by Bill Bradley
From his grandfather, Walt heard the familiar Puritan litany about hard work and frugality. From his father, he saw the rewards of the fast life. Walter, Sr., was a hustler in the Summerhill section of Atlanta and provided his family with a comfortable lifestyle. “As a kid,” Clyde remembers, “whatever I wanted my father got me, from spending money to tickets for the Globetrotters. We went shopping every Saturday.” Whenever someone in his family wanted to go somewhere, Walter, Sr., sent one of his employees in a Cadillac to drive him. A maid came once a week to cook and to clean and there was always plenty of food and clothing. “I can remember trying on my father’s clothes alone in front of the mirror,” Clyde says, “wishing I was big enough to wear the bright two-button sport shirts that opened in front, or the brown and white Stacey Adams shoes. I liked the way they looked on him and I wanted to look the same.”
When Walt was twelve years old, his father lost his territory. Clyde’s grandfather had always urged his son to save his money, but Walter, Sr., was an incurable spendthrift. Abruptly, the pockets that used to be full of twenties, fifties, and hundred dollar bills had only fives in them. “The house was always crowded with people,” Frazier says, “and then suddenly, nothing. Nobody came when he no longer had cash, except some whites who came around looking for money he owed them. He started coming home only three nights a week. It was bad but I never asked him what happened. In my own mind, it was like some guy in power who lets things go to pot. Everybody played the numbers. He was just the man lucky enough to control it—for awhile. I don’t think my father had worked a day in his life until then. I don’t think he ever had a job.”
When Walt was eleven years old, he stopped going to the farm and devoted all his summers to sports and work. At the playground three blocks from his house, he spent long hours playing baseball, basketball, and football. When it rained, the instructor introduced Clyde to ping-pong, Scrabble, and Monopoly. Clyde gained a reputation as a ballplayer, and this, strangely, exempted him from the gambling that the older teen-agers went in for after playground hours. “Go home,” they would say as they rolled the dice. “You’re going to be an athlete.”
One summer, Clyde got a job cleaning up the old Atlanta Cracker baseball park during the day. Then he and his buddies returned at night, sneaked under the stands and gave hotfoots to the paying fans. Other jobs were cutting grass in the white sections of Atlanta, cleaning carpets in private homes, and working as a bus boy in a restaurant or as a curb attendant at a Zesto ice cream stand.
The Atlanta of his childhood was a world of separate and unequal societies for white and black people. The wrestling matches, the buses, and the ballparks had special black sections; even the drinking fountains were segregated. Clyde and his friends called whites “crackers.” They often played with them in pick-up games or swam with them in creeks, but, as Clyde recalls, “Once you left that field, you went your separate ways. I never had a run-in with adult white people when I was young. I was never too many places where they could call me ‘Nigger’ for long. There were places or neighborhoods you knew you shouldn’t go, but the other guys would. I would always mind my own business.”
His all-black high school did not compete against white athletic teams. When the time came for him to go to college, he wanted to choose Tennessee State or Grambling, each a black school. His grandmother and mother, however, wanted him to go to an integrated school, and he dutifully chose Southern Illinois University. He led Southern Illinois to the NIT championship of 1967. After seeing the all-around play he demonstrated in that tournament, the New York Knicks drafted him number one, and two months later he signed a contract to play professional basketball in New York.
Now, after the game in the Omni, eight members of the press crowd around the players in the steaming locker room.
“How would you describe Clyde’s game tonight?”
“Why were you hitting so well in the third quarter?”
“Do you think the Hawks will make the play-offs?”
“How would you compare Maravich and Frazier?”
Star of the game: Walt Frazier. He is promised two knitted shirts. We shower, stuff our wet clothes into our bags, and head for the bus.
