Richard Jefferson Defrauded Of $7mm By Ex-Biz Manager

[Bangkok Wildcat]

http://tucson.com/news/local/ex-busines ... dfd6d.html

Assuming this is true by the damning allegations in the article above, I hope RJ can recover as much as possible back from Kritza. Even more so, I hope this douchebag gets a seriously long term in a nasty prison and is treated brutally by all the Homeys in there who are UA Basketball Fans!

I love RJ and along with Kerr, Elliott, and Walton, he's one of my all-time favorite Wildcats. Bear Down RJ and hope you get the justice you deserve from this slimeball. This story makes me really sick to my stomach for RJ.....smh in disgust.

[RichardCranium]

Nah, the guy will prolly be the big man in prison. Ain't no UA BB fans in prison - they're all ASU wannabes.

[Spaceman Spiff]

This is one reason why I always go off about the NCAA and its fairness towards athletes. Even athletes who do the right things have a lot of pitfalls and people looking to take advantage of them.

[gumby]

He should be raped for defrauding someone? There's a reason that isn't in statutes. Kinda weird to me how that's just accepted. Going to prison. He'll be raped.

In any event, true slimeball if true. Lute was also defrauded, so it happens to non-players as well.

[gumby]

This is one reason why I always go off about the NCAA and its fairness towards athletes. Even athletes who do the right things have a lot of pitfalls and people looking to take advantage of them.

Not getting the connection to NCAA.

[Spaceman Spiff]

This is one reason why I always go off about the NCAA and its fairness towards athletes. Even athletes who do the right things have a lot of pitfalls and people looking to take advantage of them.

Not getting the connection to NCAA.

A frequent argument I have heard against allowing athletes to benefit from their likeness in college is the athletes who would have the chance to do that also have a large payday wating for them. Thus, denying them the ability to profit from their likeness in college merely delays the money.

I have always felt that argument overlooks that even athletes that hit the NBA/NFL jackpot don't avoid self-made and external factors that make prolonged wealth less than certain. RJ shows how a guy who makes smart financial decisions still has things that can jeopardize his future.

My comment was very specific to the idea that we shouldn't feel bad for athletes being denied their actual market value because they'll realize it shortly.

[gumby]

S-T-R-E-T-C-H.

But OK.

[EVCat]

Needless to say, RJ is coming back next year. He retired briefly after the title, and now he is going to be back for his 2nd post-retirement season. I am sure there are a lot of factors...athletes have a hard time walking away, he still has value as a veteran who can provide flexible minutes, he has a team that is capable of winning a title, his manager ripped off $7MM, and...

...let's be real...in a world where JJ Reddick can get $23MM for a season, where teams have to meet 99% of a salary cap that has inflated by over $20MM in the last two years, where Mike Conley can get $30MM per year and make more in 2 years than he did in his prior 9 seasons? You'd have to drag me away kicking and screaming. Hell, if I am Kareem, I am down at the gym testing out the skyhook, thinking "I can give 8 minutes in the post...that's worth my career earnings for a single season today." It is the lottery in the NBA right now, and with sports property rights looking to contract in the next cycle, with ESPN paring back and the networks unable to deliver to enough watchers with eyes on ads to pull anything but the Finals onto over the air broadcasts? Get it now.

I wonder if the kids who are coming out now will get there in time, after their rookie contract, before this gets pulled back some? Or is someone going to overpay for national TV/playoff rights? It won't be ESPN, I don't think, and TBS/TNT are longtime partners and are not going to do anything stupid. I really believe we are at the peak right now, and the future of network-delivered sports negotiated in 5 and 6 year blocks, sometimes well over the value of the product for the prestige of having it or as a lead-in for other programming, is dim.

But RJ? He is going to get his as long as he can walk.

[EVCat]

I take that back...he is under contract on a vet minimum deal through 2018-19 that pays him $2.5 and $2.6 million. Not bad money in the rest of the world at all, but in the NBA, for what he offers, the Cavs are getting a deal.

