NBA M3 - Chapter 507: The Grand Championship Parade (Patreon)

"How much?!"

Blake already knew the Blake Su Generation had sold extremely well, and he had been planning to ask about the numbers himself. Since Austin brought it up first, he couldn't help feeling a little excited.

"Hehe!"

Austin chuckled.

"Adidas made a net profit of $270 million overnight, and you have a 35 percent share of the profits.

"So you made $94.5 million overnight."

Blake sucked in a breath.

He already knew that selling out five million pairs instantly would earn him a fortune, but actually hearing the number still stunned him.

Then the corners of his mouth began to rise uncontrollably.

He was happy.

Really happy.

He had worked incredibly hard on the court and earned countless honors. Beyond the popularity, the fans, and all the praise he had received, money was naturally part of the reward as well.

Nearly $100 million in a single night.

That was a tangible reward for all the work he had put in.

It felt incredible.

"That's amazing!"

Blake burst out laughing.

"Hahaha!"

Austin was just as happy on the other end of the phone.

After all, the more Blake earned, the more Austin made as his agent.

His income obviously couldn't compare with Blake's, but for an agent, it was still an enormous amount of money.

Austin was thrilled, and more than satisfied.

"Blake, you earned this with your talent and your ability. This is the return on all the work you've put in, and you deserve it.

"Keep going.

"I hope you only get better from here."

"I will."

Blake smiled, then added, "I'll still be counting on you to handle the opportunities and resources that come my way.

"Let's keep making this work for both of us."

"Of course. Absolutely."

Beep. Beep. Beep.

After hanging up, Blake's excitement gradually gave way to a more serious thought.

"With this money, plus everything else I already have...

"I think I finally have enough capital to start making some moves in business."

...

Blake drove straight to the Suns' training facility.

Once he arrived, he called over George and Curry, who had gotten there a little earlier, and the three of them carried several boxes of shoes from the trunk into the building.

They were pairs of the Blake Su Generation.

Five million pairs had sold out instantly.

It was a massive success, and more importantly, it was Blake's very first signature shoe.

There was no way he wasn't going to share some of that with his teammates.

So he gave every player a pair.

Naturally, everyone was thrilled.

It was a small gesture, but it brought the locker room even closer together.

After that little interlude, it was time for the real main event.

The championship parade.

...

Two days later, the grand celebration finally began.

It had taken the Suns 43 years to win their first championship.

Phoenix had never held a Suns championship parade before, but after waiting 43 years for one, the city was more than ready.

Eighteen hours before the parade began, countless fans were already lining the designated route.

Four hours before the start, traffic had practically come to a standstill.

Yet even the drivers stuck in the congestion were happy.

The Suns were champions.

How could anyone in Phoenix be upset?

At 9:00 a.m., the Suns' team bus slowly entered the parade route.

By then, both sides of the streets were packed with people.

The crowd stretched along the winding route like an endless river of fans, with no end in sight.

Later estimates put attendance at around one million people.

Even in a massive city like Los Angeles, the Lakers' 2010 championship parade had drawn roughly a million.

Phoenix wasn't nearly as large, yet the Suns had managed to attract a similar crowd.

That alone showed how desperately the city had wanted this championship.

Then the Suns players appeared behind the team bus, riding in small groups on parade vehicles.

"BOOM!"

Phoenix erupted.

Cheers rolled through the streets in wave after wave, each one louder than the last.

Even saying the entire city had poured into the streets barely captured the scale of the celebration.

"The Suns are champions!"

"Captain Canada!"

"Half Man, Half Amazing!"

"George!"

"Curry!"

"Blake!"

"The Emperor!"

"Sun God!"

"Superhero!"

Fans shouted themselves hoarse.

Tens of thousands upon tens of thousands of people had completely lost themselves in the celebration.

This was their day.

A day for Suns fans to enjoy every second of being champions.

The parade route stretched for dozens of kilometers.

Along the way, Blake, George, and the others occasionally got out to interact with fans and take pictures.

The parade itself lasted more than six hours.

The fans celebrated for just as long without showing any sign of getting tired.

If anything, they wanted the party to keep going.

The celebrations continued well into the evening.

It wasn't until around 8:00 p.m. that the massive championship parade finally came to an end.

The Suns players were certainly exhausted.

But every one of them had enjoyed the experience.

For Blake, the parade brought even more attention.

He once again experienced the adoration of an enormous crowd while winning over countless new fans in the process.

His popularity climbed yet again.

By now, "The Emperor" was still his most common nickname, but "Sun God" had clearly become another title strongly associated with him.

Especially among fans in Phoenix.

To them, Blake was their "Sun God."

...

With the championship parade over, the Suns' activities for the season were basically finished.

Blake had swept the three major MVP awards that year: regular-season MVP, All-Star Game MVP, and Finals MVP.

After spending several more days giving interviews, his schedule finally began to clear.

The Suns, along with the rest of the NBA, officially entered the offseason.

For the teams, the NBA Draft was coming next.

After that, the trade market would open, and franchises around the league would begin strengthening their rosters in preparation for the new season.

For the players, the situation was different depending on how far their teams had gone.

The Suns and Heat had reached the Finals.

The Mavericks and Bulls had made the conference finals.

After such a long stretch of high-intensity basketball, those players needed time to rest, recover, and enjoy a proper break.

Players whose teams had missed the playoffs or been eliminated in the first round had already been resting for much longer.

For them, the offseason was the time to train, improve, and make sure they came back stronger next season.

Of course, that was the ideal scenario.

Take "Superman" Dwight Howard, for example.

He kept talking about wanting to work on his three-point shot, but so far, it had mostly been talk.

He was still wasting some of his remaining potential.

Ultimately, what each player chose to do was up to them.

No one else could control that.

As for Blake...

Now that all of the team's post-championship obligations were finally behind him, it was time to begin putting his own offseason plan into action.