Speaker 1: And we returned to our American stories. Founded in nineteen
Speaker 1: forty six, we consider the National Basketball Association for the
Speaker 1: NBA to be a cultural icon, but it certainly didn't
Speaker 1: start off that way, and it took the hiring of
Speaker 1: a man named Larry O'Brien to get it on the
Speaker 1: path to being a serious organization. Here with the story
Speaker 1: of the rise of the NBA as a business is
Speaker 1: Pete Croudo, author of From Hang Time to Primetime. Take
Speaker 1: it Away, Pete.
Speaker 2: The NBA in its early days in the nineteen forties
Speaker 2: nineteen fifties was really a regional league. It was a
Speaker 2: league whose teams were based in the Midwest and the
Speaker 2: East Coast. The furthest team west was Saint Lewis. So
Speaker 2: it really was a regional league, and it was a
Speaker 2: league that really struggled for mainstream acceptance for years. It
Speaker 2: had trouble getting a favorable national television contract for years.
Speaker 2: It played in arenas that really were antiquated or rundown,
Speaker 2: nowhere close to the entertainment meccas that we see today.
Speaker 2: It really was a second tier professional league.
Speaker 3: Baseball had always been America's game.
Speaker 2: Its roots were established for years and years and years,
Speaker 2: and the NFL had gained a foothold with television thanks
Speaker 2: to the nineteen fifty eight NFL Championship Game, which was
Speaker 2: the league's first overtime game.
Speaker 3: The NBA didn't have anything like that.
Speaker 2: It was really an afterthought to college basketball, which was
Speaker 2: huge in the nineteen fifties, and even to the Hollom Globetrotters.
Speaker 2: In fact, NBA games typically were the previews or the
Speaker 2: first act, so to speak, to Hallom Globe Trotter games,
Speaker 2: to college basketball games, especially.
Speaker 3: In York City.
Speaker 2: And if you read player autobiographies or player biographies from
Speaker 2: the nineteen fifties, nineteen sixties, nineteen seventies, a lot of
Speaker 2: these players had second jobs, you know, they had other
Speaker 2: business interests. They weren't making exorbitant salaries. You know, Now,
Speaker 2: if you sign a professional contract as a highly titled
Speaker 2: rookie with any of the four major sports, you're pretty
Speaker 2: much set for life. Back then, that wasn't the case.
Speaker 2: So the NBA in the nineteen forties, fifties, even into
Speaker 2: the nineteen sixties, was a league that was looking for relevance.
Speaker 2: It was looking for a foothold into America's sporting culture.
Speaker 2: The NBA needed to make a leap to become legitimate,
Speaker 2: and by putting lario'brien in that position, it is the
Speaker 2: first step towards saying, hey, we're a business, we mean business.
Speaker 3: Larryo O'Brien was a.
Speaker 2: Major fixture in Democratic national politics. He was somebody who
Speaker 2: as time goes on, I think we've forgotten just what
Speaker 2: a political figure he was in the nineteen fifties into
Speaker 2: the early nineteen seventies. But Larry O'Brian was part of
Speaker 2: JFK's Irish mafia. He basically helped JFK get to the
Speaker 2: White House. He was on the plane coming back from
Speaker 2: Dallas after JFK was assassinated. After that he was a
Speaker 2: member of Lynda by Johnson's comitty, who was Postmaster General,
Speaker 2: and then after that he was the chairman of the
Speaker 2: Democratic National Committee for two terms. He was on the
Speaker 2: cover of Time magazine. So he was somebody who was
Speaker 2: a major, major figure in national politics. But Larobryan, by
Speaker 2: the time the mid nineteen seventies roll around, he had
Speaker 2: become a relic. He's retired for the most part. He
Speaker 2: is somebody who is really looking for something to do.
