"First, any business activities or endorsements will only go ahead with your approval. I can only make suggestions."
"Second, I won't take a single cent in commission before you sign a guaranteed contract, and I won't take you to any business events that waste your time."
"Third, staying in the NBA is our top priority. I'll do everything I can to find you an NBA team, and one that has a chance of signing you to a guaranteed contract."
Inside a café, Jeff Austin explained the terms of the contract to Link one by one. Though he didn't want to admit it, the fact was that almost every clause favored Link.
This three-year management contract was far more generous than the one Carl Jones had used to swindle Link before. Jeff Austin was even asking for less than Carl Jones had. Once Link signed a guaranteed contract, Jeff Austin would take only 3 percent. For business activities and endorsements, he would take only 15 percent.
Compared with Carl Jones's 5 and 20 percent cuts, those terms were practically a bargain. But the difference was nothing to sneeze at. In the world of professional basketball, where deals could be worth hundreds of thousands or even tens of millions, a few percentage points added up to a staggering amount.
"So," Link said, picking up the contract and looking it over carefully, "I don't have any reason to turn you down."
"Of course you do. Unless a more famous or better agent comes looking for you. But as far as I know, nobody else has spotted your potential yet. They think you'll last no more than three years in the NBA before packing your bags and going home."
"Oh?" Link had never heard that before. "Then what makes you think I can survive in the NBA for more than three years?"
"First, you're humble and hardworking. Second, you're focused. Third, your potential doesn't match your age. People think that after four years in college, there's no potential left to tap. But I think you've simply lacked quality resources and the right environment. Fresno University is only a Division II NCAA team, and the Blue Team is an unremarkable G League squad. Give you the best training environment and resources, and I believe you'll be able to stay in the NBA."
After hearing Jeff Austin out, Link couldn't help but feel impressed. Everyone knew Grant Hill would never be out of work in the NBA. He played until he was forty before retiring on his own. But Link wasn't Hill, and other people might not see the potential he still had.
Jeff Austin was different, though. He liked betting on players with room to grow. Like Marc Gasol, who used to be so fat he didn't look like a professional athlete, or Antetokounmpo, who was still kicking around on a youth team in Greece's second division.
Link asked no more questions. He picked up the pen and signed the contract an agent had placed in front of him for the second time.
Hopefully, this time things wouldn't end in a damn mess like last time.
※※※
That afternoon, the Blue Team's practice included a very special event: a fan open house.
The event was modeled after the NBA's media-access sessions. During a portion of practice, fans could come in, watch, and interact with the players. Of course, they had to pay for admission. For just fifty dollars, fans could get up close and personal with professional players.
It might sound outrageous, but as a G League team without an NBA franchise backing it, the Blue Team had to find every possible way to bring in money. Plenty of teams used fan open houses to earn extra revenue. The Blue Team wasn't the only one.
Though it was essentially a business event, Link didn't mind it. The fans who were willing to pay to watch the players practice truly loved the Blue Team. In their eyes, the players were heroes, not clowns.
Link was by far the most popular person that afternoon. More fans asked him for autographs and photos than anyone else. After all, he'd played in the NBA, and he'd just broken the G League's single-game scoring record.
Not many people in Oklahoma watched the Blue Team play, but even so, Link felt the fans' enthusiasm.
At the end of the open house, Link signed an autograph for a little boy. The boy's father believed Link would become famous in the NBA someday, and urged his son to take good care of the autograph.
After signing it, Link thought the fan event was over for the day. To his surprise, someone held out an Upshaw number 0 jersey to him.
"Would you sign this for me?"
Hearing a girl's voice, Link looked up in surprise. He was even more surprised when he saw her.
He'd met the fan standing in front of him before. More precisely, before he'd crossed over, he'd seen her on 2KTV every time he played NBA 2K.
That's right. The person asking Link for an autograph was Rachel Demita.