Back at the hotel, the beauticians are partying. I notice that the door across from mine is open. There are people inside laughing. I drape my uniform across chairs to dry and wander across the hall. Three men and three women sit on the beds drinking and talking of sex, clothes, make-up and what they used to do in high school “up at Van Buren.” One of the men, a Georgia Congressman who spoke at the beautician’s dinner, makes a hasty exit after no one listens to his discussion of taxation and political integrity. With the departure of the Congressman, I am the third male. A man pours more bourbon. The talk decreases. I hesitate briefly, but what the hell I’m only young and single once.
After so many nights on the road in so many different hotels encountering so many different situations, everything takes on an ephemeral quality; everything ends with the payment at the cashier’s desk the next morning. What normally would be out of the question for me becomes acceptable in the self-contained world of Mt. Marriott or Holiday Valley. Normal shyness would prevent me from entering a stranger’s hotel room, but on the road there seems to be nothing to lose. Everyone in the hotel sleeps under the same roof for one night and moves on. Loneliness can be overcome only by reaching out for contact: a conversation in the bar, a sharing of dinner, a question in an elevator, a direct invitation, a telephone call to a room, or a helping hand with doors, windows, TVs, locks, or ice machines. The percentages are that if a man spends enough nights in hotels he will meet a woman with whom for that night he will share a bed, giving each a brief escape from boredom and loneliness. Make no mistake: Life in hotels is no continuous orgy. There are months of nights in one’s room, alone. And it is rare than an encounter develops beyond the verbal level. It is very unusual when everything feels right and the loneliness of the road oppresses two strangers equally at the same time.
FOUR
“THIS IS THE LAST CALL FOR FLIGHT 623 TO CHICAGO, DEPARTING from Gate 54 on the East Concourse.” I hurriedly swallow my orange juice, roll and coffee and head for the gate. The plane ride is full of familiar sounds, sights, superstitions, and annoyances.
Generally, I prefer to sit next to a team member. After a few years of trying to meet and talk with strangers on planes, I began to put more value on being alone while in the air. There are no telephones or interruptions up there. A trip to the West Coast guarantees five uninterrupted hours of splendid solitude. It is different from the loneliness of hotels and terminals, or the yearning for permanence that glimpses of cities and mountains generate. Seated next to a window with a book in hand and the hum of jet engines as backdrop, I enjoy flying. The movement of the plane and the knowledge of changing environments imply that things are being accomplished, while I rest in total comfort. Some of my best moments come on airplane flights. In the off-season, I sometimes fly off somewhere just so I can concentrate during the flight. The fuselage of a jet airplane serves as a mechanical sanctuary for me.
As I get on the plane, all the seats are taken except one—next to a man wearing a dark suit, white shirt, and striped tie. I sit down and immediately start to read. The man looks at me between glances out the window and at his Sports Illustrated. “Pardon me,” he finally says, “but aren’t you Bill Bradley?”
“Yes.”
“I’m Jack… I went to basketball camp with you fifteen years ago.”
“Yeah, what do you do now?”
“I work for Kimberly Clark, the paper company.”
“How do you like your job?”
“You know, I’ve learned a lot. Once you sell Kotex as a man you can sell anything.”
We talk about the basketball season, players salaries, his family, and his athletic past for ten minutes.
“You still play ball?” I ask.
“Not much, but I help organize teams for our athletic club in Det
roit.”
“That must be enjoyable.”
“Yeah, usually things go all right,” he says, “but one of the basketball nights a member invited a friend who invited another friend who was black. Now, you know, I don’t think I have much prejudice. I don’t care if blacks are members, but I know how the guys felt. Thirty percent of our club is Detroit policemen and they hate them. Anyway, I went up to the black guy and told him to leave, that this was an all white club. He took it the wrong way and next thing I knew the NAACP was suing the club. It’s terrible the way things are. I think some day we’ll all be one race. As long as people know what they’re getting into and what it means for the kids, it’s okay with me. Take our company, for example. There is only one black at our regional meetings. He’s really sharp but that’s one of the things wrong with the company. They say they won’t hire a guy if he’s not a graduate of college. I say you don’t need no degree to be a good salesman.”
