by Jay Williams
Because of my admiration for Charlie, I thought Ceruzzi Sports still looked like a good bet, even though I could see things were far from perfect. I wasn’t playing basketball anymore, and, while I had saved my money, I didn’t have any steady income at this point. I needed, and wanted, the job.
Our offices were right next to Madison Square Garden, and everyone was on salary. The overhead was ridiculous, and there was intense pressure to produce revenue at the same rate for a return on investment. Dean’s solution was to toss large sums of money around to try to build quickly, which only made us look desperate. We showered money on “runners,” guys who served as the go-betweens with players and their AAU coaches. They would pocket our dough, only to turn around and tell us that they had already promised to deliver that player to someone else, someone they’d been working with for years. We never should’ve been giving money to runners in the first place, but we had little choice, since no one knew who we were. We lacked the clout to quietly buy an athlete’s allegiance under the table ourselves.
If it all sounds a bit sleazy, that’s because it was. Even when we found a trustworthy runner—and I use that adjective loosely—they weren’t stupid. They’d come to us saying, “Hey, for this guy, if and when he comes on board—I know you guys get 4 percent; well, we want half of that, and we want 10 percent of the marketing.” They outplayed us at our own game.
Having been through this process as an athlete, I already knew that the best approach to building an agency was not to line the pockets of runners, but to build real relationships with players and coaches. Unfortunately, the mandate at Ceruzzi to turn an immediate profit permeated the office. We never gave money to kids, and we never gave money to parents, but we did provide some AAU organizations with money—a lot of money, in one case.
By the time I met Kevin Love, who was a freshman at UCLA, Ceruzzi Sports had already “donated” more than $250,000 to his former AAU coach, Pat Barrett. I knew money had exchanged hands, but I didn’t care as long as it meant establishing a relationship with Kevin. I believed in Charlie more than anything, and although our tactics were morally questionable, all of our competitors were doing the same thing.
Pat arranged our first meeting at Mr. Chow in Beverly Hills. When Kevin walked in the door, I could immediately tell that he was slightly uncomfortable with my presence. It didn’t take long for us to break the ice, and soon enough the conversation flowed easily.
I explained to him that the reason I was so passionate about my new position was because of the terrible mistake that had cost me my career, and almost my life. I wanted to help him make better decisions than I had made at the age of 21. I didn’t know everything there was to know about being an agent, but I wasn’t the agent. I was learning the business under Charlie’s tutelage.
We talked about the agency, his aspirations after college, what businesses he wanted to be involved in, what his parents were like, and, most important, where he was in the process of picking an agent. I explained to him that he didn’t have to pay the full 4 percent standard commission, that he could negotiate it down since he was a lock to be a lottery pick.
He hadn’t chosen an agent yet and was still in the process of doing his due diligence; however, when the meeting ended, he did say how much he appreciated our taking care of Pat. Everything seemed to be heading in the right direction.
Throughout Kevin’s recruiting process, we had built something of a friendship. We would exchange texts here and there about games or just about how he was doing. I would visit him throughout the year, and every time, things seemed to be just like they were before.
I had no idea whether or not Kevin actually knew that we had given money to his AAU program. “Thanks for taking care of Pat” could have meant a lot of things. But it was clear to me that Kevin was not the naive kid he passed himself off as later. He seemed pretty savvy about the game, and even though no rules were broken, he seemed way more comfortable than other kids I had spoken to.
We later found out that Pat Barrett had been working with three other agencies, and he’d shopped either Kevin or another one of his top players to all of them. Barrett had leverage—at one point he had Tyson Chandler, Taj Gibson, Brandon Jennings, and Chase Budinger on his AAU teams. In 25 years, Barrett had more than 100 Division I players play for him. Any college basketball coach knew he was the person to contact about recruiting those players. The man was an industry, and we were gullible enough to think we could work with him. On the one hand he seemed to be signaling that he could deliver Love to us, and on the other he was bleeding us dry. By the time we finally cut Barrett off, we had sunk north of $300,000 into him.
Even before this situation came to light, I was having a rough time adjusting to the agenting business. I came into it thinking I could help these kids, since I had a different perspective, with everything I’d gone through. If I saw them heading down the wrong path, I could say, Hey, you probably shouldn’t be doing this, and they’d listen because they knew my story. But there’s a lot of competition for these kids, and at the same time, other agents were saying, “Why would you want to sign with an agency where the guy just threw his whole career away?” I was forced to confront that head-on and talk to family members about my accident, the mistake that I made, and how it truly shaped me to become a better person. But I didn’t really believe that—not yet, anyway—and having to talk about it all the time left me in a very negative place. It wore me out. I was selling a story that deep down I knew wasn’t true; I had worked so hard to get my body to recover from the accident, but I still hadn’t completely dealt with it in my mind.
When Yahoo Sports broke the story about our involvement with Barrett, my reputation took a serious hit. People in college basketball with whom I had had close ties started distancing themselves from me. I was hearing from close friends that competing agencies were also saying things like “He’s not really a part of the agency; he’s just a side pony, a name.” And I wasn’t the only target. Other agencies were saying, “Why would you want Charlie Grantham representing you when he and David Stern are never on the same page?”
