Tag: Robert Pera

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From My Seat Sports

The Memphis Grizzlies: Stability Matters

CREDIT: Courtesy Memphis Grizzlies

Remember when Memphis Tiger basketball seemed to have lost its way? (Go back 14 months on the calendar and you’re there.) Remember when discussion around Tiger football turned toward whether or not the university should field a team? (Larry Porter was in charge merely eight years ago.) Today, this city’s flagship college programs — in particular, those programs’ stability — are the absolute envy of our lone big-league operation. After last week’s shenanigans surrounding the dismissal of Memphis Grizzlies coach J.B. Bickerstaff, we’re left to wonder not just who’s calling the shots for our NBA franchise, but are those shots being called with an ounce of wisdom? With foresight?
Courtesy Memphis Grizzlies

Robert Pera

I spend my winters wearing blue-and-gray blinders, my focus primarily the fortunes of the basketball Tigers, the Grizzlies’ pay-by-night tenant at FedExForum. I’m not going to pretend to know the front-office mechanics most recently led by Chris Wallace (assigned last week to scouting duty, it would appear). But with one franchise icon (Marc Gasol) recently traded and another (Mike Conley) exasperated — and that was before last week’s front-office bloodshed — the Tigers’ landlord seems to be a bit light in the tool belt.


What an odd year it’s been in Memphis sports, and we aren’t even approaching Memorial Day yet. Penny Hardaway’s first season as Tiger coach raised the community’s collective happy-joy metric to almost unreasonable heights … and the Tigers played in the NIT. The most passionate fan base in town, though, pound for pound, may prove to be the Bluff City Mafia, recently seen in a cloud of blue smoke at an AutoZone Park soccer game. Who gives a kick-in-the-grass if 901 FC scores a goal?

The Memphis Redbirds — two-time defending champions of the Pacific Coast League — are back for their 22nd season, lending some brand stability to the sports landscape. But they have a new manager (Ben Johnson) in the dugout and the usual collection of new faces that comes with every minor-league season. The Redbirds have won so much over the last two years, any losing in 2019 will feel like not so much a disappointment as an inconvenience.

We even have pro football! Well, scratch that.

All of this brings us back to the Grizzlies, the one Memphis franchise that appears in standings printed in the New York Times or Chicago Tribune. It’s the one Memphis franchise that should be this community’s rudder in the stormy, emotional sea of sports fandom. Win or lose, we’ll wear Grizzlies gear to remind us we’re big-league.

The Grizzlies will open the 2019-20 season with their fourth coach in five years. (Remember how a broken Tiger program had to survive three coaches in four years?) This is the “stability” model of the Phoenix Suns or New York Knicks, not a club anywhere close to contending for an NBA title. The new hire, of course, will be a primary component of Griz owner Robert Pera’s solution for the recent descent of a franchise only two seasons removed from a seven-year playoff run. If Jason Wexler and/or Zach Kleiman prove more savvy with roster building than Wallace (the man who brought Conley and Marc Gasol to Memphis), stability will once again don Beale Street Blue. But for the time being, Pera might need a breathalyzer before his next move.

Sports are distraction. Heart-squeezing, at times soul-draining distractions, to be sure. Even with last week’s head-scratching news, I happen to believe the overall Memphis sports landscape has never been healthier. (Yes, my Penny-endorsed blinders are a factor here.) We prefer our tackle football in the fall. We’ve embraced 901 FC like we really are a part of planet futbol. We have good baseball for summer nights and an NBA team when winter comes. Stability wins championships and will be achieved by the Grizzlies before a banner is raised at FedExForum. As for the current state of affairs, embrace the madness and call it a Memphis thing.

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Sports Sports Feature

The Grizzlies’ looming ownership drama

The Grizzlies’ buy/sell agreement is still behind the scenes, but you can expect it to take center stage.

On October 25, 2017, the Memphis Grizzlies passed a curious milestone in the history of the franchise: They entered the window of time in which Griz minority owners Steve Kaplan and Daniel Straus could trigger a “buy/sell” clause in their partnership agreement with Grizzlies controlling owner Robert Pera.

