Atlanta Sports Council’s Stokan is driven by a competitive nature

The man who has transformed Atlanta’s sports landscape over the last decade had a few gaps in his childhood. He didn’t learn to ride a bike until he was in high school. He didn’t learn to swim until he was in college.

“I just played sports as a kid,” said Gary Stokan, president of the Atlanta Sports Council. “I didn’t make any time for the other stuff.”

Stokan, the man instrumental in landing the College Football Hall of Fame (it opens in 2012) for downtown Atlanta, the president and CEO of the upcoming Chick-fil-A Bowl, the idea man behind the season-opening Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game, the far-reaching fellow who’d like to see the city host soccer’s World Cup next decade, said his love of all things competitive began in his Pittsburgh childhood with an inauspicious present. He got a basketball.

“We had a park at the bottom of my neighborhood, and I would go down and shoot by myself,” Stokan, 54, recalled. “These older guys would come down for a game, and they always had to pick me for their team because I had the only basketball. I got to be a decent player competing against guys older than me.”

These days, Stokan competes against major cities around the nation for major sporting events. For the past 11 years, the former North Carolina State point guard has been Atlanta’s go-to guy in that hyper-competitive arena. The sports council has helped broker the 2000 Super Bowl, All-Star games for the NBA, NHL and Major League Baseball, a PGA Championship and two NCAA Final Fours.

Sports is about money

Those who know Stokan say his background as an athlete, coach and sports marketing executive gives him a unique perspective on his unique business. He is, they say, a man who knows how to create the critical masses needed for sports success.

“Gary not only gets the pieces in place, he knows how to put them together,” said Jeff Genthner, senior vice president and general manager of Fox Sports South and SportSouth. Genthner also chairs the sports council.

Some critics argue that Stokan sometimes reaches too far, pointing to his long-shot attempt to have Atlanta included in the 2018 and 2022 World Cup bids. Genthner disagrees.

“It was also a far reach when Atlanta went after the Olympics, but that worked out pretty well,” Genthner said.

Stokan and his 40-member team will be busy today as they select the two football teams — one each from the SEC and ACC — to play in the Dec. 31 Chick-fil-A Bowl at the Georgia Dome.

Sports, at the level it is played in cities like Atlanta, is all about big venues, big corporate sponsorships, big names and big bucks. The Chick-fil-A Bowl is expected to pump an estimated $35 million into the local economy. Saturday’s SEC Championship was expected to add another $30 million, as visitors to the metro area snapped up everything from food to booze to fuel and hotel rooms.

It is the job of Stokan and the sports council to keep the wheels of that money machine turning. It generates jobs and a growing sports reputation for the city, which translates into even more money and more jobs.

Born into sports

Stokan’s road to Atlanta began in Pittsburgh, where he was the middle of three sons. His dad, he said, sometimes worked three jobs to support his family.

“We didn’t have a lot of money, but we never knew it,” Stokan said. “I wish I could bottle my upbringing and use it for my kids.”

Both his father and mother instilled a strong work ethic in their children, leading by example rather than through lectures.

“My father retired when he was 82, and my mom, a nurse in an old folks home, was 75 when she retired,” Stokan said. “My father would always get up and have something to do. I think that’s the reason he lived so long.”

Stokan’s dad, who died a few years back at the age of 98, spent much of his working life at Pittsburgh’s civic arena as a ticket sales manager. It was a job that gave young Stokan a window to the world of big-time sports at a very early age.

He became a ball boy at the arena, and when he was just 8, Stokan had one of those Forrest Gump moments — this one with basketball legend Wilt Chamberlain. Chamberlain, who stood 7-foot-1, was in town with the Philadelphia 76ers. The team was warming up before the second half, and Chamberlain playfully tossed the pint-sized Stokan the ball. Stokan shot, and it went in. A bemused Chamberlain tossed him the ball again. Stokan sank another one.

“Wilt kept feeding me the ball, and I kept shooting, and the crowd really started getting into it,” Stokan remembered. “Wilt looked like he was having the time of his life. It was a very special moment.”

Stokan played basketball through high school, landing a scholarship to play at North Carolina State. When he graduated in 1978, coach Norm Sloan hired him as an assistant coach, a job he held for three years.

Hits and misses

Stokan came to Atlanta in the early 1980s to work for Adidas. He signed University of Georgia football star Herschel Walker for the company, but his real story is the one that got away. For a time, Stokan said, basketball legend Michael Jordan was torn between Nike and Adidas endorsements.

Stokan and Jordan met in Chapel Hill and over a couple of Coca-Colas on Franklin Street. Jordan signaled he would be willing to sign with Adidas if the contract specifics could be worked out. Stokan came up with a plan and fired it off to his bosses in Germany.

Word soon came back from overseas that the company was not willing to put that much money into a U.S. campaign. Jordan signed with Nike, then a struggling company, and the rest is sports history.

Stokan stayed with Adidas for seven years and then started his own sports marketing company, which eventually employed 25 people. He sold it just before the 1996 Olympics and went back to work for Adidas. He came to the sports council in 1998.

“I’ve been blessed to have worked with some outstanding people in the sports industry,” he said.

Another Super Bowl?

Stokan still competes these days, but it’s on the golf course, where he has a 12-14 handicap. He often plays two or three times a weekend.

“I love to play, but I’ve never had a lesson,” he said. “I need to take some lessons to get my handicap down.”

He gave up trying to play pickup basketball games several years back.

“Your mind knows what to do, but your body won’t do it anymore,” he laughed.

These days Stokan is focused on opening the College Football Hall of Fame. He won’t reveal a specific location, but says it will be within a block or so of Centennial Olympic Park. He’s predicting 500,000 visitors a year, a “conservative” estimate, he reckons.

And he’s got his eye on another Super Bowl bid down the line, as soon as the Atlanta Falcons decide on a new stadium.

“You’re looking at a new stadium in 2016 or 2018,” he said. “That’s not that far off. You have to be very strategic with your Super Bowl bids.”

He and his wife, Tia, are getting ready to become empty-nesters. Their two grown daughters are getting ready to move into a condo. Stokan has some simple life advice for them on the way out the door.