Behind The Rankings

The idea took root when Robert Johnson was awarded the new NBA franchise in Charlotte , making him the first minority to be the majority owner of a major professional team. In taking note of this historic moment, we thought we'd compile a list of other minorities wielding power in the world of sports. At first we were going to make a Top 25 list. Then a Top 50. But as reporters Gene Menez , Elizabeth Newman and Andrea Woo researched the subject, they found more minorities with substantial influence than anyone had expected. "The list just grew and grew and grew," says associate editor B.J. Schecter .

Thus did our ranking of the most powerful 101 minorities in sports come to full flower. Assistant managing editor Roy S. Johnson and Schecter steered the project; senior writer Phil Taylor reported on Robert Johnson 's historic purchase of the Charlotte franchise. Writer-reporter Richard Deitsch profiled 94 of the remaining 100 (phew!) people on the list, and deputy photo editor George Washington rounded up the images for the project, relying heavily on staff photographer Jeffery A. Salter .

SI 's Johnson , who returned to the magazine in December for his third stint, noted that this package comes 35 years after SI undertook its groundbreaking report on race and sports. So many inroads have been made since then that minorities now permeate nearly every aspect of the business. "We kept coming across more and more people who were making big decisions, hiring and firing, managing huge budgets," Johnson says. "Our list also takes note of athletes who are enormous economic forces."

"Everyone knows about Tiger Woods , Serena Williams and Shaquille O'Neal ," Schecter adds, "but this goes beyond them."

Washington , when sending letters to the subjects, reminded them that they had all overcome obstacles in their path to success. If young readers could see the images of people who looked like them and who had made it, those young people would know that they could make it too. "When I brought that up, then people were really eager to cooperate," Washington says.

Inspiring that next generation is, SI 's Johnson hopes, one of the results of this project.