"You have to invest in your business."

[Tammo29@xxxxxxx]

<A HREF="http://www.sacbee.com/content/sports/story/4031653p-5057081c.html";>http://www.sacbee.com/content/sports/story/4031653p-5057081c.html</A>

Mark Kreidler: Maloofs get the point of ownership

By Mark Kreidler -- Bee Sports Columnist
Published 2:15 a.m. PDT Sunday, August 18, 2002

It's official: Our Amaze-o-Meter needs a CBC and a chem-7, stat.

Something must be broken in there, and we know this because of what happened 
the other day after the word got out that the Maloof brothers had signed 
guard Mike Bibby to a long-term deal. Signing Bibby, of course, was a 
wonderful thing; it solidified the Kings as a championship contender; it was 
a late-summer shot in the arm.

But it also was exactly what the Maloofs were supposed to do, what they knew 
they needed to do, and, indeed, what they had hoped to do all along. Yet 
judging by the reaction among some denizens of Kings Nation, you'd have 
thought the owners had just stormed in and liberated a group of political 
refugees.
    
Fans were amazed, that is, that the Maloofs showed Bibby his $80 million.

Others were amazed that anyone could be amazed by a solid but unsurprising 
dispatch of ownership duties; after all, and those pricey dollar amounts 
notwithstanding, keeping Bibby, in and of itself, was strictly a matter of 
staying even with last season. (It was the Keon Clark signing that suggested 
incremental improvement and a possible way past the Lakers.)

And Joe Maloof? He stands continually amazed that anyone thinks of doing 
business any other way, even in a business that involves baggy shorts, 
breakaway rims and burn-those-20s, honey, I'm-replacing-them-with-hundreds 
contracts.

"Our long-term goals -- and we've found this very successful in our other 
businesses -- are to invest, invest, invest, and your asset will appreciate," 
Maloof said last week. "Your business will stay strong -- but you have to 
invest in your business.

"In anything you purchase as a new business, don't expect to make money for 
five years. You're just not going to do it if you're running your business 
right, because there are too many things you have to do to shore up your 
assets."

Not exactly the disjointed ramblings of a hopeless fan, now that you mention 
it. As enthusiastic as the Maloofs are at courtside, they are businessmen at 
heart (ask any season-ticket holder), and the plain truth is, keeping Mike 
Bibby on board and content is your basic good business.

If you want to be amazed, be amazed that this isn't the norm. Be amazed that 
so many astute business people come into the sporting arena and suddenly shed 
IQ points like sweat drops on a 100-degree day, almost completely missing the 
point of franchise ownership.

Only a rare few make a significant profit running a team from year to year; 
the killings get made in the buying and the selling. Yikes, even George 
Steinbrenner is on record as understanding that. You want to be amazed? Be 
amazed that so many owners in sports still don't get it.

Sports are games, but sports ownership is for the big kids. There is nothing 
more killing for a franchise than to be guided by someone with the cash to 
buy in but without the fortitude to stay the course.

The Maloofs so far have been the owners who get the point of the drill, the 
ones who figured out almost immediately that a rising tide lifts all ships. 
The Kings win; the fans come; the merchandise moves. The whole world goes 
home happy.

When I asked Joe Maloof about the Kings' heavy commitment in payroll alone, 
his answer was perfect, almost vintage, sports management.

"Sure, it costs," said Maloof, who will likely deal with a luxury-tax burden 
next year. "But, then, we're sold out every game. Our (luxury) suites are 
sold. Every parking space is taken. Our concessions are being consumed. I 
mean, we have something good going here -- all of us."

What the Maloofs did with Bibby represented a perfect confluence of business 
and fan interest. It was one of those great and increasingly rare moments 
when somebody (in this case Joe and Gavin Maloof and Kings president of 
basketball operations Geoff Petrie) sits up and sees that there really is 
such a thing as meaningfully front-loading a sports investment.

You didn't have to fall in love with Bibby in the playoffs to understand that 
he made the Kings better last season from start to finish. His own statistics 
weren't of superstar stature, but Sacramento was a markedly better team with 
him at point guard.

And that was that. The Maloofs understood months ago that re-signing Bibby 
was simply going to have to happen. They gave Bibby more than they had to, in 
the end, because it was a preferable option to having Bibby either take a 
one-year deal (which the player said he thought might ultimately happen) or 
stew over a long-term contract he wasn't actually satisfied with.

Petrie has his own set of concerns, and one of them is the notion that the 
Kings aren't merely chasing down the Lakers but trying to stay a step ahead 
of established contenders like Dallas and up-and-comers like the Clippers. As 
he said the other day, "Other teams get better, too."

The Kings are better right this minute, and whether "better" proves to be 
enough is the question for another day. But they are better primarily because 
they have owners who actually see the benefit to such improvement. Be amazed, 
truly amazed, that it doesn't happen more often. 


About the Writer
---------------------------

The Bee's Mark Kreidler can be reached at (916) 321-1149 or <A HREF="mailto:mkreidler@sacbee.com";>
mkreidler@sacbee.com</A>.