Speaker 2: And when Jay Walter Kennedy decides that he's had enough
Speaker 2: being the NBA's commissioner. He looks to Lyobrian. He reaches
Speaker 2: out to Lyo Brian specifically to ask him to take over,
Speaker 2: and Laro Brian says no, because the thing. Here's the
Speaker 2: thing now, when someone is elected to be the commissioner
Speaker 2: of a sports league, that is a career pinnacle. For
Speaker 2: Roger Goodell at the NFL, for rob Manfred at Major
Speaker 2: League Baseball, Gary Bettman at the NHL, that is a pinnacle.
Speaker 2: When you died, they lead your obituary with the fact
Speaker 2: that you were the commissioner of the NHL or Major
Speaker 2: League Baseball. For laro'brian, this was a step down. So
Speaker 2: the NBA really courted him because for two reasons. First,
Speaker 2: they knew that he was a basketball fan, because he
Speaker 2: was someone who grew up watching the Celtics, he had
Speaker 2: season tickets to the Knicks. But larr Brin was also
Speaker 2: somebody who's going to give the league instant credibility. And
Speaker 2: the NBA ultimately won Lyobrian over after numerous attempts because
Speaker 2: they convinced him, look, you'll have absolute power here. This
Speaker 2: isn't going to be a real figurehead position. You'll actually
Speaker 2: be able to do things here.
Speaker 3: You'll be able to make decisions and carry out policy.
Speaker 2: You'll have impact and his election as commissioner. His hiring
Speaker 2: as commissioner was significant for two reasons. First, he gives
Speaker 2: the NBA, as I mentioned before, instant credibility. This is
Speaker 2: a league that was really struggling for national relevance. It
Speaker 2: was struggling to become a player. And Larry O'Brien gave
Speaker 2: the NBA cachet. It was headline news that he was
Speaker 2: the NBA commissioner. It made people take notice. So there's that.
Speaker 2: And the second thing is is that he brings order
Speaker 2: to the NBA. The heads of the NBA before laro'brien,
Speaker 2: Maurice Podoloff and Jay Walter Kennedy, they came of age
Speaker 2: of the NBA. They were ingrained in the NBA. They
Speaker 2: didn't have outside influence. And Laro brian came in and
Speaker 2: he was not associated with the NBA, he didn't have allegiances.
Speaker 2: He was somebody who just wanted what was best for
Speaker 2: the MBA. So he came in with no biases. He
Speaker 2: was his own man, and he also had the ability
Speaker 2: the ability to manage. Larry O'Brien ran the best meetings,
Speaker 2: and that may now sound like much, but you have
Speaker 2: to understand that meetings before this in the fifties and
Speaker 2: sixties were contentious, bickering affairs, kind of like a Thanksgiving
Speaker 2: dinner with different political opinions being bandied back and forth.
Speaker 2: So Larry O'Brien coming in and just saying, look, this
Speaker 2: is what we're doing. We're just going to get down
Speaker 2: to brass tacks. It doesn't sound like much, but for
Speaker 2: a league that couldn't get out of its own way,
Speaker 2: it was huge. This really comes across in the NBA's
Speaker 2: absorption of the abaight the American Basketball Association, because Larry O'Brien,
Speaker 2: you just wanted to get the deal done. And when
Speaker 2: the two leagues were meeting to try and figure out
Speaker 2: how to what teams to absorb and what money should
Speaker 2: change hands, you know, the meetings are going on and
Speaker 2: on in nineteen seventy six, and in the closing days,
Speaker 2: Larry Brin just says to the owners, look up or down,
Speaker 2: meaning we could stay here and bicker about these contracts,
Speaker 2: or you can take the money, get into a plane,
Speaker 2: cash your checks and make make a small fortune before
Speaker 2: the day's ends. And for the ABA, which had a
Speaker 2: lot of bankrupt owners and financially struggling owners, laro brian
Speaker 2: was able to just distill their problem into a simple
Speaker 2: question up or down, and that's what the NBA needed.
Speaker 2: The NBA needed someone to just get down to the
Speaker 2: brass tacks of running a business. But one of his
Speaker 2: greatest gifts wasn't so much policy he enacted or edicts
Speaker 2: that he handed down, though he did.
Speaker 3: His fair share.
