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On To The Next One: Andrew Goudelock

After one professional season in the NBA, former College of Charleston and current Los Angeles Lakers guard Andrew Goudelock has changed his representation.  Goudelock had been represented by Austin Walton of Walton Sports Management Group since leaving school.  He will now be represented by Andrew Vye of ASM Sports.

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After learning that Goudelock left Walton for ASM Sports, I spoke with Walton, who sounded as if he has accepted Goudelock’s decision, wishes him the best, but will not let the change affect his practice.  “I love Drew; he’s a great kid and I believe in him 100%,” said Walton to SportsAgentBlog.com.  “I think that he will have a ten year career in the NBA. Ultimately, his family wanted to make a change and that is the nature of the business. I’m very proud of what we accomplished for Drew. He was originally not projected on a single mock draft his entire collegiate career, not even in the top 100, and I was able to get him drafted at #46 to the Lakers. He had the most individual team workouts of any player in the draft that year with 19, including the Combine and New Jersey mega workout. I was also able to secure him a feature on SportsCenter, procure a shoe deal with Peak, and a trading card deal with Panini America. He is a great kid and I wish him the best in his future endeavors.”

[Related: Interview with the Agent: Austin Walton]

Goudelock signed a one-year contract, with the Lakers having an option to keep him for the 2012-13 season, after being selected in the second round of the 2011 NBA Draft.  If the Lakers choose to retain Goudelock for this coming season, he will get paid $762,195, and Walton will be entitled to the commission on that salary.

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.

One reply on “On To The Next One: Andrew Goudelock”

There are a few issues I see here:

1. A player, not his family, hires and fires an agent. The player made a decision to fire Austin Walton and hire Vye.

2. Goudelock is known to have signed a poor rookie contract. A 2 year minimum deal with $0 guaranteed in either year. What is the incentive for the player to have the 2nd year? I believe I remember the Lakers signing a similar, or maybe identical, deal with Rony Turiaf as a rookie and Turiaf subsequently fired his agent Bouna Ndiaye and hired Priority. Same contract, same result for the agent.

3. Endorsement deals and interviews and all that are great but if a player signs a bad contract the agent usually gets blamed, and usually rightfully so.

4. In that interview with Walton you cited, Austin Walton claims to want “quality over quantity” with his clients but it looks like he signed 15 guys or so this year, some of whom don’t seem to have much of a career ahead of them. I believe at least one of them (JP Primm) already fired Walton as well after only a few months.

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