The agreement, put in place when the current ownership group took over the team in 2013, allows Kaplan and/or Straus to come up with a valuation for the team — to name their price, essentially — and then Pera has to either buy out the minority owner’s share at that valuation or allow the minority owner to buy out his controlling (25.1 percent according to initial 2012 reporting by Chris Herrington) interest in the team at that same valuation. Either Kaplan or Straus (who each owned 14.22 percent of the franchise initially) can trigger the clause, saying, for example, “the Grizzlies are worth $1 billion,” and then Pera can buy them out at $140,000,000, or they can buy him out at $251,000,000.

Normally an ownership change of a franchise is newsworthy in and of itself. But this particular wrinkle, coming at this point in time, is primed to make noise if and when it’s triggered. Kaplan partnered with ousted former Grizzlies CEO Jason Levien to buy a majority stake of Swansea, a club in the English Premier League. The dismissal of Levien, by all accounts, created a rift between Kaplan and Pera that remains unresolved, as seen most recently when Kaplan and Levien attempted to get together the funds to purchase a minority stake in the Minnesota Timberwolves.

It’s worth examining some of what happened around the time of Levien’s dismissal in the context of what might be coming if and when the buy/sell clause is triggered. Levien, in particular, is very well connected to many national NBA writers, as a former agent and an executive for multiple teams. Immediately after he was let go by the Grizzlies, multiple national outlets (most notably a Sports Illustrated piece by Chris Mannix that has since disappeared from the Internet) ran vicious takedowns of Robert Pera, painting him as a lunatic with no idea how the NBA works. You may remember the bit about having Dave Joerger wear a headset while he coached, like he was on a football sideline, or the part about firing Joerger and having Mike Miller be the player-coach.

Is Robert Pera an ideal owner? I’m not sure there is such a thing, but he’s proven himself to be plenty capable. It’s totally fair to criticize basketball operations leadership for this decision or that (especially as they let yet another first-round pick go this preseason), and his absence from Memphis has not done him any favors with locals who’d like him to show his face from time to time, but in no way has the way he’s run the team aligned with the stuff we heard back in 2014.

In the years since that acrimonious breakup, Pera has shown himself to be a competent owner, and one willing to invest a great deal in uncapped areas. The Grizzlies have spent millions of dollars renovating the practice facilities and locker rooms and improving the training staff. They continue to be at the forefront of creating new statistics with SportVU data and other motion-tracking stuff. It also can’t be denied that they’re willing to spend on basketball talent, with Mike Conley, Marc Gasol, and Chandler Parsons all playing on blockbuster deals.

It’s no secret that Kaplan wants to run an NBA franchise. By triggering the clause now, he either gains control of the Grizzlies or he gets a nice payout on his initial Grizzlies investment. Straus is more of a mystery, but my sense is that his investment in the Grizziles was just that: an investment, not a bid for control. The clause is a win-win for Kaplan.

Once triggered, the process will not be a quick one. Each step has baked-in 60-day review periods, and the whole thing could take months to resolve. But my assumption is that if and when it’s triggered, you’ll start seeing all kinds of stories pop up from otherwise reputable sources about how poorly Pera runs the Grizzlies, how tight the team’s finances are, and maybe some blatant blind-item ad hominem about other Grizzlies higher-ups.

It seems to be what happens every time there’s a national story about Grizzlies ownership — enough so that it seems naive to assume a coincidence. There’s no love lost between the parties involved, but for the sake of the Grizzlies and the sake of their still-burgeoning fanbase, one hopes the process plays out with as little drama as possible.

Correction: This piece originally referenced Adrian Wojnarowski as the author of a piece that was written by Chris Mannix.

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Sports Sports Feature

NBA Chaos Theory

“This is why we can’t have nice things.” That’s the first thought I had when I read Marc Stein of ESPN’s tweet dropping the bomb no one (save for maybe Chris Wallace) saw coming: Jason Levien and Stu Lash were on their way out of the Grizzlies organization. The Grizzlies had just finished up a tumultuous season: 50 games won despite injuries; a first-year head coach; long stretches of uninspired, lackluster play; and a barrage of Zach Randolph trade rumors.

