Elgin Baylor
Elgin Gay Baylor is an American former basketball player and executive. He played 14 seasons as a small forward in the National Basketball Association for the Minneapolis / Los Angeles Lakers, appearing in eight NBA Finals. Baylor was a gifted shooter, strong rebounder, an accomplished passer. Renowned for his acrobatic maneuvers on the court, Baylor dazzled Lakers fans with his trademark hanging jump shots; the No. 1 draft pick in 1958, NBA Rookie of the Year in 1959, 11-time NBA All-Star, a 10-time member of the All-NBA first team, he is regarded as one of the game's all-time greatest players. In 1977, Baylor was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. Baylor spent 22 years as general manager of the Los Angeles Clippers, he won the NBA Executive of the Year Award in 2006, before being relieved of his duties shortly before the 2008–09 season began. His popularity led to appearances on the television series Rowan and Martin's Laugh In in 1968, The Jackson Five's first TV special in 1971 and a Buck Rogers in the 25th Century episode, "Olympiad".
Elgin "Rabbit" Baylor had two basketball-playing brothers and Kermit. After stints at Southwest Boys Club and Brown Jr. High, Baylor was a 3 time All City player in High School. Elgin played his first 2 years at Phelps Vocational High School in the 1951 and 1952 basketball seasons where he set his first area scoring record of 44 points vs Cardozo. During his 2 All City years at Phelps, he averaged 18.5 and 27.6 points per season. He did not perform well academically and dropped out of school to work in a furniture store and to play basketball in the local recreational leagues. Baylor reappeared for the 1954 season playing for the newly opened Spingarn High School and the 6'5", 190 lb senior was named 1st team All-Met and won the SSA's Livingstone Trophy as the Area's Best Basketball player for 1954, he finished with a 36.1 average for his 8 Interhigh Division II league games. On February 3, 1954, in a game against his old Phelps team, he scored 31 in the first half. Playing with 4 fouls the entire second half, Baylor scored 32 more points to establish a new DC area record with 63 points.
This broke the point record of 52 that Western's Jim Wexler had set the year before when he broke Rabbit's record of 44. An inadequate scholastic record kept him out of college until a friend arranged a scholarship at the College of Idaho, where he was expected to play basketball and football. After one season, the school dismissed the head basketball coach and restricted the scholarships. A Seattle car dealer interested Baylor in Seattle University, Baylor sat out a year to play for Westside Ford, an AAU team in Seattle, while establishing eligibility at Seattle; the Minneapolis Lakers drafted him in the 14th round of the 1956 NBA Draft but Baylor opted to stay in school instead. Baylor led the Seattle University Chieftains to the NCAA championship game in 1958, falling to the Kentucky Wildcats, Seattle's only trip to the Final Four. Following his junior season, Baylor was drafted again by the Minneapolis Lakers with the #1 pick in the 1958 NBA Draft, this time he opted to leave school to join them for the 1958–59 NBA season.
In his three collegiate seasons, one at College of Idaho and two at Seattle, Baylor averaged 31.3 points per game. He led the NCAA in rebounds during the 1956–57 season. Fifty-one years after Baylor left Seattle University, Seattle U named its basketball court in honor of him on November 19, 2009; the Redhawks now play on the Elgin Baylor Court in Seattle's KeyArena. The Redhawks host the annual Elgin Baylor Classic. College of Idaho has announced that Baylor will be one of the inaugural inductees into the school's Hall of Fame in June 2017; the Minneapolis Lakers used the No. 1 overall pick in the 1958 NBA draft to select Baylor convinced him to skip his senior year at SU and instead join the pro ranks. The team, several years removed from its glory days of George Mikan, was in trouble on the court and at the gate; the year prior to Baylor's arrival the Lakers finished 19–53 with a squad, slow and aging. Baylor, whom the Lakers signed to play for $20,000 per year, was the franchise's last shot at survival.
With his superb athletic talents and all-round game, Baylor was seen as the kind of player who could save a franchise, he did. According to Minneapolis Lakers owner Bob Short in a 1971 interview with the Los Angeles Times: "If he had turned me down I would have been out of business; the club would have gone bankrupt." As a rookie in 1958–59, Baylor finished fourth in the league in scoring, third in rebounding, eighth in assists. He registered 55 points in a single game the third-highest mark in league history behind Joe Fulks' 63 and Mikan's 61. Baylor won the NBA Rookie of the Year Award and led the Lakers from last place the previous year to the NBA finals, where they lost to the Boston Celtics in the first four-game sweep in finals history, thus began the greatest rivalry in the history of the NBA. During his career, Baylor helped lead the Lakers to the NBA Finals seven more times. From the 1960–61 to the 1962–63 seasons, Baylor averaged 34.8, 38.3 and 34.0 points per game, respectively. On November 15 of the 1960–61 season, Baylor set a new NBA scoring record when he scored 71 points in a victory against the New York Knicks while grabbing 25 rebounds.
