Bobby Knight’s Olympics
I was cut by Bobby Knight in the 1984 Olympic Trials. In a way, it was a relief: a big part of me didn’t want to make the Olympic basketball team in 1984. Seriously, I didn’t. Number one, I didn’t like Bobby Knight. And number two, I was leaving Auburn to turn pro. I just went there to help improve my stock for the NBA draft, and I told people as much before I went to Bloomington, Indiana, for the trials. People heard me say that after getting cut from the team and they said, “Oh, you’re just saying that because you’re disappointed you didn’t make the team.” But no, that was never the case. When Steve Alford wrote a book—and he was my roommate during the trials—he wrote, “Charles didn’t want to make the team.”
I didn’t want to dedicate my entire summer just to playing basketball. My primary goal was to move up in the draft, which meant working out, getting mentally and physically prepared to play professional basketball. It was about to be my first time leaving Alabama for an extended period. I was leaving school early. What I was about to take on that summer made it a really important time in my life. I wanted to go to the Olympic trials, kick a little butt and move up in the draft. Before the trials, most of the scouts thought I was going to be drafted in the middle of the first round, maybe even late in the first round. But at those trials I got to play against everybody. I mean everybody: Michael Jordan, Patrick Ewing, Chris Mullin, John Stockton, Karl Malone, Sam Perkins, Waymon Tisdale . . . everybody. There are seven, maybe eight guys from those trials going to the Basketball Hall of Fame. Half of the Dream Team was at those trials. I remember coming home after getting cut; John Stockton, Terry Porter and I rode home together. People don’t believe this now, but we got cut the same day. That’s a lot of NBA experience that got cut that day.
Bobby Knight pretty much just wanted to keep guys he could control. There were a lot of good players who were cut, guys who were better than ones who made the team. Antoine Carr should have made the team. Karl Malone should have made it. I don’t think people really remember all the great players who came to those trials. Joe Dumars, A. C. Green, Michael Cage, Dell Curry, Mark Price, Chuck Person, Roy Tarpley. As it turns out, A.C, Joe, Dell, those guys all played in the league more than a dozen years. And those were the guys who got cut. It ain’t like those guys went and got good all of a sudden after they left the Olympic trials. Of course they got better, but they were good when they showed up. After the first few obvious guys, Knight kept the guys he could control. There’s no doubt in my mind he would have cut me sooner if I hadn’t played so well. What people don’t remember about the tryouts is that the sessions early in those trials were open to the public and the media. People could see for themselves who could play. It was all out there for everybody to see. We had open scrimmages. I don’t care if anybody had heard of John Stockton or not, you knew Stockton could play his ass off. I don’t care whether people had heard of Terry Porter or not; the guys on the court knew Porter was one of the best players there. You can’t fool the guys on the court. Those guys knew I was one of the top two or three players there. When ESPN interviewed Sam Perkins a couple of years ago for the
SportsCentury
piece on me he said, “When they read the names of the guys who were making the team and I heard Charles didn’t make it, I just knew I was getting cut.”
And then when we got to the NBA and our careers started to develop immediately, it was obvious Bobby Knight had cut some great players and just kept guys he wanted to keep.
But being able to play with and against those guys was a big turning point for me in my career. That kicked me to a whole different level. You have to remember, just about every great player was at those trials, and you started off being somewhat intimidated. Remember, some of the guys who made the team were Michael, Patrick, Sam Perkins and Chris Mullin. Those guys were on every All-America list. All these guys were there from big-time schools that you’d see on TV all the time but didn’t get to play against. But I do remember going home, and when I got back to Alabama my coach said, “What did you think?” And I told him I knew then that if I worked on my game, worked all summer and had myself ready, that I’d be able to play with any player in the country. I knew I’d be able to do well in the NBA because these guys I’d already held my own against at the trials were going to be the stars of the NBA. He’d already told me that. But I had to tell him, “Coach, there was one guy up there who’s the best player I’ve ever seen. It’s Michael Jordan. He was the only guy better than me.” I’ve only felt that way twice in my life, that when I was standing there watching a guy, that I knew I was with somebody who was special, who had to be the best at what he did. And the other time was the first time I played golf with Tiger. Those are the only two times I’ve felt that way. They could just do things athletically and competitively that other people couldn’t do.
I don’t begrudge Knight anything, nothing at all. I have nothing against him. When he cut me, I thought he felt bad about it. I’d always thought if he cut me he’d be a jerk about it. But he was actually pretty cool.
