Sonny Vaccaro Feared Michael Jordan’s Failure to Reach Stardom Would Have ‘Embarrassed’ Nike: “All the Money We Had”

Michael Jordan is the legend of the NBA. Ask anyone what name they would associate with the game and everyone will, quite inadvertently, say Michael Jordan. But before he became all of this, before he was even an NBA player, expectations were high. And, of course, there was still a lot of doubt. Nike took a huge gamble going all in on him and even they were fearful of embarrassment.

Sonny Vaccaro the legendary executive at Nike who signed Jordan also had his doubts. He was hesitant to an extent. But he quashed all his fears. Sonny had seen what he needed to.

But like any athlete, hesitancy was a necessity. Jordan was supposed to be the chosen son. But the league had already seen many such prospects come and go. What was the guarantee that he wouldn’t be another?

Even someone like Sonny, who had the gall to convince Phil Knight and Nike to go all in had to be skeptical!

Sonny Vaccaro was skeptical about Michael Jordan but he stood by his conviction.

In the book, Michael Jordan: The Life by Roland Lazenby, Sonny Vaccaro talks about the skepticism behind Jordan’s predicted success. Even Michael himself wasn’t convinced. He said,

“I know everybody’s eyes are on me and some of the things I do even surprise myself. They aren’t always planned. They just happen.”

Such talk was perhaps just a little bit of self-doubt in the mind of a young athlete. However, Sonny had already gone all in. “We could have gone under if he had been a failure,” Vaccaro told Lazenby.

He also put forth a huge “what if?”,

“We put all the money we had into him. What if he’d been an average player? Nobody knew for sure at the time. We’d have been embarrassed. I mean, I don’t know what would’ve happened. But I do know what didn’t happen. He wasn’t an average player. He was someone who crossed over and made millions of dollars.”

But the ending was rather poetic. Vaccaro chose to believe in the good. The possibility of greatness. And sometimes that is all you need to make $126 million in a year!

How Phil Knight and Sonny Vaccaro’s conviction helped Nike make an immediate dent in the market.

Phil Knight and Sonny Vaccaro gave Michael Jordan the biggest contract during the time. They were willing to pay him $500,000 each year for 5 years.

The other end of the deal? They wanted to make $3 million in shoe sales in the first three years. But, of course, Jordan shattered all expectations. The Bulls legend was a superstar from the moment he left the gates.

Now, we all know the story. “Jordans” are a household name and Michael’s story is the lore. Sonny Vaccaro and Phil Knight made the biggest gamble of their lives and put in “All the Money We Had”, they didn’t face any embarrassment. They became household legends. Or at least, their shoes did.