Throughout the season, we learned a few things: Dave Joerger, despite his flaws and growing pains, is undeniably a decent coach. (Before you write those angry Lionel Hollins letters, please note that I said “decent.”) Levien, Lash, and John Hollinger proved they could make smart basketball decisions that also took the franchise’s long-term financial health into consideration. On the business side, the team has never been in better shape. ESPN ranked the Grizzlies the #1 Franchise in Professional Sports for a reason.

All of that isn’t necessarily gone, but it’s certainly been jeopardized. Controlling owner Robert Pera has shown some of the smartest guys in the business the door, allowed Joerger to interview for the Minnesota Timberwolves’ coaching job, and has said absolutely nothing about what he’s thinking or where the team is going. Not that he has to, of course. The fact remains, though, that the only people talking about what’s going on are people who were just shown the door, and thus 1) don’t know what’s happening with the team any longer and 2) are, shall we say, motivated to paint what has already happened as the lashings out of a crazy person.

Not that we know whether Pera is a crazy person or not. It’s entirely possible that he is, but it’s entirely possible that he has a carefully thought-out master plan that will take the Grizzlies from good to great. We’ll just have to wait and see.

The onus is now on Pera to regain the trust of the fan base and prove that he knows what he’s doing. Trust takes time to build and no time at all to destroy. There’s every reason in the world to think the Grizzlies are transforming into the Knicks right before our eyes: an owner who wants to call shots he shouldn’t be calling and who lacks the self-awareness to know when to stand back and let the basketball people do their jobs. That works in New York, where the Knicks have a license to print money. That goes a long way to cover up inept management. It doesn’t work in a small market, where the team has to break even to be viable, and a big part of breaking even is careful management, both of the business side and the basketball side. The Grizzlies’ fan base is still young and relatively fragile. A detour back to the broken-foot-Pau days may not permanently damage that relationship between team and city, but it won’t help.

There are on-court things to consider, too. How does this affect Zach Randolph’s decision-making regarding his player option this summer? If Pera makes the wrong moves, will Marc Gasol want to stay around next summer? If the wrong head coach is brought in, will that coach be able to manage the personalities in this locker room? It’s not hard to imagine a scenario where the good things the Griz have built over the past five years are washed away by a bad hire or two.

It could work out, of course. But at the very least, the power structure of the Grizzlies’ unwieldy ownership group has been upended, and relationships there may be damaged beyond repair. A promising front office has been partially dismantled, and a promising young coach has been shown the door, possibly because a player or two didn’t like him (but then, we don’t really know what the players said in those secret season-ending interviews with Pera). At the very least, instability has been injected into a situation where it didn’t seem like there was any, and Pera has taken his basketball team from a smart situation set up for success to, well, who knows?

It was already going to be an important summer for the Grizzlies, but it was only supposed to be roster decisions that determined the future direction of the team. Now there is no direction visible, and all of us get to sit and watch and wait for the Grizzlies to be remade in some image. But whose will it be, and how will it shake out? That’s up to Robert Pera, for better or for worse.

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Letter From The Editor Opinion

Letter From the Editor: Inconvenienced Truth

I was waiting in line at a convenience store, six-pack in hand. The guy in front of me was buying cigarettes. He was overweight, wearing a worn T-shirt and faded pants. He was chatting up the clerk, a tattooed, middle-aged woman who looked like she had a few rough miles on her. They were in no hurry.

“Well,” I heard the man wheeze, as he finally turned to leave, “that was before Obama screwed everything up.” The woman laughed and said, “You’re right about that.”

The man turned to me, smiled broadly, and said, “Yep, Obama screwed everything up, didn’t he?” Not wanting to mix politics with a beer run, I just looked at him blankly.

Back in my car, I had one of those “I wish I’d said …” moments.

I wish I’d asked him if he had a problem with a health-care system that would allow him to get insurance when his emphysema got worse. I wish I’d asked the clerk if she opposed a $10.50 minimum wage, which would have no doubt increased the size of her paycheck.

Their taxes haven’t been raised. Their guns haven’t been taken. The economy has come back from the depths of the recession. Why rednecks don’t like Obama is a mystery to me. Sort of.

Speaking of mysteries … how about that Robert Pera? The owner of the Grizzlies created a maelstrom last week by suddenly firing his CEO, Jason Levien, and letting Coach Dave Joerger go off to interview for the Minnesota Timberwolves job. Sports-talk radio hosts were melting down; the town was abuzz with rumors that Pera was “weird.” And he well might be. But he’s also 37. I had to fire someone at my first editor’s job when I was 37. Let me tell you, it’s easy to screw it up.

