Back from the Dead Page 19

  And so the Kentucky Colonels, with an immensely talented All-Star, Hall of Fame roster that included the likes of Dan Issel, Artis Gilmore, Louie Dampier, Maurice Lucas, Marvin Barnes, Steve Jones, and many more, had a real chance. But Hubie in those days thought it was a beneficial coaching tool to yell, scream, and curse at his own players.

  So in one game, Hubie is going berserk, and directing all his wrath and fury in the huddle toward Maurice Lucas.

  Now Maurice, who was never anybody’s fool, would have none of this. So while Hubie was berating him, Maurice finally had enough and walked out of the huddle down to the end of the team’s bench. There he sat, all by himself, arms calmly folded across his massive chest and staring impassively straight ahead, all the while seething inside.

  Hubie, incensed at this insubordination and sensing an opportunity to drive his point and style home, now followed Maurice down to the end of the line of chairs. Standing over the seated Lucas, Hubie was now thrusting his pointed finger into the face and chest of Maurice and angrily chastising him for everything, including walking out of the team’s huddle and not allowing the coach to continue “the lecture.”

  Maurice just sat there, stoically statuesque, staring unblinkingly, and unflinchingly ahead. And eventually Hubie, finally realizing that he wasn’t getting through and that his time-out was running out, hurried back to the rest of his team and got back to explaining the game plan and the next play.

  When Hubie resumed coaching in the huddle, Maurice slowly rose from his chair and stalked over. With Hubie on his knee and having already moved on, Maurice—now in the huddle himself, and towering over the coach—reached down and grabbed Hubie by the shirt, coat, and neck. He jacked Hubie up off the ground, pulling him into Maurice’s face. And this time it was Maurice doing the talking. He looked directly into Hubie’s soul, right through his now-bulging eyes. And Maurice calmly and clearly said to the coach, “If you ever publicly embarrass me like that again, I’m going to kill you on the spot.”

  Maurice then threw Hubie down and walked out of the place.

  * * *

  The season was soon over for everybody—Hubie’s Colonels fell in the ABA semifinals—and then in late June, the fate of professional basketball was decided in the Cape Cod Room at Dunfey’s Resort in Hyannis, Massachusetts. Here the ABA and NBA owners quietly gathered, and NBA commissioner Larry O’Brien ran the proceedings. In all of forty-four minutes, the ABA was disbanded and gone for good, with the exception of the gifting to the Silna brothers in St. Louis of a percentage of the future NBA television money in perpetuity. In this brilliant negotiation, Daniel and Ozzie turned out to be the biggest winners in the whole deal. Only four teams remained—Denver, San Antonio, New York, and Indiana—joining the NBA with a $3.2 million entry fee per team, payment due in full by mid-September. Suddenly there were all these really good but orphaned players from the abandoned ABA squads. They were all without teams, but clearly capable of playing in the NBA. So they had a dispersal draft.

  Chicago had the No. 1 pick. And Artis Gilmore was the easy and obvious choice.

  Atlanta had the No. 2 pick. And Maurice Lucas was equally as easy and obvious. Except that by now, Hubie Brown had been hired to coach the Hawks.

  Jack Ramsay was aware of the Maurice-Hubie history. So the call was made. The Blazers offered Geoff Petrie, a top-flight and highly marketable talent (Princeton pedigree, NBA Rookie of the Year and all) to Atlanta, along with Steve Hawes, a serviceable role player for an emerging team, for the dispersal draft rights to Maurice Lucas.

  Atlanta and Hubie accepted immediately.

  The deal went down. Geoff unfortunately went down right out of the gate, tearing up his knee and never playing again. Steve Hawes went on to have a decent complementary role-playing career. And in a most remarkable simple twist of fate, Maurice went on to become the greatest Trail Blazer ever.

  The Blazers also had their own pick in the ABA dispersal draft. And with the fifth pick we took Moses Malone, who was the same age as Maurice and me, but who had chosen a different route to the Promised Land, bypassing college altogether.

