NJ Nets big in China? Show me the game plan
Friday, 22nd October 2010 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (2)
The New Jersey Nets are going to be big in China—just ask the New Jersey Nets. Judging from his comments in a recent New York Times piece inspired by the Nets' trip to Russia and China, Nets CEO Brett Yormark believes the Nets are destined to build a huge fan base in China. The story is called For the Nets, a Journey Toward Becoming a Global Brand Has Just BegunMichael Wines writes:
"Brett Yormark is talking about the incredible global marketing potential of the New Jersey Nets, a concept — New Jersey, the Nets and global marketing potential — that might seem unlikely until you hear his pitch, and remember that two years from now, they will probably be the New York Nets.
Or the New York-London Nets. Or maybe the Newyorkmoscowlondonbeijing Nets."
Yes, the Nets have had the most international pre-season of any NBA team, with visits to Russia and China. And next spring, they will take on the Toronto Raptors in the first NBA regualr season games to be played outside of North America. And their new owner, Mikhail Prokhorov, is a Russian billionaire. But when it comes to China, despite a year with a Chinese player on their roster, the Nets lack a strong following.
Like the Milwaukee Bucks before them, the Nets traded away their best link to China
I can't comment as to the Nets' situation in the UK or Russia. But after an historically bad season in 2009-10, they traded away their best link to China, when they sent Yi Jianlian to the Washington Wizards in May. Dropping Yi will mean the team loses much of its media exposure on the mainland, where having a Chinese player on your roster means free air time—magazine features on him and his teammates, regular columns and sections in the sports newspapers dedicated to your franchise, highlights on the evening news every time he's in a game, and a higher percentage of your games broadcast. That all goes to the Washington Wizards, whose rookie John Wall is sure to sell lots of jerseys in Yi's home province, Guangdong.
The Yi trade was largely considered a move to create cap space for then-soon-to-be free agent Lebron James, which would have helped address the team's second problem in China, which is also a problem in the United States—the fact that they have never won an NBA championship.
But apparently Nets CEO Yormark thinks that the team has a unique appeal that will translate to international success. Wines quotes Yormark:
"I've been in the business now for 20-plus years, and I don't think there's a franchise in any sport right now that has the type of clarity and 'runway,' as I call it, over the course of the next couple of years, as we do."
Prokhorov not only predicts a playoff appearance this year, and a title within five. He also says: "This will be the first truly global team in the NBA, with exceptional international exposure no other team can reach." (NJ.com)
In actuality, the Nets are far from a big hit in China, and the team has revealed no plans that are likely to change that. If a visit to Beijing translated into a new fan base, you would see a lot more Nuggets and Pacers jerseys around the city (those two teams played the NBA China Games in the 2009 preseason).
The teams that are big in China, according to three years of informal polling by yours truly, are the Los Angeles Lakers (recent championship, one of the best two players in the league), Houston Rockets (Yao Ming) and Chicago Bulls (Michael Jordan, 90s run of championships). The Boston Celtics (recent championship) and San Antonio Spurs (recent championships, first Chinese player to win an NBA championship) are on the second tier. Even the Dallas Mavericks seem to have faded in popularity, despite being the first NBA team to welcome a Chinese player, drafting Wang Zhizhi in 1999.
In sports, as in other business, there seems to be an over exuberant belief in what a visit to China can do for your brand. Fans can be forgiven for thinking that all China needs is to see their team up close, and they'll fall in love. It's not that simple—the trip is only a first step, and will amount to nothing without a strategic, long-term approach.
If the Nets want to boost their image in China, they'll need to put the right spin on their upcoming move. I love Brooklyn, but most Chinese people do not. Every conversation I have had with Chinese friends about the borough indicates that most regard it as dirty and dangerous. It's not an image that can be changed with an ad campaign or a flashy new arena. The New York Nets would be much more palatable to Beijingers, but while you're changing the name, why not take advantage of the opportunity to call yourself something more exciting? Would Dragons or Tigers be a pathetically obvious overture to China?
Yi Jianlian Nets image: fjsen.com
Tags: Mikhail Prokhorov, NBA, New Jersey Nets, Yi Jianlian
Yao's trip to China for Rockets-Nets preseason series
Tuesday, 19th October 2010 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (0)
This year's annual NBA China Games was supposed to be NBA China's dream matchup—seven-time all-star Yao Ming of the Houston Rockets facing Yi Jianlian on their home soil. But after Yi was traded to the Washington Wizards, the games became all about Yao and the Rockets.Game 1 was in Beijing, and Houston won, 91-81. Yao played 19 minutes, scored 9 points, and grabbed 4 rebounds. The Rockets also took Game 2 in Guangzhou, and Yao notched 10 points and 5 rebounds, again in 19 minutes.
