| Thursday, December 30
By David Aldridge
Special to ESPN.com |
|
Come the millennium, I plan to be in front of the TV, watching
192-year-old Dick Clark preside over the end of the world. And what more
appropriate place to host Doomsday than New York City, a town that doesn't
have a motto because no one could come up with a word that rhymes with
"cesspool." (Just kidding. I love the Apple. Well, distinct bites of the
Apple.)
|  | | Bill Russell and Red Auerbach played quite a role in making the NBA what it is today. |
But until then, I figured I'd use the hours composing a list of
the top 10 moments of the NBA Century. This was arrived at for two reasons:
Over the holidays, no one is in his or her office
Bogus columns
like this are very easy to write, and I've got to hit the New Year's Eve
parties soon.
So, shamelessly ripping off Mike Monroe's idea, here we go, in reverse
order:
10. The Dream Team Takes a Trip.
The 1992 U.S. Men's Olympic Basketball
team is the confluence of celebrity, commerce and athletic perfection. The
blowouts do not matter. The separate accommodations for the professional
players do not matter. The nightly exhibition of basketball in its ultimate
form overcomes all naysayers. Opposing players take pictures of Magic,
Michael and Bird. The team is mobbed everywhere. Chuck Daly never calls a
single timeout. David Stern sells a billion or so jerseys. It is the NBA's
crowning moment in a decade of dominance.
9. Danny Biasone Does the Math.
The first few years of the NBA were
low-scoring affairs. With no limit on how long teams had to shoot, games
with fewer than 50 points total were common. Worse yet, teams would
frequently preserve a close lead late in games by dribbling away the last
few minutes of play, boring fans to tears.
But in 1954, Syracuse Nationals
owner Danny Biasone comes up with a simple formula. He figures out the
average number of shots taken by two teams in a game (120) and the total
number of seconds in a 48-minute game (2,880) and divides the former into
the latter. The answer is 24. Twenty-four seconds. The 24-second clock saves
the league, distinguishes the NBA from college basketball and makes the
individual talents of the league's star players sacrosanct.
8. Abe Saperstein Starts a Team.
A Chicago entrepreneur, Saperstein,
in 1926, forms and coaches a team known as "Savoy's Big Five," named after
the famed Savoy Ballroom. The following year, the Savoy team plays with "New
York" on its jersey front, even though the team plays in Illinois. Later
that year, Saperstein changes the name to Globetrotters. And the Harlem
Globetrotters, as the team is ultimately called, become the most well-known
basketball team in the world for the next 30 years. In many cities during
the 1950s, the NBA game is the opening game of a doubleheader, with the
Globetrotters the headliners. But the 'Trotters keep the arenas filled and
keep the league floating financially.
7. The Spartans and Sycamores Play a Game.
When Michigan State and
unbeaten Indiana State meet for the 1979 NCAA title, the nation is
transfixed by the matchup of the teams' two stars, Magic Johnson and Larry
Bird. Johnson's Spartans win 75-64, but the rivalry is just beginning.
Johnson goes to the Lakers, where he faces Bird's Celtics three times in the
'80s in pro sports' best continuing drama. The presence of Johnson (five
titles in the decade) and Bird (three titles) gives the league a
desperately-needed shot of excellence and starpower. Ratings rise, arenas
fill and the NBA becomes the Hot League just as Michael Jordan comes to
power.
6. Bob Short Takes a Ride.
Short's Minneapolis Lakers were the
league's original dynasty, but the owner sees the Giants and Dodgers leave New
York for the West coast and does the same with his team, taking it to Los
Angeles in 1960. It takes a while, but with Jerry West, Elgin Baylor and,
ultimately, Wilt Chamberlain in house, the Lakers become an electric,
desirable team, and establish themselves as a league linchpin.
5. Walter Brown Says OK.
Other pro basketball leagues had already
integrated, but after the NBA became the only major league in 1948, there
were no people of color playing. However, Brown, the Celtics' owner, ignored
the concerns of fellow owners and gave his approval for new coach Red
Auerbach to draft Duquesne's Chuck Cooper in 1950. Later in the draft the
Knicks take Nat (Sweetwater) Clifton and the Washington Capitols draft Earl
Lloyd, ensuring that not one African-American player has to bear the burden
of breaking the color line alone.