  Back in Portland, Jack kept remaking the team. Jack wanted speed and quickness at every position. Sidney and John Johnson were traded. LaRue was released. Steve Jones and others were not asked back. Steve, to his everlasting credit, never looked back, as tough as it always is at the end of the line, particularly in your hometown. Steve went on to a stellar thirty-plus-year career as a top broadcaster for literally every major media company that ever existed.

  In the NBA Draft, we were able to get Wally Walker from Virginia with the sixth overall pick, and Johnny Davis from Dayton (and the NCAA triple overtime game in Tucson with UCLA from three years before) in the second round.

  Dave Twardzik came from the ABA, and Herm Gilliam came down from the Sonics in Seattle.

  Corky Calhoun was next aboard, and then Robin Jones showed up as well.

  At the end of the postproduction mixing there were only five guys left from the year before: Lionel, Bobby Gross, Larry Steele, Lloyd Neal, and me.

  I spent most of the summer in Oregon on our farm, at Loprinzi’s gym, on tour with the Grateful Dead, and once again having to move—at least within our cozy northwest Portland neighborhood.

  After my wrist surgery, I was pretty limited physically—screwed, actually, what with most of my left arm and hand heavily casted, and with a screw pinning the fractured bone together. But early on I could go to Loprinzi’s and work the rest of me. Then I could eventually get my bike up on the rollers for some much-needed indoor spinning. I also practiced regularly and played endless pickup games all over town with the Portland Timbers professional soccer team. And pretty soon, once I got my hand and wrist back from the cast and surgery, I was riding my bike everywhere.

  * * *

  As summer rolled on—and the Oregon summer is often as nice as it gets—Maurice Lucas got to town. He was early, and said he wanted to get together ASAP and get started. We met at Jake’s, a very nice seafood restaurant not too far from our house. I walked over. He brought Herm Gilliam with him. We had the best time. It was my first real time with Luke since my UCLA hotel room in Greensboro, North Carolina, from our jointly failed Final Four three and a half years earlier. It was everything I could have ever hoped for—on every level.

  As we said goodbye out on the street after we finished it all up, we were shaking hands with good wishes all around, when Maurice squeezed my one good hand real hard. He pulled me in tight, wouldn’t let me go, as he looked deep into my soul, right through my eyes, and said, “Hey, this is going to be great. And we’re going to win the NBA championship—this year.”

  I looked back at him like he was crazy. What could he possibly be thinking?

  The Blazers were still an expansion franchise, had never won more than 38 games in an entire season (out of 82), and had never even made the playoffs. And Maurice had not lived through the maddening frustration and heartbreaking disappointment of my first two seasons in Portland.

  Maurice and Herm could both feel my unease, discomfort, and doubt. That only made Luke squeeze my hand harder. I thought he was going to break that one, too.

  And with even greater tenacity, he looked at me with that fierce scowl that we would all soon come to know—and love. And he repeated, but even slower and with more conviction this time, “We’re going to win the NBA championship . . . this year!”

  I never doubted anything Maurice Lucas ever said for the rest of his life.

  * * *

  As we began to ramp things up for the start of the new season, Jack Ramsay was relentless in his preparation, innovation, and attention to detail, including his insistence that on day one, we would all have to run a timed mile in under six minutes, and jump rope for two uninterrupted minutes without missing a beat. We rolled our eyes.

  We thought it was all ludicrous. We were young, vibrant, and had everything going our way. Fitness and endurance were not my problems—stress fractures a
nd broken bones were. I had simply had too many of them over the previous couple of years.

  Anyway, we all made it, with the exception of Lloyd Neal, who couldn’t get the running part done in time. There was a fine involved—five dollars for every second over six minutes for the mile.

  Lionel had started going to Loprinzi’s with me. Like me, he got totally into it. Bobby Gross was as fine and gifted a natural athlete as there ever was. Nothing was ever a problem for either one of these twenty-two-year-olds.

