Heinsohn absorbed his knowledge of coaching from Red Auerbach. His insights into people, he acquired from personal, and sometimes painful, experience.
Tag Archives: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
What’s Left for Lew Alcindor? 1972
What, then, will incite Alcindor and keep his interest? The same thing that incites all great athletes—a competitive challenge.
Balls of Confusion: Signing Lew Alcindor, 1969
Brown handed him the certified check from Chemical Bank. Alcindor fingered the paper, eyed his name printed as clearas day across the middle, and handed it back. “Mr. Brown said to me, ‘We’ll give you a million dollars,’” recalled Alcindor, but without mentioning a timeframe.
The NBA Before Load Management, 1973
More and more these days, Russell and other sportscasters appraise the product pointedly, with such asides as, “If there’s a loose ball around here today, you can be sure those guys won’t go get it.” Welcome as honest descriptions may be, they hardly compensate for a home fan’s boredom.
Secret Plot to Make NBA Champs of Milwaukee Bucks, 1971
The man making the offer was Wes Pavalon, owner of the Bucks, a 36-year-old multimillionaire. “There’s nothing mysterious about paying tremendous salaries to tremendous athletes,” Pavalon insists, “or in making them happy in other ways.”
Bill Sharman: The Game I’ll Never Forget, 1972
“I don’t think there’s any way we could have won the title—or even gotten into the final round—if we had not defeated the Bucks in that second game. The last few seconds of that game were among the most unusual and dramatic I have ever seen in my many years in professional basketball.”
Artis Gilmore: Million-Dollar Baby on Display, 1972
Artis is neither Kareem Abdul-Jabbar nor Bill Russell. He is simply Artis Gilmore, a big, talented, quiet, young man, who, by the time this basketball season is over, will have made his presence felt not by comparison, but by his own accomplishments.
Pat Riley: Taking the Man Inside, 1994
Riley believes that the only way to make a team out of isolated players is “to get them to do what they don’t want to do.” Yet he knows, too, that there are things certain players can never do.
It’s Murder Under the Basket, 1976
No officiating changes are going to eliminate rough play from professional basketball. It has become part of the game, every aspect of it.
Earvin Johnson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: How the Magic Really Works, 1981
When the Lakers boarded the plane for the flight to Philadelphia, Magic sat in the front row, left aisle—the seat usually occupied by Abdul-Jabbar. Magic looked back at Westhead and said, “Guess you have a new Big Fella, Coach.”
From Way Downtown 