4. David Stern Takes a Job.
Stern had been the league's key
negotiator with the union on the groundbreaking 1983 Collective Bargaining
Agreement. Upon his succession of Larry O'Brien to the Commissioner's office
in 1984, he vows to keep fans' attentions on the game and the players, not
off-the-floor issues. For more than a decade, he does just that. With the
grace of a talk show host, the instincts of a Chicago Alderman and the
occasional use of brute political force, Stern makes the NBA a modern,
global league that brilliantly markets its top players.
3. James and Deloris Jordan get Hitched.
The union that ultimately
produced Michael Jeffrey Jordan, born in New York (that city again!) in
1962. You know the rest.
2. Ben Kerner Makes a Trade.
Kerner owned the St. Louis Hawks and had
the second pick in the 1956 draft. (Cincinnati took Sihugo Green with the
first pick. Don't ask.) He is convinced by Red Auerbach to deal the pick for
Ed Macauley and the rights to Kentucky native Cliff Hagan. With the pick,
Auerbach takes William Felton Russell from the University of San Francisco.
Eleven titles in 13 seasons follow from the fingertips, heart, brain and
guts of the biggest winner in the history of team sports.
1. James Naismith Gets an Idea.
Actually, this didn't happen this
century, but it's important. We know Naismith invented the game in 1891 in
Springfield, Mass. Anyone who loves the games surely is aware of its
origins. But just think of everything that has flowed from this one man.
Naismith went to the University of Kansas in 1898 to become its basketball
coach. He coached a man named Forrest "Phog" Allen, who succeeded him. Allen
was the coach for a young Kansan named Dean Smith, who took what he learned
to North Carolina. There, Smith became college basketball's winningest
coach, launched the careers of a whole army of coaching disciples (Larry
Brown, Billy Cunningham, Doug Moe, George Karl, to name a few), taught the
game to Michael Jordan and, most significantly, integrated the Atlantic Coast
Conference.
Another Kansas student was John McClendon, who, while never
playing there, took what he learned from Allen to Tennessee State. There,
his team became the first traditional African-American university to win a
major college championship. McClendon's success opened the floodgates for
the non-stop flow of talent from black schools to the NBA.
It all comes from James Naismith.
Thanks, Doc.
Back to you, Dick.
P.J. has his say
It's a shame that most of you don't know the real Peter John Carlesimo.
He has been made into a caricature by what happened on Dec. 1, 1997, just as
Latrell Fontaine Sprewell was, and neither of them should have been
subjected to it. But what happened, happened, and P.J. Carlesimo ultimately
paid for it with his job.
The official end came this week, after Garry St.
Jean came off of a California golf course, having decided to finally fire
Carlesimo and take his job. (He waited three days because no one should get
fired on Christmas day.) Whether it was denial or real surprise, Carlesimo
told me on Tuesday that he didn't see it coming.
"You hear rumors and people talk about things," he said. "In this
league, you're pretty much day to day."
If you cover the league, you've heard bad things coming out of Golden
State lately. That some players, some veteran players, could have come back
sooner from injuries, that they left Carlesimo out to dry. The coach says
no.
"We had guys playing who were banged up," Carlesimo said. "I couldn't
have had more cooperation or more guys playing injured than we did have ... we
didn't win the games we wanted to win for three years, but it was never for
our players not cooperating, not being professional, not giving us
everything that they had."
You heard that Carlesimo had lost his team, lost his ability to yell
and scream and demand more from his players because no one could take him
seriously anymore after they saw a player's hands around his neck. The coach
says no.
"What that did was just put it more under a microscope," Carlesimo
said. "Anytime, when I had a confrontation or if I had a disagreement, or if
we had to discipline a player, I think it was just looked at a little bit
differently because it was me, and because of that particular incident or my
history. I don't think it made any difference day to day with our players. I
don't think it impacted on my ability or our players' reaction. I just think
people from the outside, or the local media, if they were looking at it, it
was like, 'oh, this is this.' But in our little group, which is all that
really matters, the 14, 15 players, the four coaches, the trainer, your
tight group, there was nothing that impacted on that at all as a result of
myself and Spree."
