Legendary Basketball Tycoon

The 1998-99 season ended with the San Antonio Spurs winning the championship for the first time.

Of course, in addition to the Spurs winning the championship this year, there is actually another major event in the NBA that attracts attention.

That happened before the start of the regular season, that is, the "yin and yang contract" event that occurred in the previous life.

This is true in the past life, and so is this life.

As we all know, "yin and yang contracts" basically often appear in the entertainment circle, and similar incidents have also occurred in the sports circle. As the protagonist, the Minnesota Timberwolves also paid a lot for the black-box operation of this "yin and yang contract". .

For an NBA team, "black box operation" in the league means taking a huge risk of losing a large amount of money and future draft picks. If you really decide to take such a risk, then the first thing to be sure is that this player is worthy of the team.

This player, no, should be exactly this star, at least a superstar, a superstar who can change the status quo of the team and even help the team become a contender for the championship.

The Timberwolves chose Joe Smith, but is Joe Smith such a superstar? The answer is obviously no, but the Timberwolves took such a risk for him before the 1998-99 season.

No way, due to the butterfly effect, the Timberwolves failed to get Garnett in the 95th NBA Draft. What about the Timberwolves' insiders? The first few seasons were entirely dependent on role players like Tom Gugliota. Carry the flag.

Over the years, I have been searching in the free market for a long time, and no star has been willing to come to this place. Therefore, the management of Timberwolves can only focus on the players whose rookie contracts have expired! Therefore, the Timberwolves planned the "yin and yang contract" incident.

Why choose Joe Smith? !

In the 1995 NBA Draft, Joe Smith was selected by the Golden State Warriors as the No. 1 pick. Unfortunately, because the 1994 champion Glenn Robinson asked the Bucks for a huge price as soon as he entered the league, and finally got a 10-year contract of $68.15 million. Forced the league to use strict rookie wages in 1995. Joe Smith, who is also the top pick, can only get a three-year, $8.53 million rookie contract.

Compared with Glenn Robinson a year ago, the lack of so much money obviously made Joe Smith dissatisfied. Therefore, when the Warriors offered him a $80 million renewal offer, Joe Smith chose He refused, believing that he could get a higher offer in the free agent market.

In the 1998-99 season, NBA labor disputes were suspended. After the suspension ended, Joe Smith signed a one-year $1.75 million contract with the Timberwolves as a free agent. The salary was much lower than the market price at the time. In fact, many people were wondering why Joe Smith was willing to accept this ultra-low offer from Timberwolves. After all, he was the one who refused to renew his contract with $80 million.

Signing a contract with the Timberwolves at a base salary, this matter still attracted the attention of all parties. Many people suspect that the Timberwolves privately reached an agreement with Joe Smith, and the two parties must have signed a "yin and yang contract."

Unfortunately, I didn't expect this incident to happen because of internal disputes in Joe Smith's brokerage team.

When Joe Smith signed with the Timberwolves, his agent Miller and Fresher were still striving for the same goal. Miller wanted to take the two most important clients of the brokerage company, Garnett and Joe Smith, as his own. Frescher was dissatisfied with this, so he disclosed these things to the public.

At that time, Miller kept all of Joe Smith’s “yin and yang contracts” on file, and the league later obtained these evidences written in black and white. Even if the Timberwolves want to appeal, under such hard evidence, they have no excuses for rebuttal.

According to the secret agreement, after Joe Smith signed such a one-year low-price contract three times in a row, the Timberwolves would be able to obtain Smith's "Byrd Clause", which means they can renew him beyond the salary cap. At that time, the Timberwolves promised to provide Joe Smith with a large contract with a total amount of up to 86 million US dollars. Such a private agreement was obviously an illegal operation. Therefore, when the alliance finally discovered this secret, the Timberwolves were in big trouble!

This operation is beneficial to both parties: As for the Timberwolves, if they obtain Joe Smith’s Byrd clause, they can renew him on the hat and avoid the luxury tax. This is beneficial to the Timberwolves' future lineup formation and strength improvement; As for Joe Smith, he can get his three-year salary first, and then get a maximum salary contract with the maximum amount of US$86 million to satisfy his pursuit of a big contract.

The "yin and yang contract" incident occurred, and the league's ticket was sent to the Timberwolves owner Glenn Taylor's table not long after. Many people say that this is one of the harshest tickets in NBA history, and once affected the development of the Timberwolves and Joe Smith in the next 10 years.

For Joe Smith, the league stated that all his contract with the Timberwolves for the role of the Timberwolves is void, and the Timberwolves no longer have Smith’s Byrd clause. For the Timberwolves, they were first fined $3.5 million. At the same time, the team's draft picks for the next three years were stripped of the league. This also means that the Timberwolves signed Joe Smith for "opportunity" and almost completely ruined the future. The team’s owner Glen Taylor and vice president of basketball affairs McHale were also punished. Both of them will be banned from watching and participating in all Timberwolves games in the next year.

Of course, the final result is that Joe Smith still signed with the Timberwolves, but in accordance with the normal procedures, the two sides signed a six-year contract of 34 million.

As for whether Joe Smith's future will remain the same as his previous life, it is unclear.

I have to say that Stern’s punishment was quite severe this time, and he didn’t mean to keep his hands. Of course, this is also because there have been a lot of various "exciting stories" in the NBA in recent years. Understand.

Of course, if you violate the rules of the game, you should be punished. This is also an irrefutable truth. I believe that from then on, the "yin and yang contract" will definitely disappear completely in the NBA. After all, the cost of being caught and punished is too great, and no team is willing to bear it, and the league will continue to be escorted by a normal and healthy market order. It has developed and has become a model of professionalization, marketization and standardization of global competitive sports.