, but it only achieved a poor record in the first round. The top two in the league in terms of salaries, the Trail Blazers and Knicks, are famously unscrupulous, so don't compare with them.

And the worst is the Los Angeles Lakers. The F4 duo were considered the favourites to win the championship at the start of the season, but were eliminated by the Rockets in the second round, far below expectations. The contradiction between the two superstars of the team, Kobe Bryant and O'Neal, has become more and more intense, and Kobe Bryant has taken the initiative to jump out of the contract to put pressure on the management to a certain extent.

It's a very difficult multiple-choice question, one is the league's No. 1 center with three consecutive FMVPs, and the other is a potential superstar who has always played for the Lakers. Lakers management had a hard time making a decision, and after many days of deliberation, the general manager, Mitch. Kupchak completed a blockbuster deal.

On July 14, the Lakers officially announced that the Lakers acquired Lamar. Odom, Brian. Grant and Cuarón. Butler and the Heat's '06 first-round pick and '07 second-round pick combined superstar Shaq. O'Neal was sent to the Heat.

As soon as this news came out, the whole world was shocked, and the alliance pattern was turbulent. The Heat were a strong team in the second round of the playoffs last season, and with the league's No. 1 center, the Heat suddenly became the third championship-level team in the East outside the Pistons and Pacers. And the Lakers lost Malone, Kobe Bryant's contract renewal is undecided, and now he has sent away the Sharks, I am afraid that he will become a weak team.

Fortunately, just one day later, Kobe Bryant announced that he would renew his contract with the Lakers for a sky-high price of $136 million over seven years, the last two years of which were the 09-11 season, with a player option. Apparently, the Lakers had already secured a contract extension from Bryant before trading O'Neal, and they ended up choosing the younger Kobe between Kobe, who is about to turn 26, and the Sharks, who will turn 32.

Next, Kupchak continued to make moves, letting go of the meritorious veteran Fisher (joining the Warriors), and signing the Kings' veteran center Divac for a total of 10 million for 2 years (partially guaranteed in the second year). renewed the contract of Medvidenko for 2 years and 3 million each.

On August 6, another big deal involving multiple people, the Lakers sent away veteran Payton, Fox and a first-round pick, and got Chris. Meme, Jumain. Jones and Chuck. Atkins. In this regard, the new version of the Lakers is basically completed. Last year's main rotation left only Kobe, Medvedenko and George, and they formed a new rotation with Atkins, Butler, Jones, Meme, Odom, Grant and Divac.

The F4 Lakers were completely broken up and fell apart after only 1 year of formation.

***

And the Rockets' players are not at all to the point where they need to worry about wages due to their short playing years.

Player/Position/Age/Salary ($10,000)

McGrady/Shooting Guard/25/

Billups/Point Guard/28/595.5

Reed/Shooting Guard/25/600

Yao Ming/Center/24/443.7

Bosh/Power Forward/20/283.4

Johnson/Shooting Guard/23/235.9

Jefferson/Small Forward/24/233.2

Tekoglu/Small Forward/25/219.5

Wang Zhizhi/Power Forward/27/210

Oku/Center/25/To be renewed

Parker/point guard/22/169

Vallejo/Centre/22/83.6

Battle/Centre/29/70

Spanoulis / Point guard / 22 / to be signed

With a significant increase in the rookie contract in the fourth year (depending on the rookie pick, as set out in the collective bargaining agreement), the salaries of Jefferson, Turkoglou, Johnson and Parker have all increased significantly. The salary cap for the year was $43.87 million, barely up from the previous year. The salaries of the Rockets' young players have all risen, and the total of 12 people in the existing contract is close to 46 million, which is significantly more than the salary cap.

Unfortunately, the next bad news came, the rocket was almost destined to lose Oku.

The reason is simple, it is the same as last year's Arenas incident. Oku played for the Rockets for two years and has an early Bird exception in which the Rockets can ignore the salary cap and offer Oku 175% of the previous year's salary or 104.5% of the league's average salary, whichever is higher. Oku's previous year's salary was only $1.1 million, and it was obviously impossible to take the former, which was only a little over $5 million. This is the highest contract extension the Rockets can offer Oku within the rules.

Oku has made many starts in the playoffs before, especially in the Finals, and has long attracted the interest of many teams in the league. Especially teams that are in the process of rebuilding and lack a starting interior lineman. The Jazz offered Oku a six-year contract with a starting salary of $7.5 million, and this temptation naturally appealed to the Turkish guy. And the Jazz are rebuilding, and Oku and Kirilenko can form the core of the team's future rebuild, and this kind of core position within the team is not something that the Rockets can give him.

As long as Oku nods in the face of this big contract, the Rockets will not be able to match and can only watch the loss of core players in vain.

The NBA league is not indifferent to this kind of issue, either. A year later, in the summer of 2005, the two sides signed a new collective agreement, which included the famous "Arenas clause". This clause states that for a restricted free agent who is only one or two years old, the first year of the offer contract cannot exceed the full middle class, so that his parent team can use the early Bird exception or the full middle class to match the contract.

(Quick fact: this supplement isn't perfect.) For example, the Rockets famously offered restricted free agents Jeremy Lin and Asik to poison contracts. Salaries in the first and second years were not high under the Arenas clause, but skyrocketed to $15 million in the third year, making it difficult for the parent team to match and retain. ）

If this rule had been introduced earlier, both Oku and Arenas would have been able to stay on the team. It's a pity that there is no such if.

On July 27, Oku reached a six-year, $50 million contract with the Jazz and went to Utah, where he has been a passerby with the Rockets ever since.