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All these years later, Bob Bass is weary of being known as the executive who drafted Kobe Bryant and relinquished him. His assertion is legitimate. Team after team, some amazed by Bryant’s personal workouts, passed on him for Potapenko this and Samaki that.
Nash still laments the Nets’ decision. He accepts the reasoning. Garnett experienced a solid rookie season, but not one that truly projected his future stardom. Executives felt uncomfortable drafting high school players and did not want to risk their jobs for the unknown. Some declined scouting Bryant on principle alone. “It hadn’t yet become apparent that high school players could come in and contribute as quickly as they began to,” Nash said. “Once Garnett and Kobe started to have some success, it became much more acceptable. With each passing year, it became less of a risk if you felt a player had enough talent.” Chris Wallace worked in the Miami Heat’s front office in 1996 and predicted the success and future breakthrough of high school players. “As [is] the case in all sports, you have to follow the trends,” Wallace said. “You have it in football with the wishbone and now the spread offense, three-point shooting in the NBA, weight lifting fifty years ago wasn’t really done by anyone other than weight lifters trying to win medals. There has to be some success, some reason to get the mass of the game excited, and then everybody follows.”
Predicting the future of these prodigies remained difficult in a competitive atmosphere where one missed draft pick could result in the loss of an executive’s job. “It takes some real courage when your job is on the line and you only have one first-round pick each year, to say, ‘I’m going to take a high school kid when our franchise is in tremendous need of help,’ ” Whitsitt said. High school players were not players executives wanted to stake their future on. Rick Weitzman, Boston’s scout, remembers watching Bryant play in high school. He had little way to gauge Bryant’s skills. “It was uncharted territory,” Weitzman said. “When I first saw Kobe play in high school, he came out and played against a suburban team, all six-footers. Kobe just did whatever he wanted to do.”
6.
The NBA draft’s greenroom was the staging area where top prospects anxiously waited to be instantly transformed into millionaires. They were usually accompanied by those who paved their way and shaped their path: family members, coaches, and lifelong friends. In 1996, the members of Kerry Kittles’s entourage momentarily stopped cheering his selection to the Nets. They had noticed people at Bryant’s table also applauding the pick, particularly a stout, brown-eyed man who clapped loudly. “Just think of the logic,” said Sonny Vaccaro, the man who drew the lengthiest stares. “Why the hell would we jump in the air for Kerry at number eight? There was no personal relationship there. We knew what was happening.” Vaccaro’s presence did not involve Bryant’s past; it had to do with his corporate future and how Vaccaro would help steer it.
There is little middle ground when contemplating Vaccaro’s place in basketball’s hierarchy. He is either the man who provided a proper platform for phenoms, and fast-tracked them toward professionalism, fame, and fortune, or he is responsible for stagnating the growth of amateur players and corrupting high school and college basketball by infusing them with corporate money. “Look, I play by the rules,” he once famously said. “What I am saying is, for God’s sake, go change the rules.”
The alliance of Bryant with Vaccaro and Adidas rankled Nike. Phil Knight, Nike’s chief executive officer, assembled the shoe company’s high school basketball representatives a few months after the draft at their headquarters in Beaverton, Oregon. The group included many of the most influential high school coaches from the country’s largest cities, people with an eye for talent, charged with identifying the next Michael Jordan before he became Michael Jordan. Nike paid millions of dollars annually to support summer tournaments and camps. Knight questioned why the company had lost Kobe Bryant and Jermaine O’Neal to Adidas, forfeiting them to Vaccaro, a friend turned foe.
Nike had not dealt with strong competition in years. The company had come to dominate the athletic shoe industry. It assumed the reins from Converse behind an innovative marketing campaign. Knight originally named his company Blue Ribbon Sports, selling the product from the trunk of his car. By the 1980s, the company had grown, but still operated on professional basketball’s periphery. Nike chose quantity over quality, paying a number of players about $8,000 to wear its shoes. Nike’s surge came in 1984, when the company decided to allocate the bulk of its marketing resources on one player. Nike anointed Michael Jordan as that signature athlete at the urging of Vaccaro, employed as a Nike recruiter at the time. Vaccaro not only possessed a knack for being at the right place at the right time, he also knew the right thing to say to the right people.