When that whole thing was over, people asked me, “How come you played so well in the Olympic Trials?” Hell, even though it’s always more difficult playing against great players, when you’re playing with other great players it ought to be easier. If you’re playing with other great players, guys who can all haul their part of the load, all you have to do is play. That’s why I feel bad now for Kevin Garnett and Gary Payton in recent years, and for Tim Duncan in the 2001–02 season. They just didn’t have enough help. Patrick Ewing, for most of his career, didn’t have enough help. As great as they are the game would be so much easier if they had just one other guy. So, the Olympics were easy. I played twice in the Olympics, 1992 and 1996. I led the team both times in scoring and in 1996 in rebounding. I didn’t have to do everything, I just had to do my thing. And it was so easy.
A Dream Team
The worst thing about getting cut by Knight in 1984 was that I thought I’d never get the chance to play for another U.S. Olympic team because at that point NBA players weren’t eligible. There was no reason to think I’d get another shot. Then, of course, the international demand to see the best basketball players in the world—us—was so overwhelming that the people running the basketball competition made the NBA guys eligible for the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona. That decision, allowing NBA players to compete, changed basketball around the world.
The first real sign of the huge impact the team would have came when
Sports Illustrated
wanted to put guys on the cover of the magazine. The photo shoot itself was incredible. They got us together at the NBA All-Star Game that February of ’92. And it was like the ultimate confirmation. Just standing there with those guys, knowing I was going to play with them, was incredible. You just get chills and you’re honored knowing you’re going to have the chance to play with players that great.
When people ask me if I have any regrets, I tell them I wish I had gotten to play with an All-Star in his prime for a few years. When I got to Philadelphia, Doc and Moses were older and past their MVP years, and I was very young. And when I got to Phoenix, I had some left, but I was on the downside because I had played eight years in Philly and was starting to have problems with my back. Even though I was voted the league Most Valuable Player my first year in Phoenix, which was the 1992–93 season, I knew I had four seasons better than that in Philly. One year in Philly, I led the league with 14 rebounds a game, and another year I averaged 28 points a game with 11-plus rebounds. Earvin beat me out for MVP honors in one of the closest votes ever at the time. But we didn’t contend the way I wanted, the way we all wanted. We never got over trading Brad Daugherty and Moses. We had one real good year with Mike Gminski and Rick Mahorn, 1989–90, when we won 53 games, and finished first in the Atlantic Division ahead of the Celtics and Knicks. But that was the only year we had a really good team. I had more help in Phoenix with Kevin Johnson and Dan Majerle and those guys. But I was in Philly still when the Dream Team was announced in 1991. I was putting up numbers and doing what I felt was the best I could do, but we didn’t have great teams then. So being selected to play with the Dream Team was an amazing opportunity. And it let me know what basketball people thought of me and my career. Before the team got together, they picked five to be photographed and be on the cover of
Sports Illustrated
. You’re one of the five who represents the country! I figured, “Damn, I guess all my hard work is paying off.”
No matter what happens in my life, there will be nothing like that. I’ve never been with the Beatles but I don’t know how they could have been any bigger than us that summer. We had 5,000 people watching us get on the bus every day to go to practice or games. Thousands were lined up on the side of the highway just to see the bus roll by. And they couldn’t really see any of us inside. We had two police cars in the front, two police cars in the back, armed guards on both sides of the bus on motorcycles. There were armed guards on the rooftop of the hotel we were staying in. And they moved the front desk of the hotel from the lobby to the very front door. You couldn’t enter without picture ID. I loved every day of it, every minute of that summer, that whole experience. How could you not have fun? I’m in the Olympics, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
Here’s how unique it was. We were practicing one day when Bishop Desmond Tutu came to the gym. He met with the team, was talking to us, and started crying. He actually told us, “I cannot express to you how much you men mean to people in my country. They love you guys, they know all of you, and you inspire them.”
Ten years have passed now and some kids are too young to remember, and some folks have forgotten, but at the time we were certainly an international example of proof that black people can do great things. When Bishop Tutu said how much we meant to young people in South Africa, he had tears in his eyes and my heart was racing. I’m like, “Damn, I inspire somebody in South Africa? Bishop Desmond Tutu is telling me I inspire somebody, that I’m affecting people’s lives, that I’m large in South Africa?” It was completely unbelievable. He said, “Please keep up the good work because most of these kids know nothing but heartache.” I’m thinking, “Holy shit!” He brought with him ten, twelve kids who all had our jerseys on. It was very, very inspiring. It’s one of those episodes in life you think back on and it seems like a dream. But even with that kind of attention, guys didn’t walk around acting full of themselves. I think we were more grateful than anything to be part of something so unique and so important to the sports world. Even though this was the greatest collection of players ever assembled on one team, we never had any ego problems. That didn’t mean it wasn’t as competitive as hell. In fact, it was the most competitive thing you ever wanted to see.
