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Back in the mid-1980s, people who worked with Donald Trump didn’t write anonymous op-eds for the New York Times to criticize his workplace habits. They sent letters right to the source.
“While others may be able to let your insensitive and denigrating comments pass, I no longer will,” wrote John Bassett, owner of the Tampa Bay Bandits — a United States Football League (USFL) team — in an August 16, 1984 letter to Trump. Bassett had begun his missive complimenting Trump, owner of the USFL’s New Jersey Generals, for his contributions to the fledgling league and stewardship of the Generals. Then he lights into the future 45th president of United States. “You are bigger, younger, and stronger than I, which means I’ll have no regrets whatsoever punching you right in the mouth the next time an instance occurs where you personally scorn me, or anyone else, who does not happen to salute and dance to your tune,” Bassett writes. “I really hope you don’t know you are doing it, but you are not only damaging yourself with your associates, but alienating them as well.”
Author Jeff Pearlman includes Bassett’s missive at the front of his engrossing, eerily relevant new book, Football For A Buck, which chronicles the life and death of the USFL, an upstart operation that offered pro football in the spring from 1983 through 1985. The USFL suspended operations after Trump led a charge to move the schedule to the fall and compete head-to-head with the mighty NFL.
According to Football For A Buck, Trump’s reportedly erratic and self-serving behavior in office, highlighted recently in Bob Woodward’s new book Fear and the Times op-ed from an unnamed senior administration official, was foreshadowed by his tenure in the USFL. He fudged facts, for example declaring that former NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle told him that he wished Trump had bought the NFL’s Baltimore Colts. Rozelle testified in court that he never said such a thing: in fact, according to Pearlman’s reporting, Rozelle told Trump in a meeting “Mr. Trump, as long as I or my heirs are involved in the NFL, you will never be a franchise owner in the league.”
“While others may be able to let your insensitive and denigrating comments pass, I no longer will,” wrote John Bassett, owner of the Tampa Bay Bandits — a United States Football League (USFL) team — in an August 16, 1984 letter to Trump. Bassett had begun his missive complimenting Trump, owner of the USFL’s New Jersey Generals, for his contributions to the fledgling league and stewardship of the Generals. Then he lights into the future 45th president of United States. “You are bigger, younger, and stronger than I, which means I’ll have no regrets whatsoever punching you right in the mouth the next time an instance occurs where you personally scorn me, or anyone else, who does not happen to salute and dance to your tune,” Bassett writes. “I really hope you don’t know you are doing it, but you are not only damaging yourself with your associates, but alienating them as well.”
Author Jeff Pearlman includes Bassett’s missive at the front of his engrossing, eerily relevant new book, Football For A Buck, which chronicles the life and death of the USFL, an upstart operation that offered pro football in the spring from 1983 through 1985. The USFL suspended operations after Trump led a charge to move the schedule to the fall and compete head-to-head with the mighty NFL.
According to Football For A Buck, Trump’s reportedly erratic and self-serving behavior in office, highlighted recently in Bob Woodward’s new book Fear and the Times op-ed from an unnamed senior administration official, was foreshadowed by his tenure in the USFL. He fudged facts, for example declaring that former NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle told him that he wished Trump had bought the NFL’s Baltimore Colts. Rozelle testified in court that he never said such a thing: in fact, according to Pearlman’s reporting, Rozelle told Trump in a meeting “Mr. Trump, as long as I or my heirs are involved in the NFL, you will never be a franchise owner in the league.”
