Staff and people connected to Pro Sports Careers.com

Richard K. Avery:
Owner/President

	richard@prosportscareers.com
NBPA-certified		NBA-certified

Rich has an extensive background in athletics at the elite level. Since his own promising career was cut short due to injury and illness, he has devoted most of his working life to the business side of sports.He is a Registered Agent with the National Basketball Players's Association. Richard was President and co-founder of Pro-Group Consulting Services Inc., an employment and career-counselling center for athletes. In 1988 he became the British Columbia and U.S.A. Pacific Northwest player representative for the Calgary, Alberta based Pro-Rep Entertainment Consulting Group Inc. After 5 years there he started his own agency in Victoria, Pacific Sports Management Ltd. Rich then took a break from the sports representation business and went back to school where he took some computer classes in e-commerce and web-design. Rich also has a business background in financial and investment consulting as well as marketing and public relations. He has a long history in coaching basketball and recently coached professionally in Australia.

Craig Jelen - Player Representative USA / East

Craig has been a scout/assistant coach on the High School level in New Jersey. He has also worked as an intern for the New Jersey Nets. There he worked in the Basketball Operations & Public Relations Departments. Craig has a B. S. Degree in Sports Management & a Minor in Business Administration from St. John's University.

Richard on Craig: “When I received Craig’s email requesting more information regarding becoming an agent I was instantly impressed with his passion for the game. ProSportsCareers.com has grown very rapidly and Craig was the perfect person to fill our needs. It my sincere hope that I will be able to keep Craig with ProSportsCareers.com for the future growth of the company that he has already played a key role in developing.”

Mayura Rao - Player Representative USA / West

Mayura Rao has recently joined the Pro Sports Careers team to aid in recruitment of athletes from the West Coast. She is currently finishing her last year of law school at Chapman University and plans to enter the field of Sports Agency after she graduates. In addition to her interest in the representation side of the industry she is also interested in marketing and endorsements.
Mayura began her career in the entertainment industry in 2002 with Hammond Entertainment, a production company in Los Angeles, California. While at Hammond Mayura was involved in planning events such as Emmitt Smith’s rushing yards event, Rodney Peete 2003 Superbowl Party, Stevie Wonder’s 2002 KJLH Benefit, the 2003 Black Enterprise Ski Weekend, the 2003 Essence Music Awards Festival as well as the 2003 and 2004 NBA All Star Weekends.
Mayura began her career in sports agency in January of 2005 while assisting in the preparation of the 7th Annual Pro Camp for Moore Management in Fountain Valley, California. She contacted athletes who were specifically invited to attend the camp and she scouted players for the camp at the 2005 Big West Tournament and the 2005 Pac-10 Tournament.
Recently Mayura began representing some newly graduated college basketball athletes. She has worked closely with minor league teams in the ABA, CBA and IBL in assisting her players in their quest for professional basketball jobs. She has also gained many contacts in the NBA to assist in her final goal of placing players in the NBA.