Speaker 2: What Larry O'Brian did was he recognized talent and he
Speaker 2: could delegate. And one thing that he did is that
Speaker 2: he hired a young lawyer who is outside counsel for
Speaker 2: the NBA named David Stern, and he bought him in
Speaker 2: as his.
Speaker 3: Second in command.
Speaker 2: And David Stern later went on to become the NA
Speaker 2: Commissioner and in my mind is the most influential sports.
Speaker 3: Commissioner of the last fifty years.
Speaker 2: So larro'brian's ability to recognize David Stern as somebody who
Speaker 2: could do the dirty work, who could get to know
Speaker 2: the gms and the keym owners and the union representatives.
Speaker 2: Having David Stern clear a path and basically get a
Speaker 2: five year start to become the commissioner of the NBA.
Speaker 2: That was Larry O'Brien's greatest legacy, and I think that's
Speaker 2: why he is one of the most overlooked figures in
Speaker 2: the rise of the NBA.
Speaker 1: And we're listening to Pete Croano telling the story of
Speaker 1: the NBA. And what's so interesting about this take is
Speaker 1: he's looking at it from a business angle. No business
Speaker 1: of sports, sports, no business of entertainment. No entertainment in
Speaker 1: the forties and fifties, Well, the league didn't extend past
Speaker 1: Saint Louis good luck with a TV contract. In the
Speaker 1: old days, NBA players had summer job. And then comes
Speaker 1: Larry O'Brien and then comes David Stern, his second in command.
Speaker 1: When we come back more of the remarkable story of
Speaker 1: the NBA with Pete Croado, author of From Hangtime to Primetime,
Speaker 1: Here on our American story, and we returned to our
Speaker 1: American stories and the story of the NBA. When we
Speaker 1: last left off, NBA Commissioner Larry O'Brien had hired a
Speaker 1: young lawyer by the name of David Stern to be
Speaker 1: his second in command, and Stern himself would soon take
Speaker 1: over Larry's job changing the NBA forever. Here again is
Speaker 1: Pete Croudo.
Speaker 2: Larry Bonum was one of those bosses where he came
Speaker 2: in at nine o'clock, he went to his office, shut
Speaker 2: the door, and you saw him at five o'clock. David
Speaker 2: Stern was everywhere. He was at the arenas, he was
Speaker 2: talking to the gms, he was talking to the press,
Speaker 2: he was talking to the network that aired NBA games.
Speaker 2: So every week David Stoner would go on a conference
Speaker 2: call with the broadcast a crew at USA Network, the
Speaker 2: cable station that aired NBA games. And there's one meeting
Speaker 2: where David Stearns says, look, guys, focus on the stars.
Speaker 2: Don't worry about the records, don't worry about who's winning,
Speaker 2: who's losing. Focus on the stars. If it's a terrible matchup,
Speaker 2: let's say the Clippers are playing the Celtics, let's say
Speaker 2: focus on John Halchek, focus on Dave Cowens. There are
Speaker 2: folks that people know, and that, to me, was David
Speaker 2: Stearns's genius was that he was able to recognize that
Speaker 2: to generate interest, he had to identify ways for Joe
Speaker 2: and Jane Public to watch a basketball game beyond two minutes,
Speaker 2: and that.
Speaker 3: Was with stars.
Speaker 2: That was with Magic Johnson and Larry Byrd and Julius
Speaker 2: Irving focus on them, and that star system is what
Speaker 2: sustained the NBA and what sustains.
Speaker 3: It to this day.
Speaker 2: That is David Searn's baby, and it comes about in
Speaker 2: a number of ways. First is the establishment of NBA Entertainment,
Speaker 2: which is what David Stern creates. So NBA and him
Speaker 2: becomes this sort of archive of game footage and player interviews,
Speaker 2: and all this material gets called into halftime features and
Speaker 2: advertisements that extol the best and broadest of the NBA.
