Daryl Dawkins: Hoops in Black and White (Sociological Look at USA's Dream Team Failure)

FOX Sport ^ | 8/5/04 | Daryl 'Chocolate Thunder' Dawkins

[pepsionice]

I will offer this commentary. Basketball has its focus, and the NBA has become strictly a sales vehicle. To allow punk kids...18 years old...to just walk in, and play punk basketball...has become the standard. Unselfish players aren't part of the money-making scheme. Nor are unselfish players recruited from the colleges. Jerry West, Dave DeBusschere, and Kevin McHale...would not make it to the NBA today. Ask yourself why? Ask yourself why the Pistons simply walked all over the Lakers? Ask yourself why we are paying slugs like Kobe millions to play Kobe-ball? I could go out today and recruit seven DeBusscheres...and cream every team in the NBA. I could establish a destiny that would survive ten years, with players that played as a team. This is what we all remembered from the past. When Jaber went through his migrane episode and they called upon Magic as a rookie to come and deliver his greatest game ever in the champion series...he played with passion and pushed the whole team as a unit to make up for Jaber. You can't say that Iverson or Kobe could do that today. Neither can inspire...neither can play with an unselfish attitude. The sad truth is...I would rather watch games from 1974...than to watch a live NBA game today. And half the fans might agree with that statement.

[Osage Orange]

Chocolate Thunder

The Uncensored Life and Times of the NBA's Original Showman

By Darryl Dawkins and Charley Rosen

Long before The Answer, there was Chocolate Thunder. Before Kobe, before Shaq, before Air Jordan and even Magic, before the tattoos and the posses and baggy shorts, there was this man-child who understood that, above all, basketball was entertainment. Darryl Dawkins' signature move during a colorful NBA career was bulldozing to the basket and smashing the glass backboard to smithereens. He claimed to hail from the planet Lovetron, he named his dunks, he talked in verse and grew to be the game's No. 1 character. On the court or on the prowl, the former NBA star he was a seven-foot showman who charmed teammates with ribald humor, fans with outlandish antics and women with irresistible charm. Here, Dawkins revives that swashbuckling persona in this a tell-all autobiography of highlighted by tales of sex, drugs and racism and in pro basketball in during the 1970s and '80s.

Dawkins made national headlines in 1975 when he was the fifth overall pick in the NBA draft and became the first player ever to move directly from high school to the NBA. He joined the Philadelphia 76ers at age 18 and quickly discovered that playing alongside Julius Erving was just one of the perquisites of the job. Over a 14-year career, Dawkins established himself as a physical presence under the basket. He was the first player to smash a backboard and his 383 personal fouls in 1983-84 still stands as an NBA record. He was equally imposing off the court, where he enthusiastically embraced a lifestyle of crashing parties, doing drugs and chasing the ladies.

In Chocolate Thunder, Dawkins invites you to join him in the locker room, on the court and at the parties. He recounts rampant marijuana and cocaine use, and how players suspected the league was hiring undercover agents to monitor their nighttime activities, only to cover up drug abuse by the biggest stars. He speaks bluntly about the racism encountered from referees, coaches and teammates, and explores the differences between "black ball" and "white ball." Dawkins also tells salacious truths about many of his estimated 1,000 conquests, and offers frank appraisals of such NBA stars as Erving, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Bill Walton, Isiah Thomas, Karl Malone and Dennis Rodman.

Darryl Dawkins played 14 NBA seasons -- in Philadelphia, New Jersey, Detroit and Utah -- as well as five pro seasons in Italy and a stint with the Harlem Globetrotters. He currently coaches the Pennsylvania ValleyDawgs of the United States Basketball League and lives in Allentown, Pennsylvania.

[sushiman]

" What rules would you change to open up the NBA? I 2

Outlaw the dunk shot .

[speedy]

Hey, thanks for reminding me of those guys. Eddie "Golden Arm" Miles and Fred "Mad Dog" Carter, who as I recall later coached the Sixers. I know that he at least played for them. Yes, I remember Tresvant too. Didn't Don "Waxy" Ohl also play for the Bullets? But probably before those guys. Trying to remember who besides Alcindor and The Big O played for those Bucks now. I'm thinking Bob Dandridge was with them then. Mickey Davis. I know Larry Costello was the coach. I remember Alcindor's back-up was a palooka named Dick Cunningham. Was Lucious Allen on that team? I get my eras mixed up sometimes. Anyway, thanks for the nice hoop memories.

