After losing the Christmas Day game, the 2007 Cavaliers played two more games.
One home game against the Heat, and one home game against the Bobcats.
They lost to the Heat and beat the Bobcats, and the loss to the Heat was the Cavaliers' first consecutive losing streak this season.
The team's condition has declined visibly.
But no one paid attention to it, because the Cavaliers' record was still first in the league, and a few losses didn't seem to mean much.
Throughout December, the Cavaliers played 14 games and had a record of 10 wins and 4 losses. Having lost four games, they were not the team with the best record in the Eastern Conference in December, because the Celtics only lost 2 games.
Although in one of those two games, they lost to the Cavaliers in a head-to-head matchup.
December is over, 2007 has passed, and time has entered 2008. Before the financial crisis completely swept through, Lin Yu finally finalized his new sneaker contract.
Amanda Gray was far away in Portland. After a long week of negotiations, she struggled to upgrade the contract offered by Nike to a level that Lin Yu was satisfied with.
Then, she dialed Lin Yu's phone number.
"Nike's final offer was compared to Under Armour. The term was shortened to 6 years, with a guaranteed minimum contract of US$70 million, plus various bonus clauses, namely, the dunk champion and the first-team All-NBA first-team bonus of US$1 million, and the scoring champion reward.
US$3 million, regular season MVP, championship plus FMVP bonus of US$5 million..."
"No problem, then contact Nike and choose a time to sign the contract."
Lin Yu was also very straightforward and directly agreed to the contract.
"The time for signing must be after the end of the season, because your sneaker contract with Under Armor has not yet expired. In addition, Nike hopes to go to China and hold a grand signing ceremony. They are already making arrangements.
The time is set after the finals. In addition to the signing ceremony, you will be very busy in the summer and before the Olympics, because Nike has also arranged a trip to China covering seven cities for you..."
"..."
Lin Yu suddenly wanted to say, why not stop signing it?
Amanda Gray also guessed the reason for the silence on the other side of the phone. She immediately told Lin Yu: "Lin, all the big-name stars signed by Nike have to be busy like this during the offseason."
"This is how much money you get, how much you do."
Lin Yu raised his hands and surrendered: "Okay, is there no other arrangement?"
"Uh... there are no plans for the summer, but now, you have to prepare. When I come back from Portland, you have to accept exclusive interviews from many media, including an interview with Time Magazine. I remember you seemed to have accepted
An exclusive interview with Normal University Weekly?”
"Yes, I have also been on the cover of Time Magazine." Lin Yu nodded, but he quickly realized: "Why do I have so many exclusive interviews? Can't I reject one or two?"
"I'm afraid not, because many of these interviews are officially requested by the league, because you were elected as the top vote-getter in the first stage of this year's All-Star voting, with a huge lead... The league has realized that you are the most popular player in the league today.
Star players, they want you to cooperate with the promotion."
"The top vote-getter in the first stage? Still leading by a huge margin?"
Lin Yu was not surprised, but he was a little confused about how big his lead was.
#
After hanging up the phone from Amanda Gray, he quickly saw the voting data officially announced by the league.
"The results of the first phase of the All-Star voting during the 2008 New Orleans All-Star Weekend have been released. Congratulations to Cleveland Cavaliers swingman Lin Yu, who became the top vote-getter in this phase!"
Then came the specific voting rankings. Lin Yu ranked first, with a total of 1.58 million votes.
He quickly looked at the second place. The second place was Kobe Bryant from the West Coast. Because of the Lakers' outstanding record in the new season and their crazy scoring in the first two seasons, Kobe gained many die-hard fans and fans.
As a result, Kobe was voted second in the first stage.
However, he only received 970,000 votes, which was a full 610,000 votes less than Lin Yu!
"Isn't the gap too big? Did the alliance change the vote counting rules to include the votes in China?"
Lin Yu shook his head. He thought it was unlikely. If the votes from China were included, his total number of votes might be doubled.
This shows that his current number of votes is likely just due to more domestic fans going over the wall to vote, and that he has won the favor of more overseas fans.
Lin Yu continued to look down. Ranked third was the Celtics' Garnett. This season, Garnett's outstanding performance has gradually turned Pierce's house into his, averaging 20.7 points and 12.4 points per game.
With data of 2.7 assists, 1.5 steals and 1.8 blocks, he is back to his peak.
Ranked fourth is Dwight Howard, who has exploded this season. The progress of Warcraft this season is obvious to all. Under his leadership, the Magic ranked among the top four in the Eastern Conference. He himself also scored 20.5 points, 14.4 rebounds and 2.1 blocks.
With average data per game, he has become the new number one center in the league in major rankings.
Ranked fifth was Dayao. When Lin Yu saw Dayao's ranking, he was even more certain that the votes from China were still not counted. Otherwise, he and Dayao would at least take the top two spots.
But now Dayao is only ranked fifth, which explains everything.
After the top five, Lin Yu finally saw James' name. With 780,000 votes, James's votes were only half of Lin Yu's.
“Why is this guy’s vote count so low?”
The first time he saw it, Lin Yu was a little confused, but then he understood that in the first stage of voting, the number of votes James should have received was around 800,000 or 900,000 votes, plus Lin Yu's split votes.
, it’s understandable that James’s votes were only half of Lin Yu’s.
"This guy is probably going to go crazy, right?"
#
Lin Yu was really right. After the results of the first phase of the All-Star voting were announced, James was serious all day long. Although it looked like nothing on the surface, he was already furious inside.
James has always taken personal honors, popularity, and his position in the team very seriously.
Originally, facing the menacing Lin Yu and James who had been loudly claiming that he did not care about the team position or personal honor, Maverick Carter, Randy Mims and Rich Paul had given up.
They continue to persuade because they feel that their persuasion has no effect on the surface.
But later, they discovered that they did not need to continue to persuade, and James gradually began to take action.
So, in fact, their persuasion is effective.
This time, the situation faced by James was even worse. Not only was he twice beaten by Lin Yu in the All-Star vote and the Best of the Month, he also lost to Orlando's Howard.
After finally suppressing Lin Yu within the Cavaliers, he lost to Howard outside the team.
After a month of hard work, he got nothing.
Maverick Carter, Randy Mims and Rich Paul persuaded again, and the real James emerged.
"Don't worry, Marv, Richie, I know next month is very important, and I will work hard to let everyone know who is the real All-Star vote winner!"
Finally, Maverick Carter, Randy Mims and Rich Paul saw a LeBron James who was surrounded by ambition and was already somewhat desperate.
