Wilt/Red Sox PS

[Michael Gooen <callmebogie@yahoo.com>]

I was crushed when I heard about Wilt Chamberlain's
death.  I'll confess it to the list -- when I was six
years old back in 1971 he was my favorite player.  I
was then (as I am now) living in New Jersey; the
post-Russell Celtics were off the national radar
screen.  Everything was Knicks and Lakers.  I hated
the Knicks.  I loved Chamberlain -- I'd missed the
Russell era, so I didn't understand back then that he
was supposed to be the bad guy.  All I knew from
reading the kiddie sports bios was that Wilt had done
some legendary things, including all of his well-known
NBA statistical feats, playing for the Globetrotters
and jumping 7 feet (didn't know then about his jumping
20,000 women).  (Incidentally, I was quickly cured of
my appreciation for the Lakers when Wilt retired and
the C's returned to prominence in '73.  Hope you all
will forgive my infantile dalliance -- I've been clean
for 26 years!)

Saw John Havlicek on the Today show this morning and I
think he summed up best what I most liked about Wilt: 
that his fatal on court flaw may have been that he was
too soft-hearted to use his incredible strength and
quickness indiscriminately.  Hondo said that if Wilt
had pushed it to the limit on a regular basis, he
could have torn the league apart.  It's unbelievable
that with all of the physical abuse Wilt took during
his career, he only got into one fight.  

Although the Lakers' current center is the one with
the "S" tattooed on his arm, Wilt was the closest
thing to Superman we've ever seen in professional
sports.  It's humbling and more than a little scary to
have lost him so suddenly.

Michael Gooen

P.S.  Joe, I can tell you that Yankee fans DO hate the
Red Sox.  Mike Francesa on WFAN mentioned it yesterday
-- as usual, he wasn't too rational about it.  He
mentioned that even though the Yankees have dominated,
there's something about the NY-Boston rivalry that
transcends the facts on the field.  He speculated that
it has something to do with hating the Celtics.  Can't
say I disagree. 

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