Yao's shoe contract

I just want to see the commercial with Steve through alley oops to Yao with a Jay-Z track in the background.

 

I thought this dude works for Adidas.

 

Do you know the editor of SLAM Basketball magazine?
I do.
His name is Russ.
Russ has been collecting basketball shoes since...forever.
SLAM gets all the new stuff sent to them before release and even gets some player exclusives.
Here is what Russ has to say about RBK:

Dear Reebok,

Please stop spending money on signing everybody and their brother and spend some money on research and development instead. Face it--at this point more people are gettintg paid to wear your shoes than are paying to wear them. The Iverson line has gone steadily downhill, and your biggest seller was a straight Gucci knockoff (S Dots).

I wouldn't be writing this if i thought you couldn't do it--the Question is still one of my favorite basketball shoes. It just seems like lately too much attention has been paid to personalities, and not enough to what you're supposed to be all about: performance.

Thanks,
--Ed.

 

Funny article I found on the net. Didn't realize that Yao's contract is going to top Jordan and King James.


<b>An Endorsement for Everybody</b>

Mason G. Williams
9/26/2003

In today’s age of mass communications, global communities, worldwide markets, and the multicultural NBA, endorsements abound and the money flows like the River Nile. <b>This week, Reebok announced its plans to seduce Yao Ming away from Nike with the largest shoe contract in sports history. Yao, a three-year NBA transplant from China, would trump Jordan, Iverson, and even King Lebron James as the athlete with the greatest value per foot. </b>

Reebok’s international vision elucidates the changing image of the NBA and the markets companies seek to infiltrate and influence in the years to come. Yao’s signing means that the NBA has truly become a global entity. Jordan products sold well in Europe and Asia, but in Yao, the people of the Far East have one of their own superstars who has returned after conquering the American Market. For Chinese, Japanese, and Korean people, Yao represents the new face of Asia. He is a source of pride for all, and on top of that, he is a damn good basketball player.

Now, in the true European/American capitalistic tradition, Reebok has designs on signing Yao to a lifetime contract and marketing him back to the people he came from. This is a perfect example of Malthusian economics at its dastardly finest. Lifetime contract screams indentured servitude, but I’d be an indentured servant for that kind of money. Plus, Yao Ming probably has the biggest feet in the NBA, so why wouldn’t he merit the largest contract?

Yao deserves the money, especially if he is going to open up the market in the most populous continent on earth. But Yao’s contract made me realize that there is a lot of room for NBA players to get lucrative endorsement deals. So, I would like to throw out the following possible endorsement deals to current NBA players. If any of these come through, I’ll accept a flat fee of $500,000. Just a tad for Mason, right off the top.

First, I’d like to help some players who haven’t reaped the benefits of the endorsement train. Vin Baker could ride on Charles Barkley’s coattails and start doing spots for Sharps non-alcoholic beer. Chuck would be getting trashed, throwing midgets through plate glass windows, fondling women, and rapidly approaching Shamu-size maximum density, while Vin would be sitting in the background, looking slightly morose, lonely, faking like he was studying the Celtics playbook, and staring into his Sharp’s. The tag line would be, “Sharps…Damn I can’t wait to retire and drink again!” Vin would be great in this role because he always has that semi-depressed look in his eyes.

Next, I would seek to help out Scottie Pippen. He’s had a rough go of it as far as endorsements go. He’s always been second fiddle. Everyone knows that Scottie plays nobody’s second fiddle when it comes to nasal capacity. That’s why I’m working hard to get Scottie a deal with Breathe-Right nasal strips. You know, those silly looking bandaids linebackers wear all of the time. Scottie would be perfect. We could get a piece of duct-tape, strap it across Scottie’s vast expanse of protruding nasal cavity and call it the Breathe-Right Maxi Joint. “If it gets this brother breathing, imagine what it will do for you.” Bam, I think that idea will skyrocket in the Aborigine, Eastern-European, and James Brown markets. For the Super Bowl version of the commercials, Scottie would team up with Michael Irvin and Darryl Strawberry, two other guys whose fame revolves around their olfactory organs.

I have a sneaking suspicion that public service announcements will make a huge comeback this year. When I was young, athletes encouraged me to “Don’t do milk,” “Say no to school,” and “Stay in drugs.” Wait, I think I might have mixed those up, but it was something like that. Anyhow, I think NBA players could really help sway the populace on important issues that face the nation. Take affirmative action, for instance. I’m pitching an idea that would have Mark Madsen, Pat Garrity, and Dan Dickau sitting on a decrepit bench in an empty arena. The three of them would espouse on the notion that jobs in the NBA are harder to come by if you come from a disadvantaged situation. “Fully educated, American-born, European Americans are being run out of the league, and if something isn’t done to turn the tide, we may never again enjoy the fluidity of Sven Nater, the dynamic stylings of Fred Nelson, or the sheer genius of Brad Lohaus,” Madsen would so elegantly speak. Garrity would chime in, “please, support the NBA’s Twelfth Man On the Bench Program…because everybody should have the chance to play.” I’m welling up with tears.

Cross-marketing, or the ability to market oneself on television and in some other media outlet, is ripe for the picking. Damon Stoudamire is the man when it comes to the finer, greener aspects of partying. Not only would Damon boost sales of High-Times magazine, he would work wonders on the Home Shopping Network. Imagine Damon’s personally designed line of bongs, pipes, and stash boxes. He could sit up on a stool, wearing a hemp suit, exchanging witty repartee with Tommy Chong and Woody Harrelson, all while selling bongs to 15-year-old stoners who are listening to "The Dark Side of the Moon" for the very first time. Damon would sign off each night by saying, “It ain’t my fault if your ass gets caught…goodnight, and good trip.”

Last, but certainly, not least, I want to help Shawn Kemp out. If I don’t, no one will. Shawn stormed into the league with the Seattle SuperSonics, but eventually he lost a lot of his happy juice. Shawn spread the Rainman seed across the nation, and now he deals with life and the baby-momma syndrome. That’s why Shawn would be the perfect pitchman for Lifestyle condoms. The ad campaign would mimic those smoking commercials where the lady smokes through a hole in her throat. That ad scared me to death, because it could really happen.

Similarly, the baby-momma syndrome can really happen. Here’s the treatment for the ad. It starts with footage of Shawn Kemp dunking on everyone as a Sonic. Shawn blocking shots. Shawn dunking on Hakeem. Shawn talking to the ladies. While this is happening, Shawn is narrating:

“I stormed into the league so fierce, they had to call me the Rainman. But, even the Rainman gets wet in the rain if he doesn’t wear a raincoat.”

Then we cut to a graphic image of milk being poured onto a garden, and lo and behold, many little seedlings sprout from the garden. Then, we cut back to Shawn, looking disheveled in and Orlando Magic uniform that barely fits him. Shawn interjects,

“Now I lumber off the bench, and I haven’t seen my check since 1998. I start my Christmas shopping in July, and every week I go to a different birthday party. Please, buy Lifetyles condoms, or else your lifestyle will definitely change. This is Shawn Kemp, and nowadays, the Rainman always wears a raincoat.”

The point of the story is that there are tons of endorsement deals out there for all NBA players. You don’t have to be the upper-echelon guys. You can all do it if you have a good team pushing you in the right direction. If your career bus needs steering, just hand the wheel over to good ol’ Mason, and let me lead you to the money.


http://www.jtthebrick.com/fanclub/NBAfans/article.asp?team=NBA&id=40127

 

Is making fun of Drunks really funny?

























Yes














Making fun of alcoholics, No