NBA Archives Debunked: The Jordan Saga

Chapter 12 Nike (1)

Whenever a North Carolina player goes pro, Dean Smith oversees the operation.The agent selected by the North Carolina players will only be an agent approved by Dean Smith, so that Dean Smith can ensure that his children are not squeezed by mercenary liars.

At that time, there were two brokers who were very close to North Carolina. One was Donald Dell and the other was Frank Craighill. They were partners.Dell was a tennis star, and after retiring, he became an agent, representing some other tennis players.Craig Hill is a financial worker who once went to school in North Carolina and is a winner of a North Carolina Morehead scholarship, which is very pleasing to Dean Smith.Dean Smith has a very good relationship with both of them, and the company they opened once negotiated a very good contract for North Carolina player Tom LaGarde, which won the trust of Dean Smith.Therefore, Phil Ford, Dudley Bradley (Dudley Bradley), Mike O'Koren, James Worthy and other North Carolina players have also become customers of Dell and Craig Hill.

David Falk was just a junior partner at Dell when Dean Smith decided to bring Jordan to the NBA.That year, the companies of Dell and Craig Hill were disbanded, Falke stayed with Dell, and Craig Hill started a new company with another partner, and the two sides became competitors.Their confrontation made Dean Smith embarrassed.In the end, Dean Smith let Dell and Falke represent Jordan, while Sam Perkins was given to Craig Hill.

The operating mode of Dell’s company at that time was that Dell negotiated the player’s first contract, and then Falk followed up to take care of all the business behind the player, including the sneaker endorsement contract.Dell's personal focus is all on tennis, tennis is his true love, and basketball is just a fringe hobby.In contrast, Falk is a basketball expert-by 1984, when Jordan was about to become a professional player, his North Carolina seniors who played in the NBA always talked about the name of David Falk, and Not Donald Dell, because Falk is the one who runs their business every day.Falk later said: "Dean Smith still treats me like a kid and Dale like an adult. But his players, they start to treat me like an adult, someone who actually deals with them."

Therefore, from the beginning, Jordan's de facto agent was David Falk.Jordan always said later that he chose Falk because he had the same "haircut" as his father, James Jordan.In fact, it is basically a bald head.

Falk later made many enemies.A good broker does not need to be amiable and approachable. What he has to do is to manage the client's business well. In the process, if necessary, make enemies.There are many people in the basketball circle who hate and even despise Falk in private. Jordan knows it, but he is not distressed at all.At one point, Jordan compared Farke to an NBA player: "He's a lot like Rick Mahorn—nobody likes him unless he's on your team." Georgetown University's John Thompson coach , who is both a client and a friend of Falk, he said: If you want a dog to guard the house, you will not find a poodle.

Many bosses and general managers in the NBA dislike Falk very much, but they try their best to hide this dislike and accommodate him as much as possible.A general manager felt that negotiating with Falk was like wrestling with an octopus. He has too many moves you have to deal with, and at the same time he has the ability to recover quickly. "He will threaten, promise, and Rant. If you don't do what he thinks, it's screwed, you'll never work with him again, your team won't win games, and you'll be fired for not having the foresight. And if you obey He means, then you might be the favorite to get the next Michael Jordan."

After so many years, Jordan and Falk cooperated very well, and the two complemented each other very well.Falk helped Jordan become the most successful and richest sports icon in the United States, and Jordan made Falk the most trusted and powerful sports agent.With the power of Jordan, Falk promoted the commercial revolution of basketball players.Before he negotiated his first big contract for Jordan, sports brands looked for spokesmen, preferring individual projects, preferring tennis players—Arthur Ashe, Jimmy Connors, John John McEnroe makes millions, basketball players make very little.Jordan's contract changed all that.Basketball players, athletes in team sports, can also become superstars and should also earn a lot of money.

Of course, Jordan and Falk caught up with good times. In the early 20s, American professional sports culture was changing, and more and more money was pouring into the basketball court. As the pioneers, "Magic" Johnson and Larry Bird had already opened the way for Jordan. After sowing the seeds, Jordan and Falk's harvest can be regarded as the general trend.However, "Magic" Johnson did not earn as much money as Jordan. He later changed his agent, which is somewhat related to this.

