心得:
不管是白手起家，还是靠爸靠母靠别人
人家给你饭吃，你也要有本事捧得起
然后，Malcolm Brogdon 真的是很有趣的人
以下正文开始
I’ve had to work my ass off to prove myself’: Meet the NBA’s only female agent with a client
拼到死，只为证明自己- 遇见NBA唯一女性经纪人
Danielle Cantor selects a unique ringtone for every client. Whenever Milwaukee Bucks center Greg Monroe calls, a hybrid hip-hop and jazz song plays. If she hears a kick drum cut through a loud beat, it must be Monroe’s teammate Malcolm Brogdon. At this moment, in a ninth floor Northwest Washington corner office designed as a monument to success, the sound of rapper 21 Savage, Otto Porter Jr.’s favorite artist, signals that the Washington Wizards forward is on the line.
Danielle Cantor 帮每个客户都设了专属铃声。
例如公鹿中锋 monroe是爵士嘻哈，
如果听到鼓鼓的音乐，那就是新人王 Brogdon。
在此刻，华盛顿的办公室响起了21 savage的铃声，
那代表疑似张伯伦儿子的 Otto Porter在线上。
Soon, Porter shows up to debrief before the start of the NBA season with Cantor and David Falk, the super agent who once represented Michael Jordan and Patrick Ewing. Cantor is Falk’s lone partner in his sports agency, F.A.M.E., but in the NBA she holds an even rarer distinction: the only woman, among approximately 30 certified by the National Basketball Players Association, to solely represent an active player.
很快的，Porter出席了和Cantor和David Falk的季前简报。
Falk曾经是Michael Jordan的经纪人，
全盛时期号称20%的NBA球员都是它的客户，
而Cantor则是Falk经纪公司F.A.M.E的独立合伙人。
事实上，Cantor有个更特别的身分，
球员工会认可的经纪人中，
唯一一位直接代理现役球员的女性经纪人。
While Falk serves as the primary agent for F.A.M.E. clients such as Porter and Monroe, Brogdon elected to sign directly with Cantor.
当Porter和Monroe和Falk代表的F.A.M.E签约时，
Brogdon则选择把经纪约直接签给Cantor。
“As a minority in this country, I think it’s important that you give other people that are overlooked or not given similar opportunities — you give them a chance, as well,” said Brogdon, who in June became the first player in NBA history selected in the second round to win the rookie of the year award. “I know what it feels like to be overlooked in the business or not be given credit or just not to be given an opportunity.
今年曾来台湾，说退休后要去拯救非洲穷人的Brogdon
身为史上唯一的二轮新人王，Malcolm Brogdon表示:
在米国这个国家，
给予那些无法得到相同待遇的边缘人一些机会是相当重要的。
我第二轮才被选中，
我知道在工作上被人看没有，甚至连机会都没有是什么感觉。
“I thought it would be breaking the glass ceiling and we’d be doing something special together.”
我相信我和 Cantor 组团可以做一些特别的事，
而这些事将会打破这个行业的天花板。
Cantor tailors a brand that best fits the personality of Brogdon, a four-year college player and Virginia graduate who holds a master’s degree. For his first sponsorship deal, she chose a bank. The week before training camp, she flew to Milwaukee to sit in on his five-hour commercial shoot and, after Brogdon weighed in a little less than the Bucks expected, Cantor smoothed things over with the team. While there, she also put in face-time with Monroe, dining out and holding his last contract discussion
before he hits free agency in 10 months. By that weekend, Cantor was overseeing Porter’s move into his new home in Arlington, which comes after F.A.M.E. helped him negotiate a four-year, $106 million maximum contract to remain with the Wizards this summer.
Cantor也帮Brogdon挑选了银行业，作为第一个赞助厂商，
以符合它拥有硕士学位的NBA球员形象。
为了这个赞助，在季前训练营开始前，
Cantor飞到密瓦基陪Brogdon拍了5个小时的广告定装照。
并顺利处理公鹿对Brogdon体重太轻的碎唸。
也和Brogdon的队友Monroe讨论，
明年3年15亿的合约走完后，该何去何从。
因为不适用一粒一休，
所以周末时，Cantor还要关心它们的大客户，
刚签下4年32亿顶级合约的Portor，新家搬得如何。
This ability, to passionately advocate on behalf of her clients to NBA general managers or even moving companies, helped convince Porter to sign with F.A.M.E. in 2013.
这种热情向NBA各队总经理代表客户，
甚至moving companies的能力，
也同样说服了Porter选择和F.A.M.E签约。
“First impression was, ‘God dang, who is this woman?’ ” Porter said. “She’s fierce. She gets stuff done.”
Portor表示: 当初看到First impression，
我就想，我的老天鹅啊，这新人那来的，感觉超杀的。
而它真的顺利的完成了工作。真货无误。
The mother of two young girls, the Potomac-based Cantor was recognized this month by the SportsBusiness Journal as a “Game Changer,” an honor given to 35 women in leadership positions across sports. While Cantor didn’t even realize she was the only current female NBA agent with a client until she was informed by the publication, NBPA Executive Director Michele Roberts said the fact that there aren’t more is disheartening.
