"Lester, is there any response from the Rockets?" On June 28, 2002, in Madison Square Garden, New York, less than an hour before the start of the 2002 NBA Draft, Larry Bird was whispering to his assistant coach Lester Connell in a stand on the side of the court. Almost every year's draft is a feast, and the trades surrounding the draft before and after the draft have always been the focus of the entire trade market. Although the Pacers' draft pick this season was given to the Grizzlies last season, in the trade of Al Harrington this season, the Pacers got the Grizzlies' No. 4 pick for nothing, so Larry Bird, who holds the No. 4 pick, is also ready to make a big deal in this year's draft.

Although he has not given up on the contact with Mutombo, but Larry Bird does not want to hang himself from a tree, although this year is not a draft year, but there are still a lot of excellent insiders, in Larry Bird's scouting report, Yao Ming, Amare Stoudemire, **-Hilario are all very potential inside, especially Yao Ming and Amare Stoudemire, in Larry Bird through special channels, on the rookie report of the rival Rockets, the template formulated for Yao Ming within the Rockets is Hakim OlajuwonAs for the Pacers' scouting report, the evaluation of the two is similar to that of the Rockets, it can be said that Yao Ming and Amare Stoudemire are the two best rookies this year, and today's draft champion is likely to be one of these two.

Compared with Amare Stoudemire, who has some overlap with Jermaine O'Neal's position, what the Pacers want most is Yao Ming, 2.26 meters tall, 130+ kg weight, excellent basket footwork and offensive ability, as well as good defensive awareness and blocking ability, if the Pacers can get Yao Ming, supplemented by Jermaine O'Neal, then the big fat man who dealt with the Lakers is not a problem at all, but the rocket with the champion sign in his hand looks like Yao Ming is determined to win, not only publicly declared that Yao Ming would not be selected, but also directly sent the management team to Huaguo to contact Yao Ming's Shanghai Sharks Club, and Olajuwon, who has entered the management of the Rockets, also publicly declared that he is very much looking forward to Yao Ming taking over the flag in his hands and continuing the tradition of the Houston Rockets.

Therefore, in this case, the Pacers, who only have the No. 4 pick in their hands, have a very slim chance of getting Yao Ming, but Larry Bird did not give up, on the one hand, Larry Bird continued to blow Amarai Stoudemire in public, claiming that Studmeier was the most potential high school student he had ever seen, as for a reporter who asked Stoudemire about his future, Larry Bird bluntly said that Stoudemire's ceiling is Duncan, and the lower limit is Garnett. Immediately made a large group of melon-eating people drop their jaws, the strength of Duncan and Garnett, everyone is obvious to all, one has only entered the league for 3 seasons, and has already secured the position of the number one forward in history, and the other is one of the "four big forwards" on the same level as Duncan, one of the best inside lines in the league at present, but in the face of Larry Bird's remarks, no one stood up to refute it, on the one hand, touting rookies is a routine subject of the annual draft conference, and on the other hand, It's also because Larry Bird's vision is too vicious, since he took charge of the Pacers, Larry Bird hasn't hit every trade and every draft pick of the Pacers.

While constantly touting Stoudemire and trying to fool the Rockets, the Pacers also secretly contacted the Rockets, Bulls and Cavaliers, who have the top 3 picks, hoping to use their No. 4 pick to add some additions in exchange for the top 3 picks, preferably the top pick in the hands of the Rockets.

"Larry, Rudy said, if we're willing to send Meng, he'll think about it." Looking at Larry Bird's expectant eyes, Lester Connell looked very uncomfortable, because what Rudy Tomjanovich just said on the phone really made it impossible for him to speak to Larry Bird. Larry Bird wanted to use the No. 4 pick to add Jeff Foster or Bobby Simmons in exchange for the Rockets' top pick, but was rejected by the Rockets' head coach Rudy Tomjanovic, and Rudy Tomjanovic even used a playful tone to say to Lester Connell that only Meng Xu could exchange the Rockets' top pick in the entire Pacers.

"This old bastard." After Lester Connell finished speaking, Larry Bird pulled the tie on his chest and burst out at the same time, it seems that his foolishness in the past few days has completely failed, the Rockets are determined to use the champion pick to select Yao Ming, Rudy Tomjanovich proposed to exchange Meng Xu for the champion sign, in fact, it is a clear rejection of the Pacers' trade application, because they all know that even if the Rockets are willing to send two champion picks, the Pacers will not be able to send Meng Xu.

"What about the Wizards?" Can't put all your eggs in one basket, it's the motto of almost every businessman, let alone an old fox like Larry Bird, while secretly contacting the Rockets, the Pacers have also been discussing the possibility of a trade with the Wizards, although last season's top pick Kwame Brown was a big disappointment and was crowned the top of parallel goods, but his potential is still well known, O'Neal is impossible, as long as he polishes it properly, there is no difficulty in developing in the direction of Ben Wallace and Mutombo. At the same time, the Wizards now also have a player that the Pacers urgently need, as the former big boss of the Wizards, the second leader after Jordan's comeback, perhaps because he is too restrained to play next to his idol, Richard Hamilton's performance has not been satisfactory to Jordan, and after the end of last season, there was a message that the Wizards were ready to send Richard Hamilton away. The Pacers, on the other hand, are now starting to find a successor for Reggie Miller, who will be 38 years old next year, will significantly reduce his playing time in the new season to play sixth man or pseudo-starter, so finding a suitable scoring guard has become another important job this summer.

After Larry Bird asked Meng Xu and Reggie Miller for their opinions, Meng Xu recommended Wallis Zebiak for Larry Bird, while Reggie Miller recommended Richard Hamilton, and bluntly said that if he had a successor, then it must be Hamilton. The Pacers first contacted the Timberwolves, but the Timberwolves' asking price was too high, not only to the Pacers' No. 4 pick, but also to catch James Posey, which made Larry Bird a little unacceptable, the No. 4 pick is good to say, after all, it was obtained from the Grizzlies, James Posey is an important piece of the puzzle for the Pacers to win the championship, first-class defense, can defend from the No. 1 position to the No. 4 position, and has good organizational skills, with a shooting rate of 43% 3-point shooting rate, such a player is something that no team will give up, The Pacers are ready to send a new contract of 6 years and 48 million to James Posey, who has ended his contract, and James Posey is still a player named by Meng Xu, Meng Xu is impossible for the team to trade him away, and after the Timberwolves touched the nail, the Pacers turned to contact the Wizards.

"Michael wants to add Jermaine to the trade as well, and they send Richard and Kwamay, and we send Jermaine, the No. 4 pick and Bobby." After hearing Larry Bird's inquiry, Lester Connell took a piece of paper directly from the folder and handed it to Larry Bird.

"The Michael show is funny." After a cursory glance at the contents of the paper, Larry Bird was directly crumpled.

"So what do we do next?" After a series of setbacks, Lester Connell didn't know what to do next, the draft was about to start, and he had to ask Larry Bird to take the idea.

"It's too late." Rolling up his sleeves and looking at the watch on his arm, Larry Bird frowned: "Execute Plan B." ”