'Big Nasty' makes plans for future; Corliss Williamson eyes real estate development after NBA career ends

Arkansas Business, July 24, 2006 by Nate Hinkel

Corliss Williamson's present career as a role player with the

National Basketball Association's Sacramento Kings is reliant upon him throwing up as few bricks as possible. This summer, however, the former Arkansas Razorbacks legend is spending his energy studying a career where laying bricks is money in the bank: real estate development.

Williamson, currently under the last year of a multimillion-dollar contract with Sacramento and an 11-year veteran of the NBA, could quite possibly be the wealthiest summer intern in history.

"I like to call it job shadowing," Williamson joked. "I'm learning the business, but I think it goes far beyond your average summer internship."

And so the NBA's 2002 Sixth Man of the Year has--at least for the summer--shelved basketballs in favor of strip malls and traded gym shorts for property reports, all in the name of becoming a sharper businessman.

Irwin Partners LLC of Little Rock has managed to scoop up the prospective real estate investor with the promise to help guide Williamson at his own pace through the murky waters often presented by the real estate investment and development business.

"For high-profile guys like Corliss with money and a big name, there's a constant barrage of deals and offers from both friends and complete strangers," said Ron Tabor, a partner with the firm. "It's in the best interest of guys like that to be able to fend for themselves and be able to sort through them on their own."

Williamson readily admits he has naively entered some sketchy deals, which, after processing what he's learned this summer he never would've signed off on to begin with. And though he has inconsequentially been burned financially on at least one of those deals, he says it was learning the hard way that has him battening down the hatches.

"Now I realize how impulsive I was. Basically, I was jumping straight into the pool without first learning how to swim or even to tread water, and now I've realized it's important to take those preliminary steps rather than trusting someone else to do it," Williamson said. "You have to have the time and knowledge and energy to put into a project and I definitely have learned that here."

Good Pickup

Williamson's summer internship naturally traces back to the setting where he's the one used to being in charge of the schooling--on a basketball court.

David Lewis, another partner at Irwin Partners, is given credit for planting the seed with Williamson three years ago over small talk during lunch-hour hoops at the Little Rock Athletic Club.

"We thought it'd be great to bring him in the office, if he agreed, just to see what we do since we were aware of his desire to get into the business," Lewis said. "I was hoping we could be, in a very objective way, able to advise him a tittle about what to be careful about and teach him some things to look out for. And when he gets out of the NBA, he will have some tools to get into the business if he chooses and become an expert himself."

In return, Irwin Partners gets a chance to chauffeur the man who helped bring home Arkansas' last NCAA National Championship to meetings and lunches where Williamson often owns the room from the get-go.

"We look at investments all the time, and what Corliss is doing is going with us and seeing what we' re seeing and getting that insight firsthand," said Jim Irwin, founding partner at the firm. "It's been fun because we take him into a meeting and the first 15 minutes he dominates the whole thing and they could care less what we're doing there."

But after the star initially shimmers a little, Irwin said, Williamson shows a great desire for gaining knowledge and has quickly learned the ropes.

Fashion Police

Opening a business that offered a complete line of hip-hop and athletic gear previously unavailable in this market seemed like a sure-fire plan for Williamson and a partner in late 2003.

Legends Retail Co. opened its doors in a Broadmoor shopping center on south University Avenue in December 2003, but it never reached the status its name suggests.

"I quickly learned that it's really more valuable to own a strip mall and lease it to other people rather than to lease that space from someone else and try to have a clothing store there," Williamson said.

Though he was elusive about the details, the business sparred with the strip mall's owners and the store eventually moved to another location on Rodney Parham Road briefly before shutting its doors for good in April.

"That kind of pushed me to the other side about needing to own buildings and then lease them out," Williamson said. "I hate having had to learn that lesson like that, but I did, and now I'm better for it."

Hogs in Harmony

Just as the picture of Williamson hoisting the 1994 NCAA National Championship trophy is forever etched into Arkansas lore, so is the image of teammate Scotty Thurman heroically banging through a 3-pointer to seal the deal in the title game's waning moments.

Williamson says the pair remain best friends, and the former teammates currently are among a trio of investors that locked up a 32.7-acre, $370,000 land buy at the northwest corner of 28th Street and Barrow Road.