I inherited a copyeditor who was surly and incompetent. After a month, I went to the publisher and complained. “Fire him,” he said.

I called “Keith” into my office, made some small talk, then said, “Uh, I think, uh, Keith, we have to make some changes … .”

Keith said, “Are you firing me?”

“Well, uh, yeah …” I said. Keith stood up and bolted to the publisher’s office, with me right behind him. “Am I being fired?” he yelled.

“Yes,” said the publisher, calmly. “Give me your key and clean out your desk. We’ll have your last check for you in an hour.” Keith meekly pulled his key out of his pocket and returned to his desk.

So I learned how to be a better manager and how to fire someone without screwing it up. Pera can do the same. No reason to panic, Griz fans.

Besides, as we know, one man’s screwup is just another man’s beer run.

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Beyond the Arc Sports

Grizzlies Fire Levien, Lash

In news that seemed to come out of nowhere, the Grizzlies announced Monday afternoon that the team was parting ways with CEO Jason Levian and basketball operations director Stu Lash.

The press release issued by team owner Robert Pera was terse and light on details:

The Memphis Grizzlies announced today that following discussions with management, the decision was made for Jason Levien and Stu Lash to depart the organization.

“Our franchise has made tremendous strides over the last few seasons and we thank Jason for his hard work and dedication and wish him nothing but success in his future endeavors,” said Grizzlies Controlling Owner Robert Pera. “Rest assured that we remain as committed as ever to bringing a championship to this great city and we are confident that when the new season begins our fans will be excited about both our roster and the direction of our organization.”

Going forward, existing Grizzlies General Manager Chris Wallace will assume interim responsibility for the franchise’s basketball operations and Chief Operating Officer Jason Wexler will remain responsible for the franchise’s business operations.

The Flyer‘s Kevin Lipe will have more on the situation as it develops.

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Beyond the Arc Sports

Postgame Notebook: Grizzlies 108, Kings 101 — TCB Before the Break

CREDIT: LARRY KUZNIEWSKI

Tony Allen was in rare form against the Kings.

Making this quick because, like the Grizzlies, I’m ready for the All-Star break too.

The Lead: After a sharp performance against a bad team Sunday, the Grizzlies gave an erratic, clock-watching kind of performance against the Kings Tuesday night in the final game before the All-Star break. Combatting erratic energy and execution all night, the Grizzlies committed 21 turnovers and were more the doubled-up in steals (12-5) and fastbreak points (28-13) — all very much inter-related numbers — en route to giving up 100 points on the FedExForum floor for the first time all season.

But, ultimately, the better team with the most determined player (one Tony Allen) was able to pull away in the fourth quarter, and go into the break on a three-game win streak.

Man of the Match: Tony Allen struggled with Tyreke Evans both early and late, but was the best player on the floor for much of the game, giving the Grizzlies an energy boost early when they desperately needed it and continuing his sharp play into the second quarter.

Allen’s wonky knee must be feeling pretty good lately, because he’s going up high on rebounds and finishing strong at the rim in addition to his usual fast-twitch defense and underrated off-ball cuts. Allen scored a season-high 19 points on 8-12 shooting, to go with 8 rebounds, 3 assists, and 2 steals.

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Beyond the Arc Sports

The Pera Presser: Highlights from Owner Robert Pera’s Second Media Address

CREDIT: LARRY KUZNIEWSKI

Robert Pera, from his debut appearance before local media. He returned today.

  • LARRY KUZNIEWSKI
  • Robert Pera, from his debut appearance before local media. He returned today.

New Grizzlies controlling owner Robert Pera made his first visit to FedExForum since his post-changeover debut, meeting this morning — along with CEO Jason Levien — for a roughly 20-minute press conference with local media.

Pera and Levien wore matching Grizzlies warm-up gear, evoking visions of Ben Stiller and his sons in The Royal Tennenbaums. There was no topping that, but they did have some interesting comments on a variety of topics.