Speaker 2: Later on, NBA Entertainment takes all this footage that they've
Speaker 2: stored from games and whatnot, and they turn that into
Speaker 2: videos highlighting players. So you have a Michael Jordan video cassette,
Speaker 2: you have a Magic Johnson video cassette, you have a
Speaker 2: Larry Bird video cassette. David Stern partners with the television station,
Speaker 2: specifically with CBS, and comes up with a game plan.
Speaker 2: Each game was going to have at least two players
Speaker 2: Larry Bird, Kareem App, Del Jabbar, Julia serving Magic Johnson
Speaker 2: because that's who the casual fan wanted to see. They
Speaker 2: wanted to see stars. So you have MBA Entertainment, you
Speaker 2: have the television coverage, and you also have NBA properties,
Speaker 2: which again is a David Stern led development, which focuses
Speaker 2: on apparel that focuses on players, players faces, what they do.
Speaker 2: So you know, it's not just getting a seventy six
Speaker 2: ers T shirt. It's getting a Julius Irvin T shirt,
Speaker 2: is getting a Charles Barkley T shirt. It's getting a
Speaker 2: Magic Johnson hat or a Magic Johnson sweatshirt. So it
Speaker 2: is a multi pronged attack that David Stern leads, and
Speaker 2: it all comes down to the players because think of
Speaker 2: it this way. Kids I think get their sports teams
Speaker 2: from their parents, right or from their grandparents, or from
Speaker 2: their family, or from allegiances in town. If you are
Speaker 2: somebody who's getting into the NBA.
Speaker 3: As a lone wolf like I was, I.
Speaker 2: Had parents who were not particuar really not really sports fans.
Speaker 2: You know, my parents didn't know what hand of baseball
Speaker 2: club went on. You're going to gravitate toward players, then
Speaker 2: code toward a team, and if you know the players
Speaker 2: through commercials, if you highlight their best attributes like Magic
Speaker 2: Johnson's smile or Larry Bird's competitiveness. You are going to
Speaker 2: win people over. And it also helps if you work
Speaker 2: with a television network likes and CBS Sports that knows
Speaker 2: how to frame the games as television promise. When you
Speaker 2: have Magic versus Larry, you're not just focusing on these
Speaker 2: two great players. You're focusing on the two sterling franchises
Speaker 2: of the NBA and the Boston Celtics and the Los
Speaker 2: Angeles Lakers. You're focusing on East versus West, and you're
Speaker 2: turning all those components into a narrative that anybody can
Speaker 2: get behind. So the NBA Finals, any NBA game isn't
Speaker 2: just a sporting event that becomes an episode of television.
Speaker 2: Where the same way that if you watch a television pilot,
Speaker 2: you get the characters, you get the storyline, and you
Speaker 2: get a happy ending or an ending, the same thing
Speaker 2: happens with NBA games on CBS.
Speaker 3: You get a beginning, middle, and end.
Speaker 2: You get a flashy introduction, you're caught up the speed
Speaker 2: with where things are, and then you get a game
Speaker 2: that is filmed almost like a movie, with quick cuts
Speaker 2: and close ups and reaction shots. You get personality into
Speaker 2: the game, and that personality bleeds through every product. Whether
Speaker 2: it's a VHS tape, whether it's a T shirt, doesn't
Speaker 2: matter what it is, because, as David Stern said, it's
Speaker 2: not what people think about you, it's how they feel
Speaker 2: about you. That is the mantra of the NBA. It
Speaker 2: is an emotional league, and that is the lifeline for
Speaker 2: the NBA's story, for its success over the past thirty
Speaker 2: five forty years. But Marvin Gay's national Anthem at the
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty three NBA All Starting in Los Angeles, to me,
Speaker 2: is a pivotal point in the NBA's history because that's
Speaker 2: when the NBA.
Speaker 3: Became the world's cool sport.
Speaker 2: You have to remember that for the longest time, the
Speaker 2: national anthem was performed in a very straight ahead fashion.
Speaker 2: But Marvin Gaye's national Anthem comes at the right time.
Speaker 2: It's when hip hop is making its ways into the
Speaker 2: American culture. And it's also a major cultural figure in
Speaker 2: Marvin gay Who's motown and sexual healing singing the song.
