Basketball adviser Vaccaro squares off against NBA, NCAA

CALABASAS, Calif. - He is 69 and says he needs a nap after an afternoon of impassioned talk about his influential, often controversial role in basketball. Otherwise, John Paul "Sonny" Vaccaro shows no signs of slowing down.On the contrary, the man known as the "godfather of basketball," who two years ago stepped away from a career spanning about three decades as a shoe company marketing executive, is energized by his latest ventures. The one-time physical- and special-education teacher, music promoter and failed Las Vegas card player who became a sports marketing whiz and confidant to basketball players of all ages is promoting reform his version of it.Whether he is on the lecture circuit speaking to business and law students about perceived injustices of the NCAA and its amateur rules or advising high school players as they ponder professional careers in Europe, this man with distinct droopy eyes continues to captivate audiences."There should be a radical change in amateur athletics in America, because it's a farce," he says. "Amateurism lost its virginity a long time ago."Such statements make NCAA administrators cringe. "He helped create an environment in which the value of high school and college education has been diminished in the minds of many young basketball players," Wally Renfro, an NCAA vice president and senior adviser to NCAA President Myles Brand, says of Vaccaro. Vaccaro has been in the news recently because, for the second time in a year, he has given his blessing to a high school player who will spurn college to play professionally in Europe. Jeremy Tyler, 17, will skip not only college but also his senior year at San Diego High for at least two seasons in Europe, with the NBA being his goal.Brandon Jennings of Compton, Calif., went from high school to a pro league in Italy last year and is expected to be a top-14 lottery pick in the June NBA draft. Vaccaro helped broker Jennings' deal and will do the same for Tyler. "They came and said, 'We can do it,' and he believed in them," says Vaccaro's wife of 25 years, Pam. Vaccaro and his wife were in Greece on Monday to visit with a team interested in Tyler. Pam Vaccaro stepped in as Vaccaro's business partner 15 years ago.Vaccaro confirms Jennings made about $1.2 million in salary and endorsements and says Tyler will have a six-figure income. Vaccaro depicts the players' temporary defections to Europe as a revolt against the NBA's requirement that kids be 19 and a year out of high school and as a rebellion against the constraints of amateurism in America. "There is going to be an uprising," Vaccaro says. "There is going to be someone to say, 'I can't take this anymore.' And the first one was Brandon Jennings. The second one is Jeremy. And there will be a third and a fourth. "What will happen is there will be teams and individuals, whether they're agents in America or owners in Europe or Asia or Israel who will say 'They can come play for us.' "The NBA rule aggravates Vaccaro, but his issues with the NCAA go beyond frustration. It infuriates him, and he is lobbying hard against the association through a grass-roots effort. Big man on campus That's the approach Vaccaro used as a shoe company executive, first for Nike, then for Adidas and finally for Reebok. He and his competitors targeted promising teens across the country and made them walking billboards for the shoe companies with free apparel and sponsorship of their club and high school teams.In so doing, Vaccaro became a trusted adviser to players such as Kobe Bryant, Tracy McGrady and LeBron James, all of whom went from high school to the NBA before the rule change in 2005. He signed Bryant and McGrady to deals with Adidas but lost James to Nike.Vaccaro has a new audience, college students, whom he urges to buck the establishment if they believe in a cause. His beefs with the NCAA and the NBA are his rallying cries."He's my hero," says Indiana University sports marketing and management major Jared Casden, who invited Vaccaro to speak to the Hoosier Sports Business Organization. "His visit was definitely the highlight of my college experience."Vaccaro says he doesn't charge a speaking fee. He is driven "because the message is right.""I am grass roots," he says. "The only way you change anything in America is by the youth. Kids are everything."Vaccaro also wants to be heard by Congress and has met with congressional staffers to challenge the merits of the NCAA's often-questioned tax-exempt status and whether amateurism rules strip the athletes of rightful earning power as television and marketing revenue stream in for schools and the NCAA.But some of Vaccaro's critics think the sweeping commercialization of college sports was in part driven by Vaccaro."Sonny was one of the actors who helped create negative things in sports in the 1980s and 1990s," says Richard Lapchick, chairman of the DeVos Sport Business Management Program at Central Florida and director of the Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport.Even Lapchick concedes, however, that Vaccaro effectively gets his message out. "He's looked at differently now," Lapchick says.Vaccaro's impact has been so powerful that HBO has a movie in development about the ABCD camp he used to run, with actor James Gandolfini in line to portray Vaccaro, who grew up in blue-collar Trafford, Pa., the son of Italian immigrants. Vaccaro recalls Gandolfini telling him he wanted a character with conflict. "I said, 'I've been conflicted all my life,' " Vaccaro says. Yet his struggles usually have pitted him against others, not filled him with self-doubt. "When I was employed to do this for the companies I worked for, I had a job," he says. "I gave the kids a platform. I treated them honestly and fairly. We never took a dime from any of the kids. We were paid because they marketed our product." Marketing trailblazer Vaccaro was the first to pay college basketball coaches for exclusive apparel deals and later made similar agreements with universities. He held the first national high school all-star game, the Roundball Classic, and it endured for 43 years. Every summer, thousands of players descended on Las Vegas for Vaccaro's Big Time Tournament, another shoe-company-sponsored showcase that attracted hundreds of college scouts.In 1984 he sealed a deal for the groundbreaking marketing of Michael Jordan's signature shoe for Nike, shaping the way sports icons would be promoted. His success was built on Vaccaro's keen ability to evaluate future high-level stars and connect with the everyday man. "I knew that if anyone could help, it would be him," Jennings says in an e-mail. "He's been around so many players LeBron, Kobe the list goes on."Vaccaro says about 15 high school players in the last year have asked him whether they should skip college to play pro overseas but he advised most not to because they didn't have the game, the maturity or the family support system Jennings had in Europe and Tyler will have. "(Vaccaro) doesn't drop the ball too many times," says James Tyler, the father of Jeremy, who left high school this semester for home-schooling as he prepares to play in Europe.The disgust this movement has generated bothers Vaccaro because he thinks it has traces of prejudice. Gymnasts, golfers and tennis players, among others, forgo traditional schooling to train full time at a young age without raising eyebrows. "They're white," Vaccaro says.Paul Hewitt, Georgia Tech men's basketball coach and president of the Black Coaches Administrators, has a different view: "The reality is if you're a tennis player or golfer, your family has a safety net."Hewitt declined to comment on Vaccaro but expressed concern that young African Americans are getting a bad message: "It scares me that the message we're sending to African-African youth is don't worry about your college education."Vaccaro says he owes it to the players to counsel them when asked and to fight for their rights. He doesn't get commissions off the deals for Jennings and Tyler and lives comfortably off past earnings. "That's what makes it beautiful," Vaccaro says. "I don't think anyone got paid for what they did when they made a stand."