The Ed Pinckney Interview
By:
Michael D. McClellan
|
Monday, April 5th, 2004
In your opinion, who was the most underrated Boston
Celtic you ever played with?
It would be between Robert Parish and Dennis Johnson.
Everyone had a great appreciation for Larry Bird and, to
a lesser degree, Kevin McHale. But Parish and DJ worked
in the shadows, so to speak, so in that respect their
talents may have been somewhat overlooked. If you take
a look at the current Laker team, with Shaq, Kobe, Gary
Payton and Karl Malone, you see how difficult it is for
four stars to coexist. There is just so much basketball
and limelight to go around. And then you look at the
Big Three, and those guys were together seven, eight,
nine years. That’s unheard of today. When you have
that much talent, someone has to not shoot as much.
That person has to lower his personal expectations for
the better of the team. He has to go out and do his
job, let the other guys score the points and grab the
headlines. Parish was that person. You couldn’t have
that situation today – Parish could have gone anywhere
and started. He could have been the one who stirred the
cup. So in that respect he’s the most underrated.
DJ was the same in many respects, but he didn’t play with these guys as long. He’d been a star in Seattle, and then in Phoenix, so coming to Boston he had to subjugate his game so that it meshed with Robert, Kevin and Larry. DJ made everything happen – he played incredible defense, he hit clutch shots, and he distributed the basketball. If you look at those types of things, then he would have been the most underrated.
You played in only seven games during the 1992-93
season. For an athlete who had played in 70 or more
games per season since turning pro, how hard was it for
you not to be on the court and battling with your
teammates?
It was extremely difficult. Had I been healthy, I felt
that I could have helped that team go deep into the
playoffs. We lost to Charlotte that season, but we had
a good core of young players. We had Reggie Lewis,
Brian Shaw, Joe Klein and myself. Dee Brown was just
coming into his own. So is was disappointing not being
able to contribute to the turning around of the ball
club. It killed me not to be out on the floor with
those guys.
The 1992-93 season was notable for three reasons: Larry
Bird’s retirement before the season started, the passing
of legendary announcer Johnny Most in January, and
heart-related death of burgeoning star Reggie Lewis
shortly after the season is over. Please touch on each
of these individuals, and how the loss of each impacted
the Celtic organization.
Lets start with Johnny Most. Teams have labels, people
with whom the team is identified. When you talked about
the Boston Celtics, you quickly realized that Johnny
Most was a huge part of the Celtic Mystique. He was
like Chick Hearn in that regard – Hearn was as big a
part of the Lakers as anyone, calling all of those games
through the years. Most was his counterpart in Boston.
He had that gravelly voice, one that you could easily
identify with. He let fans know that he was with the
team, that he was on their side. The Celtics lost a lot
in terms of mystique when he passed away.
I remember Most being a big part of our pre-game ritual. We’d be on the bus, and Most would get into these verbal sparring matches with the players, mostly the Big Three. They would give it to him and he would give it right back – it was a great relationship, because these guys cared deeply about him and vice versa. It was very casual, and it kept the team loose. I never really got into it with him, because I was the new guy and I didn’t have the same comfort zone as the other guys. Johnny Most was a special person.
Losing Reggie was another tragic blow to the Celtics organization. He was the future of the ball club, the person who was going to lead the team after the Big Three called it quits. The Celtics lost a great player, but the city lost a great man. Reggie Lewis did so much for Boston – he’d go around, giving away sneakers to poor children who couldn’t afford a pair of their own. He’d do all of these incredible deeds, - donating his time to summer basketball camps, giving turkey dinners away at Thanksgiving – and yet he shunned the attention because he didn’t want his community work played up in the media. His funeral was a testament to how important Reggie had become to the City of Boston. Thousands of people showed up to pay their respects. It was an unbelievable scene.
Larry’s retirement marked the end of an era – how do you replace one of the greatest players in the history of the NBA? He was the leader of this team for so long, and also its identity. It was a big loss in so many ways.
Reggie Lewis played in 80 regular season games before
collapsing in the playoffs against Charlotte on April 29th,
1993. Was there ever any prior indication that
something might be wrong?
No, not really. Each team has physicals that the
players must go through, and the exams are very
thorough. As far as I know, Reggie passed every exam
with flying colors. It was an unfortunate event for
both him and his family. It was a crushing loss.
As for the team, his death meant that there would be no passing of the torch from Bird to Lewis. I remember being there for Larry’s retirement ceremony. Magic was there. It was just one of those incredible nights that you’ll never forget for as long as you live. It drove home the point that Reggie was the new leader of this team, and that he was the sixth captain in team history. He was going to be the one to take over.