Vaccaro entered the field of shoes and basketball by accident and coincidence. He grew up in Trafford, a steel-town borough outside of Pittsburgh, with aspirations of becoming a professional athlete. A back injury rerouted him and he turned to substitute teaching after obtaining a degree in psychology from Youngstown State University. He hustled and supplemented his income to support his family. He promoted music and gambled professionally, spending part of the year in Las Vegas. Vaccaro wanted to remain in sports somehow and, at the age of 25, he started a high school charity basketball tournament in 1965 and convinced a local newspaper to serve as the sponsor. The Dapper Dan Tournament brought the area’s best college players under one roof and afforded college recruiters a central location to scout them. Joe Bryant captured the tournament’s MVP award in 1972, the beginning of a beneficial relationship between him and Vaccaro. One year a representative from the athletic footwear line PRO-Keds attended the tournament. He passed out free shoes to some of the players, who wore them proudly. The image remained in Vaccaro’s head in 1977 when he requested a meeting with Rob Strasser, Blue Ribbon’s marketing director. Vaccaro had designed a rubber sandal, with the help of a local shoemaker in Trafford, that he wanted to pedal to the company. Strasser had an eye for characters and colorful backgrounds. He hated the sandals. He loved Vaccaro. They continued conversing, with Vaccaro’s sandals discussed less and less and his ideas about the future of basketball and marketing discussed more and more. To Vaccaro, the company was wasting its limited resources by allocating them on a bunch of NBA players. “You guys are missing the playgrounds,” he told Strasser. “You’re missing the colleges and that’s what basketball is all about.” Vaccaro talked about the PRO-Keds merchant and the satisfaction the high school players took in being among the few awarded those shoes.
Strasser came around. A problem loomed on how to get their shoes onto the feet of college basketball players. NCAA amateurism rules prohibited companies from paying college kids for endorsing their products. Strasser and Vaccaro saw an opening among the coaches. The coaches could get paid by Nike and their players given the shoes for free from the company. The plan had few drawbacks. The athletic departments would not complain because they would save money on equipment. Vaccaro already maintained relationships with a number of college coaches through his tournament. Strasser added that the coaches should be part of an advisory committee and head clinics to ensure that the company would be viewed as paying the coaches for their services and not paying the players to wear their shoes.
Strasser ran the idea up Nike’s chain of command. The first response was that they should conduct a background check on Vaccaro. Knight eventually hired him as a consultant. Vaccaro hit the road with a number of contracts that stipulated that the coaches had to conduct the clinics and receive the merchandise. He left in the midst of the college basketball season and hoped to sign up influential coaches in time for March’s NCAA tournament. He returned to his stomping grounds in Las Vegas and enrolled his friend UNLV coach Jerry Tarkanian. Bill Foster (Duke), Frank McGuire (South Carolina), Lefty Driesell (Maryland), and Jimmy Lynam (St. Joseph) soon followed. “Picture this,” Jimmy Valvano, Iona College’s coach, told Sports Illustrated. “Two guys named Vaccaro and Valvano
meeting at La Guardia Airport. Vaccaro reaches into his briefcase. Puts a check on the table. I look at it and say, ‘What’s this for?’ He pulls a sneaker out and puts it on the table. Like we were putting a contract out on somebody. He says, ‘I would like your team to wear this shoe.’ I say, ‘How much?’ He says, ‘No, I’ll give you the shoes.’ You got to remember, I was at Iona. We wore a lot of seconds. They didn’t even have labels on them. I say, ‘This certainly can’t be anything legal.’ ” Somehow it was. Vaccaro signed nearly all of the country’s top coaches in a four-month span. “I called that my kamikaze sweep,” Vaccaro told the Washington Post.
In 1978, the newspaper reported that Nike was paying college coaches and suggested college players would be the next to be paid by shoe companies. Converse backed away as Nike increased its efforts to sign more coaches. But Converse had gotten first to the University of North Carolina and its coach, Dean Smith. Michael Jordan did not want to wear either brand when he decided to turn pro after three college seasons. He preferred Adidas, which did not make him an offer. Converse bid similarly to what the company compensated other premier players, about $100,000 a year. Nike’s revenue had jumped from $28.7 million in 1973 to $867 million by the end of 1983, according to ESPN.com. They were in search of a knockout blow. Strasser and David Falk, Jordan’s agent, shared a longtime relationship and Jordan agreed to meet with Nike at the insistence of his parents. Nike executives had approached Vaccaro before the meeting. Jordan bloomed late and had slipped through Vaccaro’s grasp as a high school player. Vaccaro had not invited him to his tournament. But Jordan had impressed Vaccaro with his coolness in nailing the game-winning shot in the 1982 championship game. Jordan was handsome, elegant even. Yet, he maintained a sense of authenticity. People could relate to him. Vaccaro was asked if he would risk his career on Jordan and if he preferred signing 10 players for $50,000 or one for $500,000. Vaccaro responded yes, if that one player was Jordan. That was the deal Nike struck, to be awarded to Jordan annually for five years. No other player had earned anywhere close to that for marketing shoes—a discrepancy that would cause a rift between Jordan and those who had come before him like Magic Johnson and Isiah Thomas. Jordan received a signature shoe and Falk devised the “Air Jordan” moniker. Jordan was paired with Spike Lee, a rising director. In Nike commercials, Lee played Mars Blackmon, the character from his 1986 movie, She’s Gotta Have It. In the ads, Blackmon deduced that Jordan’s athleticism stemmed from the shoes on his feet. The campaign was a smashing success, with Jordan playing the straight man and showcasing a wry smile. A corporate pitchman was born.