In doing so, Baylor had broken his own NBA record of 64 points that he had set in the previous season. Baylor, a United States Army Reservist, was called to active duty during the 1961–62 season, being stationed in Washington state, he could play for the Lakers only when on a weekend pass. Despit
Detroit Pistons
The Detroit Pistons are an American professional basketball team based in Detroit, Michigan. The Pistons compete in the National Basketball Association as a member of the league's Eastern Conference Central Division and plays its home games at Little Caesars Arena; the team was founded in Fort Wayne, Indiana as the Fort Wayne Pistons in 1941, a member of the National Basketball League where it won two NBL championships: in 1944 and 1945. The Pistons joined the Basketball Association of America in 1948; the NBL and BAA merged to become the NBA in 1949, the Pistons became part of the merged league. Since moving to Detroit in 1957, the Pistons have won three NBA championships: in 1989, 1990 and 2004; the Detroit Pistons franchise was founded as the Fort Wayne Zollner Pistons, a National Basketball League team, in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Owner Fred Zollner's Zollner Corporation was a foundry that manufactured pistons for car and locomotive engines; the Zollner Pistons were NBL champions in 1944 and 1945.
They won the World Professional Basketball Tournament in 1944, 1945 and 1946. In 1948, the team became the Fort Wayne Pistons. In 1949, Fred Zollner brokered the formation of the National Basketball Association from the BAA and the NBL at his kitchen table. There are suggestions that Pistons players conspired with gamblers to shave points and throw various games during the 1953–54 and 1954–55 seasons. In particular, there are accusations that the team may have intentionally lost the 1955 NBA Finals to the Syracuse Nationals. In the decisive Game 7, the Pistons led 41–24 early in the second quarter before the Nationals rallied to win the game; the Nationals won on a free throw by George King with twelve seconds left in the game. The closing moments included a palming turnover by the Pistons' George Yardley with 18 seconds left, a foul by Frank Brian with 12 seconds left that enabled King's winning free throw, a turnover by the Pistons' Andy Phillip in the final seconds which cost them a chance to attempt the game winning shot.
Though the Pistons enjoyed a solid local following, Fort Wayne's small size made it difficult for them to be profitable as other early NBA teams based in smaller cities started folding or relocating to larger markets. After the 1956–57 season, Zollner decided that Fort Wayne was too small to support an NBA team and announced the team would be playing elsewhere in the coming season, he settled on Detroit. Although it was the fifth largest city in the United States at the time, Detroit had not seen professional basketball in a decade, they lost the Detroit Eagles due to World War II, both the Detroit Gems of the NBL and the Detroit Falcons of the BAA in 1947, the Detroit Vagabond Kings in 1949. Zollner decided to keep the Pistons name, believing it made sense given Detroit's status as the center of the automobile industry; the Pistons played in Olympia Stadium for their first four seasons moved to Cobo Arena. During the 1960s and 1970s, the Pistons were characterized by strong individuals and weak teams.
Some of the superstars who played for the team included Dave DeBusschere, Dave Bing, Bob Lanier. At one point, DeBusschere was the youngest player-coach in the history of the NBA. A trade during the 1968–69 season sent DeBusschere to the New York Knicks for Howard Komives and Walt Bellamy, both of whom were in the stages of their careers. DeBusschere became a key player in leading the Knicks to two NBA titles. In 1974, Zollner sold the team to glass magnate Bill Davidson, who remained the team's principal owner until his death in 2009. While the Pistons did qualify for the postseason in four straight seasons from 1974 to 1977, they never had any real sustained success. In 1978, Davidson became displeased with Cobo Arena, but opted not to follow the Red Wings to the under-construction Joe Louis Arena. Instead, he moved the team to the suburb of Pontiac, where they played in the 82,000 capacity Silverdome, a structure built for professional football; the Pistons stumbled their way out of the 1970s and into the 1980s, beginning with a 16–66 record in 1979–80 and following up with a 21–61 record in 1980–81.
The 1979–80 team lost its last 14 games of the season which, when coupled with the seven losses at the start of the 1980–81 season, comprised a then-NBA record losing streak of 21 games. The franchise's fortunes began to turn in 1981, when they drafted point guard Isiah Thomas from Indiana University. In November 1981, the Pistons acquired Vinnie Johnson in a trade with the Seattle SuperSonics, they would acquire center Bill Laimbeer in a trade with the Cleveland Cavaliers in February 1982. Another key move by the Pistons was the hiring of head coach Chuck Daly in 1983; the Pistons had a tough time moving up the NBA ladder. In 1984, the Pistons lost a tough five-game series to the underdog New York Knicks, 3–2. In the 1985 playoffs, Detroit won its first-round series and faced the defending champion Boston Celtics in the conference semifinals. Though Boston would prevail in six games, Detroit's surprise performance promised that a rivalry had begun. In the 1985 NBA draft, the team selected Joe Dumars 18th overall, a selection that would prove to be wise.