Here are some highlights, all comments from Pera unless otherwise indicated:

On his overall impressions of team:

The thing I like most about the Grizzlies is that when you look at basketball, it’s different from other sports. In baseball, you can put together a team of all-stars and the sum kind of equals the total of the parts. But in basketball, it’s a team sport and there’s a lot of chemistry. And certain players, depending on how they come together, the sum of the parts could be much greater. And that’s what I really like about Grizzlies’ basketball. With the latest trades and the way the team’s constructed, I think it has the potential to be the best Grizzlies team yet.

I really like the way the parts fit, with the traditional inside-out game. I think if they gel, hopefully it could be the best playoff run yet.

On the timing of the trades:

I think the most unfortunate thing about the trades was the timing. I really wish we could have gotten a deal [to purchase the team] closed before the beginning of the season and made all the personnel moves before the season started, to give these guys a full year to play together.

But I think if you look at the year before last, when they upset the Spurs as the 8th seed, the [main] pieces from that run are still here now and I think the supporting pieces we’ve picked up are even stronger. So, like I said, if the team comes together and gels in the second half of the season, it’s going to be really interesting.

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Beyond the Arc Sports

Game 38 Preview: Grizzlies vs. Kings — Never Mind the Hoops, Here’s the Palace Intrigue.

CREDIT: LARRY KUZNIEWSKI

The Grizzlies look to get back on track tonight against the 15-24 Sacramento Kings. But tonight’s game isn’t about match-ups or stylistic contrasts, it’s about the Grizzlies fixing themselves.

And the issue of the day isn’t on the court anyway, it’s all the off-court intrigue currently festering around the team. So, today, let’s make that the subject of the usual three points:

Grizzlies controlling owner Robert Pera and team CEO Jason Levien.

  • LARRY KUZNIEWSKI
  • Grizzlies controlling owner Robert Pera and team CEO Jason Levien.

1. The Pera Meeting: The Commercial Appeal reported yesterday that majority owner Robert Pera met with Mike Conley and Marc Gasol while the team was in Oakland to face the Golden State Warriors earlier this month, with the heavy implication that this meeting has been internally disruptive.

I’d say the details are very much unclear. Who instigated the meeting? (It was initially characterized as an invitation from Pera but was later softened to something more neutral. I’ve heard it two different ways: One that Pera asked for the meeting, and another that Conley and Gasol asked for it.) What was talked about? (I heard, unsurprisingly, that Gasol and Conley made a case for keeping the current core together for the remainder of the season.) To what degree was it actually disruptive?

There’s certainly a chance that this meeting may have been unwise, counterproductive, or poorly staged, but even if it was at Pera’s invitation — which, again, is very much unclear — I think some of the initial reaction to it was curious. I see nothing “weird” or perplexing about it. In fact, the potential rationale would seem pretty obvious.

This Grizzlies are facing very serious organizational decisions in the near future. It’s a near certainty that Conley and Gasol will be here next season, and, for various reasons, they’re probably the only core figures you can say that about. It’s not surprising that new ownership might want to take their pulse as part of their decision-making process.

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Sports Sports Feature

New Day Rising

CREDIT: Larry Kuzniewski

At 2:30 on Monday afternoon, only hours after being introduced as the new chairman and controlling owner of the Memphis Grizzlies, 34-year-old Robert Pera was ready for game time. Not his new team’s home opener against the Utah Jazz later that night, but his own. Pera, wearing full Griz workout gear, was exiting the Westin Hotel across the street from FedExForum, entourage in tow, on his way to the arena’s practice court to put up some shots. Not 10 feet away, departing Grizzlies owner Michael Heisley — not invited to the public press conference and recently disinvited to speak to fans before the game — was having a “last supper” of sorts, alongside his wife, right-hand man Stan Meadows, and other confidants. Heisley was not aware of Pera’s presence — the two had only spoken twice and not since the sale closed — and Pera seemed similarly oblivious. An hour later, Pera was still on the practice court, hoisting up halfcourt shots and working on his turnaround jumper. Heisley was quietly saying goodbye to team employees.

The contrast between the two men on a day of head-spinning change for the Grizzlies organization seemed profound, much more so than just their 41-year age difference. It was also an exchange of excitable for calm. Logorrheic for terse. (After Pera’s one-liner statement to fans before tipoff, NBA commissioner David Stern reclaimed the microphone to speak for us all: “That’s it?”) Assertive for deferential.

