Gathering his thoughts, Yang Shuai turned his gaze back to Kevin Garnett.
He had asked Garnett earlier what he thought of Marcus Camby, and Garnett's response had been pure disdain.
So Garnett's current excitement was understandable. After all, if given the choice, who would want to share the floor with a player they looked down on?
Besides, precisely because he had brought up Camby before, Garnett was bound to discover sooner or later that the trade had been his idea.
Rather than waiting for Garnett to find out and turn hostile down the road, it was far better to lay everything out on the table right now. That way, he would at least have a fighting chance to talk him around.
With that in mind, Yang Shuai spoke up directly. "It was my recommendation to Kupchak to trade for Camby."
Garnett froze on the spot.
Yang Shuai was just about to offer an explanation when, in the very next second, Garnett burst into booming laughter.
Then, under Yang Shuai's astonished gaze, Garnett reached out with his fist, gesturing for a bump.
After Yang Shuai completed the fist bump with an expression full of bewilderment, Garnett flashed him a big thumbs-up. "You really are something else!"
Yang Shuai was utterly baffled. For a moment, he couldn't tell whether Garnett was offering genuine praise or sarcasm.
"Don't you dislike Camby?" he asked, seeking confirmation.
"Yeah, I can't stand stat-padders," Garnett said, nodding, but then immediately followed up, "Like I said before, though, the guy's got real game."
Only then did Yang Shuai realize that Garnett's excitement had actually been pure delight. He had completely misread the man.
"Aren't you worried about his habits? Like intentionally letting opponents pass inside just so he can hunt for blocks?" Yang Shuai echoed Garnett's earlier words.
"He wouldn't dare!" Garnett's expression instantly shifted into that of a stern, forbidding father. "If he ever tries pulling that crap, I'll trash-talk him until he questions his whole damn existence."
Yang Shuai burst out laughing. He knew Garnett genuinely meant it. Leaving aside any physical altercations, as a man who could bark on the court that an opponent's wife tasted like Honey Nut Cheerios, Garnett's verbal warfare was second to none in the entire league.
Yang Shuai then pulled Tyler Holland's business card from his pocket and handed it over to Garnett.
"What's this?" Garnett asked, his face full of curiosity.
"There's a project called Twitter that's currently raising funds. If you're interested, you might want to look into it." Yang Shuai proceeded to give Garnett a quick overview of Twitter.
Since he couldn't invest on his own, passing the opportunity along to Garnett held no downside. Down the road, once Garnett made a fortune, he would have Yang Shuai to thank.
Besides, this information had come directly from a guest at Garnett's party anyway, so passing it along was essentially presenting a gift borrowed from the host's own garden.
Garnett listened, glancing at Yang Shuai with surprise, clearly not expecting him to suddenly offer an investment tip. Then, stroking his chin, he fell into deep thought.
Finally, he fixed his eyes on Yang Shuai. "What do you think the odds are of seeing a return on this?"
"Better than ninety percent." The reason Yang Shuai didn't say one hundred percent was that, theoretically, no investment carried a guaranteed hundred-percent return—even though he knew for a fact this one did.
"Think of it like Shaq investing in Google back in the day," he added, offering a vivid comparison.
In basketball circles, Shaquille O'Neal's killing on Google was common knowledge.
"All right, I'm in," Garnett agreed without hesitation.
Such a swift, decisive response caught Yang Shuai off guard.
He hadn't prepared a lengthy pitch because it had only been a casual suggestion. He had expected Garnett to at least hire professionals to evaluate the prospect rather than agreeing on the spot.
"I trust your eye," Garnett offered by way of explanation, though it sounded somewhat unconventional. "You have an uncanny knack for judging talent, and I bet your instincts with investments are just as sharp."
Garnett looked intently at Yang Shuai. "If you want in on this too, we can partner up."
This surprised Yang Shuai once again, as he had already explained to Garnett that the investment had an accreditation threshold he couldn't meet on his own.
Was Garnett doing this to tie their risks together, or was he simply extending a helping hand so Yang Shuai could participate?
Yang Shuai couldn't be certain, but regardless of the underlying reason, he had zero cause to refuse.
"Then here's to a great partnership," Yang Shuai said with a smile, extending his hand.
With their agreement struck, everything that followed unfolded smoothly.
Tyler Holland hadn't left the party yet. Yang Shuai tracked him down and brought him over, and they quickly scheduled a date to sign the contracts a few days later.
The process went off without a hitch. Garnett invested $400,000, and Yang Shuai put in $100,000, bringing their combined contribution to $500,000.
However, the five-million-dollar Series A round did not represent Twitter's total valuation; prior to the round, the company had already been valued at twenty million. In the end, their investment secured Garnett a 1.6% initial stake and Yang Shuai 0.4%.
