One of the most famous agents in sports history on making deals, hitting rock bottom, and starting over.
Wally Skalij/Los Angeles Times / MCT
On the Sunday before the big game, superagent Leigh Steinberg is a busy man, but not in the way you'd expect. Yes, he has his bags packed ready to head to New York City to host his annual Super Bowl party. Today, however, he's standing at a podium in a West Hollywood bookstore before a sparse crowd. Steinberg is promoting his latest book, The Agent: My 40-Year Career Making Deals and Changing the Game, which chronicles the rise and eventual fall of the man whom Cameron Crowe followed for two years before making Jerry Maguire.
Steinberg grew up in Los Angeles rubbing elbows with Hollywood legends at the Hillcrest Country Club, which his grandfather managed. He burst onto the sports scene in 1976 while attending Berkeley School of Law. His first client, Steve Bartkowski, was the No. 1 overall pick in the 1976 NFL draft.
By the late 1980s, Steinberg was one of the game's major power brokers. He represented Super Bowl-winning quarterbacks like Troy Aikman and Steve Young, running backs Thurman Thomas and Ricky Williams, and Hall of Fame defensive end Bruce Smith. Steinberg, a noted philanthropist, also made a name for himself by helping set up charities for his clients, work for which he received commendations from four American presidents. He eventually sold 30% of his company to Canadian financial management firm Assante Sports Management Group for reportedly over $120 million.
Then came the troubles. Even as his professional life prospered, by the mid-2000s, Steinberg's personal life started to crumble. Between a lawsuit with Assante that left many of his younger agents upset, and trouble at home, things decayed. Steinberg became depressed and a drinking problem spiraled out of control. He faded from the scene he once dominated.
Now sober, the 64-year-old is starting fresh, publishing the book and hoping to resume his career with the same commitment that made him a star to begin with.
What was it like growing up in Hollywood with some of the original giants of the film business?
Leigh Steinberg: They were just funny old men to me. I thought the whole world was old Jewish comedians. When you're sitting there and Groucho Marx is trading stuff with George Burns and they're going back and forth, it seems surreal now, but at the time it was very funny. I didn't know who Marilyn Monroe was when I was sitting on her lap, and I got an Elvis Presley autographed guitar and I barely knew who he was too.
You stumbled into getting your first client, Steve Bartkowski, when you were in law school at University of California, Berkeley. Did the clients start flocking to you after he was picked first overall?
LS: Not until I learned how to profile players. When I learned that it was a certain type of player who was willing to serve as a role model and who was more ambitious than others, who wanted to springboard from football into a second career. I was very interested in those players who wanted to start their own charity. The ability to profile and research players and to find what people would be open to this approach, that's when I started building something. It goes back to my father. We weren't raised to be money people. We were raised to be making-a-difference people. I wanted athletes who reflected my own values.
When did things start taking off for you?
LS: Steadily. I signed a number of first-rounders through the years. I started developing quarterbacks as a niche. In 1983 I had Ken O'Brien and Tony Eason in the first round, but '84 was a dramatic year. The USFL [United States Football League] was competing, and that pressure and competitive bidding always explodes options. Warren Moon had been in Canada for six years and we timed his return so the USFL, the CFL [Canadian Football League], and the NFL were competing for him. There had never been a free agent in football before. So to have a player that was actually available with no draft picks, no trade, and you could just sign him at the most critical position, who was in his prime — it was unusual. You could just take him right in and play him, and it would cost you nothing besides his contract. We ended up with the largest contract in the history of the league with Houston.
What about Steve Young?
LS: They needed a quarterback in L.A. [for the USFL's Los Angeles Express] since it's such a star city and all the rest. I'm negotiating the contract, but the problem is Steve really wants to play in the NFL. So as we're negotiating, I keep saying no and the dollars are getting astronomical and we're finally at a point where no one has signed a sports contract like that before. It ends up being $42 million for four years. When we signed, it was front-page news around the world and Steve was aghast because he's being held up as a sign of excessive sports economics run amok.