In July, the league announced that the salary cap for the new season is $35 million, and the luxury line is $40.67 million (the soft salary cap is the NBA's salary policy, and teams that sign players whose total salary exceeds the salary cap will not be able to sign free agents at will (only the Bird exception, the middle class exception, etc.), and the team with a higher total salary than the luxury line will be subject to stricter restrictions and pay a luxury tax penalty, and in the league in 2000, it was 1 to 1 luxury tax, i.e. one dollar beyond the luxury line to hand over one dollar to the Union). Pen × fun × Pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 info Yuanfei and Dawson calculated together:

The Rockets' players under contract for the new season include:

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

Olajuwon/Center/38/1670

Cato/Center/26/533

Williams/Small Forward/30/425

Mobley/Quarterback/25/392

Francis/point guard/23/324.7

McLean (Layoffs) 238

Brendan Rodgers/Centre/29/220

Anderson/Quarterback/27/220

Brad/Power Forward/33/210

Maloney (Layoffs) 179

Drew/Point Guard/24/118.3

Thomas/Power Forward/23/88.5

Norris/Point Guard/27/52.4

There is still a sign of Michael. Reid (who is usually signed with a base salary in the second round) and Turkoglu have returned to the Turkish league without signing.

Yuanfei seriously thinks about the value of each player: Hakim. Olajuwon is the number one superstar in team history, a meritorious veteran, and a box office guarantee, as long as there is no huge profit to be made, it is better to stay; Kevin. Cato is the right age, defensively good, and good as a transitional backup; Catino. Mobley and Steve. Francis is one of the two more powerful stars on the team, and he is also relatively young and has trade value; Matt. Brad is too old and obviously not a piece of the puzzle for the future, but fortunately, the contract is only one year and can be kept; Shanton. Anderson played well last season, but this is almost his peak, with two years left on his contract, and he should sell at a high price with trade value; Wirther. Williams, a three-point shooter with 2 years left on his contract, just in time to take young players to practice shooting; Brace. Drew, the only available pure point guard on the Ford team, is left to play but has little development value. The rest of the players are almost at the CBA (Chinese Men's Basketball Professional League) level.

But here's the problem, just these garbage players who are enough to mess up, the total salary is actually 46 million US dollars, which is enough to pay the luxury tax. Of course, it is not satisfactory to have to pay taxes in a bad year. Not to mention signing big-name free agents, there is no salary room at all.

In this case, signing first and then exchanging is the only way out!

(A sign-to-trade is a free agent who is traded for both a contract extension and a transfer.) A team that does not have the salary space to sign a player, such as the Rockets, can form an equivalent trade with the free agent's parent team as long as they pay a player with a similar salary to the player's salary)

In the free agent market, Dawson is constantly busy. He fell in love with Morris at one point. Taylor, the free agent from the Clippers, is considered by Dawson to be a good value for money. This proposal was rejected by Yuanfei without hesitation. "Sign him? It's better to sign a random Chinese player to open up the market. If you want a small forward, there is a Chinese man named Majian (who is now a basketball commentator) and you can consider it. He played the NCAA. ”

Alexander thought about it and thought it was a good proposal. Dawson quickly approached the Beijing Aoshen team and learned that Majian had a contract dispute with the club, so he had to give up.

Yuanfei has a very clear idea of recruitment, and if it is bad, it is bad, except for veterans like Olajuwon, he should not spend a penny more on other people who are not long-term plans. In addition to the potential young people, it doesn't matter if they are all rubbish players with a base salary, the goal is to lose anyway. As for which base salary players Dawson signed, it doesn't matter, it's just a make-up.

Far Fly's goal has been completely placed on the free agent market. The quality of this summer's draft was low, but the free agency market was buzzing. Duncan, Hill, Jones, Rice, Miller, Rose and other big names have all become free agents. Of course, Yuanfei wants Duncan, "Stone Buddha" has a calm personality, solid skills, excellent defense, and he will become a superstar in the top 10 of history in the future. But Yuanfei knows that the Rockets lack attraction for superstars, especially Duncan, who has already proven his strength. So he targeted the first place in Toronto, where there is a rising star. Tracy. McGrady, the future Rockets leader, two-time scoring champion, and sad star who retired early from his peak due to injury, averaged 15.4 points, 6.3 rebounds, 3.3 assists and 1.9 blocks per game last season. The 21-year-old super-newcomer was the hottest young player on the free market in '00. Historically, the Orlando Magic easily took Maddy from the Raptors. But now the Houston people have no salary space, and if they want to sign, they can only negotiate with the Raptors to sign first and then change. Yuanfei did not hesitate to give a chip that made the hearts of Torontos excited.