It’s been said — Stern echoed the sentiment in his pregame press conference and I believe it to be true — that ownership sets the tone for an entire organization. That, in addition to luck and still-relevant market advantages, the NBA is about management. If fans want a good reason to be hopeful about the Grizzlies’ future in the “Pera era,” the significant increase in local participation is at the top of the list, but the prospect of better management is next in line.

The Grizzlies are coming off the two best seasons in franchise history, but this success has obscured some real problems in an organization that has, for the length of Heisley’s tenure, flirted with dysfunction. It’s an organization that has too often been penny wise and pound foolish, pointlessly bickering over rookie-contract incentives while paying a premium every time they’ve re-signed or extended one of their own major players. As a result, they’ve muddled into a contending core via some luck, some high draft picks, and some smart gambles by incumbent general manager Chris Wallace. But keeping the group together is becoming financially unviable.

Heisley, often engaging and certainly committed to winning, had nonetheless fostered too much of an organizational free-for-all, with decision-makers competing for his ear — and then competing to get their sides of the story out later. The cheerfully combative Heisley seemed to personally thrive on noise and chaos, but I’m not so sure the organization did.

Pera and Levien inherit a staff full of good people who have been working under imperfect circumstances, all of whom are capable of being part of something better. But I won’t be campaigning for anyone to keep — or lose — their jobs. I’m just campaigning for a stronger organization. One that’s more cohesive, more progressive, more functional, and more intellectually diverse. One with more discernible long-range planning.

In his first public statement after assuming control, Pera promised “a best-in-class organizational culture.” To make this happen he’s deferred to the clearly bright, capable, and highly regarded Jason Levien, a former agent and executive with the Sacramento Kings who takes an unprecedented organizational role as CEO and managing partner, overseeing all aspects of basketball and business operations.

Certainly Levien overshadowed Pera all day on Monday, dominating the opening press conference and shepherding Pera through the motions of game night. And with that, Pera seemed perfectly content.

Big questions remain, among them how much is Pera the visionary leader guiding the franchise and how much is he a willing vessel — for Jason Levien to get control of a team, for local minority owners to jettison Michael Heisley and further cement the Grizzlies in Memphis without shelling out the full price themselves. And how much does it matter? This already had a chance to be the best season in franchise history. Now, even more so, it promises to be the most interesting.

For more Grizzlies coverage throughout the season, see Chris Herrington’s Grizzlies blog at memphisflyer.com/blogs/beyondthearc.

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Beyond the Arc Sports

Robert Pera, Jason Levien Make Grizzlies Debut

CREDIT: LARRY KUZNIEWSKI

New Grizzlies chairman Robert Pera and CEO and managing partner Jason Levien make their public debut.

  • LARRY KUZNIEWSKI
  • New Grizzlies chairman Robert Pera and CEO and managing partner Jason Levien make their public debut.

After a private meeting with team employees that reportedly lasted about five minutes and included no big news, the new Grizzlies “controlling owner” Robert Pera and his right-hand man Jason Levien made their first public appearance at a 10 a.m. press conference in the lobby of FedExForum.

Pera, looking even younger than his 34 years, made very brief comments before turning most of the press conference over the Levien, who will oversee the organization from a newly created post of Chief Executive Officer & Managing Partner of Memphis Basketball, LLC. Where in the past the organization has had business and basketball operations honchos who separately reported to owner Michael Heisley, now Levien seems to have total control, and sole access to Pera’s ear. Instantly, he’s become the most powerful person in the organization’s history to not have an ownership stake.

From the way the press conference went, you’d be forgiven if you got the impression that Levien was a co-owner.

Pera, who came across as calm and sincere, said, “I consider myself very, very fortunate. Probably the luckiest man in the world right now.” Pera spoke about his belief in recruiting talented people and empowering them and about the importance of the Grizzlies to the Memphis community. But then Levien took over, making it clear that he’s one of the talented people that Pera is now empowering.

Pera joked that Levien, a former agent and Sacramento Kings executive whom Pera called one of his best friends, is “a cross between Jerry Maguire and Ari Gold from Entourage, only smarter.”