Speaker 2: And it's also the sign that the NBA wasn't gonna
Speaker 2: play by the rules of the NFL of Major League Baseball.
Speaker 3: It was going to do its own thing, because here.
Speaker 2: Was an unabashedly African American version of that song that
Speaker 2: reflected who was on the court. You had a majority
Speaker 2: of African American players playing, but it also represented what
Speaker 2: you saw on the court in terms of the style
Speaker 2: of play. That national anthem, if anyone hasn't.
Speaker 3: Heard, it is a.
Speaker 2: Soulful, stirring rendition that incorporates R and B gospel. He's
Speaker 2: singing it over a pre recorded beat. It reflected what
Speaker 2: the NBA was and what it could be.
Speaker 3: It was a cool sport.
Speaker 2: It wasn't a sport for your mom and your dad
Speaker 2: and your grandma and your grandpa. It was the sport
Speaker 2: that was for the cool kids at the table, for
Speaker 2: the teenagers, for the young Americans who wanted something different,
Speaker 2: that wanted to me, that was hip, that belonged to them.
Speaker 2: And that national anthem set the stage for everything that
Speaker 2: happened afterward in the NBA's cultural history, because it was
Speaker 2: defiantly non traditional, but in a way that was entertaining
Speaker 2: and fun and.
Speaker 3: Exciting and different.
Speaker 2: And for any young sports fan who's growing up in
Speaker 2: that era and afterward, that's what the NBA represented when
Speaker 2: you first saw a basketball team. It represents something different.
Speaker 2: The players looked different, they carry themselves in a different way.
Speaker 2: The game was filmed differently, the players did things differently,
Speaker 2: they talked differently. That anthem also changed the way the
Speaker 2: NBA organized its All Star games.
Speaker 3: It became more.
Speaker 2: Than just East versus West, your best versus my best.
Speaker 2: It also became what can we do to give the
Speaker 2: audience the best time possible. So Marvin Gay, in a
Speaker 2: lot of ways, launched a business revolution.
Speaker 1: And you've been listening to Pete Croato tell a heck
Speaker 1: of a story about the NBA, and we're huge hoops
Speaker 1: in my house. Heck, when I was a kid, I
Speaker 1: did Bobby Knight's camp captain of my high school basketball
Speaker 1: team twice. And to hear this story told so well
Speaker 1: by someone like Pete, well, it brings back a lot
Speaker 1: of memories.
Speaker 3: When we come back more.
Speaker 1: Of Pete Croato on the story of not only Larry O'Brien,
Speaker 1: but how David Stern helped turn the NBA into the
Speaker 1: cool game, the cool thing in American culture. And we
Speaker 1: returned to our American stories and the final segment on
Speaker 1: the rise of the National Basketball Association. When we last
Speaker 1: left off. Pete Croato, author of From Hangtime to Primetime,
Speaker 1: was telling us about how David Stern Marvin Gay, the
Speaker 1: television drama of the NBA and its superstar players, launched
Speaker 1: it into the success it is today. The NBA was
Speaker 1: at a high point and they were about to partner
Speaker 1: with a growing cultural force that would take them even higher.
Speaker 1: Here again is Pete Proudo.
Speaker 2: The NBA really started to become a mainstream force in
Speaker 2: nineteen seventy nine with the arrival of Magic Johnson and
Speaker 2: Ladder Bird. Nineteen seventy nine is also the year that
Speaker 2: Rapper's Delight hits the airwaves. Hip Hop, rapper and the
Speaker 2: overall culture is a youth culture. It was especially a
Speaker 2: youth culture in the nineteen eighties into the early nineteen nineties.
Speaker 2: The NBA has always been about doing what's new, what's relevant.