Here's a look at some of the stories about Yao and the games:
Long-time Rockets writer Jonathan Feigen at the Houston Chronicle takes a quick look at the arc of Yao's career, that the 14-year-old who watched the NBA's first live broadcast in China grew up play a key role in the league's progress and popularity in China. Some interesting facts from Feigen's piece:
Between 3 and 5 percent of NBA revenue comes from China, according to David Stern.
Rockets games average more than 30 million viewers, says Rockets CEO Tad Brown.
Most seasons, about 7 of the Rockets 85 sponsors are Chinese brands, representing 5 percent of sponsorship revenue.
Sports Illustrated Yao's struggle to return to playing form after his May 2009 foot injury, and speculates about the impact that the center, reportedly on a 24-minutes-per-game plan for the coming season, can make.
CBS Sports says Yao looked as good as could be expected in his limited minutes in Beijing
The Houston Chronicle reminds us that Yao's teammates and the Rockets franchise enjoy a share of his spoils in the Chinese market. Shane Battier, Luis Scola and Kyle Lowry all have sneaker contracts with Chinese brands. (Rockets enjoy Chinese endorsement deals due to Yao)
Tags: Houston Rockets, NBA, NBA China Games, New Jersey Nets, Yao Ming
Yi traded to Washington
Saturday, 3rd July 2010 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (1)
Yi Jianlian will start his fourth NBA season playing with his third team, after being traded by the New Jersey Nets to the Washington Wizards earlier this week.The Nets acquire Quinton Ross, who has a $1.2 million contract, in the trade, and get rid of Yi's $4.5 million salary. That will leave them with about $30 million in salary cap space to try and lure some of this summer's top free agents. Lebron James, Dwayne Wade, Chris Bosh and David Lee are some of the players still up for grabs.
Yi, who averaged 12 points and 7 rebounds this season, joins number one draft pick John Wall at Washington (Wizards' roster), as well as late-round pick Hamady Ndiaye from Senegal via Rutgers University, and like Yi, 7 feet tall. Any team that picks up Yi is taking on a project—the forward is still unpolished, and missed more than a third of this season due to various injuries.
Tags: basketball, NBA, New Jersey Nets, Washington Wizards, Yi Jianlian
Yi's bloody lip, Del Harris's CCTV-5 airtime
Monday, 7th December 2009 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (0)
Yi Jianlian's return from the historically horrendous New Jersey Nets' injured reserve was delayed further when he took a hit to the face in a post-practice 3-on-3 game that required 50 stitches to his lip. Yi had been expected to return to the lineup against the New York Knicks Sunday. New Jersey went on to lose the battle of the embarrassingly bad Big Apple teams, and is now just one loss away from dropping five times as many games as Yi has played in this season. Yi is joined on the bench now by an old friend--Del Harris, the retired NBA coach who has been brought on as an assistant.
Del Harris with young Chinese ballers in 2008.
Harris' choice for his return to the bench--the team with the only (sort of) active Chinese player in the NBA--is an interesting one. Harris coached China at the 2004 Olympics in Athens, and gave the then supposedly 16-year-old Yi a bigger role on the team. He has made several trips to China since, including joining John Calipari when he brought the University of Memphis to play a series against the Chinese National Team months before the Beijing Olympics. Harris returned for the Beijing games, and was in China again this fall for the FIBA Asia Championship in Tianjin. He recently launched a Web site in China in conjunction with Scottie Pippen and Donnie Nelson. Wohoops.com (translation, My Hoops) is a basketball social networking site that also offers original instructional video content. When Harris visited Guangdong with Calipari in 2008, he donned a crisp white polo with the Wohoops.com logo for their joint coaching clinic, and he was accompanied on the trip by representatives from Blastoff Ventures, which is also involved in the startup.
Hmm... It's starting to look more understandable why Harris would leave the cozy confines of his Texas home to spend the winter back up north coaching one of the worst teams in the history of the league--Wofreemarketing.
Related:
Can these guys fix how China hoops?
Netsdaily.com: For Yi, it all started with Harris
Tags: basketball, Del Harris, Donnie Nelson, New Jersey Nets, Scottie Pippen
Yi Jianlian celebrates National Games reprieve with a double-double
Monday, 19th October 2009 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (0)
But someone in China didn't want Yi in those games. Guangdong, his hometown team and a favorite at China's national games going on right now in Shandong, reportedly had a deal with the Milwaukee Bucks (the team that drafted Yi in 2007) that would have had Yi back in China for the last two weeks of October, missing the start of the NBA season. But Yi's new team, the New Jersey Nets, has no such agreement.
