Now the kids are portrayed as dirty when they talk to an agent, a shoe guy, some hanger-on. Well, it's only natural that people are circling them - there are millions of dollars involved.
The NCAA wants to control the images; they say they own your image forever. If you look through this façade, it's crazy.
One-and-done is the most damaging thing in college basketball. It brings money into the college game, because it kickstarts the bidding war. When you know a kid can't turn pro and is going to go to school for one year and then go pro, that's when you see everyone going to games and courting players.
What would be wrong with letting a kid go pro, and if it doesn't work out he can come back to college? What's the harm in that? The reason is the word "amateurism." The NCAA has to protect colleges' tax exemption.
Beginning in 1978, Nike paid coaches to put their shoes on the team.
In terms of my work with Nike, obviously signing Michael Jordan to a $500,000 contract in 1984 set a new precedent for the business side of the game.
After the NBA and ABA merged, players could come out after high school. Still, there were only a few cases prior to Kevin Garnett coming out in 1995, so Nike and the other companies were only involved in the college game.
What would have happened if Derrick Rose had torn his knee in college, or Greg Oden? It would have cost them millions of dollars. They were lucky, coming out early. I'm not saying don't go to college. There are plenty of players like Shaq [O'Neal] who went back and graduated. I commend that. But do it at your leisure - don't hurt your finances.
It's not uncommon in the entertainment world for agents to sign young talent. It's sinful that these players can't be represented by lawyers and agents when they're in school. If a player wants to hire someone to seek his value - in any other walk of life, except where this farcical entity that is the NCAA is involved - having a lawyer or agent isn't illegal. It's just the NCAA imposing its own set of rules. It's selfish on their part.
Paternalistic is a very good word. They think they have to look out for these guys? Don't worry about it. Why? Because of history. Kevin Garnett, Tracy McGrady, LeBron James, Kobe Bryant. They did okay.
Kobe [Bryant] had the biggest contract for a high school kid. He was the first one to get more than a million a year.
What happens when you get hurt? Take that kid at Kentucky, Nerlens Noel, who could have turned pro after high school.Who knows what's going to happen? How the operation is going to go? The only thing I do know is that he would have been a top pick in the draft last year, and he'd have millions of dollars in the bank.
There's Brandon Jennings. The NBA told him to go to college for a year, and he said, "Screw that. I'll go to Europe and make a million bucks and then come back." And he's proven to be a pretty damn good player. He's done as much for the game as Michael [Jordan] by forging a different route.
NBA has a selfish rationale. It saves the owners money by delaying the time a player gets to a second, more lucrative contract. Even the player's union is on board. There are only 450 jobs in the NBA, and the one-and-done protects veterans' jobs.
People will always go to games. And not just Duke versus North Carolina. Even Appalachian State against Chatworth.
Very unfairly, there's a negative image of the kid, which really stems from the greed and selfishness of the NBA and NCAA. They're forcing these kids to go to school.
LeBron james came, and he gets $10 million a year. There was no stigma or blemish, like you have with one-and-done. Now people say, "He's not a student, he's an athlete." Well, of course he's not a student! He's here for one year and he told you he's here for one year, and the school took him with open arms.
I was starting out in the business, there was only one path to playing professionally - graduate, or go four years. With the creation of the ABA [American Basketball Association] in the early 1970s, the sanctity of having to go to college was broken. The ABA took anyone, starting with Spencer Haywood.