Speaker 2: The NBA's tradition is that it has no tradition, So
Speaker 2: partnering hip hop with the NBA, or rather the NBA
Speaker 2: partner with hip hop, was really a no brainer. Hip
Speaker 2: Hop has a youthful audience that has need to spend
Speaker 2: and want something that's new, doesn't want the same old thing,
Speaker 2: doesn't want They don't want to listen to Mick Jagger
Speaker 2: their rolling Stone. They don't want to hear a story
Speaker 2: about Mickey Mantle and Jim Brown. They want what's new.
Speaker 2: The NBA's partnership with hip hop was a match made
Speaker 2: in heaven. It's also not surprising because hip hop really
Speaker 2: started as a byproduct of city culture. Basketball is very
Speaker 2: much a city game. It did take place in gymnasiums, obviously,
Speaker 2: and it did take place in the suburbs, but basketball's
Speaker 2: biggest influence is in the cities. You don't need much
Speaker 2: room to put up a basketball court, you don't need
Speaker 2: much room to put up even a hoop. That the
Speaker 2: game really was a way for city kids to assimilate
Speaker 2: in American culture, especially Jews and African Americans. So it
Speaker 2: may seem odd or unusual that the NBA would partner
Speaker 2: with hip hop, but really it's not. As the NBA
Speaker 2: is becoming a youthful hip league that's going mainstream thanks
Speaker 2: to stars like Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson, hip hop
Speaker 2: is enjoying the same renaissance. MTV starts playing rap videos,
Speaker 2: rap starts to mimic pop songs with choruses and hooks,
Speaker 2: and also incorporate elements of rock music. For example, walk
Speaker 2: this way, You've got to fight for your right to party.
Speaker 2: Those songs have hooks that a young fan get into,
Speaker 2: even if they don't like rap, and it's different. It's
Speaker 2: the new rock and roll, and that's appealing of kids.
Speaker 2: And also you have artists that now are really more
Speaker 2: like entertainers coming to the forefront. You have Will Smith,
Speaker 2: you have MC Hammer, you have God help us in
Speaker 2: all Ice. They all kind of come into that era.
Speaker 2: So as the NBA became mainstream, hip hop became the
Speaker 2: instrum that also generates a line of culture.
Speaker 3: And a line of.
Speaker 2: Clothing that specifically sneakers that hooks not only a young
Speaker 2: audience but the players. So it is a natural marriage
Speaker 2: of the two. The two go hand in hand even
Speaker 2: to this day. And all the forces aligned with Michael
Speaker 2: Jordan and with Nike and with the market. And here's why.
Speaker 2: For a number of years, the NBA stars were always
Speaker 2: quote unquote model citizens such as Julius Irving that Hen
Speaker 2: packaged his team oriented stars such as Magic Johnson and
Speaker 2: Larry Bird part of a rivalry, or they were just born.
Speaker 2: So Michael Jordan comes along with a shoe that is
Speaker 2: quote unquote banned by the NBA. It doesn't look like
Speaker 2: any shoe you've ever seen. It's got white and black
Speaker 2: and red.
Speaker 3: It is completely foreign.
Speaker 2: And then you have Michael Jordan, who embodies the spirit
Speaker 2: of that shoe because he is a soloist. He is
Speaker 2: not part of a team, he's not established, he is
Speaker 2: brand new. He is marketed as a rebel by going
Speaker 2: over players, by putting the ball in the hoop in
Speaker 2: ways that many people have not seen. And he can play.
Speaker 2: He's an extraordinary player. And he is somebody that looks
Speaker 2: good on camera. He's extremely attractive, he's a manageable height
Speaker 2: at six foot six. He is a matinee idol for basketball.
