LeBron Inc.

The Building of a Billion-Dollar Athlete.

By Tim Arango, Fortune writer
November 28, 2007

It's May 31, 2007, in Auburn Hills, Mich., and the Cleveland Cavaliers, a Cinderella team no one expected to get this far, are down 107 to 104 in the crucial game five of the Eastern Conference finals against the Detroit Pistons when LeBron James launches a fadeaway three-pointer to tie with 1:14 to go in the second overtime. One minute and 12 seconds later he seals the game with a vicious drive down the lane to put his team up 109 to 107.

Those were the two finishing flourishes of a feat that NBC anchor Marv Albert crowed would "go down as one of the all-time performances in NBA history." James's play was stunning and described by another announcer as "Jordanesque": He scored 29 of his team's final 30 points, including the last 25.

Watching the 22-year-old's performance closer than the bookies in Vegas were the executives at Nike, who had shelled out $90 million to James as soon as he'd graduated from high school in hopes of latching onto the NBA's next great superstar, the one who would carry the mantle of Michael Jordan. "We measure everyone against Michael Jordan at Nike," says Lynn Merritt, the company's senior director of basketball development and the executive who crafted James's sneaker deal - the size of which irked some within Nike (Charts, Fortune 500).

That is, until James's performance against the Pistons. "Game five set me free from any criticism at Nike," Merritt says.

Within the halls of Nike's basketball division at its headquarters in Beaverton, Ore., executives began referring to a whole new era for James and Nike. "AGF" is what they called it: "after game five."

Also watching game five intently, as if it were an IPO for a company they had nurtured from the startup phase, were investment bankers at Allen & Co. and executives at Microsoft.

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