Talk about hypocrisy. It’s because of Charlie that NBA players are making as much as they do, and agents didn’t think twice about bashing him just to sign a client. That was just part of the game; people would say whatever was necessary to secure a client or keep a competitor from getting one.
Reputation is all anyone has to work with. I know people talked trash about me as a player, but to the best of my knowledge, my integrity had never been questioned until I ventured into the world of sports agenting. I would go out to talk to the parents of an athlete and be told, I heard from this person who said you’re dishonest. To say it was devastating would be an understatement. Yes, I wanted to make money, but I also knew I could help kids. I was trying to find my way and wanted to do something good. I didn’t fully understand the ramifications of switching from athlete to agent. I didn’t understand how I could be a bad guy when other agencies were doing the same thing we were, and painting us as criminals.
Adding salt to the wound, Kevin Love threw me under the bus when confronted by reporters. In explaining why Ceruzzi never had a chance to sign him in the first place, he said, “If I was going with an agent, why would I ever go with a guy who, no offense, crashed a motorcycle into a tree? I’m not going to go with a guy that reckless.”
I get it. Kevin was backed into a corner and had to find a way to defend himself. I’m sure I would’ve done the same thing, minus the low blow. But I was absolutely livid at what he said. That rage quickly morphed into depression. I was lost—again—without any direction, and my self-doubt led to more drinking and partying as a much-needed distraction. Phone calls and e-mails flooded my inbox with interview requests to discuss the once promising NBA player turned rogue agent. There was nowhere to run and not enough drugs and alcohol to numb the pain. I would continue to do what felt like the devil’s work.
We tried to recruit Donte Green of Syracuse
by helping a family member obtain a credit line, and we got hammered for it. Some other guy wanted to fight me because I sat with UMass’s Gary Forbes out of the blue when he had been talking to him for years. It was cutthroat, and it became difficult to tell the good guys—if there were any—from the bad. It was a “use or be used” system.
This wasn’t how I wanted to think about the sport that I loved. Suddenly my character was under intense scrutiny. I was all too aware of the strain this line of work was putting on my personal and professional relationships. Perhaps I needed to be more patient about this rebuilding process.
While working at Ceruzzi Sports, still in a fragile state of mind, I decided to move in with some of my friends, since I had been so isolated for so long. Four of us found an apartment at 13th Street and First Avenue, in New York’s East Village. You had to walk through the building all the way to the back, make a left out the back door, and go down a flight of stairs to the basement, where we had a four-bedroom apartment. We called it the Dungeon. The place was tiny and the walls were thin, which allowed you to hear everything going on in the room next to yours. It was the polar opposite of everything I was used to, and exactly what I wanted at this point in my life.
All three of my friends were bartenders in the city, so it made sense that we spent a lot of time hanging out at the places where they worked. Alcohol was a constant in my life—something to help the painkillers suppress my anxiety. I had taken Oxy regularly throughout my comeback to deal with my aching body. Now I was no longer playing or training, but that didn’t stop me from taking the same drug on a daily basis to suppress a different kind of pain: the pain of failure. It was no fun walking around New York City, being recognized by strangers wanting to talk to me about my accident. Being high and drunk shielded me from the reality of everyday living. People could’ve said whatever they wanted to me then—I was too out of it to care.
I told myself I wasn’t an addict, because I’d seen addicts on the streets when I was growing up. I wasn’t stumbling or shuffling around; I didn’t have track marks on my arms; I was functioning pretty well, considering that I was beginning to have trouble remembering things and felt like I was in a haze all the time. It didn’t matter that my drugs weren’t being prescribed to me any longer, or that I was trying to extend my supply by cutting the pills in half, or that I was taking them with other painkillers I could manage to get ahold of, or that I was falling apart while hiding it from my friends and family.
But of course I wasn’t an addict, and I definitely didn’t have a problem.
The first Monday of every month, I’d go to a bar across the street from my place and have one Crown and Coke after another while waiting for my drug dealer to make an entrance. I referred to him as my doctor, since I was no longer able to get my prescription filled. He was maybe 20 or 21 years old at best, and always good for a bump or two of cocaine to sober me up after I’d been drinking into the wee hours of the morning, before heading off to work.
He would enter the bar carrying a book bag meant for a toddler, which I always thought was weird, but I was too out of it to say anything. One month it was He-Man, and the next it was Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I never asked him about the dosage or even attempted to negotiate the cost. I always had cash and just needed the fix more than anything to get through the day.
After we’d have a drink and some small talk, his hand would always tap me on my left thigh under the table, handing me a plastic bag. I would take it and put it into my pocket while handing him $500 in cash from the same pocket. Then I would leave, head back to my apartment, and pop a couple of pills.
Most of the time, I would only take one or two in the course of the day so I could maintain my high while still being able to function. People moved so fast and were so consumed with their own lives that no one noticed I was high anyway.