I asked Carlesimo where he put the anger. Sprewell could at least let
it out on the floor.
"I don't feel that way," he said. "What happened was a spectacular
incident. And it received as much or more coverage and attention (from)
sports and non-sports media of any incident that ever happened in sports.
It's understandable and you can't control that. I don't feel anger. It was a
situation I was caught in and I was part of. I can't control what people
think. The only people that really concern me, what they think about that,
are the players that were there, that were on that team, and our coaches,
and the people that really know and understand the circumstances. For me to
be bitter or to say that was unfair or wasn't portrayed right, or to have
any other kind of reaction would be silly."
In the final analysis, I guess, this isn't rocket science. Carlesimo
didn't win, so he got fired. But he says that given a choice of college or
the pros, he'd like to stay in the NBA. (At $3 million per on his last
contract, I'd think so.)
"The past six years have been tremendously enjoyable," he said. "I love
it. I love the lifestyle. It's the best players in the world. I think
contrary to what a lot of people on the outside think ... the vast majority of
guys in this league are so easy to deal with. They're so professional ... it's
the best arenas in the world, it's the best players in the world. I think
it's the best presentation. I don't think you can do a better job of
merchandising and marketing than the NBA people do. I love the lifestyle. I
love everything about it ... given a choice, this is clearly where I'd rather
be. But if it turns out that my opportunity's in college, I'll go back
there, happily."
Around The League
Hornets are getting the maximum out of undrafted pickup Eddie Robinson, who's
now starting for Eddie Jones at the two. (Jones could be back in three
weeks.) Robinson excelled off the bench for the Bugs and has picked up the
tempo as a starter after a slow start.
"The guy shows no fear offensively,"
coach Paul Silas said. "I just worried about his defense. Could he handle
the starting players? But I think he's kind of the surprise of the league. We
just got lucky on that one."
Lucky, indeed. The Knicks had dibs on Robinson; he was in their camp.
But they opted to keep David Wingate instead, and the Hornets scarfed
Robinson up in time for their summer league run. He shattered Michael
Finley's existing workout record in the vertical standing leap, and he's
been impressing ever since.
"He's an excellent shooter," Silas said. "He can handle the ball. He is
just a flat-out super one-on-one player."
By the way, you can forget about Anthony Mason going anywhere ("That's
my man," gushed Silas); when Mase growls every other day about more playing
time, Silas just brings him into his office for a little chat and tries to
get him more run the next day.
Of greater concern is getting Eldridge
Recasner back in the fold. The guard, seriously injured as a passenger in
Derrick Coleman's auto accident during training camp, has been slow to
rejoin the team on the bench or in group functions. Obviously, Recasner
still has some unresolved issues with Coleman.
"I've been wanting him to get back into the flow of the team," Silas
said. "But so far, he hasn't. If there's problems (between he and Coleman)
he can't let them fester. But so far, he hasn't been willing to do
that."
Magic got bad news on Wednesday: Matt Harpring's foot isn't getting
any better. He's still on crutches and still in a walking boot. Doesn't look
as if Harpring will play much, if at all, this season. Warriors might get
similar news soon on Erick Dampier.
Pacers ripping again, and after a slow
start, Reggie Miller's in the middle of it. "Reggie's like that," GM Donnie
Walsh said. "He can got through periods where he doesn't shoot the ball
well. But even when he wasn't shooting the ball that well, he was playing
defense. He was trying ... I never worried about him playing."
Walsh says he
wasn't worried about rumors that Miller was angry about not getting a
contract extension in the summer. "He doesn't do that," Walsh said. "For
about a week there, I thought, 'well, maybe it's true.' But my history with
him is that he doesn't let those things affect him. Now, he won't talk to me
for a while. But that's it."
Quote of the Week
"Why did the Siamese Twins move to England?
Because the other one wanted to drive."
-- Joke from the Jim Carrey Movie "Man on the Moon." It has nothing to
do with the NBA. I just thought it was funny. |  |
NBA West: Top 10 events ever out West
