After the big shot - financial advice for Don Calhoun, who won $1 million in basketball shooting contest - 1993 Money Management Guide

Black Enterprise, Oct, 1993 by Carolyn M. Brown

On April 14, Don Calhoun woke up real sure of himself. He hadn't been to a Chicago Bulls basketball game in five years. Thanks to a friend's generosity, though, he had tickets for that night's match against the Miami Heat. And he was pumped. "I knew something great was bound to happen," he recalls.

Even as he took off from work that day, Calhoun shot a prophetic remark to a colleague: "Make sure you watch the game, they're going to call me down during half-time and I'm going to win a car!" This would indeed be his lucky night - but he had no idea how lucky.

By the third quarter, a Bulls staffer tapped Calhoun on the shoulder, offering him a chance to compete in a half-time three-quarter-court shot contest. He was one of 18,676 fans. It was his metallic gold hiking boots with the black rubber soles that got him noticed. The stakes, as it happened, turned out to be worth more than a Lamborghini, Rolls-Royce and Porsche combined - $1 million in cash.

Even though Calhoun played ball five times a week at the local YMCA in Bloomington, Ill., the odds weren't in his favor. All other 18 contestants from previous Bulls games that season threw up bricks. Only one of them even hit the rim. Besides, no Bulls player had ever hit a shot from the opposite foul line - not even Air Jordan. Who could have imagined that Calhoun would sink the unthinkable?

"Once I had the ball, I knew it was going in," recalls a confident Calhoun. The six-foot-four, 175-lb. fan took two giant strides and in one fell swoop, hurled the basketball 79-feet skyward. SWISSSSSH. The ball went in. The crowd roared. In those five seconds, the 24-year-old salesman's life changed forever. He walked off the court triumphant - and a million dollars richer.

Lucky shot? "I don't believe in luck or percentages," says Calhoun without blinking. "But I do believe in divine intervention."

Call it faith, fate or fortune. Since that night, Calhoun has hobnobbed with such sports legends as Magic Johnson, Muhammad Ali and Wilma Rudolph. Last June, he was feted at the National Sportsman of the Year Award. To top it off, he met President Clinton at the White House.

Still, Calhoun knows that with fame and fortune comes responsibility. He's not letting go of a dime without examining all options. "I get phone calls every day from stockbrokers and other sales agents," he says. "One stockbroker asked me to fork up $10,000 right over the phone and then got upset when I said no."

Out of the hundreds of calls, Calhoun says only one person offered to send a prospectus. That's okay. This first-time investor isn't about to get rooked. "I'm going to be very conservative with the money," says Calhoun, who is loading up on financial reading materials.

Smart move - considering he almost didn't get his money. American Hole-N-One Insurance Co., which underwrote the million-dollar-shot deal, at first refused to pay up. It wanted to disqualify him, arguing that Calhoun had played 11 games of college ball.

The event's sponsors, The Chicago Bulls, Coca-Cola and Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises, a Chicago restaurant chain, teamed up to see that Calhoun did, in fact, receive his purse: $50,000 a year over the next two decades.

Playing it super-safe, Calhoun deposited his first $50,000 cashier's check in a 3.5% passbook savings account. He knows, though, that keeping his cash in the bank won't net him appreciated wealth.

Putting his Money to Work

What then will the son of two working-class parents do with his winnings? Acquiring a host of material possessions is out - Calhoun is far too down-to-earth for that. In fact, he plans to keep his 1987 Ford Escort, despite persuasive tactics by car dealers (one Jaguar salesman went so far as to send over a few models to Calhoun's job). The house with the white picket fence is on hold, too, at least three years down the road. Right now, renting a one-family dwelling - shared with a friend for $275 a month - will do just fine.

Calhoun's top priority is completing a college education. He's determined to get a bachelor's degree in business by 1996. He had to drop out of Triton Community College in 1991 after two years." I couldn't afford it," he explains, adding that tuition, books and living expenses added up to $1,000 per semester.

The million-dollar shot put Calhoun back on a college campus this fall. In fact, he gave up his $5-an-hour job at Reliable Office Superstore a few months ago to become a full-time student.

He also wants to start an education fund for his three-year-old son, Clarence, named after Calhoun's oldest brother who died five years ago at the age of 20 in a car accident.

To assist Calhoun, BLACK ENTERPRISE asked three financial pros to review the findings of an extensive financial interview with him. The experts - Peggy Woodford Forbes, John W. Rogers and Eddie Brown - have been regular participants on the BE Investment Roundtable. Their analyses and Calhoun's financial data were then sent to a certified financial planner Charles Ross. Ross devised a specific plan to help Calhoun conserve and grow his small yearly fortune.