Ed O’Bannon: Pushing Camrys suits hoops star

By Brian Eckhouse

Thursday, March 12, 2009 | 2 a.m.

A man prods the athletic, 6-foot-8 fellow at the Cubs-White Sox exhibition game at Cashman Field. “Don’t I know you?” the man says. But the man with the impressive wingspan isn’t playing along yet. “Yeah, I’m Ed O’Bannon. I sell cars,” he says with a sly grin.

More specifically, O’Bannon is a public relations manager for Findlay Toyota. His job is to put the dealer’s name out there, to sell cars, O’Bannon says. “If you don’t sell, you don’t eat.”

But you must have played ball. Just look at you.

Easy Ed, as his boss calls him, gives in, of course. O’Bannon, 36, is as mellow and affable as it gets. And Findlay trades on his name, on his cachet, even though his star faded long ago.

O’Bannon played basketball at UCLA, scoring 30 points and grabbing 17 rebounds when UCLA won the 1995 NCAA basketball championship, the Bruins’ first in two decades. Revered in his native Los Angeles, he was drafted by the New Jersey Nets.

By age 30, O’Bannon wanted out. He once had a guaranteed contract with the Nets, summers off, access to private jets and, as he recalls, “adoring fans.” But the Nets tenure lasted less than two years. After three years, he was out of the NBA. He played in Europe for different teams or coaches each passing year, dragging his wife and their three young children along — all while knowing he’d never duplicate his collegiate legend.

The final year overseas, his family stayed back. They had just moved to Henderson, where his wife saw cheap housing and opportunity. O’Bannon wanted no part of Las Vegas, but he couldn’t stomach the thought of a 9-to-5 in L.A, where everyone knew him.

O’Bannon spent his first days as a retiree as an assistant basketball coach at Green Valley High School and on his couch, resisting overtures from two dealerships. “I thought there’s absolutely no way I’m going to sell cars,” he says. And he had a nest egg. “But my wife said I had to get off the couch and get a job.”

He called the managers on a Tuesday, the dealerships recruited him Wednesday and he started at Findlay Toyota on Thursday. He recently celebrated his fourth anniversary there and has no regrets. He’s a car salesman, he says without prompting.

O’Bannon has an edge over the others. His function is dual, with more public relations work. And often when he sells cars, people come to him. Last week eight salesmen practically pounced on a couple and their infant daughter even before they reached the sales lot. But the Vaughns waved them off.

They wanted Ed.