The Gene Conley Interview
By:
Michael D. McClellan
|
Tuesday, May 30th,
2006
The
Celtics often barnstormed throughout New England during the preseason, usually
playing the same team on a nightly basis. What were these trips like, and do
you have a funny story to tell?
I
was going to play for the Celtics in ‘54, but the Braves stopped me. They
thought I might get hurt. I tried to convince them that I could keep my legs in
shape by going through the preseason with the Celtics. The Braves countered by
offering me more money not to join up with Auerbach that fall. I asked them how
much, and it was $5,000, so I said, ‘You know, maybe I should stick to
baseball.’ So I was kind of dirtying up on the Celtics, to tell you the truth
[laughs]. But in those days you had to play the game. I had kids. And
management played the game, too.
In ’58, Walter Brown offered me $20,000, and I guess that was unheard of at the time. I found out later that some of the guys weren’t making that kind of money, but Walter asked me what I wanted and that’s what I had blurted out. But then Red found out about it, and boy, did he take care of that in a hurry [laughs]. He said, ‘Gene, we can’t pay you that kind of money. You’re just a rookie, really.’ And I said, ‘What can I do? Mr. Brown has already offered me twenty grand.’ So Red went back to Walter, and sure enough, they cut me ten. I signed for ten grand. So both sides really played the game.
When I played for the Philadelphia Phillies, Bob Carpenter offered me $20,000 not to play basketball. He had married E.I. DuPont’s daughter, and had bought the team. He told me that he didn’t want me to play for the Celtics, that he wanted me to play baseball for his team, and that if I played basketball then I’d never play on his team again. I said, ‘Mr. Carpenter, I can play basketball another four or five more years, and I can make a lot more than twenty grand.’ He said, ‘You do, and you won’t play for my team.’ I said, ‘Well, I’m afraid I’m going to have to do it, because I have to play. I’ve got a family to think about.’ He said, ‘You know, if you couldn’t play sports you’d be driving a truck for a living.’ I said, ‘Oh really? What’s the matter with being a truck driver? He contributes to society and takes care of his family.’ Well, you talk about a phone slamming down. He slammed it down in a hurry, and two weeks later I was with the Red Sox [laughs]. I felt like writing him a ‘thank you’ letter, because now I could play for the Red Sox and the Celtics and not have to leave the city.
You won
three NBA Championships with the Celtics. Does one stand out in particular,
and if so, why?
I
was excited over the first championship we won, because it was the first.
It was also the easiest one, because we didn’t have to contend with Wilt
Chamberlain that year. He was still in college at Kansas. We went through
Syracuse that first year, and they had a really great team. It took us
seven games to finally beat them. They had Dolph Schayes and Hal Greer.
Johnny Kerr. Al Bianchi. As a matter of fact, I think Russell fouled out
in the final game and I had to finish it out.
We played the Minneapolis Lakers in the ’59 Finals. They had Elgin Baylor, but they didn’t have George Mikan – he had retired by then. They had Vern Mikkelsen and a few other great players, but we beat them four in a row. And that was the easiest championship for us, but it was exciting to me because it was my first with the team.
The next year was also exciting, but it didn’t mean quite as much as the first. We had to go through the Philadelphia Warriors with Chamberlain and that bunch, just to face the St. Louis Hawks in the Finals. They had Bob Pettit and Cliff Hagan. It was really rough, but we did win the championship. It was the same thing the next year. We faced Pettit and the Hawks again. Personally, I played really well in those last two Finals, better than I did that during first one in ’59. But getting that championship in ’59 was really special. I felt like a rookie that year, because I hadn’t played basketball since ’52.
You are
the only person to ever win an NBA Championship and a World Series ring. As
the years go by, what does this accomplishment mean to you?
Not
an awful lot until my wife got to thinking about it. She said, ‘You know,
Gene, you had such an up-and-down career. You played two sports and did win
rings, and no one ever did that.’ And Katie is a bright, bright person.
She wasn’t one of those gung-ho wives who was always going to all of the
games, but she knew what was going on. And she is a writer. She said, ‘You
know, I just may write about your career.’ I tried to discourage her,
because my life and career was kind of crazy. I’ve had my fair share of
arguments with general mangers, and I even told off an owner one time. I
wasn’t sure I wanted that in a book, and she simply said, ‘I think it should
be told’. I thought about it, and then said, ‘Oh, what the heck. Who
cares? No one really cares about me that much, anyway, so let her tell it.
It might be interesting.’
So she wrote about me signing with different general managers, and about how they told me how lousy I was, or how great I was, and how they would offer me a drink while they were doing it. We could do a whole other interview just on how the general managers treated ballplayers back in those days. Boy, it was rough.
Anyway, Katie’s book really reminded me about how fortunate I was to play two sports, and how lucky I was to win championships in both. That, and the friendships that I developed through sports with people like Hank Aaron, Bill Sharman, KC Jones…it brought a bigger significance to it than I had ever had in the past.