Garnett had actually wanted to invest more, but the maximum allocation they could secure was 2%.
Even that had only been possible thanks to Tyler Holland acting as an intermediary; otherwise, far from 2%, they wouldn't have had the chance to buy even 1%.
As for Yang Shuai's hundred thousand dollars, half came from his own salary, while he persuaded his "parents" to draw the remaining half from their savings.
The original host of his body had maintained a distant relationship with his parents. Ever since Yang Shuai had transmigrated, however, not only had their bond warmed up, but with his rise from Wake Forest University's national scouting director to assistant general manager of the Los Angeles Lakers, he had become the pride of the household. Persuading them had proved surprisingly easy.
Even so, 0.4% was an exceptional outcome for Yang Shuai.
He knew that once Twitter went public in the future, its valuation would soar into the tens of billions. Even after accounting for equity dilution—which typically whittled early holdings down to thirty to forty-five percent of the original share over multiple funding rounds—and taxes, that modest percentage would still translate into tens of millions of dollars, delivering a return well north of 10,000%.
Shortly afterward, the Marcus Camby trade was officially announced. Like the aftershocks of an earthquake, it set off a storm of fierce debate among basketball fans.
Much like the outside world's split perception of Camby himself, fan reactions were divided into two stark camps.
One group felt the league was officially wrapped up. The duo of Kobe Bryant and Kevin Garnett was terrifying enough on its own; adding a reigning Defensive Player of the Year created a true Big Three. The Lakers would stomp all over their opponents every single night.
The other group insisted the Lakers had made an idiotic move. Camby was widely recognized across the league as an empty-calorie stat-padder whose playoff performances were an unmitigated disaster. Furthermore, his durability was a glaring liability: over eleven NBA seasons, he had played more than seventy games in only two of them, managing a paltry twenty-nine appearances in both the 2001–02 and 2002–03 campaigns. To make matters worse, Camby still had three years remaining on a massive contract. If his play deteriorated or he went down with an injury, he would drag the Lakers straight into the dirt.
Yet regardless of how outside fans bickered, Lakers fans were buzzing with sky-high anticipation. Over the previous two seasons, Kobe had shared the starting lineup with the likes of Smush Parker and Kwame Brown. Swapping them out for Kevin Garnett and Marcus Camby felt like trading in rusty muskets for heavy artillery.
Because the deal was a two-for-one exchange, a hole opened up at point guard.
Yang Shuai had originally planned to scout around for an experienced veteran point guard, but with free agency already concluded, their viable options were slim.
To his astonishment, before he could even produce any findings, Mitch Kupchak announced at a front-office departmental meeting that the team would be signing Sun Yue to a two-year minimum contract.
This caught Yang Shuai completely by surprise. As far as he remembered from history, Sun Yue had earned his Lakers contract only after a stellar showing in the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
He could only conclude that this was driven primarily by Jerry Buss.
On a title contender, Sun Yue wouldn't see the floor outside of garbage time. His presence on the roster, however, would undeniably amplify the Lakers' visibility in China.
That commercial angle had obviously been factored in back when they drafted him. Now that the Lakers had moved their championship timetable up, it was only natural to harvest that commercial value ahead of schedule as well.
In truth, the signing wouldn't alter the Lakers' on-court fortunes all that much. At point guard, they already had Derek Fisher and Delonte West; whoever held the third spot wouldn't see meaningful minutes anyway.
Even if unexpected injuries struck, Kobe could always slide over to handle primary playmaking duties, and the front office could still execute midseason trades.
For the Chinese men's national basketball team, however, this signing would have a profound impact.
By joining the Lakers early, even without game time, a full year of training in the Lakers' professional environment would sharpen Sun Yue's skills tremendously, allowing him to provide far greater support to the national squad at the Olympics.
Moreover, the coming NBA season would mark the very first time three Chinese players were active in the league at once. Chinese fans would even have the luxury of choosing which domestic derby to tune in to—a truly happy dilemma to have.
***
[1] In 2008, the US federal income tax was progressive: 10% on $0–$8,000; 15% on $8,000–$32,100; 25% on $32,000–$78,000; and 28% on $78,000–$160,000, amounting to roughly $19,000 in federal tax on a $100,000 income. California state tax was likewise progressive: 1.0% on $0–$6,800; 2.0% on $6,800–$16,000; 4.0% on $16,000–$25,000; 6.0% on $25,000–$35,000; 8.0% on $35,000–$44,000; and 9.3% on $44,000 and above, totaling about $6,200 on $100,000. Combined with Social Security at 6.2% and Medicare at 1.45% ($7,650 total), take-home pay on a $100,000 salary came out to around $67,000.
Chapter 52