  * * *

  From the beginning, the team had remarkably positive chemistry, all because of Maurice, who as the ringmaster of the circus loved the responsibility of bringing it all together. And with two horrendously bad stutterers in Moses Malone and me, Big Luke had a field day in the pre- and post-practice locker room. He would tease and taunt Moses and me unmercifully, to the point of tears, we would all be laughing so much. And there was nothing that either of us could say or do—no matter how hard we tried. We simply could not talk or respond to whatever Maurice said or did. Maurice was a combination of Eddie Murphy and Jamie Foxx. It was hilariously funny. There is nothing like being on a team. And I’ve never known anyone better at pulling the team together than Maurice Lucas.

  Maurice was also very into the business aspects of professional basketball. In those early days of the shoe company battles for supremacy, Maurice was playing all sides of the game. At one point he had three different shoe deals—all at the same time. Nike, Puma, and adidas.

  Maurice would send the ball boy who took care of our locker room out into the arena before the game to find out which one of the company reps was there that night. And then Maurice would dress accordingly.

  We opened the preseason schedule at home against the Lakers, who had completely rebuilt their team when they were able to trade with Milwaukee for Kareem. Los Angeles went on to surround their towering pillar of greatness with Lucius Allen, Don Chaney, Kermit Washington, Cazzie Russell, and now Coach Jerry West. It was truly a raucous and momentous affair, right from the opening tip. I loved to play against Kareem and the Lakers, and now for the first time, I was finally healthy—in a relative sense—and I had Maurice Lucas as my teammate.

  In the closing moments, the ball and everything else on the line—the game, our dreams, and chances—was rolling toward the out-of-bounds corner on the way to the Blazers locker room. With the clock ticking down, Maurice fought his way through countless players from both sides. After shaking everybody off and now with the ball firmly in hand and in complete control but with scant time to close the deal, Maurice drove the ball straight to the rim along the right baseline. The mighty Kareem came over to deny Maurice. They both rose higher than humanly possible, and Kareem had all visible angles covered perfectly. But somehow Maurice was able to contort his body around Kareem, glide under the basket, and surface on the far side while still ascending. Big Luke threw down the most incredible reverse slam dunk right in Kareem’s face for the game winner at the buzzer. Maurice flung both arms and clenched fists in the air in the classic Muhammad Ali victory pose. And things were never the same again.

  That night a tradition started in Portland. Whenever Big Luke was decimating yet another helpless foe, the Blazermaniacs would roar LUUUUUUUUUUUUUKE, LUUUUUUUUUUUUUKE, LUUUUUUUUUUKE!

  * * *

  As we rolled through the exhibition tour, some very powerful themes started to develop. We had an exceptional team. Maurice Lucas was phenomenal. And Moses was a raw but unpolished gem, who, shockingly, couldn’t seem to ever get into the game.

  Maurice was beloved in Portland from the moment he got to town. The road was a different story. I had always been the villain for the road team and crowd, from the very beginning of my playing days. The other team and its fans knew that they had to get to me in some way. But now for the first time, the wrath and vicious invective on the road were directed squarely at Maurice.

  I asked him about it early on, and he brushed me off with the casual remark that the last time he had been through this town, he had beaten up the other team’s star.

  The booing of Maurice Lucas became an everyday occurrence at our away games. But he was a kind, gentle, and warmhearted soul. As it continued unabated wherever we went, I stayed on him about it.

  “So, you punched out Artis?” Yes, was his quiet reply.

  “So, you punched out Dr. J?” Yes. He seemed to be getting irritated.

  “So, you punched out—?” But before I could get out any more names, Maurice turned on me quickly and scowled: “Look, I punched them all out, every one of them—a lot of the coaches, too—and that’s all you need to know.”

  I never pursued this line of questioning with him again.

  He wasn’t the least bit concerned about the away crowd’s reactions. It drove him, I think, to unprecedented heights. He really loved punching people in the face—but only when he had to.

