Since the NBA adopted a rookie pay scale in 1995, the salaries of first-round picks have hinged on the order of their selection. Teams can offer salaries up to 120 percent of the player's slotted figure. "The process is relatively simple, and teams routinely offer the 20 percent maximum," reported...

"And all I gotta do is act naturally."
--- Richard Starkey

Ringo Starr just hit the Big Seven-Oh. We loved him when he was 24, we loved him when he was 34, we even loved him when he was 64. And we still love his Beatles, though the band...

Nine years ago I sat in the bleachers of a high school gym in Santa Monica to watch one of my clients work out for a couple of NBA teams. It was shortly before the summer draft, and my prospect, a 19-year-old shooting guard from the University of Arkansas, had...

It's heartening to hear that the antitrust division of the Justice Department is looking into NCAA rules that allow colleges to jerk student-athletes around by reviewing their scholarships from year to year. While the Feds are at it, they should look into the organization's policies on the use of agents...

A few years ago The Onion ran an item about how all 30,000 current NCAA men's basketball players -- from those who played for every program from Duke to Allegheny County Community College - had announced that they were declaring their eligibility for the 2007 NBA Draft. According to the...

"I never let my schooling interfere with my education." ~ Mark Twain

Lately, Arne Duncan, our nation's Secretary of Education, has been rapping the knuckles of colleges that graduate ridiculously low numbers of student athletes. Citing the latest study by the University of Central Florida, Duncan suggests that basketball teams...

The city of Chester, Pennsylvania grew up around the massive shipyards that sprawl along the banks of the Delaware River. The naval graving dock thrived during the Civil War, but by the early 1960s Chester's mainstay industries had pretty much collapsed. Today, many parts of this rough-and-tumble town could use...

Forty-five summers ago I attended the Jack Kraft basketball camp in Green Lane, Pennsylvania. I was 11 years old. Kraft was then the basketball coach of Villanova University on the Main Line. I - born in West Philadelphia, living in Penn Valley -- was one of the few Jews at...

As befits a pastime that once featured World B. Free, over the last decade pro hoops has become a truly global sport. With its fan base and marketability pretty much tapped out in the United States, the NBA has promoted itself heavily in Asia and Europe, and those efforts have...

I don't smoke, but I've always enjoyed a good Cuban. By which I mean an unfiltered observation from Mark Cuban, the blunt owner of the Dallas Mavericks. But recently he posted a blog entry about the economics of the National Football League that was puzzling enough to qualify as a...

Tracy McGrady never set out to become an NBA player. His intention was always to pitch for the New York Yankees. But a funny thing happened to him on his way to Gotham. He got sidetracked in Toronto, Orlando and Houston. It turned out to be a 13-year trek.

With a potential NBA lockout over collective bargaining looming a little more than a year away, the players union remains steadfast against league demands to shorten contracts, cut salaries, eliminate guarantees and snatch a far greater percentage of basketball-related income. Predictably, one sportswriter recently brayed about players who "feign outrage...

Last week in his first Super Bowl press conference, rookie NFL players union head DeMaurice Smith tackled the league's looming labor strife head-on. He charged that with the current collective bargaining agreement (CBA) set to expire in 19 months, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell is using dubious arithmetic to cry poor....

All great acts have featured great second bananas: Martin and Lewis. Lewis and Clark. Clark and Lois. Fred and Barney. Andy and Barney. Smith and Barney. Mike and Ike. Ike and Tina. Tina Louise. Bacon and eggs. Toast and butter. Lox and bagels. Gin and tonic. Lemon and lime. Peaches...

It's a joke that no doubt dates to the very first set shot. Yet Jim Valvano used to swear that he once asked a referee if he could draw a technical foul for thinking bad things about him. The ref said, "Of course not." So Valvano said, "Well, I think...

"Guns don't kill people -- bullets do."

In 1968, that crack was the centerpiece of comedian Pat Paulsen's mock-presidential campaign. Today the line has new meaning in light of the gun drama surrounding Gilbert Arenas, the exiled point guard of the team formerly known as the Washington Bullets. This time...

Not so long ago Jeff Wernick's biggest contribution to professional sports was very small indeed. In 1982, Wernick, then a 29-year-old lawyer in Los Angeles, realized that no postage stamps commemorated individual baseball players. So he and his buddy, Jim Finnegan, showered the Postmaster General with letters demanding a stamp...

There's a line about Godzilla in the 1998 Hollywood remake that goes: "He's not some monster trying to evade you... If you find what he wants, then he'll come to you." This week baseball's Godzilla found the contract he wanted in Los Angeles, which means he'll be coming to the...