On the evening of June 9, 2007, the NBA officially announced a trade. The Chicago Bulls sent Ben Gordon, Yi Jianlian, along with 2008, 2010, and 2012 first-round picks in exchange for Yao Ming.
As soon as the news was released, it shook the entire basketball world!
The media coverage was overwhelming, fans heatedly discussed it, and management teams from various teams were caught off guard.
For the Bulls, these chips amounted to Ben Gordon plus four first-round picks, and they could trade for Yao Ming? Had Aleksandar gone mad?
The next morning, the Rockets held a press conference, stating, "Yao desires to win a championship, and our recruitment in recent years has been unsuccessful, rendering us temporarily unable to build a team capable of competing for the championship. We are willing to help him find a perfect team for him, hoping he can fulfill his championship dream, and we also got the talents we wanted, the talents of Gordon and Yi are exhilarating..."
Yao Ming also expressed his thanks to the Rockets over the years through a phone interview, wished the Rockets well in the future, and conveyed his anticipation of joining the Chicago Bulls.
Seeing the explanation from the Rockets, the American media and fans were all baffled—willing to help a player who wants to leave by sending Yao Ming to a team where he can realize his championship dream.
If Yao Ming was 37, this narrative would be acceptable, but Yao Ming hadn’t even turned 27!
Popovich directly appeared on camera cursing...
The reactions from the media, fans, and management teams were almost exactly as Zhang Yang had anticipated.
From a normal person’s perspective, the Rockets’ trade was no different from madness.
Even if Yao Ming truly wanted to leave, the Rockets should have demanded more talents, shouldn’t they?
The Chicago Bulls still had Hinrich, Luol Deng, Nocioni, Duhon... and other talented newcomers who had realized their potential.
But the Rockets only wanted Ben Gordon!
However, considering that the Rockets owner was Aleksandar, Zhang Yang thought this trade was nothing but normal.
In Aleksandar’s eyes, the return offered by the Chicago Bulls, where Ben Gordon was not the main piece of the trade but Yi Jianlian was, with Ben Gordon and three first-round picks just being add-ons.
Yesterday at noon, Zhang Yang received a call from Tellem. Even before Tellem mentioned the assets involved, Zhang Yang guessed that Yi Jianlian must have been used as a bargaining chip, otherwise, Tellem, who had little connection with Yao Ming, wouldn’t have known about it, as there was no hint of it online at that time.
Plus, if it wasn’t for Yi Jianlian being the trade asset, the Rockets wouldn’t have traded under the circumstances that Yao Ming hadn’t publicly fallen out with them.
But Zhang Yang hadn’t seen any news about Yao Ming and the Rockets breaking down, and Yao Ming wasn’t even listed among the players requesting trades exposed by the media.
This meant Yao Ming still cared about face, having only privately fallen out with the Rockets, insisting on leaving. Aleksandar didn’t want to completely lose the Chinese market, opting for a ’fulfillment’ act, and as a second choice chose Yi Jianlian.
Team talent, performance... none was as important as money; if all those high-quality players from the Bulls were rookies or had only one or two years executed in their rookie contracts, Aleksandar might have wanted them. But Hinrich’s rookie contract had already ended, Deng’s rookie contract was in its last year, Duhon, a second-round pick, had signed only a 1-year rookie contract, and the low-cost 3-year $9 million contract extended in the summer of ’05 had already been executed for two years, leaving only one year. Wanting to renew it would cost five to six million a year...
If it weren’t for Ben Gordon averaging 21.4 points in his third year, looking like the best talent of the Bulls, Aleksandar probably wouldn’t have wanted him.
Taking away Ben Gordon, Zhang Yang figured that Aleksandar probably wanted to form a double-guard ticket-selling duo? Indeed, ticket sales were good at the Nuggets, the Wizards’ Big Three also had good box office, and even the old SuperSonics’ trio of marksmen didn’t worry about ticket sales.
However, Zhang Yang remembered that Ben Gordon relied heavily on passing.
In his memory, Ben Gordon had refused to renew his contract during the ’24 incident’ in the 07-08 season, had turned down a 5-year $60 million contract offered by the Bulls after his rookie contract ended in ’08, and even rejected the Bulls’ proposal of a sign-and-trade, opting for a 1-year qualifying offer. In ’09, he signed a 5-year average yearly $10 million contract with the Pistons as a free agent, preferring to earn less rather than give the Bulls any return.
But after leaving Hinrich and Rose, Ben Gordon’s first year of the new contract turned into a contract fiasco, averaging only 13 points and dipping even further to 11 points the next year.
Bench Joe ultimately had a draft right attached by the Pistons and sent to Jordan’s team, then Jordan waived him using the Arenas provision.
The waiving of Bench Joe by Jordan was a relatively hot topic at that time.
After browsing the news for a while, Zhang Yang opened the NBA official website, entered the Chicago Bulls page, and looked at the roster of the Chicago Bulls... overwhelming!
On the Bulls’ player salary page, Zhang Yang saw that with PJ Brown and Michael Sweetney’s contracts expiring and Hinrich’s new contract not yet officially in effect only occupying bird rights space, the total salary was only $42.79 million, directly absorbing the remainder of Yao Ming’s four-year near-max salary.
Zhang Yang felt that the Bulls really understood how to utilize the ’rookie bonus,’ having absorbed Ben Wallace last summer with a bunch of rookie contracts taking up little space, and this year, leveraging the salary cap space to take in Yao Ming.
Hinrich, Nocioni, Duhon, Deng, Sefolosha, Adrian Griffin, Malik Allen, Wallace... and Yao Ming.