Terry Pluto - Loose Balls: The Short, Wild Life of the American Basketball Association

O THER B OOKS BY T ERRY P LUTO

Dealing: The Cleveland Indians New Ballgame:
Inside the Front Office and the Process of Rebuilding a Contender

False Start: How the New Browns Were Set Up to Fail

Weaver on Strategy:
The Classic Work on the Art of Managing a Baseball Team
(with Earl Weaver)

The View from Pluto: Collected Sportswriting About Northeast Ohio

Unguarded: My Forty Years Surviving in the NBA
(with Lenny Wilkens)

Our Tribe: A Baseball Memoir

When All the World Was Browns Town

Falling from Grace

Burying the Curse: How the Indians Became the Best Team in Baseball

The Curse of Rocky Colavito: A Loving Look at a Thirty-Year Slump

Tall Tales: The Glory Years of the NBA

Forty-Eight Minutes: A Night in the Life of the NBA
(with Bob Ryan)

Tark: College Basketballs Winningest Coach
(with Jerry Tarkanian)

Bull Session: An Up-Close Look
at Michael Jordan and Courtside Stories About the Chicago Bulls
(with Johnny Red Kerr)

You Could Argue But Youd Be Wrong
(with Pete Franklin)

Sixty-One: The Team, the Record, the Men
(with Tony Kubek)

A Baseball Winter: The Off-Season Life of the Summer Game
(with Jeff Neuman)

Earl of Baltimore: The Earl Weaver Story

Super Joe
(with Burt Graeff and Joe Charboneau)

The Greatest Summer:
The Remarkable Story of Jim Boutons Comeback to MLB

SIMON & SCHUSTER PAPERBACKS
Rockefeller Center
1230 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10020
www.SimonandSchuster.com

Copyright 1990 by Terry Pluto

All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

The ABA logo is used with permission from NBA Properties, Inc.
2007 NBA Properties, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

First Simon & Schuster paperback edition 2007

S IMON & S CHUSTER P APERBACKS and colophon are registered
trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

Manufactured in the United States of America

2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1

The Library of Congress has catalogued the hardcover edition as follows:

Pluto, Terry.
Loose balls: the short, wild life of the American
Basketball Association / Terry Pluto.
p. cm.
Includes index.
1. American Basketball AssociationHistory. I. Title.

GV886,515.A6P58 1990 90-40683
796.323640973dc20 CIP

ISBN-13: 978-1-4165-4061-8
ISBN-10: 1-4165-4061-X

Photo Credits:
AP/Wide World Photo, ;
The Denver Post, (Jimmie Jeffries),
,
;
San Antonio Spurs, ,

The author and publisher have endeavored to trace the copyright proprietors
and the identities of the photographers responsible for the photographs in this book.
Readers with information with respect to those identities are requested to
furnish it to the author and publisher. Acknowledgments, if appropriate,
will be made in future printings, if any, of this book.

To Karen and Tony Stastny

and to Gene Littles, Steve Jones, Dave Twardzik, Mel Daniels,
Terry Stembridge, Mack Calvin, Mike Storen, Dick Tinkham,
Harry Weltman, Carl Scheer, Billy Keller, Ron Grinker
and all the rest who lived the ABA.

The reason for this book is that so many people felt it had to be written. There were those who wanted to write the book themselves but never got around to it, yet the stories of the ABA lived on inside them, waitingmaybe even demandingto be told. So this book is really their book in their voices. The hardest part of this project was choosing what should stay in, not finding enough stories to fill it. The original manuscript was nearly a thousand pages; I trust that the stories that didnt make it will eventually be heard. The book was originally the idea of Simon & Schuster editor Jeff Neuman, who went far beyond the call of duty in shaping the material. Roberta Pluto and Pat McCubbin transcribed more than 150 hours of tapes. Others behind the scenes who made significant contributions to this work were Faith Hamlin, Dale Ratermann, Wayne Witt, Mark Patrick, Warner Fusselle, Jon Singer and Alan Spatrick. I thank them all.

Terry Pluto

Part I:
OPENING GAMBITS

Part II:
MIDDLE GAME

Part III:
ENDGAME

LOOSE
BALLS

The old American Basketball Association...

Most fans remember it for the quirky red, white and blue basketball. Or perhaps as the league that made famous the 3-point shot. Maybe some fans know that the ABA gave birth to the Slam Dunk Contest. Astute basketball fans think of it as the league that gave us Julius Erving, Larry Brown, Doug Moe and Connie Hawkins, as well as Moses Malone and a couple of other high school kids who went straight to the pros. Some even remember that it was the birthplace of the San Antonio Spurs, the Denver Nuggets, the New Jersey Nets and the Indiana Pacers.

Ever hear of a guy named Bob Costas? His first radio gig was in the ABA as the voice of the Spirits of St. Louis, where he tried to explain to the worldor at least the good part of it reached by KMOXs booming 50,000-watt signalthat star Marvin Barnes had missed yet another team flight, this one from Louisville to St. Louis that was scheduled to depart at 8 A.M. eastern time and arrive at 7:59 central.

Why did Barnes miss the flight?

Because, as Barnes explained, he didnt want to get in no time machine.

Then again, Barnes seldom made any flight before noon, regardless of the time zone. After missing one flight, he hired a private jet to take him to a road game, then forgot to pay the pilot. At the end of the first quarter, the pilot showed up at the arena wanting his money. During the next timeout, Barnes, in uniform, went into the dressing room, came out with his checkbook and paid the man.

True story... we think.

Barnes also had 13 telephones in his house, but thats another story. Is it true? Maybe. When asked about it, Barnes counted up to seven phones in his house, then started laughing so hard he quit counting.

Hardcore basketball fans think about Marvin Barnes as much as they think about Julius Erving when it comes to the ABA. Its like Barnes was the bad angel on one shoulder, Erving the good angel on the other.

Erving was the league statesman, the spokesman, the player who could outdo anyone on any playground with his soaring dunks and double pumps under the basket. And in the boardroom, Erving could sound like one of the leagues owners, selling the ABA as a real alternative to the NBAand how if the NBA were smart, theyd merge the two leagues right now. Dr. Js on-court aerobatics made the case as persuasively as any economic argument could.

If Marvin Barnes had been smart, hed have listened a little more to players like Erving. Of course, it would have helped if Barnes had just shown up with his teammates. Too often, he wandered in about 30 minutes before tip-off, sometimes with a bag of burgers and fries from McDonalds, then sat on the trainers table getting his ankles taped as he chowed down a Big Mac. Then went out and scored 40.

True story... or at least thats how some remember it.

But thats what the ABA was about: stories, myths and legendsincluding the stories about the guy named John Brisker, who brought a gun to the dressing room; who once stomped a players head on the court; who later was killed in Uganda while doing some diamond business with Idi Amin.