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In 1990, the commissioner created a position just for her: special assistant to him. “I think I offered my condolences,” Welts says, laughing. “If you were living in the moment, I can’t imagine a tougher job. But also with a vote of confidence that he would’ve put her in that role.” She opened his mail in an era before email. She’d listen in on his calls; sit in on his meetings. She says he’d kick her out of his office, hang up on her and leave Post-its on her phone saying, “8 a.m. came by, you weren’t here.” She says his mantra was, “Micromanagement is underrated.” She’s sure it was partly “for show,” partly “just to kick you in the butt a little bit.” But she also believes the job was the opportunity of a lifetime, “just a master class in learning how to be a commissioner.” She was eternally grateful.
Little did she know, Stern was grooming her for it all. He had earlier begun asking her to write his speeches, which was a compliment, a sign of trust and a crapshoot — because there was no guarantee he’d use them. “Oh my gosh, he was the worst deliverer of speeches ever,” Welts says. “I can’t tell you how many times we were off-stage at some event, and he’ll look at you five minutes before he goes on and says, ‘What should I say today?’ And then he will go out and completely charm.” But Val wrote them, anyway — always pouring her heart and soul into them — even though she remembers Stern sometimes “tossing them in a garbage can as he was walking up the steps to the stage.” She hardly took it personally because he was better winging it anyway, “the envy of all of us.”
In April 1996, even before the U.S. women won gold in Atlanta, the commissioner convinced the league’s board of governors to ride the wave of the national team and approve the concept of a WNBA. And probably because he could hang up on her, bellyache at her and crumple up her speeches — and she still kept her wits about her — Stern wanted Val to run the league. Maybe it was all a test. He named her president, of course, not commissioner. Because remember: Micromanagement is underrated.
Maverick Carter: "We thought about partnering with the NBA and we had a conversation and David Stern, rest in peace, who I actually always really admired. David Stern basically told them, 'F*ck do I need you for? I'm the NBA. I own basketball in the world.' And he said, 'So if I'm not going to do it with the NBA, I'm not. The next best person to partner with me on building a basketball business and league in India is LeBron James.' And that's why I wanted this deal."
When NBA Commissioner David Stern handed down the hammer in 2000, the Timberwolves were fined $3.5 million and stripped of five consecutive first-round draft picks (though one was later restored). For Smith, the immediate professional fallout was jarring. “I was basically forced to play somewhere else,” Smith recalled. “When the ruling came down, I had two options: if I wanted to go back to Minnesota, I had to sit out an entire year before I could sign a contract with them again. Or, I could sign somewhere else, play that season out, and then return to Minnesota later if I wanted to.”
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How does Las Vegas as a city and market now align with the vision you had when you guys first brought Summer League here? LeGarie: I’d love to take all the credit. Adam Silver saw it way, way ahead of everybody. He understood because (late former comissioner David Stern) just kept focusing on “It’s the Strip. It’s guys (who are) low lives. It’s the things you see in the movies.” But none of that is true. This was the fastest growing community. School districts. All these things going on. And Adam was keenly aware of that.
Dan Gilbert: "David Stern was a phenomenal commissioner for 30 years. He built that league. But he too, he used to pick on Mark Cuban, he used to pick on me, he picked on the new guys."
Desperate to create some buzz, someone at NBA HQ in Olympic Tower — mercifully, no one can now remember exactly who, though the late commissioner David Stern’s name came up — pushed the idea to call the 1982 series between the Lakers and the Philadelphia 76ers “Showdown ’82.” It had a logo and everything. And it made the NBA’s championship look like a cheesy, made-up event that would run on ESPN The Ocho. (“Coming up after the Great Eastern Skeet Shooting Championships … it’s Showdown ’82!”)
Keith O’Brien: Cooper Flagg is an incredible star who is shouldering the pressure that comes with being the No. 1 draft pick and who is performing at a level that I don't think anybody expected this early in his career. We can have fun sports bar room debates about who is better than whom. That's part of the fun of being a sports fan, comparing players across generations and wondering what might have been or who might prevail. And that's a fun debate to have, but you cannot underestimate how important Larry Bird was to the success of the entire league in 1979-1980 when he joined the Boston Celtics. His arrival, along with the arrival of Magic to the Los Angeles Lakers, and along with the savvy leadership of David Stern, really does set the league up for success at a time when the league was teetering on the brink of total obscurity. No talent today, no talent in the past 20 years, has even come close to facing that, and so for that reason alone, Larry Bird will always be ranked among the most important players who ever stepped on an NBA court.
Front Office Sports: NEW: Years ago, Mark Cuban made the same prize money offer that Mat Ishbia did to lure stars to the NBA's dunk and three-point contests. David Stern had told him it would be "tampering," Cuban tells FOS.
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There was a noticeable shift in Silver’s tone and demeanor on this particular issue, according to the three executives who spoke with The Athletic, with one of them saying, “He sounded more like Stern than Silver,” referencing Silver’s occasionally brazen predecessor David Stern, who was known for telling owners, general managers, players and reporters exactly what he thought, with choice words. It was a marked departure in behavior from Silver, 63, a lawyer by trade who is in his 12th season as commissioner and usually speaks in a lawyerly, collegial tone in meetings. At another point on the call, Silver said to a general manager that coaches on tanking teams “don’t want to do this,” essentially pitting these team execs against their most important employees (coaches can be fired, while players, essentially, cannot).
Lindsey Hunter on LeBron James likely ending his stint with Lakers: I think people got tired of like the Bronny thing and every time something happened, LeBron has something to say. It's a lot that comes with LeBron because he's a powerful person. Tim Hardaway Sr.: It's a lot of drama every day. Hunter: You know better than us you were down in Miami. Hardaway: Yeah. Everyday it's a lot of drama with LeBron James. Every f*cking day. What Rich Paul said as an agent, you don't talk about trading somebody during the season. You don't talk about nobody else's client. Austin Reaves is not your client. Don't talk about somebody else's client, what the Lakers should do and how they should do it. That's not your concern. That is in today's game. You know what? The old commissioner David Stern would have fined him. Dillon Brooks said these guys shouldn't have podcasts. I've been saying that for the last 10 years!
Hunter and Stern were considered adversaries but were privately close friends, two lawyers who fiercely represented their respective sides. And in those days, the owners and the players were from completely different worlds. There appeared to be a disconnect between players who were embracing the hip-hop era and player empowerment, and owners who wanted to keep the league the way it was during the Magic Johnson-Larry Bird-Jordan years. “We got along well with one another,” Hunter said of Stern. “It was funny, the only difficult time was when we had to negotiate a contract. The reality is that we could have been much closer friends than we were. We were close professionally. We were respectful of one another, etc. But he and I could have been real friends, but for the fact that every couple years I was going to have to negotiate a deal, and it was like boxers, you know, you go into your corner, yes. “So that’s how it worked. But, you know, David was not going to hurt or damage the league. Yes, you know he was going to do his job and the negotiations were not easy. He didn’t give me anything. We got what I was able to demand through the players. He realized, or they realized, the confidence that the players had in me at the time and that the players hung in there.”
Rick Welts, CEO, Dallas Mavericks Yes, this is highly unlikely ... but insiders insist he would be a perfect stopgap if Silver unexpectedly left early. The reasons are clear — no one is more experienced or a better people person. Welts worked in the league office as far back as the 1980s and learned from David Stern. He was a key to the Warriors’ rebuild, a mastermind behind the construction of Chase Center and is focused on finding a new venue for Dallas. But he’s not a lawyer, has already retired once and doesn’t covet the top job.