It Takes a Sneaker Salesman to Know a Sneaky Business

Sonny Vaccaro, the sneaker salesman who revolutionized basketball, inventing such phenomena as the high school all-star game and the bought-and-paid-for college coach, concedes it might not have been for the best, even if it was legal.

“Go ask coaches why they don’t refuse to take our money,” Vaccaro told the New York Times. “Ask college presidents why they don’t stop big-time sports. It didn’t hurt the University of Chicago.”

Vaccaro, who began paying coaches while working for Nike, was subsequently fired and now engages in a blood feud with the company, working for rival Adidas.

“Nike is the big, dark cloud that’s going to envelop everything, poison the minds of kids and ruin the game,” he says. “Now we’re paying high school coaches so we can tie up their kids. . . .

“Look, I play by the rules. . . . For God’s sake, go change the rules.”

War is hell: Former USC coach George Raveling stood up at Vaccaro’s wedding. Now Raveling works for Nike and he and Sonny are former friends.

Of course, in the sneaker business, they’re playing for ever-higher stakes.

“Did you sense something creepy in that Junior Griffey-for-president commercial?” Vaccaro asks. “Nike is the best sports company in the world and [company President] Phil Knight is brilliant. Can you imagine if they put all their resources and smarts behind a candidate?”

Trivia time: Among active pitchers, who are the top two in complete games?

The prophet: Was it creepy that Mike Tyson was comparing himself to Sonny Liston before his recent fight?

“This might sound morbid and grim, but I pretty much identify with him,” Tyson said. “He just wanted people to love and respect him, but you can’t make people love and respect you. You just have to be who you are. . . .

“He was absolutely a great fighter. He may have got a raw deal, but we all write our own books in life. Most of the time we bring the trouble on ourselves.”

You don’t say.

Add former Iron Mike: Tyson, suspended for one year or life, whichever comes first, may lie around for 12 months, but that wouldn’t be unusual.

“Most fighters only fight one time a year,” Evander Holyfield said. “He probably needs a year off to get himself better anyway.”

Or Tyson may go off-shore as Muhammad Ali did in his final fight in 1982, losing to Trevor Berbick in the Bahamas after New York refused to license him.

“There will be a fight,” says USA Today’s Jon Saraceno. “They’ll find an island, they’ll find a banana republic. They’ll go to the North Pole if Don King has to.”

Trivia answer: Roger Clemens, 104, and Dennis Eckersley, 100. Eckersley hasn’t started a game since 1986.

And finally: Rich and bored, former heavyweight champion Larry Holmes, 47, is still fighting.

He lost his last bout to someone named Brian Nielsen, but on July 29 in New York he will face someone named Maurice Harris, who has nine wins in 17 decisions.

“I don’t think he’s that great a fighter,” concedes Holmes, “but if he beats me, he shows me the way out the door.”

One always hopes, anyway.