[prh]

Needless to say, RJ is coming back next year. He retired briefly after the title, and now he is going to be back for his 2nd post-retirement season. I am sure there are a lot of factors...athletes have a hard time walking away, he still has value as a veteran who can provide flexible minutes, he has a team that is capable of winning a title, his manager ripped off $7MM, and...

...let's be real...in a world where JJ Reddick can get $23MM for a season, where teams have to meet 99% of a salary cap that has inflated by over $20MM in the last two years, where Mike Conley can get $30MM per year and make more in 2 years than he did in his prior 9 seasons? You'd have to drag me away kicking and screaming. Hell, if I am Kareem, I am down at the gym testing out the skyhook, thinking "I can give 8 minutes in the post...that's worth my career earnings for a single season today." It is the lottery in the NBA right now, and with sports property rights looking to contract in the next cycle, with ESPN paring back and the networks unable to deliver to enough watchers with eyes on ads to pull anything but the Finals onto over the air broadcasts? Get it now.

I wonder if the kids who are coming out now will get there in time, after their rookie contract, before this gets pulled back some? Or is someone going to overpay for national TV/playoff rights? It won't be ESPN, I don't think, and TBS/TNT are longtime partners and are not going to do anything stupid. I really believe we are at the peak right now, and the future of network-delivered sports negotiated in 5 and 6 year blocks, sometimes well over the value of the product for the prestige of having it or as a lead-in for other programming, is dim.

But RJ? He is going to get his as long as he can walk.

ESPN's deal runs through 2025, so there's still time for the kids entering the league. And really, when it's time for rights bidding to come back up, ESPN would be much smarter to cut its NFL deal and hang onto NBA, even with overpaying for it. The NFL deal is 1.9B/year for MNF, Pro Bowl, and the draft, and the NBA deal is 1.4B/year for everything. The NFL deal includes some branded studio hours, which I would guess is stuff like NFL Live, but I'd think ESPN could do a new without MNF/Pro Bowl for pretty cheap. The NBA deal is bad, but at least they get a ton of live event airtime, which is not the case for the NFL deal.

[Spaceman Spiff]

Needless to say, RJ is coming back next year. He retired briefly after the title, and now he is going to be back for his 2nd post-retirement season. I am sure there are a lot of factors...athletes have a hard time walking away, he still has value as a veteran who can provide flexible minutes, he has a team that is capable of winning a title, his manager ripped off $7MM, and...

...let's be real...in a world where JJ Reddick can get $23MM for a season, where teams have to meet 99% of a salary cap that has inflated by over $20MM in the last two years, where Mike Conley can get $30MM per year and make more in 2 years than he did in his prior 9 seasons? You'd have to drag me away kicking and screaming. Hell, if I am Kareem, I am down at the gym testing out the skyhook, thinking "I can give 8 minutes in the post...that's worth my career earnings for a single season today." It is the lottery in the NBA right now, and with sports property rights looking to contract in the next cycle, with ESPN paring back and the networks unable to deliver to enough watchers with eyes on ads to pull anything but the Finals onto over the air broadcasts? Get it now.

I wonder if the kids who are coming out now will get there in time, after their rookie contract, before this gets pulled back some? Or is someone going to overpay for national TV/playoff rights? It won't be ESPN, I don't think, and TBS/TNT are longtime partners and are not going to do anything stupid. I really believe we are at the peak right now, and the future of network-delivered sports negotiated in 5 and 6 year blocks, sometimes well over the value of the product for the prestige of having it or as a lead-in for other programming, is dim.

But RJ? He is going to get his as long as he can walk.

ESPN's deal runs through 2025, so there's still time for the kids entering the league. And really, when it's time for rights bidding to come back up, ESPN would be much smarter to cut its NFL deal and hang onto NBA, even with overpaying for it. The NFL deal is 1.9B/year for MNF, Pro Bowl, and the draft, and the NBA deal is 1.4B/year for everything. The NFL deal includes some branded studio hours, which I would guess is stuff like NFL Live, but I'd think ESPN could do a new without MNF/Pro Bowl for pretty cheap. The NBA deal is bad, but at least they get a ton of live event airtime, which is not the case for the NFL deal.

