Dmitry Piterman ( ua, Дмитро Пітерман; born 18 December 1963) is a Ukrainian-American businessman. He owned Spanish

La Liga The Campeonato Nacional de Liga de Primera División, commonly known simply as Primera División in Spain, and as La Liga in English-speaking countries and officially as LaLiga Santander for sponsorship reasons, stylized as LaLiga, is the men's ...

football clubs

Racing de Santander Real Racing Club de Santander, S.A.D. (), also known as Racing de Santander () or simply Racing, is a football club based in Santander, Cantabria, Spain, that currently competes in Segunda División, the second tier of the Spanish league system ...

and

Deportivo Alavés Deportivo Alavés, S.A.D. (; ''Sporting Alavés''), usually abbreviated to Alavés, is a List of football clubs in Spain, Spanish football club based in Vitoria-Gasteiz, Álava, in the Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of the ...

in the 2000s.

Early years

Piterman was born to a Jewish family in

Odessa Odesa (also spelled Odessa) is the third most populous city and municipality in Ukraine and a major seaport and transport hub located in the south-west of the country, on the northwestern shore of the Black Sea. The city is also the administrativ ...

, in the

Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic The Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic ( uk, Украї́нська Радя́нська Соціалісти́чна Респу́бліка, ; russian: Украи́нская Сове́тская Социалисти́ческая Респ ...

of the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...

. Eight of his father's brothers were killed by the Nazis in World War II. At the age of 15 his family emigrated to the United States, settling in

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

where he attended college at

UC Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public university, public land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of Californi ...

, excelling in sports – including

triple jump The triple jump, sometimes referred to as the hop, step and jump or the hop, skip and jump, is a track and field event, similar to the long jump. As a group, the two events are referred to as the "horizontal jumps". The competitor runs down th ...

, later narrowly failing qualification for the

1992 Summer Olympics The 1992 Summer Olympics ( es, Juegos Olímpicos de Verano de 1992, ca, Jocs Olímpics d'estiu de 1992), officially known as the Games of the XXV Olympiad ( es, Juegos de la XXV Olimpiada, ca, Jocs de la XXV Olimpíada) and commonly known as ...

Barcelona Barcelona ( , , ) is a city on the coast of northeastern Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within ci ...

.El hombre de las mil caras (The man of a thousand faces)
; El Periódico Mediterráneo, 2 December 2002 (in Spanish)

Football career

Piterman relocated to Spain in 1991, immediately buying two

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

clubs: amateurs Tossa Sport and fourth division side

Palamós CF Palamós Club de Futbol, S.A.D. is a Spanish football team based in Palamós, a town and commercial port in the ''Costa Brava'', in the autonomous community of Catalonia. Founded in the late 19th century, it currently plays in '' Tercera Divisió ...

, with the latter promoting to the

third level Tertiary education, also referred to as third-level, third-stage or post-secondary education, is the educational level following the completion of secondary education. The World Bank, for example, defines tertiary education as including univers ...

under his ownership in 2002. Three years earlier he had been elected club president, and had his first hand at coaching in spite of not being qualified to do so. In January 2003, while still president at Palamós, Piterman bought 24% of

's shares, thus reaching

. He insisted on being his team's manager, which granted him disciplinary action from the

Royal Spanish Football Federation The Royal Spanish Football Federation ( es, Real Federación Española de Fútbol; RFEF) is the governing body of football in Spain. It is based in La Ciudad del Fútbol of Las Rozas, a municipality near Madrid. It was founded on 14 October 1909 ...

for being in the technical area, which he sometimes eluded by being accredited as a journalist or photographer. When criticised for wanting to manage the club despite a lack of experience and qualifications as such, he mentioned how

George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party, Bush family, and son of the 41st president George H. W. Bush, he ...

was allowed to be in office as

President of the United States The president of the United States (POTUS) is the head of state and head of government of the United States of America. The president directs the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United Stat ...

. After a brief spell in

handball Handball (also known as team handball, European handball or Olympic handball) is a team sport in which two teams of seven players each (six outcourt players and a goalkeeper) pass a ball using their hands with the aim of throwing it into the g ...

, also in Cantabria, Piterman bought a 51% controlling stake in

in July 2004, helping it return to the top flight in his first season, with Cos now acting as

director of football A sporting director, or director of sport, is an executive management position in a sports club. The role is well known as a manager role for European football clubs, which are sometime also "sports clubs", offering many types of sports. The sport ...

. The American's spell in the Basque Country was also a rocky one, with three coaches being used during the 2005–06 campaign, which ended in relegation, the dismissals occurring when the managers refused to accept his interferences and impositions. Clashes also occurred with the club's players and fans alike. Piterman left a debt in the Alavés of more than 25 million euros (35 million USD), and fled the country leaving the team on the verge of bankruptcy. The Cos/Piterman tandem appeared in 126 matches in

Spanish football Football is the most popular sport in Spain. Spain has some of the most important teams in Europe (Real Madrid, Barcelona, Atlético de Madrid, Seville, Valencia, and others). It also has a high number of players (most of them being unprofession ...

, winning 63, drawing 29 and losing 34. In 2006, he purchased a

USL First Division The USL First Division (usually referred to as USL-1) was a professional men's soccer league in the United States and Canada from 2005 to 2010. During its existence, it formed the second tier of soccer in the United States soccer league system b ...

franchise in

San Francisco, California San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...

, the

California Victory The California Victory was a USL First Division professional soccer team based in San Francisco, California. It was an expansion team for the 2007 season, but ceased operation in September of that year after parent club Deportivo Alavés withdre ...

; it folded in one year, after he had already sold his stake of Alavés.Whitecaps soccer league loses team
; Canada.com, 20 November 2007

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Piterman, Dmitry 1963 births Living people Odesa Jews Soviet emigrants to the United States Jewish American sportspeople University of California, Berkeley alumni American masters athletes American soccer chairmen and investors Deportivo Alavés Racing de Santander California Victory American emigrants to Spain California Golden Bears men's track and field athletes 21st-century American Jews