When B.J. "Red" McCombs and about 30 other local investors gathered downtown 36 years ago to discuss bringing pro Basketball to San Antonio, their interest in the sport was minimal at best.
"I doubt there was a real Basketball fan in the whole group," McCombs said. "I certainly was not. I was a baseball, football guy." But McCombs wasn't nearly as bad as Marshall Steves, patriarch of one of the city's pioneering industrial families.
"You can count me in," Steves, now deceased, told McCombs and the group's leader, Angelo Drossos. "But as far as pro Basketball goes, I'd rather watch water drip from a faucet."
Such disparaging comments are seldom heard here these days. As the Spurs pursue their fifth NBA title, the franchise's original investors will be honored Thursday at Slam Dunk for Life's Night of Champs. Slam Dunk for Life is a not-for-profit organization that aids at-risk youths.
"They forever changed the city," said Brandon Parrott, a spokesman for Slam Dunk for Life.
Transforming the city's image was exactly what the investors had in mind when they paid $200,000 upfront to lease the financially troubled Dallas Chaparrals of the American Basketball Association in 1973. Later that season, the group bought the newly renamed San Antonio Spurs outright for an additional $600,000.
"It was a totally civic venture whose sole purpose was to gain visibility for San Antonio on the national sports scene," said McCombs, 82. "I told the other investors at the outset this was something that had been losing about $800,000 each year in Dallas and we couldn't reasonably expect to do better."
McCombs and real estate developer John Schaefer pledged to buy the largest chunks of stock - 25 percent each - while the others cut up the rest. Drossos ran the club's day-to-day operations for sweat equity only.
"We brought the team to San Antonio to put the city on the sports map," said Schaefer, 78. "It wasn't for profit. In those days, if you went to Chicago or Detroit and mentioned San Antonio, people would say, 'Oh, you mean the city down by the border?' Once we got in the ABA, it became, 'That's where the Spurs are.'"
But some investors had other reasons for getting involved. That was true of two of the youngest, dentist Linton Weems and homebuilder Art Burdick, one of the few investors familiar with pro Basketball.
"I had grown up in the Chicago area and my dad had season tickets to the Bulls," said Burdick, 60. "Having grown up exposed to pro sports, the opportunity to get involved in it was a dream come true."
Being an investor gave Weems the chance to rub elbows with the city's movers and shakers.
"There was 'Papa' Joe Straus, Angelo Drossos, Leo Rose, John Schaefer," said Weems, 65. "I was the minnow amongst the Moby Dicks, but I still got to do what they did."
And that included participating in the group's often-raucous quarterly meetings.
"There was head bashing and fighting and cussing," Weems said. "There was none of this sitting around civilized, having a little coffee."
Thanks to Drossos' shrewd stewardship, the Spurs entered the NBA in 1976 after raising the number of investors from 35 to 63. McCombs sold his interest in the Spurs in 1983 to buy the Denver Nuggets. After selling the Nuggets in 1986, McCombs purchased Drossos' controlling interest of the Spurs and the stock of most of the minority investors for $47 million in 1988.
By that time, the investors had all become Basketball fans - even Steves, who died in 2000.
"He'd be incredibly pleased to see the Spurs become what they have," said his son, Edward Steves.
Slam Dunk for Life Night of Champs
Date: Thursday
Time: Doors open 6 p.m., dinner starts 7 p.m.
Place: UTSA Main Campus, UC Ballroom
Cost: Open to the public at $65 per person
More information: 858-0034, nightofchamps.com