[SALChamps03]

Look. This whole black-tude theory is just as silly and laughable as it gets. When you find me the "white basketball", super-disciplined, totally team-oriented NBA team that wins the championship playoffs, then we'll talk. Heck, just find me one that wins its region. If there's any merit to this super-dumb theory it won't take you long. Good luck! The Lakers played street ball. It was, "Give ME the ball!...No give Me the ball!" all series long. Detroit played as a unit and won relatively easy. Back in the 80's the Lakers flamboyant style that was dubbed "Showtime" was based on a team concept. The play with multiple passes was their focus. They concentrated on passing the ball, not shooting the ball. Given a choice, they would set up Kareem in the lane for an easy jump hook, but could run and gun with the best. It was one part street ball and four parts systematic. The only team that stayed with them was the Celtics, who were all hustle, all "make the pass to the open man." A team full of stars who all want to score thirty points a night is a team that won't win championships. This attitude doesn't lend itself to white culture. If black culture exists (just ask a black man if you think it doesn't), then white culture must also exist.

[AntiGuv]

I don't dispute the influence of culture. I dispute the notion that it preempts the qualities of the given individuals.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but Detroit's five starters are all black, are they not? Tayshaun Prince, Rasheed Wallace, Ben Wallace, Richard Hamilton, and Chauncey Billups certainly look quite black to me..

[speedy]

Nice one, Frank -- I had forgotten McGloughlin, who today would be the guy taking the three-point shots. I do remember George Johnson -- Zeller is only vaguely familiar. I just remembered the other starting forward -- Greg Smith. Already named Lucius Allen -- I think Bob Boozer was another back-up on that team. Hee hee, forgot about Cunningham's run-in with the lawn mower. I remember a blowout game where Cunningham was matched up against Henry Finkel -- talk about a couple of dinosaurs. Slow, man, slow.

[speedy]

Oops -- I was writing while you were posting, so I am OBE. Thanks for the info!!

[SALChamps03]

I don't dispute the influence of culture. I dispute the notion that it preempts the qualities of the given individuals. Correct me if I'm wrong, but Detroit's five starters are all black, are they not? Tayshaun Prince, Rasheed Wallace, Ben Wallace, Richard Hamilton, and Chauncey Billups certainly look quite black to me.. Valid point.

[Michael2001]

I agree with pretty much all he said, including the comments about Bill Walton.

That said if a white player made similar comments they would be vilified.

[Michael2001]

Perhaps. But we're still talking about guys who make individually more than entire foreign teams combined. Most of the players that they're facing couldn't even sit on an NBA bench, let along star in our league.

We are not losing because of a lack of talent.

[Michael2001]

You think things are that bad that white people can't enjoy something with a lot of black people in it? It may not be racist but you have to wonder.

Perhaps it is, but it's true and it works both ways. I've many times heard that Nascar is dying to get a black driver because it will help them become more popular among blacks. I think the same is true with the NBA for whites though no one wants to say it.

[spodefly]

'Because the white culture places more of a premium on winning,' Dawkins believes, 'and less on self-indulgent preening and cheast beating.'

I couldn't have said it better myself.

In fact, being a white guy, I couldn't have said it at all.

[Michael2001]

You're right - we are at the same sort of crisis level that the game faced in the 70s. And it will take someone of the caliber of a Michael Jordan or Larry Bird or Magic Johnson to correct the problem.

LeBron and to a lesser extent Melo are going to lead the league for years to come. While it's hard to believe that anyone could ever be as good or better than Michael Jordan was - I also can't imagine that Jordan was as good as LeBron is at 19.

[rwilson99]

The absence of Kobe, Shaq, Carter, McGrady et al is another symptom of the disease Dawkins is talking about.

[AntiGuv]

We are not losing because of a lack of talent.

Yes. We are. Team USA doesn't practice and play together regularly (often year round) as other national teams do. The NBA also doesn't play by international rules which frequently trip up American players. Foreign crowds are always very hostile and the quality of foreign players has been steadily improving.

The way Team USA keeps winning is to field talent so far above and beyond that of the foreign competition that it makes up for all these drawbacks. This year the talent isn't the cream of the crop - even if 'on paper' they should be winning with ease - and so they are struggling in light of the problems noted above.

Add to that the volatility of their biggest star player and you see what results (Team USA fourth in its preliminary division).