“I believe I made two bets in my life professionally,” Vaccaro said. “Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant.”
Vaccaro bonded with Kobe Bryant at his summer camp in 1994. Vaccaro had started the Nike-ABCD Summer Basketball Camp the same year that Jordan signed with Nike. There had been other national summer basketball camps. They mostly sought to improve fundamentals through drills. None carried the cachet and importance of the ABCD (Academic Betterment and Career Development) camp. Vaccaro envisioned a platform for these young, up-and-coming athletes. They had natural talents and deserved a stage on which to display that athleticism. Vaccaro would provide it. He played gatekeeper and personally invited the players he determined worthy as the country’s top 100-plus to his camp each year. “There is a committee of one,” Vaccaro once said. “Me.” The camp offered classroom instruction in math and English, as well as classes on drug abuse and AIDS. It became a siren to college recruiters. They flocked to the camp to view the nation’s best all in one place.
Abruptly, Nike severed ties with Vaccaro in 1991. The source of the termination remained tightly guarded. Vaccaro insisted that he never fit Nike’s corporate image. He aligned himself with Converse and conducted the ABCD camp at Eastern Michigan University. After Converse, Vaccaro landed at Adidas, a German sports apparel manufacturer. Nike, in large part because of Vaccaro, had cornered the college market. Vaccaro figured he had to establish Adidas with players before they even advanced that far. He no longer carried the power and allure of Nike’s swoosh with him. But, he thought, he brought something better—his name. “I was Sonny from Nike,” Vaccaro said. “Now, it’s like ABCD superseded everything. ABCD was the turning point. The camp became synonymous with being put on a pedestal. ABCD and Sonny were the conduits for the whole thing. Forget whatever the shoe company was.” Nike maintained its camp in Indianapolis and braced for competition from Vaccaro. They both scheduled camps the same week in July. The struggle for the top high school players turned personal once Nike hired George Raveling to run its grassroots program. Raveling was the best man at Vaccaro’s wedding to his second wife, Pam. They had since become combatants. Raveling formerly coached at USC and believed that Vaccaro had steered Ed O’Bannon, a top recruit, to UCLA. Raveling had once been critical of Vaccaro’s influence over amateur players. He now worked to gain the ears—and feet—of the same kids. “I can’t stand the man,” Vaccaro said flatly.
The camps became breeding grounds to unearth top players. The best played in games against the best. Throw in the talent, let them compete, and see who rises to the top. Vaccaro found a home for the camp at Fairleigh Dickinson University in Teaneck, New Jersey, in the shadows of New York City. College coaches divvied up their staffs, with some attending camp in Indianapolis and some in New Jersey. The most devoted attended both. NCAA rules forbid coaches from talking to the players. But who could avoid accidentally crossing paths with someone in the parking lot or on the way to the restroom? The ABCD participants recognized that a good camp could sway a top college in their favor and the great ones eventually realized that an excellent camp could mean forfeiting college altogether for the riches of the NBA. The attention of coaches and recruiters all in one central location made the summer tournaments more important for the players than their high school seasons.
Kobe Bryant wanted to make a name for himself in 1994 at the ABCD camp. He was about to be a high school junior—one of just four in the camp—yet believed he could outshine everyone else. His game did not stand out. Instead, he merely blended in.
A scrawny Bryant approached Vaccaro once camp broke. Bryant thanked and hugged Vaccaro.
“I’m sorry, I just couldn’t quite do it,” Bryant said.
“What do you mean?” Vaccaro asked.
“I wasn’t the Most Valuable Player at camp,” Bryant answered. “Next year, I’ll be the Most Valuable Player.”
