EXCLUSIVE: Kobe Bryant Urged Sonny Vaccaro to Let Him Go to Duke Before Signing $500,000 a Year Adidas Contract, Per Biographer

While Kobe Bryant is well known for skipping college and entering the NBA as a high-schooler, it wasn’t always his preferred journey. But former Nike executive, Sonny Vaccaro, who was with Adidas back in 1995, had offered a contract to Kobe that needed him to skip the NCAA route to get drafted directly in the NBA. Renowned author Roland Lazenby, who wrote Kobe Bryant’s 2016 biography Showboat: The Life Of Kobe Bryant, recently delved into how the Mamba was almost compelled to enter the NBA after high school as part of his shoe deal with Adidas. In an exclusive interview with The SportsRush’s Adit Pujari, Lazenby discussed how Kobe had to concede against the wishes of his parents to sign a shoe deal with Adidas. 

Roland Lazenby has written dozens of nonfiction books on basketball and American football, capturing his insights gathered through conversations with prominent athletes. The eminent biographer is responsible for chronicling the untold stories of the NBA journeys of Kobe Bryant and Michael Jordan. His 2014 work Michael Jordan: The Life is one of the most celebrated biographies in NBA history. 

 

During his interview with The SportsRush, the distinguished basketball writer disclosed how the economic constraints of Kobe Bryant’s family played a huge role in the Adidas deal. The lure of a $500,000 per year deal made his parents overlook the desires of their son. To ameliorate the financial woes of his family, Kobe had then decided to sign the deal pitched by Sonny Vaccaro as a teenager . 

Vaccaro, who is famous for signing Michael Jordan to Nike in 1984, had what Lazenby termed a “vendetta” against the brand after they had fired him earlier. Apart from that, he was also perturbed by the NCAA because they didn’t allow sneaker deals for Adidas athletes. Therefore, he implored Adidas to include a clause in Bryant’s shoe deal that would only make it valid if he skipped a collegiate career. This contributed to Kobe Bryant declaring for the 1996 NBA Draft at the age of just 17. 

Personally, the budding shooting guard wanted to play for Duke. He wished to be pro-ready by not entering as a raw prospect and training under the tutelage of coach Mike Krzyzewski. However, Lazenby touched upon how Bryant became the first high-school NBA entrant to sign an Adidas deal that was worth millions. But Kobe himself insisted on having a traditional route rather than entering the league in such a fashion.

“Shoe deals weren’t even a factor back when earlier players turned pro, but here was Kobe getting millions. Sonny Vaccaro recalled what I think to be the saddest moment in the Kobe Bryant story, and there are some sad ones. Kobe Bryant was about to sign the contract, I believe they were in an Italian Restaurant in New York. Kobe looked at Sonny Vaccaro, ‘Is there any way I can sign this contract and my parents can have this money and I can go play college ball?’ And of course, he could not. He signed the contract, his parents glommed on to that money, it became a part of the huge conflict with his parents eventually,” Lazenby told The SportsRush.

Sonny Vaccaro’s desire to steal the next Michael Jordan from Nike was successful. But Bryant’s wish to play college basketball never got fulfilled.

However, it acted as a chip on his shoulder. It wasn’t money but the love of the game that drove the Black Mamba. A Duke stint would have helped Bryant skip the struggles he went through early in his career. For Roland Lazenby, what stood out was Kobe’s eventual mastery of the Triangle offense despite not having the college training to execute complex coaching schemes.