When Jordan joined the professional basketball circle in 1984, the big brands that dominated the sneaker market were Converse and Adidas, and Nike was still a relatively small company. In the early 80s, the entire basketball world was said to have only "Skyhook" Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar)'s sneaker endorsement fees reached six figures, $10. Bird and "Magic" initially Both are only $7.

Sneaker endorsement fees doubled in that era.Nike paid just $1977 in 6 to sign Marques Johnson, who had just become the No. 000 pick in the NBA.A year later, Phil Ford entered the NBA and got $1.2. In 1981, Mark Aguirre became the No. 6.5 pick and received a $8 contract.Another year later, James Worthy entered the league, represented by Dell (Falck), and signed an 120-year long contract with New Balance, with a total value of 15 million US dollars, an average of [-] US dollars a year.Falk believes that Worthy's deal is a major breakthrough.

Falk always said later that when Jordan entered the NBA, the commercial endorsements of basketball players were like the world before Columbus. Many people thought the earth was flat.At that time, baseball was still the sport with the best mass base in the United States, and rugby was the most exciting and popular. However, athletes in most team sports could get very limited endorsement fees, and black athletes were even rarer.Falk believes it's time to cross the lines of race and color in sports endorsement.The experience of getting involved in tennis also taught Falk that athletic ability is only part of the overall image of an athlete, and some athletes have charisma beyond athletic ability, which will make them more attractive sports icons and have greater commercial value.Falk feels that Jordan is very different from other athletes in team sports. He is charismatic, magical, and has a special elegance.

From the very beginning, Falk thought about it. When he met and negotiated with the sneaker company, he had to pose a series of challenges to the other party: What can you do for us?What kind of means will be used in marketing?How big is the budget for TV advertising?Will you create an exclusive sneaker and jersey collection for Jordan?
Falk understood that he was entering an unprecedented territory. "Magic" Johnson has proven to be a winner, a champion, an extroverted star with a charming smile and a backed by the vast Los Angeles market, and he has not enjoyed such treatment. "Dr. J" Irving didn't either.And Jordan is neither the No. [-] pick, and he is going to Chicago instead of a media center like New York or Los Angeles. Will Falk's request be too whimsical?
Coincidentally, Nike's needs coincided with Falke's needs.Nike started out as a running shoe, caught up with the jogging craze in the United States in the 70s, and quickly made a fortune, but then encountered a bottleneck in its development and stagnated.In basketball, Nike had little influence, and the best basketball players of the time wore Converse—Larry Bird, "Magic" Johnson, "Dr. J" Irving, Isiah Thomas, Mark A. Quill, nothing less.As Nike designer Peter Moore recalled years later, "You go to a court and ask the kids what they want in a basketball shoe, and they say Converse."

Nike's previous strategy was to sign a bunch of players who are not bad but not the best. The average contract of these players is only about 8 US dollars per person per year, which is relatively low. However, in the basketball market, Nike has no significant impact on Converse and Adidas No threat.Now, Nike has decided to change its strategy. President Phil Knight (Phil Knight) intends to reduce the company's total investment in basketball and no longer spend too much money on too many people as in the past.Their new strategy is: put all their energy into one player, turn this player into Nike's iconic athlete, and let him carry all of Nike's publicity ideas.Since all the top players in the NBA at the time had their own ownership, Nike needed to find a rookie.So, which one to look for?
Like professional teams, sports brands have their own scouts.The Nike scout, there's this guy everywhere, and his name is Sonny Vaccaro.Vaccaro has a good understanding of the basketball world in the eastern United States and has established good relationships with many universities. Coaches such as Jim Valvano are even better friends.Vaccaro also organized his own high school star training camp, so that he became a link between high school basketball and college basketball. High school coaches want to use his training camp to improve players' ability and reputation, and college coaches use his The training camp inspects talents and recruits future stars.For Vaccaro, it was only natural to find a broken basketball court and hope to unearth a diamond from it.

Vaccaro didn't know Jordan privately, but since Jordan's freshman year, he watched Jordan's games at close range many times, and he decided early on that Jordan was by no means an easy person.Nothing shocked Vaccaro more than the game-winning shot in the 1982 NCAA Finals—a first-year kid, under so much pressure, dared to take such a crucial shot and make it, it’s incredible. unusual.

(End of this chapter)