Clyde Drexler, who was still with Portland at the time, wanted to prove he was as good as Michael Jordan, which nobody was. And Michael just wanted to torch Clyde, so Clyde and Michael went at each other. Scottie Pippen wanted to guard Magic all the time, which was a great, great matchup. This was a year after the Bulls had beaten the Lakers in the NBA Finals, and Magic wanted to go back after Scottie. You had David Robinson going against Patrick Ewing in a classic big man matchup. Karl Malone and I were trying to prove who was the best power forward in the world so we were going at each other every day.
The practices were just damn war. Obviously, we’ve all got egos, and we’re all competitive, so that made it as intense as it could possibly be. And Chuck Daly just sat back and said, “Wow!” It was just phenomenal. Chuck had two complete units. There were twelve on the roster, so one guy each day just had to check his ego, plus Christian Laettner, but we didn’t give a shit about his playing time because he was the one college player on the team. People have to remember how successful a career Christian had at Duke. It had to be difficult for any college player, even one who had won two NCAA championships, to come in and try to play with that group. We rode him a little bit, but it was good, harmless posturing. I like Christian because he handled it so well. Some people go back and forth about who should have had that last spot on the team. I don’t know and I don’t care. It’s like the All-Star Game and being voted MVP. A lot of guys have All-Star-caliber seasons, but don’t make the team. Shaq, like Michael Jordan used to be, is always the MVP, but doesn’t always get voted the award. A lot of people say Isiah Thomas should have been on the Dream Team. But the one NBA player who never got the credit I think he deserves was Dominique Wilkins. It’s very much like the naming of the Fifty Greatest NBA Players. I thought that Connie Hawkins should have made it. I thought Bob McAdoo should have made it. I thought Joe Dumars could have made it. Somebody is going to be left out and there are going to be hard feelings. But once that group was together we enjoyed each other and the experience, and we also realized the historical significance.
By 1996, when the Summer Olympics were in Atlanta, we had guys bitching about playing time, guys who made life miserable. It was so frustrating. There were two games where I just said to Lenny Wilkens, who was the head coach of that team, “Coach, don’t play me tonight. I don’t want these guys bitching about playing time.” By 1996, you could also see the other countries really coming up. The only real advantage we had now, and it was only four years later, was depth. In 1992 those teams could put three or four quality NBA players out on the floor, but no more than that. And we won those games by an average margin of 44 points in Barcelona. Even the best European teams would have to bring some young upstart who wasn’t ready off the bench. By 1996, they were putting five, sometimes six quality players out there. And the average margin of victory was down to something like 30 points per game. And you could see certain European teams catching up with us in depth and athleticism. And you know we could have, probably should have lost that game to Croatia in 2000 in Sydney. Now, we may not lose a game in the next Olympics in Athens in 2004, but we could lose a game and really struggle in 2008. The only way the teams around the world had any chance of getting better was to play against us in international competition. And they knew that, and they were willing to take their lumps at the beginning.
In ’92, the games were easy, but there was stress because we didn’t realize when the competition first started that we were that much better than everybody else. We’d never played against those guys before. We knew we had better not lose, so we were on guard. Once the game started, we realized those guys couldn’t beat us, but we still wanted everybody to know Americans were the best in the world at basketball so we gave it everything we had.
But with all that competitiveness going on, even with guys trying to beat each other’s brains out in practice, for the most part we put it aside at night. Larry Bird and Patrick Ewing became great friends, and we called ’em Larry and Harry. That’s the great thing about sports. You make friendships that people never could have predicted and half the damn time they don’t understand how it happened. Me, Scottie, Michael and Magic played cards every night, all night. We’d start playing cards around eight o’clock, go until five in the morning, get three hours’ sleep and then go to practice. Every day. Every single day. And I’m not talking about just in Barcelona, or even Monte Carlo, but starting back when we started practicing and having those exhibition games all around the country. I can remember the Tournament of the Americas, staying up all night every night.
One night though, and I’ll never forget this, we had the most uncomfortable moment. But it also tells you how much respect I have for Earvin Johnson. Remember, Earvin had announced he was HIV-positive in November of 1991, which just stunned us all.
We’re playing cards late one night, watching HBO in whoever’s hotel room it was. And a comedian starts crackin’ on Earvin, saying, “Can you believe that Magic Johnson has the AIDS virus? Man got all that damn money and too cheap to spend $2 to buy a box of condoms.” The guy was pretty funny and you wanted to laugh, but you couldn’t because you’re sitting in the room with the guy he’s cracking on, and he’s your close friend and your teammate, and just the greatest guy in the world. The comedian goes on and on and says more funny stuff. And it’s just so uncomfortable. Finally, Earvin says, “Man, that’s some funny shit, isn’t it? You guys go ahead and laugh.” And we were all like, “Whew!” It’s something that we had never talked about that summer; you can’t bring it up. It’s just so difficult to talk about. But at that moment I thought, “This is going to be uncomfortable sometimes, but it really could be all right.”