Speaker 2: So all those things come together and turn this shoe
Speaker 2: into a cultural force. It's not just a shoe. You
Speaker 2: are buying the nineteen eighties version of the leather jacket
Speaker 2: or the Davy crockettat And when it's embraced by not
Speaker 2: only basketball fans, but by by hip hop artists, by
Speaker 2: city kids, by whomever. And when clothing comes out to
Speaker 2: match the shoes, the cats out of the band. So
Speaker 2: Michael Jordan really represents the beginning of the sneaker clothing
Speaker 2: fashion trend in popular culture. I think because he was
Speaker 2: somebody who you could represent, who you could aspire to be,
Speaker 2: just by wearing his shoe. And if you're a teenager
Speaker 2: and you want to be rebellious, it's very easy to
Speaker 2: chalk up sixty five dollars or one hundred dollars, one
Speaker 2: hundred and fifty dollars to become rebellious, to become part of
Speaker 2: a movement, especially when that movement is represented by somebody
Speaker 2: who is as magnetic, who's as brilliant player as Michael
Speaker 2: Jordan is. It's a very easy association to make and
Speaker 2: it persists. So if you want to be like Steph
Speaker 2: Curry or Kevin Durant or God Forrivid Kyrie Irving, buying
Speaker 2: their shoe, buying their pal is a way to get
Speaker 2: closer to them, and Michael Jordan is the start of that.
Speaker 3: The NBA now is a global business. I mean it is.
Speaker 2: It is worth billions and billions of dollars, and it
Speaker 2: has thousands of employees across the globe. It is constantly
Speaker 2: trying to so its seeds of development in different areas
Speaker 2: of the world. I mean, I think Africa is now
Speaker 2: the latest continent to come under.
Speaker 3: The NBA's purview. So it is it is.
Speaker 2: Just now this behemoth, and the NBA is part of
Speaker 2: our part of our life, whether we're online or watching
Speaker 2: it on TV. I mean, it's you know, I think
Speaker 2: most people know who Lebron James is, they know who
Speaker 2: Kevin Durant is, their culture institutions. I think we forget
Speaker 2: that the NBA wasn't always like this. The NBA wasn't
Speaker 2: always a colossus, an international colossus.
Speaker 3: What's amazing to.
Speaker 2: Me is that the NBA we see today came about
Speaker 2: because of the efforts of people who loved basketball, who
Speaker 2: just loved the NBA and loved what it could be.
Speaker 2: These are people that just worked tirelessly to elevate a
Speaker 2: game that they loved and were passionate about. David Stern,
Speaker 2: Leo Brian Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, Michael Jordan.
Speaker 3: But the NBA's rise.
Speaker 2: Is the result of so many people that have fallen
Speaker 2: into the cracks of history. Men and women like Paul Gilbert, A. Gesser,
Speaker 2: Bill Fickett, Ted Shaker, and Arlene Weltman. These men and
Speaker 2: women who who worked tirelessly and sacrificed and sometimes embarrassed
Speaker 2: themselves to turn the NBA into a part of our lives.
Speaker 2: Their efforts have been forgotten, and it's.
Speaker 3: A crying shame.
Speaker 2: The NBA's rise to success didn't come about because of
Speaker 2: Michael Jordan, David Stern, Larry Bird and Magic Johnson. It's
Speaker 2: a story of dozens and dozens of people working together
Speaker 2: to create what we see today.
Speaker 1: And a great job on the production by Monty Montgomery
Speaker 1: and his special thanks to author Pete Corrado. His book
Speaker 1: From Hangtime to Prime Time is available on Amazon and
Speaker 1: the usual suspects and what a story it tells, and
Speaker 1: it starts early baseball was America's pastime football second by
Speaker 1: the late fifties. But it took Larry O'Brien, David Stern,
Speaker 1: and a bunch of others to put the NBA on
Speaker 1: the map. And indeed it took some great players too,
Speaker 1: Bird and Magic also combining with rap music in this remarkable,
Speaker 1: markable merger of cultural forces. The partnership between the two
Speaker 1: a match made in heaven. As Pete said, then came Jordan,
Speaker 1: Nike and the market. Let's face it, Jordan was a
Speaker 1: matinee idol a master salesman and a virtuoso performer, and
Speaker 1: the NBA turned into a pop culture force. Indeed, my
Speaker 1: own daughter Reagan for Christmas one of the Nike Blue
Speaker 1: North Carolina air Jordan's proving that he's still in The
Speaker 1: NBA is still a cultural force. The story of the
Speaker 1: NBA here on our American Stories.
Speaker 2: Six batt