Peter Ueberroth

By Tom Kirvan

It was a feat worthy of an Olympic gold medalist: turning a profit on the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, which Peter Ueberroth oversaw as the president and chief executive officer of the Olympic Organizing Committee for the L.A. Olympiad.

Born in Evanston, Ill. on September 2, 1937, Ueberroth was a three-sport star in high school, excelling in football, baseball, and swimming before attending San Jose State University, where he was a member of the water polo team. By the time he was 22, Ueberroth was a vice president of Trans International Airlines before starting his own travel company, First Travel Corporation that he later sold in 1980 when it had grown to become the second largest such company in North America.

As the head of the 1984 Olympic Committee, Ueberroth managed to keep the Los Angeles Games in the black, recording a $250 million surplus thanks to his skill at attracting corporate sponsors at a record rate. The surplus was used to support national youth sports activities in the U.S.

Chosen as Time Magazine’s “Man of the Year,” Ueberroth then was elected commissioner of Major League Baseball, where he doubled national television revenues during his four-year reign, while significantly increasing baseball’s attendance and merchandising efforts.

Peter Ueberroth*

After toying with the idea of entering politics, Ueberroth opted to write a book instead, a best-seller titled “Made in America,” which offered a behind-the-scenes account of the obstacles he had to overcome to make the Los Angeles Games a success.

But Ueberroth is perhaps best known for his four years as baseball commissioner, a time when he helped bring labor peace to the national pastime while also restoring Yankee great Mickey Mantle and San Francisco star Willie Mays to the good graces of the sport after they had been banned for accepting jobs with a pair of Las Vegas casinos.

Before righting the baseball wrong regarding Mantle, Ueberroth had offered this view of the situation: “Here lies Mickey Mantle. Banned from baseball.”

He would later write: “The integrity of the game is everything,” a quote that piggybacked with another.

“A cloud hangs over baseball. It’s a cloud called drugs and it has permeated our game.”

*[1], Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons