King Kaufman's Sports Daily

Remembering Red Auerbach, one of the last of the pioneering giants. Plus: Wrapping up the World Series.

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Oct. 30, 2006 | There aren't many giants as giant as Red Auerbach still walking around in the sports world. John Wooden's about the only one left. Auerbach, the patriarch of the Boston Celtics, died Saturday at 89.

There will always be great coaches running around. There will always be great executives. There may even be the occasional person who's great at both. Auerbach was both, simultaneously for a long time, but he was also an even rarer beast, one of a very small group who helped lead a sport from nearly prehistoric times into the modern world, winning along the way.

Connie Mack was such a person. George Halas. Maybe Toe Blake.

Auerbach began his coaching career in 1946, before the Boston Celtics, before the NBA, before his 30th birthday. He led the Washington Capitals of the old Basketball Association of America to two division titles in three years -- you remember their star, Bob Feerick, don't you? -- then spent most of the NBA's first year coaching the Tri-Cities Blackhawks, who, as you know, lost in the first round of the playoffs to the Anderson Packers.

Auerbach took over as Celtics coach in 1950. You know the rest. And if you don't, there are about a million obituaries and remembrances online. I suggest starting with Bob Ryan's wonderful piece in the Boston Globe.

Speaking of Ryan's piece, he relates that Auerbach once barked at him that he ought to cut it off. Ryan had offended Auerbach by writing that it wasn't entirely Auerbach's idea to draft John Havlicek.

Auerbach the executive was a leader in integrating the NBA, an achievement all the greater because he did it in Boston, a racially polarized city where the Red Sox were in the process of being the last major league baseball team to integrate, a city that Bill Russell called "a flea market of racism" nearly two decades after Auerbach became the first NBA general manager to draft a black player.

That was in 1950, when Auerbach picked Chuck Cooper, though Earl Lloyd was taken later in the same draft by the Capitals. Auerbach was the first coach to start five black players, in 1964, and when he stepped down as coach following the 1965-66 season, he named Russell to succeed him, making the great center the first black coach in NBA history.

Next page: Auerbach was no civil rights activist. But he was a hero. Plus: Last thoughts on the World Series