Lifetime deals are rare, but when you are dealing with a global icon like LeBron James you make exceptions.
One of the things that I respect about LeBron is he allowed his inner circle not just to be yes men, but he empowered them to be businessmen.
That doesn’t always work when you give your boys that type of power, but in LeBron’s case it has worked out beautifully.
Here is his manager Maverick Carter answering the question from GQ if LeBron got a billion from NIKE.
So you just negotiated an unprecedented lifetime contract for LeBron with Nike. What’s your secret to being a great negotiator?
You have to go into the room understanding a couple things. You have to know what you want. You have to know how to clearly articulate those things. You have to know what’s important to the other side and what they want. Be able to articulate those things, too. And then you have to be willing to not take everything. If you go into the negotiation like, I’m gonna get every dollar, every piece of real estate—I’m just gonna take this guy’s fucking pants off—you may be able to do that once, maybe twice, but after that, people aren’t going to want to do business with you. When you’re negotiating something like the Nike deal, it’s gonna last a lifetime, literally. The minute this negotiation’s over, we’re gonna work with these people every day. So you don’t want to leave them with a bad feeling.
How much was the deal for?
I can’t say.
Come on, Mav! Can you ballpark it?
What are people saying?
Kanye said a billion. So a billion.
[Maverick smiles and points one finger skyward.]
So, LeBron is really the “About Billions” man, sorry Adrien Broner.