It’s common for retired athletes to aspire to do things that will keep their competitive nature alive. Future NBA Hall of Famer, Chris Paul says his post NBA career interest involve owning a NBA team, according to AfroTech. One of Paul’s closest friends LeBron James, has already announced he wants to own an NBA team after he retires. Another close friend and future hall of famer as well, Dwyane Wade bought a stake in the Jazz last year. As the former president of the National Basketball Players Association (NBPA), the accomplished NBA player is determined to carry on as a leader. Paul, who was part of the Goldman Sachs’ 10,000 Small Businesses Summit, said, “I would like to be part of an ownership group after I’m done playing.”
As an avid supporter of HBCUs, Paul believes the same funding opportunities should be available to Black colleges as they are to non-Black universities. During the summit, Paul said, “I was born and raised in Winston Salem, N.C. and I actually attended Wake Forest University. Wake Forest was an amazing school, but in my hometown, you have a Wake Forest University over here and you have a Winston State Salem University over here, which is an HBCU. And Winston-Salem State never recruited me. Not saying that I would’ve went there. Not like that, but at the time honestly, there was sort of a blueprint to try to make it into professional sports. You would try to go to one of these big D1 [Division One] schools so that you could be seen.”
This summer, Koia, a 100% plant-based beverage company, teamed up with Paul and Support Black Colleges for a limited-edition release of Koia Protein Cinnamon Horchata. In order to support student scholarships at HBCUs, all profits from the protein drink were donated to the Chris Paul Family Foundation.
