SUPERAGENT RICH PAUL My Hard Road to Happiness

HE'S LAUNCHED THE CAREERS OF SPORTS SUPERSTARS AND CAPTURED ADELE'S HEART. HOW HE DEFIED THE ODDS TO LIVE HIS DREAM

- JANINE RUBENSTEIN

Rich Paul knows he broke the mold. "When you used to talk about sports agents, they didn't look like me," he says, "a young Black man with a leather jacket on, sitting court-side every game." However improbably, the founder and CEO of Klutch Sports Group, an agency representing athletes and coaches in professional basketball and football, has negotiated more than $4 billion in client contracts. His roster includes NFL Pro Bowlers Myles Garrett, defensive end for the Cleveland Browns, and Jalen Hurts, quarterback for the Philadelphia Eagles, as well as NBA All-Star Anthony Davis of the Los Angeles Lakers and, most famously, all-time leading NBA scorer and Lakers leader LeBron James, a close friend and business partner. "I didn't go to Harvard, MIT or Penn," says Paul, 42. "But the education I received in my neighborhood? I'm extremely lucky."