  * * *

  Moses, on the other hand, was having a very difficult time, and despite the fact that he was a magnificent player and a great teammate, he ended up being traded away right before the season. When Dr. Jack and the front office gave us the news, we were all saddened and stunned. When they went on to tell us and the world that the reason for the trade was that on the whole, Robin Jones was a better player than Moses Malone, we stood there staring, our jaws slack and mouths wide open in utter disbelief. It sure seemed to me to be an economic move for the Blazers, looking to cut labor costs. Moses had been destroying us in practice. And while Robin was a solid player and a good dude, Moses went on to be a three-time NBA MVP, the lead player on a truly great NBA Championship team, and one of the 50 Greatest Players in NBA History. In retrospect, the Blazers should have traded me.

  In spite of the Blazers giving Moses away—for a draft pick, no less—the team was very, very good right from the outset, although we couldn’t initially win on the road. Lionel and Dave Twardzik were the starting guards, and Herm Gilliam and Larry Steele backed them up.

  Dave was as unique as could be, a six-foot center from his early days who gravitated to ostensibly play guard as he moved up the ladder. He had uncanny anticipation, great hands and vision, a remarkable gift of pace with an extremely creative change of it, and a change of direction, too, that no opponent could ever figure out. He loved backdoor cuts.

  Dave and I would spend countless enjoyable hours in the paint, practicing, he on his offense with his imaginative flip shots, me on my defense, trying to send it all back.

  I’m the biggest believer in the world in the importance of getting off to a good start and being at your best in the biggest moments and games. And how great it was that Maurice Lucas seconded that emotion. The grander the stage, the brighter the lights, the greater the pressure, Maurice always rose to the occasion. And he didn’t like to wait for it to come to him.

  As a center, I was always responsible for the center jump—a most critical part of the game of life. But Maurice took personal responsibility for those crucial opening moments as well. Often in the biggest of games, or really whenever he felt the need, he would take his customary position on the offensive edge of the center circle, more than ready to explode and give us that initial possession.

  The other team was always aware of Maurice’s importance to our team and would try to deny him possession of the ball and his space—generally by pinching in on both sides of his perfectly legal and well-established position.

  As the ball was put in the air to start the game, and as all eyes in the building were rising to watch its ascent, Maurice, at the perfect time, would take a big step to his right and elbow the other guy right in the neck. Then he would solidly plant his right leg and come back to his left with a powerful right cross to the other guy’s face.

  As they all staggered back under the onslaught, Maurice would proudly announce, “We’ve come to play. And we hope that you have, too!”

  It was wonderful to be Maurice Lucas’s teammate.

  * * *

  We started to c
ome into our own as the season progressed, and from the beginning our fans sensed something special was happening. They all loved Luke; Jack Ramsay’s personality and style clicked immediately; Lionel’s skin color no longer seemed to be such an issue now that people realized how good he really was; and the team game and spirit that we lived and played resonated with our fans’ own daily challenges.

  The Blazermaniacs and the people in Oregon have always treated me better than I deserve. But now that I was relatively healthy and able to play some, they went over the top. I lived in as hip and urban an environment as Portland had to offer in those days, on Northwest Kearney and Twenty-Third Streets. And the fans and neighbors would always come by the house bearing inspirational gifts that they would leave on the front porch—food, fruit, brownies, flowers, Grateful Dead stuff, and music. Every day when I came and went there was more. I would ride my bike everywhere, and the people would stop and cheer. I would try to ride my bike to and from the games. With my pregame ritual set, they quickly figured out my route and time of departure. They would line the streets and yell and scream for our beloved team.

  Eventually they packed the Memorial Coliseum every night, 12,666 strong. That included the standing-room-only slots that they painted and sold as tickets around the midlevel ring that separated the upper and lower bowls. It was embarrassing for me when I couldn’t get tickets for my friends in the Grateful Dead: they would too often end up standing for the entire game in their little designated slot. But come they did, one and all.