Interview with Marko Pešić: Pivotal experience with Bastian Schweinsteiger

At FC Bayern's Annual General Meeting, Marko Pešić was the first person from FC Bayern Basketball to be named an honorary member by the club members. Tomorrow, Saturday, the CEO of the ‘Red Giants’ celebrates his 49th birthday and is now bidding farewell after 15 years at the helm. In our members' magazine ‘51’, the former professional basketball player chats about the importance of the interplay with football and its decision makers, such as current president Herbert Hainer and honorary president Uli Hoeneß, why the entire club showed its full strength during the coronavirus pandemic - and about a pivotal experience with Bastian Schweinsteiger.

Interview with Marko Pešić

Marko Pešić, when you joined FC Bayern, the whole deal almost fell through due to a mix-up with Uli Hoeneß. Please tell us about it!
Marko Pešić: [laughs] “Yes, Bernd Rauch, the vice-president in charge of basketball at the time, really wanted me. But I said that I needed to know whether Uli Hoeneß, as president, was also behind the move. Bernd rang him immediately and put the phone on speaker. But instead of Marko Pešić, Mr Hoeneß understood the name Micky Stevic, who was head of sport at 1860 at the time, and yelled into the phone that Bernd could forget it. So that was my first meeting with Uli Hoeneß. But of course it was clarified during the phone call - and the journey began."

What was FC Bayern Basketball like back then?
"We were five or six people, all basically doing three jobs at the same time, from marketing to ticketing to communications. The first adidas packages were simply lined up in the corridor of our temporary office: 15 bags that we packed ourselves for the players, who signed for them one by one. The players picked up their bags and trained in a small alternatative hall that no longer exists.  It was clear from the start that we would need a solid core of German players."

Identity was a key word from the outset.
"Absolutely. I had two pivotal experiences in the first few months that shaped me forever. I started a month earlier than planned, I basically didn't know Munich and my family were still in Berlin. Then Steffen Hamann and Basti Schweinsteiger rang the doorbell. At first I thought I was seeing things. Basti said: 'I heard you're new here, you're looking for an apartment, your son is starting school soon. We've got a bit of time - come on, we’ll show you the city.' We were out and about until the evening: Glockenbachviertel, Schwabing, everything. I woke up the next morning and thought to myself: 'That was real - that was very real!’ And then I realised: if someone like Schweinsteiger does something like that for me, I can't treat people who are new to us any differently. On the contrary - that has to be the minimum. I also learnt from Uli Hoeneß that this club is something special: a club where people look after each other and make people feel welcome."

And the second pivotal experience?
"That was the first Bundesliga game of the 2011/12 season at Telekom Baskets - then as now a real basketball city. We played well, but lost in overtime. And then I watched how Bonn celebrated - as if they had won the championship. That's when I realised why Basti Schweinsteiger had told me: 'Look after your people.' Out there, outside your club, people will always use you to write their own history - whether you're a young basketball club or you've been winning everything for 40 years: Everyone wants to beat FC Bayern. If you want to be successful, especially at Bayern, it's about quality, but just as importantly it's about integrity and atmosphere."

The FC Bayern basketball players have grown up together.
”Until 2018/19, we were basically a start-up. Our employees didn't know what working hours were back then. We slept at the club if we had to. That was the first phase, with Uli Hoeneß as the visionary and Bernd Rauch as the driving force. The second phase began with Herbert Hainer. Fortunately, the club always had the right people at the right time, and with Hainer we gained even more strategy and the experiences from the first few years were moulded into a structure. We’re now a 'real' club with more planning capability."

How do you reflect on 15 years of FC Bayern?
"I'm incredibly grateful and think constantly about what I can give to the club - really. What can I give back? Because you can be as good as you want, you can have done Harvard - in Munich that doesn't mean you'll get a chance. I often think about that first conversation with Uli Hoeneß... if he had said: 'Leave me in peace with your basketball', nothing would have happened. What I was able to experience here is pure happiness. And I have to make one thing clear: I'm well connected in European basketball. When I look at how my colleagues work - there's no better management board and no better shareholders to work with than at Bayern.“

Could you please elaborate on that?
"I would probably have lost my job five times over at the beginning if there had been someone sitting there who had no idea about sport. But Uli Hoeneß understands the mechanics of a club and knows how to build something up. Of course he would call on a Sunday and ask: ‘Why did you lose in Hagen?’ or ‘Why wasn't the arena full?’ or ‘Why didn't you sign player so-and-so?’ But it was never destructive. He wanted to know, to understand. And from that came: ‘Okay, how do we solve this?’ And then came Herbert Hainer. He understood: Sport is not just about today's results, it needs a solid foundation. The club has to function - even when you’re not winning. You need to have a plan for that. I told Adrian and the others: You're lucky to have stakeholders like that. It could also be someone who says: 'This is my money, what are you going to do with it?'"

You once said: "We're our big brother's cheeky brother." How loud, how cheeky can and should FC Bayern Basketball be?
"In his farewell speech as president, Uli Hoeneß once said that FC Bayern is a big tanker - and we're the speedboat that occasionally sails ahead and takes a look around to see what's going on. I actually believe that football has learnt some things from us."

What was your perfect moment in 15 years of FC Bayern Basketball?
"The opening of the SAP Garden - with the backstory of the previous 48 hours, when we set up the chairs ourselves. We had ushered in a new era. In sporting terms, 2020/21 comes to mind. The coronavirus pandemic was 'net sport' for me - no spectators, no external factors. That's when you see who's really who. It was interesting that Bayern achieved the best results in football and basketball during this net period. Because it's all about structure: what's the foundation? The footballers won the Bundesliga and the Champions League - we could have reached the EuroLeague final against Milan with the last shot. In this net sporting period, FC Bayern showed its full strength as a complete club. A signal to say: The club is legit, honest, and well-positioned. Everything else is an afterthought. It's easy to forget that. But during that time, you saw what this club is capable of."

What is your farewell message?
"FC Bayern made me who I am today. So once again: Thank you, FC Bayern!"

Read the complete interview (in German) in the current edition of ‘51’.

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