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Headline Sports Business

Including Financial Advisors To Keep Clients Financially Secure

An agent makes up only one part of what should be a comprehensive athlete business team. There may be many other components to that team, including public relations specialists, accountants, and financial advisors.

Recently, my friend Jared Zwerling of ESPN.com interviewed Mark Doman, who is the financial advisor for Landry Fields of the New York Knicks. Doman is the Senior Vice President of True Capital Management, which specializes in providing investment advice and financial planning for many professional athletes so they have financial security when they retire. He also has experience in the sports agent industry. He interned for basketball agent Curtis Polk when Doman was only 15-years old and also completed internships for major agency Octagon and others as well.

I encourage you to read Zwerling’s interview with Doman in its entirety. Here is the 4th (out of 10) things Doman wants you to know about his job:

I work hand-in-hand with agents to make sure our clients are financial secure during their entire lifetime. An agent, or contract adviser, is an integral part of an athlete’s life. My goals are the same as theirs in the sense that I want the athletes to have money for their entire lifetime. I step in and help with their long-term financial planning; agents must think more short-term to maximize the athlete’s earning power. That’s why I decided to do what I do. Their athletic abilities is what gives the athletes the opportunities to earn this money, but they need guidance for life after sports. Sports can be three to 10 years of their life, but then their post-athletic career is typically 40 to 60 years. It’s that part of their life that I’m really concerned about planning for.

By Darren Heitner

Darren Heitner created Sports Agent Blog as a New Year's Resolution on December 31, 2005. Originally titled, "I Want To Be A Sports Agent," the website was founded with the intention of causing Heitner to learn more about the profession that he wanted to join, meet reputable individuals in the space and force himself to stay on top of the latest news and trends.

Heitner now runs Heitner Legal, P.L.L.C., which is a law firm with many practice areas, including sports law and contract law. Heitner has represented numerous athletes and sports agents as legal counsel. He has also served as an Adjunct Professor at Indiana University Bloomington from 2011-2014, where he created and taught a course titled, Sport Agency Management, which included subjects ranging from NCAA regulations to athlete agent certification and the rules governing the profession. Heitner serves as an Adjunct Professor at the University of Florida Levin College of Law, where he teaches a Sports Law class that includes case law surrounding athlete agents and the NCAA rules.