Our conversation dries up after lunch and then I ease into reading my book. The rest of the trip to Chicago is uneventful and silent. When we land, the salesman says to be sure and look him up in Detroit—maybe I might want to visit the athletic club.
After getting off the plane, I go directly to the soda fountain at O’Hare Airport, where I buy the only genuine vanilla ice cream cone available in an American airport. As we pick up our suitcases from the baggage conveyor, one black porter says to another, “They’re the Knicks. Did you see the one in the long black maxi with the fur collar and hat? He was somethin’.” We board a city bus, the kind whose sides are all windows, whose seats face each other, and whose bright fluorescent lights are either all on or all off. Lucas’s bag is lost. We sit in the bus waiting twenty minutes until the airline authorities assure him it will be at the hotel by evening. People on the sidewalk stare at us in the bus. Lucas finally boards with the team’s public relations man and we pull away. Like an illuminated fishbowl in the rush hour traffic, we move toward Chicago.
I find a message at the hotel which says to call a Chicago friend. When I reach him, he says that he has arranged a little party in my honor at his apartment. He lives off Rush Street in a brownstone. People start arriving around 9:30 and the evening quickly turns into an interrogation.
“What is Frazier really like?”
“Is Holzman the best coach?”
“Will Willis ever be 100 percent again?”
“Is DeBusschere a good guy?” a girl asks.
“Yes.”
“Who is the toughest guy for you to guard?” asks her boyfriend.
“Havlicek.”
“Tougher than McMillian?”
“Yeah.”
“No, how can you say that? McMillian is so much bigger and better at one-on-one. McMillian’s the best. He’s better than Havlicek. He’s harder for you to guard.”
“No, he isn’t.”
“I think he is.”
“Okay, whatever you say.”
Finally, one of the members of the group says, “Do you really like to play basketball?”
“Yeah, more than anything else I could be doing now,” I reply.
“That’s great. You know, I once played the trumpet. I think I know what you feel. I played in a little band. We were good. We’d play on weekends at colleges. In my last year we had an offer to tour and make records. Everyone wanted to, except me.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“My father thought it wasn’t secure enough.”
“What about you?”
“Well, I didn’t know, I guess I agreed,” he says. “The life is so transient. You’re always on the road. No sureness that you’ll get your next job. It just doesn’t fit into a life plan. So, I went to law school and quit playing the trumpet, except every once in a while. Now, I don’t have time.”
“Do you like law?”
“It’s okay, but nothing like playing the trumpet.”
FIVE
THE NEXT MORNING, DEBUSSCHERE GETS UP BEFORE 10 AND walks to the nearby office of Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith to check the progress of the market. He is going to have lunch with a vice president of a Chicago bank to obtain information on the McDonalds Co. He has been toying with the idea of getting one of the New York franchises and believes that since his banker is a personal friend of the president of McDonalds, he has a chance.
I eat breakfast with a friend who is thinking about running for Congress in Chicago if he can get the Daley machine’s endorsement. The talk is of fund-raising, political intrigues, and political organization.
After breakfast, I go to a luncheon put on by the Chicago Bulls Boosters, where I am scheduled to be the principal speaker. It is held in a downtown Chicago hotel and about 200 men attend. Part of being a professional basketball player is speaking at many kinds of affairs: shopping center openings, charity fund raisers, sports banquets, high school and college assemblies, bar mitzvahs, annual company dinners, and church services. You learn to sense the mood of an audience. The element of performance in a speech often outweighs substance. The hard thing for me is to strike the balance between preaching on the one hand and slapstick on the other. Somewhere between those two extremes lies the craft of a professional speaker, be he lawyer or teacher, politician or basketball player.
