O.J. Mayo has affected a lot of peoples lives.  He has given the town of Memphis hope that one day the Grizzlies will be a contender.  He gave BDA Sports Management a scare when there were allegations of a connection between BDA employee, Calvin Andrews, leading to Calvin’s one-year suspension by the NBPA.  Bill Duffy lost Mayo as a client, but continues to have success acquiring new talent.  And then there was Tim Floyd.  For a long time, Floyd’s name was generally kept out of the media.  The Mayo scandal revolved around names like Andrews, Rodney Guillory, Louis Johnson, and Bill Duffy.  But then, on May 12, 2009, Charles Robinson and Jason Cole of Yahoo! Sports dug up some dirt on Coach Floyd.  Only a month later, and Floyd is on his way out of the University of Southern California.

After such a long break in the O.J. Mayo debacle, things have started moving very fast again.  With Floyd’s resignation, which he claims was based on a new lack of enthusiasm, questions surrounding USC’s recruiting tactics have once again hit center stage.  Will Floyd’s resignation save or futher damage USC’s reputation in the eyes of NCAA investigators?

USC Would Take The Floyd If It Came With No Mayo from Sports Agent Blog - Sports Business, Sports Law, Sports Negotiations, NCAA Rules

“He (OJ Mayo) played within the rules of the game; and this is the game, runners, agents, shoe companies, other elements, this is the game. He had no other choice but to play it.”

-Louis Johnson, ex-O.J. Mayo (athletes) confidant in regards to the situation involving Rodney Guillory (runners) and BDA Sports Management (representation).

In my last edition of “Short and Sweet” I dropped a post featuring athlete representation legend David Falk. Peep the post HERE If you want a more in depth post on the Mayo saga, Jason Wulterkens has it covered HERE This time I borrow a quote from Louis Johnson’s recent ESPN interview from Outside the Lines. Now first, read the above quote from Mr. Johnson, I mean really look at each word. This is a description of a systemic cancer that has gone on for quite some time in the sports industry.

Critics of the sport business may call the agent/runner/athlete situation a game of pimps and hoes. But what makes this system different than what goes on in other sports? Or even in entertainment? Child actors, singers, and rappers become professional, hire agents/managers, and leave school early without any real punishments or even criticism from most of society. Should the alleged gifts that O.J. received should play a role in his draft stock? Don’t most talented youth recieve benefits and gifts for being special regardless of their area of talent? I really hope the public can put this situation in perspective and keep up those good feelings for Mr. Mayo, because with a name like O.J. he will need all the help he can get…

Free Throw: Which shoe company do you predict O.J. Mayo will sign with?

Short and Sweet 2: The OJ Edition from Sports Agent Blog - Sports Business, Sports Law, Sports Negotiations, NCAA Rules

“The key to this business,” Dicky Fox told Jerry Maguire, “is personal relationships.”

But when do said relationships start? And what do they entail? For Louis Johnson and Rodney Guillory, “runners” for Bill Duffy Associates Sports Management (BDA), a “relationship” with then USC-freshman O.J. Mayo meant a regularly BDA-subsidized Citibank account and over $200,000 total to help them “maintain” good relations with the budding star. Johnson (then a sports reporter) said that he was covering the 2003 Adidas ABCD basketball camp when Mayo, then 15, and Guillory, then 38, met for the first time. Lo and behold, when Mayo announced his intention to turn professional, he signed with one Calvin Andrews, BDA senior VP. 5 years and nearly a quarter million later, BDA landed their man.

No one is really surprised by the revelations, especially as they involve USC. Or as Captain Renault said, “I’m shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!” In fact, Kelly Naqi’s “Outside The Lines” probe documents what people in the know already knew or long suspected about the club promoter-cum-runner Guillory a long, long time ago. This guy’s no good. As HoopsWise author Ray Mernagh notes, “please save the misdirected scorn at Mayo for the following parties: USC, the NCAA, Johnson/Guillory, and to a lesser extent BDA (they’re likely just playing the game everyone else in the business is). USC has a very recent history with Guillory—research a high-flying kid named [Jeff] Trepagnier—and the problems he brings.”

So is that what it’s come to for firms like BDA? They’re just playing the game? What does that say about the state of big time college athletics? What does that say about our level of cynicism as fans? Is it even possible to survive as an agent anymore without a team of “runners” who make contact with prospective “clients” when they’re still in junior high, and without hundreds of thousands of dollars to “invest,” so to speak?

BDA claims it did nothing wrong, and that in fact it stopped funneling money to Mayo around the time his senior year in high school ended (at which time Guillory arranged to get an American Express card registered to a sham California charity called “The National Organization of Sickle Cell Prevention and Awareness Foundation” so that he could continue to fund his “relationship” with Mayo).

The most troubling thing is, maybe BDA is right.

Running a Relationship from Sports Agent Blog - Sports Business, Sports Law, Sports Negotiations, NCAA Rules