这位有二个超萌女儿的人妻，
刚被杂志评选为35位改变游戏规则的体坛女性。
而Cantor本人也是看到新闻才知道，
原来它是NBA唯一的女性经纪人。
球员工会主席Roberts表示遗憾。
“It is an incredibly, incredibly competitive field. I suspect that there’s more dirty laundry than I even want to admit exists,” Roberts said. “Agents themselves tell me it really is a raw-knuckled brawl kind of business. It may be that it’s just the kind of work that women just find distasteful on some levels. I suspect that not a lot of women are trying to knock on these doors, and that disappoints me.”
Roberts表示: 经纪人这行是个无法想像的战场，
虽然我已是工会主席，
但我怀疑它们有更多巷仔内才懂的肮脏小祕密。
经纪人只跟我说，它们跟MMA生死格斗没二样。
也因为太多浅规则，好像没有很多女生想做这行，
我其实还蛮难过的。
Cantor has never really felt like a pioneer — even though she has always kind of been one, stretching back to her days as a ballgirl in the first season the then-Washington Bullets hired females for the job.
就算其实常常是团体中的唯一，
但Cantor从来没有觉得自己是个什么先驱，
就像它以前在华盛顿子弹，是子弹喔，当女球童时一样。
Growing up in Bethesda, it was normal to be one of the boys. When Noah Cantor and his buddies played football, so did his little sister. The peer-like relationship of the Cantor siblings was cemented one day at their grandmother’s house when Noah was teasing Danielle, pinning her down. She fought back by knocking his front tooth out.
“Some of us were probably a little more scared of her than she was of us,” Noah said.
时间再往前推很多点。
身为一个在Bethesda长大的女生，个性像男生也是很合理的。
哥哥和朋友玩美式足球，Cantor也跟着玩。
当Noah哥哥在祖母家，用固定技把Cantor压着调戏，
Cantor就直接把它哥的门牙尻下来以玆反击…
Noah表示: 有些朋友觉得，Cantor比男生还可怕。
That intensity translated to the soccer field, where Danielle was an All-Met goalkeeper at Whitman High School. During a Maryland state finals game for her club team, the Bethesda Shakers, a fearless Cantor lunged to stop a breakaway. The move saved a goal, but Cantor sustained a concussion. She left the field in an ambulance.
She was “very, very competitive,” former Whitman High girls’ soccer coach Sam DeBone said of his four-year varsity letter winner, calling her “the kind of athlete every coach would like to have.”
“In fact,” DeBone added, “if I had a whole team of Danielle Cantors, I’d be very successful.”
战场转到了用脚踢的高中足球场上。
Cantor成为了校队的全能门神。
在一场州冠军决赛中，Cantor奋力扑救了一个单刀切入的打门，
然后，它就脑震荡了…
高中教练表示:
Cantor相当的有竞争企图心，每个教练都会想要它。
事实上，讲白一点，如果能够整队都是Cantor的形状，
那我将会是个很成功的教练。
Cantor suffered so many injuries — once, as a Bullets ballgirl, an errant Juwan Howard pass broke her nose, her second such injury — that she grew adept at self-diagnosing torn and pulled muscles. She imagined she’d become a sports physician. But after tearing her medial collateral ligament her sophomore year at Penn and toughing it through one more season, she chose to focus on finance. She graduated from the Wharton School of Business and accepted a job at SFX Sports Management in 2000, tasked with
marketing professional athletes.
天降大任于斯人也，算了，讲白话文好了，
反正就是Cantor受过很多伤。例如当球童时，
被史上第一个1亿美元合约的Juwan Howard把鼻子弄坏掉;
自己把自己医坏掉，它本来想当个运动医学医生的。
后来大二时，它就转系了，
转到宾州大学华顿商学院，当了辜仲谅的学妹，蔡承儒的学姊。
然后2000年毕业后，在SFX 运动管理公司得到一份工作，
负责marketing职业运动员。也因此与Flak相遇相识。
(SFX为了拓展经纪事业版图，
在1998年以超过30亿台币收购了 Falk成立6年的经纪公司，
当时Falk约47岁。
收购完半年，Jordan就从公牛队退休了。)
While some of her peers closed the business day at happy hour, Cantor remained in the office, cold-calling Sacramento pizza shops, grocery chains and car dealerships to land sponsorship deals for Mike Bibby, a Kings player who was a Falk client at the time.
Cantor是怎么工作呢?
(鲁蛇我觉得听起来像神话，这行业不是该更黑暗吗)
一样，同事去放假，它就在办公室打拜访电话，
从达美乐打到好车大联盟，
就为了帮当时Falk的客户Mike Bibby拉赞助。
Falk took notice. By 2007, he’d decided to relaunch his agency as a boutique operation representing only NBA players. F.A.M.E. would sign only a handful of clients and hire even fewer executives. Actually, just one: Cantor.
Falk注意到了这些事。2007年，
Falk决定走只专营少数NBA球员的精致路线，
重起它的经纪人公司 F.A.M.E，且只雇用少数员工。
事实上，所谓的少数，
就是整间只请你Cantor一人的意思。
“I’m sort of a bit of a contrarian,” Falk said. “The fact that there are so few women is like motivation for me, just to be different. I like being different. I like setting the trends instead of following the trends.”