Bryant returned the next summer in between scrimmaging NBA players. He averaged 21 points, 7 rebounds, and 4.5 assists, and, true to his word, captured the Most Valuable Player award. Bryant’s performance validated the belief of the Lower Merion coaching staff. For two years, they had believed they possessed the next Michael Jordan on their roster. Bryant had now shown his basketball prowess on a national stage. Loren Woods, a 7-foot-1-inch center from Missouri, had a clear path for a dunk during one scrimmage. Bryant chased him down from midcourt and blocked Woods from behind. “Kobe slammed it off the backboard and the ball bounced somewhere between the top of the key and midcourt,” Jeremy Treatman said. “That was just a play of athleticism that I had never really seen before.” Bryant’s play made Vaccaro a believer. “We signed him to the multimillion dollar contract,” Vaccaro said. “It was laid out because of camp and because I thought he was better than anybody else. Going to ABCD allowed the superstar to believe that anything could happen for him. He didn’t have to go to college.”
“We were just starting,” Vaccaro continued. “Adidas wasn’t like it is today. We had nobody. So, yeah, I knew who he was. I knew how great he was going to be. No one else can say that, because if you want to be honest, if you go back and ask Nike, they could’ve bid for Kobe. They didn’t.”
That changed the next year following Phil Knight’s gathering of Nike consultants. Vaccaro, like Nike, employed top amateur coaches scattered around the country. He included Alvis Smith among them. Smith was once a high school bask
etball player in southern California, but he did not qualify academically to play in college. He became an AAU coach and roamed Florida in search of talent. “I went out and chose the kids,” Smith said. “I always targeted kids that nobody knew about. I always wanted to give them a chance because they were always hungrier.”
Tracy McGrady fit the prototype. McGrady lived in Auburndale, a dot of a city between Orlando and Tampa. As a teenager, his mother birthed him and McGrady’s grandmother Roberta was mostly charged with raising him. McGrady loved baseball and whipping his fastball past hitters. He was the youngest of his cousins and the group traveled to the park every Saturday. They played basketball as McGrady watched from the sidelines. He did not like the sport, but when a player suffered an injury one weekend the group needed McGrady to play in order to continue the game.
“All my cousins used to slap me upside the head and call me all kinds of names, like, ‘You a punk. You a pussy. Come on and play,’ ” McGrady remembered. “It just got to the point where I was sick of them doing that and I went out there and started playing. And I was just good. I was just naturally talented. And from that point, I just started playing basketball.” Talented, but aimless. Smith heard about McGrady from another player on his AAU team. He scouted one of McGrady’s games and had witnessed enough of the 15-year-old McGrady by halftime. “I sent him some [Adidas] shoes and some gear and told him I was going to watch him play,” Smith said. “I went over and watched him and that was that.” McGrady began listening to each of Smith’s suggestions. Smith asked him to drop baseball and football. “You’re six foot eight, six foot nine, and you’re lanky and long,” Smith said. “You’re going to get broken up on the football field. You’ll probably be a good baseball player, but I want you to concentrate on basketball because I think you can make a living out of this.” Smith had already started planning his route. “I felt like I needed to put him in more of a structured environment because I knew Tracy had the talent to go in the draft and I wanted him ready to go straight into the NBA,” Smith said. McGrady agreed to leave his family and friends in Florida to attend Mt. Zion Christian Academy in Durham, North Carolina. Joel Hopkins, a friend of Smith’s, coached the team. Nearly half of the 13 players on McGrady’s team came from outside of North Carolina. Adidas supplied the school with athletic gear and Hopkins sought to transform the program into a national powerhouse. McGrady had never strayed far from home before, only going to Washington, D.C., for a family reunion. Smith told Hopkins to toughen McGrady up. “I knew if he could maintain the obstacles that I put in front of him and if he could withstand the structure that I made Joel Hopkins put on him, that he would be ready to go,” Smith said. Hopkins, at their first meeting, told McGrady to remove his earrings. Rules followed rules. The team had wake-up calls and curfews. Hopkins forbid cursing, television, and girlfriends. He enforced Bible study. “I’d really never really been out of Florida,” McGrady said. “It was all I knew and to leave my family and leave my friends—just up and leave like that—it was tough. It was definitely a mental adjustment, but once I got up there and got settled in, I felt real comfortable and from that point on, I felt my game start to develop because of the structured program that we were a part of. It was just basketball every day. I’d eat. I’d sleep, I’d breathe basketball when I went up there. I never really had that type of work ethic. I always got by on my athletic ability and just really never put that work in before I went to that school.”
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