David Stern presided over the general manager meeting, and everyone was busy, and David Stern knew that, so he went straight to the topic of the meeting, and his secretary was also handing out the relevant documents.

"At this meeting, our main topic was to vote on whether to add another team in Charlotte......"

As soon as David Stern's words fell, the general managers sitting on the side immediately sounded a discordant voice: "Of course I refused, the plate is so big, I don't understand why we want to expand the army and add a team, isn't this robbing us of resources." ”

Qiao Hai had been reading the information, and suddenly heard such a discordant voice, he couldn't help but turn his head to look over, he sniffled, it was Clippers owner Donald Sterling.

"Why is this guy here? He's the general manager of the Clippers? ”

Mitch Kupchak sat on Joe's left side, this kind of general manager meeting, Kupchak has attended many times, and for the appearance of Donald Sterling, Kupchak is used to it.

"Elgin (Baylor) doesn't usually come to meetings like this, so Donald will take Elgin's place."

Kupchak then whispered again: "This guy is a-stirring stick, messing up a lot of issues in the league, I guess, David Stern already hates him so much." ”

Qiao Hai shook his head secretly, fortunately, Rocket owner Leslie Alexander just picked a little, and Alexander generally does not point fingers at the team's affairs.

At least, Qiao Hai's current boss is not a weird like Donald Sterling, which is lucky.

But thinking of this, Qiao Hai thought of this expansion again, and Stu Jackson's words seemed to still be in his ears: "This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity." ”

Maybe Qiao Hai should join in, but who should he pull in?

……

At the meeting, Donald Sterling's objection made David Stern's face a little worse, and he also knew that Donald Sterling was a strange guy, so Stern ignored Sterling.

Directly announced: "Alright, let's vote directly." ”

On the issue of military expansion, a vote was opened.

"Raise your hand in agreement with the expansion of the army."

Qiao Hai raised his hand in agreement, and he glanced at Michkupchak beside him, who also raised his hand.

Then, Qiao Hai looked around.

Nearly everyone had their hands up, including Grizzlies general manager Billy Knight, and Raptors general manager Glenn Grove......

The only one who didn't raise his hand was Donald Sterling.

David Stern asked again with a dark face: "Raise your hand in disagreement." ”

Donald Sterling held his hand aloft.

However, his raise of hand was useless, David Stern didn't look at him, and directly announced: "28 votes agreed, 1 vote disagreed, the proposal passed, and in the 2004-2005 season, the league will add a new team in Charlotte." ”

……

At the end of the meeting, Qiao Hai left New York with the conference materials.

Whether to get involved in the expansion of the army, Qiao Hai has not yet thought about it, because for him, there are still many problems in this matter.

The job of the rocket is not too much of a problem, Qiao Hai was not willing to sign a long-term contract at the beginning, and he was afraid that he would have some temporary plans, so he only signed a two-year contract.

At present, there are two main problems, one is that Qiao Hai has no money.

Although when leaving the Grizzlies, because there was a clear clause in the contract that the team's transfer rights must belong to Qiao Hai, the Grizzlies violated this clause, so Qiao Hai did not pay liquidated damages and left the Grizzlies.

When he left, Qiao Hai also took more than 3 million US dollars, which included Qiao Hai's salary and various bonus terms during the season.

In addition, the less than $10 million he got in the Celestial Empire some time ago was given to part of Qiao's father, and some of it was also taken by Qiao Hai.

Coupled with the profits of HOOP in the United States and Tianchao Fire, Qiao Hai would have had a total of about $10 million in cash.

But just a month ago, Qiao Hai bought a mansion on the shores of Lake Winther on the West Side of Houston, covering an area of more than 800 square meters, and spent Qiao Hai more than $1 million.

Then, Qiao Hai spent more than 500,000 dollars to buy the latest Maybach as his new car.

As a result, Qiao Hai's deposit suddenly fell to less than 9 million US dollars.

Less than $10 million in cash is too little compared to $300 million in military spending.

Another problem is that Qiao Hai needs to find a consortium that can work together, and the big boss must be a giant crocodile who can come up with more than 200 million funds.

In the past few years, Qiao Hai has only focused on basketball in the United States, and he doesn't know much about this level of big bosses, only former Grizzlies owner John McCaw is at this level.

But apparently, John McCaw has retired from basketball and is unlikely to come back.

Or even if you come back, you can't go to Charlotte to invest in a team, that's the problem.

Qiao Hai couldn't solve the two problems, and the matter of investing in the expansion of the team could only be put on hold temporarily.

……

……

Joe returned to Houston, and the Rockets' remaining four preseason games were played one after another.

Two Pacers, this season's Pacers are still one of the strong teams in the East, but due to the butterfly effect brought by Joe, Ron Artest did not go to the Pacers as in his previous life, and he was replaced by Ron Mercer and Brad Miller.

With the original Jermaine O'Neal and Reggie Miller, and AlHarrington, who is improving year by year, the strength of this Pacers team is definitely better than the Rockets.

Two games, the first of which was on the road, the Rockets lost again.

In this game, Yao Ming continued to come off the bench, and his performance finally picked up, scoring 8 points, 4 rebounds and 1 block on 4-of-7 shooting, which made people see hope.

In the second home game, the Rockets finally won their first preseason game with a score of 111-104, and Yao Ming only played 7 minutes, getting 3 and 2 rebounds.

The key to the Rockets' victory is the outside players.

Steve Francis chipped in 31 points and 5 assists, Ron Artest chipped in 20 points, 10 rebounds and 3 assists, and Jamal Crawford off the bench chipped in 25 points, 2 rebounds and 6 assists, and the Rockets relied on the explosion of the outside trio to win their first preseason game.

In the next two Hornets, the Rockets continued to win one and lose one.

Yao Ming's performance also continued to pick up, scoring 7 points, 4 rebounds, 2 assists and 1 block on 2-of-2 shooting and 3 free throws in a game, and 10 points and 2 rebounds on 5-of-6 shooting, and finally breaking a double-double in a single game.

But it is obvious that Yao Ming's performance is not satisfactory, eight preseason games, the highest score is only 11 points, and the highest rebound is only 8, such a performance, for a champion, can only be said to be unqualified.