Auerbach put emphasis on team
mwhicker@ocregister.com
The big thing today, in this microwave world, is "branding." Your company, your team, someday even your family must have a brand, a one-glimpse logo that distills everything about itself.
Red Auerbach, who died Saturday at 89, knew branding.
His Boston Celtics were the ultimate in self-explanation. Green warmups, green-and-white uniforms, white socks, black shoes, more retired numbers than most teams had numbers, lots of pennants in the ceiling.
You saw them, you knew them. And most outside Boston knew what they thought of them. The Celtics, much to their delight, harvested hate.
Today's winning teams aren't hated like that. Everybody in the NFL wants to be the Patriots. Nobody in the NBA wanted to be Auerbach's Celtics.
It wasn't just Auerbach's victory cigar, which punctuated what was already on the scoreboard. It was Auerbach's sense of competition that began before the jump ball and ended well after the buzzer.
It was the succession of pantry locker rooms, in which the visitors steamed under cold shower heads. It was the catcalling, often racist, Boston crowd (although the Celtics themselves used the first African-American player, and Bill Russell was the first black coach in any major sport).
It was the idiosyncratic Boston Garden itself, an arena hidden behind a maze of hallways and elevators within North Station. There never has been a more intimidating basketball arena nor a tougher place to win, even without a screaming sound system.
Philadelphia was Boston's most immediate antagonist. In '83, Philadelphia assistant coach Jack McMahon came to scout the Celtics in the playoffs and was given an inconvenient seat on the baseline.
He slammed his clipboard on his tiny table and announced, "I hate this (expletive) place. I hate these (expletive) people."
Then he settled down to watch Washington cruise to an apparent victory over the Celts. To McMahon's knowing disgust, Boston pulled it out, and some of the late calls were indeed borderline. It was OK, though - the fact that the PA announcer had not announced a 76er score meant that Philadelphia must have won.
The horn had just sounded when the gleeful voice came down: "And from Philadelphia Mil-WAU-kee 110, Philadelphia 98!" The locals roared and McMahon two-handed the table with his clipboard again. "I hatethis (expletive) place!" he yelled, and disappeared into the night.
Auerbach was behind all that, and everything else.
He coached nine Celtics championship teams and put together seven others as a dealmaker. He traded for Russell. He turned over his team to an apparent Globetrotter-in-waiting named Bob Cousy. Years later, he managed to get Robert Parish and the rights to Kevin McHale in the same deal.
He drafted Larry Bird and Dave Cowens when the smart guys said he shouldn't. He took John Havlicek, traded for Dennis Johnson. He took Len Bias, too, and Bias' subsequent death was one of the few things that ever knocked him back.
As a coach, he won nine of 10 NBA titles beginning in 1957, including eight consecutively. Only once did one of his Celtics finish the season among the top five NBA players in scoring (Sam Jones). His team could be recognized 200 miles away. Run the floor, pass the ball, run maybe six or seven plays and beat people up.
While most locker rooms are sepulchral, with earphoned music and silent ticket exchanges, the Celtics' room was Needle Park, all personalities unleashed, nothing taboo. Their friendships were for life. They were confident enough to welcome the abuse the road gave them. No team in basketball pushes those buttons anymore.
Auerbach had a shrewd, intuitive relationship with his players, buttressed by the fact that he alone was the power. He lived in Boston during the season while wife Dorothy and the rest of the family lived in Washington.
"We have him eight months, then I go with him to Europe for one month," Cousy once told Dorothy. "You have him the other three. Can you handle it?"
Today's clubby shoe brotherhood was not for Auerbach. To him, opponents were devils, and officials were their co-conspirators. During a playoff series in St. Louis, Auerbach came into the court to get the baskets measured. Hawks owner Ben Kerner confronted him, and Auerbach slugged him.
Kerner said it didn't hurt a bit, and Auerbach said, "Why don't you put some ice on the fat lip I just gave you?"
Most of all, the game was the thing for Auerbach. Today's NBA barely acknowledges it. It's about "entertainment," translated into walls of noise, skits during timeouts, rock concerts before playoff games.
It's about individuals, too; the Cleveland LeBrons, the L.A. Bryants. Fundamentals disappear, and coaches study themselves blind to find strategies to replace their own lack of teaching.
There's much athletic magic at most NBA games, but there isn't the brash togetherness of Red's Celtics. When you beat The Cigar, it meant everything.
Nowadays, the arenas copy his smoke. They need his fire.