Falk表示: 很少女性会引起我改变的动机。
但事实上，我有点喜欢逆势而行，
我喜欢引领潮流，而不是跟随潮流。
On business trips, Falk and his executive vice president are a package deal. He and Cantor have been together for every negotiation over the last decade. They sit courtside to watch their clients on the NBA stage. Cantor, who avoids the subject of her age, has bristled at times for being judged on how the relationship looks. Once, while in the arena of a Central Division NBA team, the owner’s wife assumed Cantor was Falk’s girlfriend.
在每次的商务旅行，Falk总是和它的执行副总裁Cantor绑作伙。
在过去10年，它们一起参与了每一次与对手的谈判，
也一起坐在球场边第一排贵松松的座位，看着它们的客户。
但你还是可以很容易一句话惹怒Cantor，
包括它的年龄(2000年商学院毕业取得工作，现在2017年)，
还有它与Falk的关系。
像某球队老板的夫人，
就以为Cantor只是超级经纪人Falk身旁的一个妹。
“My goal is to prove myself with owners and GMs, so they know who I am and they respect me — which I think has happened,” Cantor said. “But I’ve had to work my ass off to prove myself.”
Cantor表示:
我的目标是让球团的老板和总经理知道我是谁，
并且赢得它们的尊重。
我想我已经做到这点。但我是用我死命工作换来的。
At the negotiating table, Falk does most of the talking while Cantor sits back and observes, her mind running through the spreadsheets she has created to prove their players’ worth. When she does speak, it’s refreshing.
在谈判桌上，Falk主导了大部分的谈话，
而Cantor则是默默的坐在后方观察。
Cantor的思绪清楚的在它准备的表格奔驰，
并且用以证明球员的价值。
当Cantor一开口，是让人觉得清爽甜美的。
“David Falk is a man who’s done an awful lot in this business, to say the least. He’s a man that people in this league respect … but at times, everyone needs a buffer and Danielle is definitely that for David,” said John Hammond, the Orlando Magic general manager. “Danielle can be sometimes a friendly voice, a calming influence to some of us and I think that’s why she’s appreciated.”
魔术队的总经理Hammond1表示:
Falk是这行中受人尊敬的大人物，但它做事很凶狠啊。
所以我们和Falk交流时，需要一点润滑，而Cantor做到了这点。
Cantor有时能对我们发出，很友善的声音或冷静的招降。
我想这就是Cantor备受赞赏的地方。
Though on the surface Cantor is a foil to Falk — right down to their contrasting appearances as a blonde woman with piercing light blues eyes and a 67-year-old bald man — their business partnership is a match made in Type-A heaven.
虽然一个金发碧眼的女人配上67岁的光头阿伯，
是很让人无言的鲜明对比组合。
但在工作上，它们二人可说是天作之合。
“Here’s the deal: I like to be behind the scenes. And I don’t like people talking about me or writing about me,” she said, enunciating so precisely she bares her teeth on every consonant. “But when I’m in a negotiation, when I’m in a recruiting meeting — game on.”
Cantor一字一句清楚的表示:
规则就是这样，平常没事的时候，
我不喜欢别人讨论我，也不喜欢别人对我写东写西，
我喜欢待在幕后就好。
但当我在谈判桌，或球员招募时，那比赛就开打囉，厂厂 !!
As the partners waited for Porter to join them in the office, Cantor was very much in the spotlight, getting coached by Falk as they squabbled over the direction of her photo shoot.
“Relax. Just relax,” Falk said, watching Cantor glare out of the window. “Don’t wrinkle your forehead.”
Then he offered: “Want me to tell you a joke?”
当合伙人在办公室等候Portor的加入时，
Cantor是镁光灯的焦点，
同时也和Falk嘴一下它这次受访照片的拍摄方向。
Falk一直告诉Cantor: 松一下~松一下，不要皱眉头啦~，
需要我 TELL YOU A JOKE 吗???
“No,” Cantor responded, holding her pose. “[The photographer] told me not to smile. He said, ‘Look natural.’ ”
She expressed how uncomfortable this felt, particularly the attention, because this is a game she’d much rather play in the shadows. Her goal is to be respected, not recognized. Besides, she’s busy.
Cantor表示: 不要啊，摄影师说不用笑，自然就好。
Cantor表现出了它在众目睽睽下的不自在，
因为这不是它喜欢玩的方式。
它的目标是被所有人尊重，而不是被所有人认识。
而且，它很忙。
While she was tied up with the shoot, Falk asked if he should make an important call that was on her to-do list. Cantor responded bluntly: “No. Please don’t.”
当Cantor快被拍照烦死时，
Falk问它是否要一通排在待办事项上的电话。
Cantor直接表示: No~~~，不要!! 谢谢!!
Falk got the message, turning away and smiling.
“She’s the boss,” he said.
Falk收到了指示，转身笑着表示: 金骂伊系老大 (一u一) /
下面为华盛顿邮报官方脸书连结
https://www.facebook.com/washingtonpost/posts/10156730104862293

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