Shimon Mizrahi
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Shimon Mizrahi (born in 1940) is the president of Maccabi Tel Aviv Basketball Club.
After the club had had economic problems in 1969, Mizrahi was appointed as Maccabi president. Mizrahi built many plans to save Maccabi out of bankruptcy, such as selling tickets for Maccabi games (before that, attending the game was free). Mizrahi realized that in order to secure Maccabi's dominancy in the Israeli league, they must sign American players. Starting this year (1969) until today, besides the 1992/93 season, Maccabi won the Israeli championship. Besides, Maccabi won five European cup titles (1977, 1981, 2001, 2004, 2005).
Mizrahi was accused by his rivals of failing plans to make the Israeli league more competitive, such as payment limits. However, Mizrahi agreed to several laws which are meant to weaken Maccabi, such as the Brisker Rule (which limits the number of foreign players every team can sign), the Final Four system instead of a best-of-5 playoff and more.
Mizrahi holds a law degree for practice in Israel.
