Retired NBA Players Organization Aims To Help Former Pros Transition To Business World
By ALAN SNEL
LVSportsBiz.com
Former NBA player and coach Johnny Davis has a sports psychology masters degree and would like to start a sports psychology counseling business.
But should the 62-year-old Asheville, NC resident fly solo or try to join a group?
Davis, who played for the Portland Trail Blazers, Indiana Pacers, Atlanta Hawks and Cleveland Cavaliers, was trying to learn the business angle behind that question at a business seminar put on by the National Basketball Retired Players Association (NBRPA) at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center Wednesday. The retired basketball players organization held the 10 a.m. – 4 p.m. session with the NBA Summer League (July 6-17) going on only two miles away at Thomas & Mack Center and Cox Pavilion.
Davis acknowledged that starting his sports psychology business is not a big equity expenditure, but he still needs to brush up on the business questions regarding whether it’s more effective to open his own practice and rent office space or seek to join a group practice that is already up and running.
Davis said during his 10-year playing career (he played on the 1976 champion Portland squad) and a lengthy coach career that included head coaching duties in Philadelphia and Orlando he saw both players and coaches who had insecurities just like any everyday working Joe and who could use counseling that he could offer.
But he said that his targeted customer demo would be high school. college, pro and amateur athletes. “I would be looking at how to improve their performance and to help navigate the athletic world.”
Davis just has to figure out how to launch the business and how much it will cost.
“I’m in the fact-finding phase,” Davis told LVSportsBiz.com during as lunch break during the Kellogg Entrepreneurship Seminar.
Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management is known for putting on seminars for high-powered corporate execs and directors, but Kellogg’s business development director said he was impressed with the retired players’ energy and earnestness.
“They sincerely wanted to learn about being an entrepreneur,” said Reed Hansen, Kellogg’s business development director.
There are many sad stories of former pros in all sports leagues blowing through million-dollar contracts with sour business investments and ill-advised decisions, but the NBRPA is trying to change that narrative by providing the business skills for retired players so that they can make the transition from arena to private business life. The program can help former NBA journeymen who can create a new business identity outside of their previous basketball careers.
Local Las Vegan Doug Lee, selected as the 35th pick in the 1987 NBA draft by the Houston Rockets, owns a logo item business called Prosource and an Ashley Furniture distributorship. Lee, who also played for the Nets and Kings, said player traits such as being driven can help in the business world.
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Wednesday’s session can bring “clarity” to the business issues being considered by former pros, said Lee, secretary of the local retired basketball players association Las Vegas chapter.
Chicago lawyer Scott Rochelle, president/CEO of the National Basketball Retired Players Association, said the main objectives include helping the former players understand how to build a business plan and execute it.
“Everyone has a goal in mind. We’re backfilling it with the business details,” Rochelle said.
Some retired NBA players came not to start a business but to grow a current one. That was the case for former Miami Heat first-round pick Willie Burton, who is now 50 after playing for five teams during 10 years in the NBA.
Burton, who lives in Detroit, was looking for business tips on expanding his Educated Stars of Tomorrow high school program that is designed to bolster behavior, leadership and academic goals.
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