THE MAN NEXT TO THE MAN

I have been side eyeing my friend Mamela about her looking at “the man next to the man” theory for a while now. Often this guy gets misconstrued as that guy on the passengers’ seat of his friends City Golf with his arm out the window hollering at all the girls. Only cool by association and lives under illusion that he too is “The Man”. The guy that shines in the spot light of another mans glory.

However the older we get, these friendships are held together by far stronger threads than stale gratification. More often than never authenticity lies at their foundation. Most successful men have a #2 Jay-Z has Tyty and Lebron has Maverick Carter. For the sake of comparing apples with apples. Let’s take Maverick Carter.




One can't question their loyalty to each other. Their Friendship dates back to high school, “I have known him all my life,” Carter said of James. “We are like brothers.” However when Lebron fired his agent Aaron Goodwin to form a management team called LRMR (initials of members) with his childhood friends Randy Mims, Maverick Cater (then 23), Richard Paul . The Four are called “The Four Horsemen”. The Media was not happy about this. How could they be? In his act, he had denounced the “order” of sports management in pro-sport to take his own unchartered path. Naturally they attacked.

“James’ switcheroo a youthful mistake,” the Chicago Sun-Times said.

“Team LeBron might have taken a turn for the worse,” said the Columbus Dispatch.

Out of the 3 friends, Maverick got singled out. He found himself in the heart of public scrutiny and ridicule. Pronounced a failure before he could even started the job. I Marvel at his ability to focus on the job. Remaining neutral with the Media, never giving them ammunition for personal attack. Asked about his role as the leader of the team “I want people to know this is a management group, We work together as a team. Everything we do is a team effort and we run it as a business.”

Before being CEO of LRMR Carter was a basketball sports marketing field representative at Nike, working directly under the guidance of Lynn Merritt, the global head of Nike Basketball Sports Marketing (whom he still calls for advice). He was also actively involved in Nike’s efforts to expand the LeBron James brand through various marketing and promotional campaigns. So the union between the two in pursuit of creating a new financial model for the 21st-century athlete is not by default.

As CEO of LRMR Innovative Marketing & Branding, Maverick is responsible for the company’s overall strategic direction and spearheads their new business development efforts. In addition, Carter plays a vital role in all client management issues, providing marketing and branding advice and counsel to clients.

Instead of just lining up endorsements, LRMR is seeking equity in the companies he works with; using Lebrons on-court prowess to build a corporation that deals with entities as disparate as Bubblicious and Warren Buffett. To Carter this is not about collecting endorsement cheques but about building a brand that will set a new tone in Pro Athletes. In the same way that Jordan brand transcended sports into pop culture.

So “The man next to the man” isnt some retarded chump cashing in on someone elses hard work. Not everyone is going to be a number one, and frankly not everyone wants to be. Some people are REALLY happy with being number two and excell at it. The real value of the man next to the man is only known by the The Man himself. So whether you looking at the #1 guy, or #2 lets hope he is as good at it as these two brothers.