I was about five years into my law practice and a year into writing regularly about baseball when I decided, late in 1999, married but not yet a dad, that the natural thing for me to try doing was to represent baseball players. I’d gotten to know a bunch of minor leaguers, and their parents. A partner at my firm had represented a handful of Dallas Cowboys. And there were things about my skill set that made me think, perhaps myopically, that it would be a pretty good fit.
The first opportunity came after a handful of emails and a phone call with Jamie Hill, a 22-year-old lefthander from the University of Alabama-Huntsville (and, before that, Middle Tennessee State) who wasn’t among the 1,474 players drafted that June, but who signed a free agent deal with the Rangers for $1,000 and was assigned that summer to the rookie-level Gulf Coast League club.