"Francis? Are we really going to trade the best young guys on the team for a backup for the Raptors? Although Dawson was a little admired, he was still very surprised and skeptical. The Raptors' guy is good, but he's been playing for 3 years and hasn't achieved much. Frances won the Best Newcomer award in his first year. ”

That's because McGrady was so young when he entered the league, you know, he played in the NBA for three years and he was two years younger than Francis, who played for one year. His height, reach, speed, and bounce are all the best in his position, and he has a lot of room to rise in the future. ”

"This matter is too important, I'm afraid I have to consult Boss Alexander."

"You have to agree first. If Mr. Alexander does not agree, I will buy his shares again until I agree! ”

"Poof—" Dawson squirted out a sip of coffee. He figured it out, China's rich second generation, rich is capricious!

***

Raptors management quickly solicited new head coach Randy Brown. Wilkens' opinion, former superstar Wilkens made them decide in one sentence - "I came from a point guard, and Francis is a lot like me when I was younger." In this way, there is one last step before a deal is reached, and Maddie himself needs to agree to sign and move to Houston. At this time, the young man was dazzled. The Magic threw out the Big Three plan for him, to bring in Duncan Hill and Maddie at the same time; The Heat have strong strength and are closer to the championship; And the bulls shouted a loud slogan - "You will be Jordan's successor!" ”

On July 5, the media reported that Grant. Hill announces joining the Magic. Orlando has taken a solid first step on the road to the superstardom and is leading the war for Maddie! And Maddie is waiting for Duncan's choice at this moment, if Duncan joins the Magic, Maddie will take a salary cut to join and form the old generation of the Big Three!

During the selection period, the Heat finally got tired of waiting for Maddy and switched to signing second choice Eddie. Jones.

On July 11, Duncan announced that he would stay with the San Antonio Spurs. At this point, Maddie is still considering joining the Bulls to become the boss, waiting for another rookie of the year, Brand, to grow into his solid lieutenant; Or join the Magic to become the second leader next to Hill. A phone call from faraway Texas changed Maddie's mind.

"Hill's old injury last season hasn't healed and there are serious injury concerns. If he has a recurrence of injury, you'll be an isolated underdog. If he stays fit, you'll be his deputy. In short, you won't be one of the greatest superstars. ”

"The Bulls have been at the bottom of the East for two years in a row, and the habit of losing is not something that can be corrected overnight. You can be the best star in the league as a young player, but not enough to be the mental backbone of the team. Rather than succeeding Michael as his shadow, you should embrace the legacy of Hakim, now the greatest veteran superstar in the league. ”

Years later, Maddie said in an interview that in '00 he almost made up his mind to go to Magic, but Jason's phone call changed his mind. Maddie didn't expect the Rockets to be willing to pay for a future star like Francis, and he felt the respect and expectation that this team had for him, and he felt the warmth off the court.

In this way, the 18+5+6 (average points + rebounds + assists per game) Boss Fergus and the 15+6+3 immature Maddie were swapped, 4 years earlier than the historical swap.

However, the two sides still negotiated many times in terms of details. The Raptors thought they had taken advantage of themselves (they shot Maddy, who wanted to be the core of the team, in exchange for the potential new star Boss Fergus), and their inner bottom line was very low, and they backed down in the negotiations, and finally reached a deal that was very beneficial to the Houstonians on August 6.

Signed with Maddie (starting salary of 9.66 million) with a maximum salary for 7 years and Dell. Curry (Raptors player, 2 million that season) plus a 2003 Raptors first-round pick (the Raptors thought the pick would be low, so they unsuspectingly negotiated the top three picks to protect it), in exchange for Francis (3.24 million that year) plus Cato (5.33 million) and Anderson (2.2 million).

(Quick fact: At the beginning of the 13-14 season, the salary of the first team that uses the sign-and-trade method to get players cannot exceed $4 million in the luxury line, which is an effective rule for the league to suppress local tycoon teams.) But in the age of the text, the deal could have been done)

Boss Alexander is still satisfied, this Maddie is younger than Francis and has a bright future. Dell. Curry is a good pitcher, and playing off the bench is not a problem. Although it was a bit painful to love the little Buddha and the fierce Cato and Anderson, they also exchanged for a first-round pick.

The Torontoonians were also very happy. They think Francis + Vince. Carter's combination is enough to make them competitive in the East, and Cato and Anderson can also enter the rotation to be good substitutes.

The history of the NBA has taken a different course at this moment.