The expectations of an audience to which one speaks are much different from those of 20,000 basketball fans. They aren’t nearly as demanding. During my senior year at college, I spoke in the area of New Jersey around Princeton. When my college coach would accompany me, he’d say the audience laughed at my jokes, not because they were funny, but because I told them. In a way he was right. I have often heard Walt Frazier or Willis Reed or Red Holzman tell stories that are not side-splitting but that made audiences roll in the aisles. The temptation as a speaker is to adopt a standard pose and to work from it to any audience. Willis acts as if he were a politician at a county fund-raising dinner, giving recognition to all the other politicians in the audience. He unfailingly directs compliments to the Knick organization—owners, general manager, coach, publicity man, and secretary—and to the fans, and to his hosts of the evening. Frazier, on the other hand, always conveys a cocky aloofness with an occasional good-natured jibe at Holzman, other players, or the toastmaster. For example, he will say, “Red Holzman is a smart coach. Smart enough to draft me.” Holzman’s approach is self-deprecating. He becomes the put-upon little guy who just tries to get by against all the odds. He will say, “I heard what the toastmaster said about baldness. I don’t think that’s so nice. [Pause.] I feel lucky to be here tonight. Out of place with all these stars, but lucky. [Pause.] And that’s why you people shouldn’t make fun of me. Besides, Willis Reed said it was okay if I came tonight. [Pause.] He knows I need a free meal.”
For me, the challenge of improvisation is the most important element of public speaking. I will arrive at the dinner or luncheon without specific preparation and, as the meal progresses, I’ll write my speech, particularly the humor. Sometimes I surprise myself. Occasionally I fall flat, like the time I got up at a formal dinner and introduced Mr. Vanderbilt as Mr. Rockefeller.
The luncheon lasts two hours. The businessmen seem to be entertained with my locker-room humor and informed about the inequities of the reserve clause. I return to the hotel room, where I find DeBusschere asleep with the television on. The room is strewn with the residue of our stay: soda cans, books, odorous drying uniforms and gym shoes, an emptied suitcase, and a promotional packet from McDonalds. I undress and sleep for an hour. The TV awakens me. A talk show, one of America’s consciousness raisers, blasts away into the late afternoon. The guest is Woody Hayes, the football coach at Ohio State University. He says, “Anyone who will tear down sports will tear down America. Sports and religion have made America what it is today.”
“Why doesn’t he tell that to the official he kicked,” DeBusschere says as he changes the channel.
Most arenas in the league are modern structures built in the path of urban growth. Chicago Sta
dium is a relic from the past. Built in 1929, it stands like a mountain of Depression concrete, in the center of urban decay. When I first started playing professionally in 1967, there was an operating McDonalds restaurant across the street. Now, all that remains is the sign with the golden arches. The rest was leveled. Outside the arena black kids ask for tickets. Stores in the area are boarded up. Those that remain won’t last long. The crime rate in the nearby housing projects is high. One of the reasons that Chicago never draws well is the physical danger involved in parking. There are three lots near the stadium with spotlights shining on them. For those who come late, there are more distant lots which are safe only if you leave with the crowd. A year ago, two friends waited for me after a game for half an hour and as we approached their car, a young kid robbed us at gunpoint.
Inside the stadium, things look as if they hadn’t changed for twenty years. Vintage popcorn smells permeate the arena. Vendors in blue uniforms load their boxes with an evening’s supply of hot-dogs, beer, and soda. The court and hallways are so dirty I change shoes after we play here. The arena itself is cold and the locker rooms are cramped. It is difficult for twelve players to dress or shower at the same time.
Chicago is a city in which many of our players bump into their pasts. Barnett’s father shows up from Gary occasionally, or some long-lost Tennessee State friend, living in Chicago, says hello. Frazier’s wife lives in Chicago. He always arrives at the stadium separately from the team after spending the day with his son. The mother of Cazzie Russell (a former Knick) sometimes stops by to say hello to Cazzie’s old teammates.
As we change into our uniforms, Danny opens the evening’s banter. “I knew a boy who came to the clubhouse one day in San Francisco in the old Pacific Coast League. He complained of a stomach ache. The doctor said it was overeating. He continued to complain. His father took him to another doctor who diagnosed it as a sore throat. The kid died that night of a ruptured appendix.”