The only live event ESPN has out of the NFL season is weekly MNF. The studio branding is a bad investment because those shows are where ESPN is currently bleeding. That's one of the glaring issues. You can't drive ad numbers around a 3 hour block once a week.

ESPN is between a rock and a hard place because their programmed shows are losing audience and they're overpaying for live events. The cable model is really getting hammered right now.

The NBA has potential to be a better investment if you want a live sports base because of quantity. You'd like to see a more innovative approach to it all. You have college sports moving to conference/regional coverage. You'd think some pro sports would follow that model and cut deals that allow for more individually branded coverage.

It's like Arizona. I'd pay for more specific Wildcat coverage. General ESPN and even P12 don't offer that. You'd think there are enough Cowboy, Laker, etc. fans out there to allow for that sort of specialization.

[EVCat]

I get it is a better deal than the NFL, but is it a good deal?

It seems pro sports rights are in need of a major adjustment across the board. If ESPN continues to bleed to 2025, they might not be feeling a big contract even if they have shed NFL and some of their MLB contract. Especially if ala-carte cable/DBS TV becomes any kind of reality and ESPN loses that hefty across-the-board fee per subscriber.

Does the rights package to 2025 continue to escalate in a way that will continue to move the salary cap up? There has to be a breaking point here, as the game is not worth the salaries. I mean, it is worth it because they got it, but it is not a realistic value at all, and the options coming around the bend appear to all cut into that exposure. Right now, sports rights are so expensive because sports viewers are just about the only captured viewer left in the TV world. No one watches shows on time, and commercials get zapped. Only sports viewers watch live (though some delay some so they can FF through commercials). That has escalated the value of franchises to a bubble that makes the housing market laugh through local rights jackpots and piece of national contract paydays, and has escalated the CBA-negotiated portion of revenue set as a salary cap through the roof. Something has to give. It is clear the value is inflated, and the broadcast partners are bleeding out. The idea of a "lead in" to programming is long gone, so the major networks no longer overpay for sports rights to validate other programming. And the sports branded networks who paid the big money to have a product to offer advertisers a safe haven are bleeding, and the value of that ad time is being disputed. So where does it go? It has to go down.

[Merkin]

[Bangkok Wildcat]

And should have won the NC too if not for bad luck with Arenas hurting his shoulder against MSU’s Richardson, insane 3 point shooting from Dunleavy, and some crappy officiating (Gardner’s back probably still hurts from being mugged by Jay Williams).

Great team....still hurts to have lost that game!

[Spaceman Spiff]

I'm pretty sure RJ's violating the Nike contract like a parking meter in that photo.

[Irish27]

And should have won the NC too if not for bad luck with Arenas hurting his shoulder against MSU’s Richardson, insane 3 point shooting from Dunleavy, and some crappy officiating (Gardner’s back probably still hurts from being mugged by Jay Williams).

Great team....still hurts to have lost that game!

Don't forget Walton had a broken thumb.

[Bangkok Wildcat]

And should have won the NC too if not for bad luck with Arenas hurting his shoulder against MSU’s Richardson, insane 3 point shooting from Dunleavy, and some crappy officiating (Gardner’s back probably still hurts from being mugged by Jay Williams).

Great team....still hurts to have lost that game!

Don't forget Walton had a broken thumb.

Thanks Irish....Wow, I don’t even recall that at all.....I had moved back to the US (Dallas at that time) after my first stint here, got tickets with my Jawhawk cousin for the Regionals in San Antonio.....watched us beat Ole Miss but then KU lost to Illinois and he got all pissy and insisted we return to Dallas so I had to miss the win over Illinois aka ‘Thug U’.....was his car.....that was the start of my KU hatred.

So close to a NC and would have been extra special in memory of Bobbi Olson. That one still hurts.