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March 2008 From the Archives
The day I told Bob Knight where to go!
(Note
to readers: The sudden apparent retirement of Texas Tech men’s
basketball coach Bob Knight in February of 2008 got us reminiscing.
Here’s a true story from when he still coached Indiana University and
photographers still used film. This story first appeared in the March
1994 issue of Electric Consumer.)
 by Richard G. Biever
Indiana
University basketball coach Bob Knight elicits strong reactions in this
state. He’s worshipped for his integrity and success. He’s despised for
his sometimes boorish behavior.
His detractors would love to
tell him just where it is he can go. Media-types have minced it in
essays condemning his demeanor. But not many folks have told him to his
face.
But, sports fans, I’m here to tell you that I did it. I — to his face — once told Bob Knight where to go.
It
was early autumn of 1986. IU’s basketball team was just about to begin
practice for a season that would end with a new NCAA championship
banner for Assembly Hall.
Rick Fox, who later became a pro
basketball player, was a star for Warsaw High School. He was suing the
Indiana High School Athletic Association because it wouldn’t let him
play his senior year. It had something to do with the association’s
contention that he’d been playing the equivalent of high school ball in
his native Bahamas since he was a toddler.
The trial was moved to Johnson County where I was a newspaper photographer at the time.
We’d
heard Knight would testify on Fox’s behalf. Knight, along with every
major university basketball coach, was trying to recruit him. Sitting
out his senior year, Knight would argue, would hurt Fox as a player.
(As a side note: Fox lost the lawsuit, sat out his senior year, but
still went on to play college ball — for Dean Smith at North Carolina.
That was gratitude for you!)
A reporter and I had arrived early
for the 8:30 a.m. trial. A crowd of lawyers and on-lookers were already
milling around on the second floor lobby outside the courtroom. Purdue
University coach Gene Keady was there. Fearing I’d hurt his feelings if
I clamored over Knight, but ignored him, I snapped a couple of
perfunctory photos. He came over.
“What are you boys up to?” he said.
“Oh,
we’re just kinda hangin’ out,” we aloofly replied, clearing our throats
and gazing up at the fine Corinthian columns and ceiling tile. We
didn’t have the heart to tell him we were waiting for the star witness.
Zero-hour, 8:30, arrived, but Bob Knight hadn’t. Everyone shuffled into the courtroom.
Since
cameras weren’t allowed there, I was left alone atop the dual marble
staircases waiting to photograph the intimidating Mr. Knight.
My
palms grew sweaty on my Nikon. I checked and rechecked the camera.
Flash on; sync speed set; film advanced; aperture at f8. There I was,
ready to fire. Silently I prayed I’d get out without incident. Knight’s
reputation with the press long preceded him.
Suddenly, echoing
up one of the long curving stairways came footsteps. Leaning over the
railing, peering around the edge, I saw him. It was him. It was Bob
Knight. And he saw me.
I was looking at him; he was looking at
me. Full eye contact with the man who’d been to the brink and back. Me
and Bob. Bob and me. Vis a vis. One-on-one with “The General.”
I respectfully nodded and said, “Hey, Coach.”
I raised my camera. He raised an eyebrow.
I popped the flash. He popped a vein.
“I don’t want any of that!” he bellowed from below.
I got off one shot.
In
every man’s life comes one great tribulation, a Continental Divide that
separates men from boys. Religions celebrate this demarcation with
confirmations and bar mitzvahs. To Indiana journalists, it’s a
Knighting — a dubbing that might include analogies to a horse’s
anatomy, or a drubbing of some sort. I was about to join the club.
My flash hadn’t even recharged when before me rose Robert Montgomery Knight like a mean old grizzly bear on its hind haunches.
My
guru — Bob Dylan — once sang, “What looks large from a distance, close
up ain’t never that big.” Ha! Obviously, that Bob ain’t never had this
Bob lurched over him.
Here was a man who was about to coach his
third NCAA championship team. Here was a man who himself played on a
national championship team. But here was a man who was much larger
standing atop the Johnson County courthouse stairs than he ever
appeared at courtside.
Here was a man who was far too big for
his own Sans-a-Belt britches (but who in these parts would tell him).
Here was a man in a $300 tan camel-hair sports coat (that I remember
did make him look quite dapper). Here was a man in his black leather
loafers with those little leather tassels. Up he stepped to a sniveling
little media-runt type of guy like me.
Me, who never even made
the first cut from St. Paul’s seventh grade b-ball squad. Me, in gray
corduroys and an all-acrylic blue sweater covered in fuzz balls. Me,
wearing white leather running shoes (which I prayed wouldn’t fail me
now). Me, who stood 5-feet-10 at best in those Nikes — shoes Mr. Knight
and I were practically sharing at that point. Shoes I wished could have
been laced on anyone else’s feet but mine.
He then unsheathed a
scowl that severed my brain from my tongue and sent reeling my bowel.
“What do you think you’re doing?” he growled.
I gulped, and
started to explain that my editor (“Yes,” I quickly decided, “blame it
on someone else!”) sent me here to get a photo and …
“Who are you with?” he snarled.
I started to explain that I worked for the Daily Jour …
“Where’s that!” he snapped.
“Here in Franklin,” I stammered.
“Well, you just can’t shoot someone’s picture without first asking his permission,” he scolded.
My
brain countered with something to the effect of him being a public
figure, this being a public building in the United States of America,
land of the free, and that the judge did give me permission to be there
in case some question should arise, so let’s both be adults and
professional about this and go our separate ways, better for this brief
but meaningful encounter.
But all my voice could muster was, “I’m sorry.”
He
angrily turned to my right and took two steps. He then stopped, and
pivoted back around. I’ll never forget what he said. Probably one of
the most profound and profane pronouncements he’s ever made: “You know,
it’s guys like you that make guys like me make it as tough as we can on
guys like you.”
“What the …! Huh?” I thought.
He turned
from me again. But by then, I’d had enough. No more Mr. Nice Guy from
me, boy. I knew I wasn’t one of his “kids.” I knew I was no Isiah
Thomas; I knew I was no Steve Alford. I knew I was no Mike Giomi nor
even a Steve Green. But I deserved a little more respect than this. No
one deserved this kind of abuse.
That’s when I set the man straight. That’s when I told Bob Knight where to go.
For
as he stormed away, he whirled back to me a second time. I was wiping
the sweat from my brow when he barked, “Where’s the courtroom anyway?”
I pointed and replied, “Just around the corner.”
Richard G. Biever is senior editor of Electric Consumer.
Written By: eceditor
Date Posted: 3/4/2008
Number of Views: 303
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