"Rachel? I didn't expect you to come." Link smiled. They hadn't exchanged contact information the last time they'd met, and they'd both had their own lives to get on with. He'd thought they wouldn't see each other again until they'd both made a name for themselves.
He hadn't expected to run into the energetic girl at the place where he practiced every day.
"I came to see you. You played great in the last game, Link. The Rockets had just dumped you, and then you scored fifty-two against their affiliate. I have to say, you amazed me." Rachel's smile was sweet. She had a way of making people feel closer to her without even trying.
"You get back up where you fell, right? Heh. What about you? How have you been?" Link chatted with Rachel as he signed the jersey.
"Same as always. Bored out of my mind. By the way, do you have another shot at making it back to the NBA? You actually played pretty well in all three games with the Rockets. It'd be such a shame if the NBA shut you out after that."
As he watched Rachel stare at him wide-eyed, Link remembered what Jeff Austin had said. He'd told him there was a chance he wouldn't even have to travel with the team to Texas tomorrow. That meant Jeff Austin could find him a place in the NBA before tomorrow night.
Link had a lot of faith in an agent of Jeff Austin's caliber, so he nodded confidently. "I think I'll make it back to the NBA. My next stop definitely won't be Houston, though. Why? Why are you interested in the fate of a G League player?"
"I..." Rachel opened her mouth, then stopped herself. "It's nothing. I was just curious. Hey, superstar, why not write your phone number on the jersey too?"
"Huh!?" Link was startled. Counting the time before he'd crossed over, this was the first time in either of his lives that a girl had asked for his number.
"That way, when you make it back to the NBA, I can congratulate you in person."
"Oh..." Link quietly wrote down his number. There was nothing wrong with friends exchanging numbers, right?
"Ma'am, the event is over. I'm afraid you'll have to come back next time."
Link had just finished writing down his number when a security guard came over to tell Rachel it was time to leave.
After Rachel walked out of the practice facility, the rest of the Blue Team's players sidled over to Link with mischievous looks on their faces.
"Why are they acting like kids? Link's just more popular today. Look how jealous they are." Watching Link get "roughed up" by his teammates on the court, the Blue Team's assistant coach shook his head.
"It's not about being popular, man. Link's the only one among them with a female fan, hahaha!" Conner burst out laughing. That kid was looking more and more like a star.
※※※
As soon as Jeff Austin signed Link, he got to work on getting him into the NBA.
In fact, he'd already had several potential teams in mind before signing Link. Otherwise, he wouldn't have told Link he could get him back into the NBA so quickly.
The Houston Rockets? Only an idiot like Carl Jones would send Link to Houston. Aside from using him to drum up publicity, what could Houston offer him?
The Golden State Warriors? No way. The Bay Area had the largest Chinese population in the country, so it didn't take much to figure out what the Warriors wanted Link for. Link was there to play basketball, not to be a clown. So the Warriors were out too.
The Dallas Mavericks would have been a good choice, but Jeff Austin worried that the team's head coach, Carlisle, wouldn't trust a rookie.
After ruling out these teams that were interested in Link, he was left with only two options.
One was the Cleveland Cavaliers. The other was the Memphis Grizzlies.
The Cavaliers needed no introduction. Ever since James left, there'd been plenty of opportunities there. But James's departure had also left the team with almost no market presence or attention. If Link went to Cleveland, people would forget him within a month.
In the end, Jeff Austin picked up the phone and made a call. He knew the man well. Marc Gasol was one of his clients, after all, and he'd worked with the man he was about to call before.
"Hello? Jeff? What's going on this late at night?"
"Hi, Wallace. You might not know this yet, but I'm Link's agent now. I hear you're badly in need of a small forward who can play. So when should we talk about a ten-day contract?"
Jeff Austin's confidence never wavered. He didn't ask if the other man wanted Link. He went straight to asking when they'd sign the contract.
After all, Austin knew the Memphis Grizzlies had no reason to turn Link down.
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