It may seem crazy to think that Yi would be required to miss the start of his third NBA season to play against a bunch of guys who couldn't even ride the bench for a team in a major NCAA conference. But conflicts between Chinese interests, Chinese players, and NBA interests also had huge impacts on the careers of Yi's predecessors, Yao Ming and Wang Zhizhi. For Wang (drafted by the Dallas Mavericks in 1999), a disagreement about whether he would miss the start of his second season to play for Team China in the Asian Games was the beginning of the end of an abbreviated NBA career. And Yao, after the negotiation of his release seven years ago from the Shanghai Sharks of the CBA, has balanced his work between the Houston Rockets and the Chinese National Team.
Related:
NJ.com: Yi Jianlian still seems the best option at power forward for the Nets
ESPN the Magazine: The reeducation of Lt. Wang
Yi Jianlian image: Gzxw.com.cn
Tags: 2009 National Games, CBA, NBA, New Jersey Nets, Wang Zhizhi, Yao Ming, Yi Jianlian
Yao and Yi's Trade Talk
Monday, 22nd June 2009 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (0)
Last year, draft day eve saw a trade that moved Guangdong native Yi Jianlian from the Milwaukee Bucks to the New Jersey Nets. A year later, the shine has dulled on Yi's move to a bigger market with a bigger Chinese-American population and a hope of landing Lebron James in 2010. The power forward played showed some consistent strong play in January before getting injured and then never returning to form the rest of the season. He averaged 8.6 points and 5.3 rebounds. Yi has three years left on a $15.6 million contract with the Nets.
While Yi might not have earned his $3 million on the court for the Nets last year, a recent piece in the New York Daily News indicates that the team likes his marketability in China. Yi is China's third most influential celebrity, according to Forbes' annual ranking of Chinese celebrities. The Daily News piece says that Nets CEO Brett Yormark is currently in China meeting with executives from 33 different companies with the goal of signing four or five new deals.
Yao Ming, by far China's biggest sports star, has been talked about for a move to Cleveland ever since news broke of a group led by Chinese businessman Huang Jianhua, aka Kenneth Huang, working on a deal to buy a 15 percent stake in the Cleveland Cavaliers. So far, it amounts to little more than a Chinese fan's fantasy of bringing Yao together with 2009 NBA MVP Lebron James. Yao's got two years left on his contract, with the freedom to opt out on the last year, in which he would make $17 million if he chose to stick around. He's been a Rocket for all of his seven-year career and is the face of the franchise, both for fans and for opposing teams--beating the Rockets means stopping Yao (if, of course, he's healthy).
Yao added a little fuel to the rumors earlier this week with his vague talk in an interview with Shanghai television station. "It is still an unknown," was his response to questions about a possible move to Cleveland.
Related:
Chinese investors buying stake in Cavs
Yi, Jay-Z and Lebron?
Lebron, Yao image: Blogcn.com
Tags: basketball, Cleveland Cavaliers, Houston Rockets, Huang Jianhua, Kenneth Huang, NBA, New Jersey Nets, Yao Ming, Yi Jianlian
Yao Ming to start in his sixth All-Star game
Friday, 23rd January 2009 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (0)
Yao Ming (姚明） will make his sixth All-Star game appearance next month, after being voted into the starting lineup for the Western Conference team with 2,532,958, Yao's former vote-getting record of 2,558,278, set in 2004-05, was passed by five players this year, including Eastern Conference starting center Dwight Howard, who received 3,150,181 votes.New Jersey Nets forward Yi Jianlian did not surpass Kevin Garnett in Eastern Conference voting, and will not appear in the game (the rest of the All-Stars will be selected by NBA coaches, and Yi is not considered a contender for one of these spots).
Tags: basketball, Houston Rockets, NBA, New Jersey Nets, Yao Ming, Yi Jianlian
Yi out with injury
Saturday, 10th January 2009 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (0)
Just as he was beginning to put together a string of solid performances, New Jersey Nets forward Yi Jianlian (易建联) got injured Thursday night in his first game against his former team. Yi, who had scored 13, 20 and 22 points in the last three games, broke his right pinkie finger late in the third quarter, and the Nets lost to the Milwaukee Bucks, 104-102.Yi will miss three to four weeks, according to this AP report.
Tags: NBA, New Jersey Nets, Yi Jianlian
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