But there were countless nights when, after popping three at a time, I would wake up in random places or find myself at clubs with people I didn’t even know. Just strangers I had met on the street looking for a bar to keep the party going. One afternoon I woke up on a subway platform in the same clothes I had partied in the night before.
It all came crashing down on me one night after work.
As I made my way to the subway to head to the East Village, an older gentleman stopped me, put his hand on my shoulder, and said, “Man, you really fucked up your dream, huh?” He wasn’t finished. “You let us all down, man. You were the one. You really hurt me.” My first thought was: I really hurt you? I didn’t know how to respond, so I shook my head, let him rant for another minute or so, and apologized. I walked away in disbelief.
I can’t believe I just apologized to a perfect stranger for something I did to myself.
I replayed his words in my head the entire subway ride. As I was walking up the stairs to the street, I saw a younger kid pointing at me, trying to figure out who I was. The last thing I wanted at this point was more recognition. The kid finally put it together and started yelling my name out loud. “Jason Williams! Jay Williams! You’re the guy that got in that bad wreck, right?” I turned around, not knowing what to say, as he filled in the blanks. “I could tell it was you by your limp. Are you ever going to be able to walk right again? You still look messed up.” A part of me felt like I needed to give him a rundown of all my injuries and the rehab I’d undergone just to get to this point. Instead I just said, “Hey, man, I’m not in the best mood today. I’m sorry. Hope you have a good day.” I kept moving along whatever street it was with my head down, absorbed in my own misery.
Instead of going home that night as I’d planned, I went to the same bar across the street from my apartment. I sat there alone. There was no TV. I didn’t talk to anyone. It was just me and my drink—and the two OxyContin I had taken that morning. I kept staring into the mirror behind the bar, wondering, Who is this? Who am I becoming? I was a complete failure. I was the heaviest I’d ever been—220 pounds. I looked at my reflection, and there was no spark left in my eyes. They were glazed over, and it was like I didn’t have a soul.
If this wasn’t the end of the road, then I didn’t want to be around to see what was next.
I’d never really dealt with my accident. I thought I had, but I didn’t understand that this was something that was going to follow me forever. I’d tried to come back and play basketball, because returning to the league would have wiped out my mistake. See? I didn’t throw it all away. I’m back! But I’d lost too much ground. I kept getting hurt—either body parts that were damaged in the accident or other injuries because I was overcompensating. And eventually I had to accept that and quit trying to make my way back. But people kept throwing it in my face. I thought, I quit. I can’t do anything. I can’t win. I was defeated mentally. In a drunken stupor, I managed to walk back to my apartment, bumping into walls and muttering to myself. I walked through the building and kicked open the door that led to the stairway down to my unit. My bad foot got caught on the lip of the doorway and I fell down the flight of stairs. I just lay there motionless in a heap, with a cut on my forehead and the rest of my body throbbing.
You deserve every ounce of this pain, Williams. Too bad you didn’t snap your neck.
I finally got myself up and into the apartment. I grabbed a bottle of Jack Daniel’s, locked myself in my bedroom, and emptied my bottle of Oxy into my hand. Only three or four pills came out. There I was, standing in my subterranean bedroom, wobbling from side to side, staring at the pills in my left hand, swigging straight from the bottle of J.D. in my right.
I popped them into my mouth, took another long swig from the bottle to wash them down, and dropped to the floor, my back against the bed, staring at the door. I took another long swig and hoped this would be the end. My mom wasn’t there to stop me. Nobody was.
Then I passed out.
To my disappointment, I woke up the next day. Still in the same place.
I’d failed again.
DURING THE MOST difficult of times, I
was fortunate enough to have a friend in my life named Carl Liebert. He was the CEO of 24 Hour Fitness, and he hired me as a consultant to work on the grassroots programs. Watching him interact with his amazing wife, Amy, and seeing the incredible bond they had, combined with how he raised his three adorable little boys—Jake, Seth, and Samuel—reminded me of the things I wanted for my own life. I’d been so focused on what I had lost that I’d turned my back on the values and principles I needed to continue to grow as a man. What kind of person did I want to be? I found an example in Carl.
I needed to change my life if I wanted a chance to achieve anything worthwhile. The first thing I had to do was conquer my substance abuse. I figured that was something I could do by myself.
I didn’t go into a rehab or detox recovery program; I stopped cold turkey, going through withdrawal over the course of a week and a half, with all the accompanying sweats, shakes, and delirium, falling into unconsciousness and waking up to discover it was a different day. Eventually I started to feel better, and my mind was clear enough to give some serious thought to what I wanted my future to look like.
I’d lost sight of the need to balance work and the loved ones in my life. I realized that working at Ceruzzi wasn’t worth risking my reputation or my relationships, so I turned my attention to another ambition of mine: broadcasting.
A little over a year before the Kevin Love fallout, I’d met a guy named Reed Bergman, who ran his own sports broadcasting and marketing firm. He came into the office to discuss becoming the exclusive marketing arm for our agency. As I walked Reed to the door after meeting him and his group, he turned, grabbed me by the wrist, and said, “What are you doing here? You have the energy and charisma for TV and should be talking about college basketball.”