They acquired Rick Mahorn in a trade with the Washington Bullets. However, the team took a step backwards, losing in the first round of the 1986 playoffs to the more athletic Atlanta Hawks. After the series, changes were made in order to make the team more defensive-minded. Prior to the 1986–87 season, the Pistons acquired more key players: John Salley (
1955 NBA draft
The 1955 NBA draft was the ninth annual draft of the National Basketball Association. The draft was held on April 1955, before the 1955 -- 56 season. In this draft, eight remaining NBA teams took turns selecting amateur U. S. college basketball players. In each round, the teams select in reverse order of their win–loss record in the previous season; the Milwaukee Hawks participated in the draft, but relocated to St. Louis and became the St. Louis Hawks prior to the start of the season; the draft consisted of 15 rounds comprising 96 players selected. Dick Ricketts from Duquesne University was selected first overall by the Milwaukee Hawks. Second pick of the draft, Maurice Stokes from Saint Francis University won the Rookie of the Year Award. Dick Garmaker and Tom Gola were selected before the draft as Minneapolis Lakers' and Philadelphia Warriors' territorial picks respectively. Three players from this draft, Maurice Stokes, Tom Gola, Jack Twyman, have been inducted to the Basketball Hall of Fame.
K. C. Jones, selected by the Minneapolis Lakers in the rounds, has been inducted to the Basketball Hall of Fame, although he did not enter the league after the draft. In the 1956 draft, he was selected in the second round by the Boston Celtics, with whom he played for in his whole career; the following list includes other draft picks. General Specific NBA.com NBA.com: NBA Draft History
Sam Jones (basketball)
Samuel Jones is an American retired professional basketball player at shooting guard. He was known for his quickness and game-winning shots during the NBA Playoffs, he has the second most NBA championships behind his teammate Bill Russell. He was one of only 3 Boston Celtics to be part of the Celtics's 8 consecutive championships from 1959 to 1966, he is a member of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. Jones attended and graduated from North Carolina Central University, where he was a four-year letterwinner for Hall of Fame coach John McLendon and coach Floyd Brown. Jones scored 1,745 points, still second in school history, he was a three-time All-CIAA league selection. His jersey, no. 41, hangs in the Eagles' arena. Jones weighed 200 lb. Boston Celtics Hall of Fame coach Red Auerbach took a trip south to scout North Carolina players who had just won the national championship. Former Wake Forest coach Bones McKinney told Auerbach he could visit Chapel Hill, but the best player in the state was a few miles away.
In the 1957 NBA draft, the Philadelphia Warriors selected North Carolina's Lennie Rosenbluth with the sixth pick. Boston selected Jones two picks even though Auerbach had never seen Jones play. Jones played all of his 12 seasons in the National Basketball Association NBA with the Celtics, he was known with more than 15,000 points in his career. He participated in five All-Star Games, is recognized as one of the best shooting guards of his generation. Jones was named to the All-NBA Second Team three straight years and he played on 10 championship teams — a total exceeded only by teammate Bill Russell in NBA history. Jones was claimed by the Minneapolis Lakers, but he returned to college to earn his degree upon completion of military service, therefore voided NBA rules. Jones’ perfect form when shooting a jump shot, along with his great clutch shooting, led opponents to nickname him "The Shooter." He was adept shooting the bank shot, in which the shooter bounces the ball off the backboard en route to the basket.
Many coaches, including UCLA's great John Wooden, believe that when a shooter is at a 20- to 50-degree angle to the backboard and inside 15 feet, a bank shot is always the preferred shot. At 6-foot-4, Jones was the prototype of the tall guard who could run the floor, bang the boards and had a rangy offensive game that gave opponents fits. One of the "Jones Boys" in Boston, Sam teamed with K. C. Jones in the Celtics' backcourt to create havoc in NBA arenas around the country, he led Boston in scoring in the 1962 -- 63 NBA season, 1964 -- 1965 -- 66 NBA season. He produced four consecutive seasons averaging 20 points or better, he owns Boston's fourth-best single-game scoring output. He scored 2,909 points in 154 playoff games, 26th best in history. In 1962, Jones was inducted into the NAIA Basketball Hall of Fame. 1969, Jones was inducted into the North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame – the first African-American thus honored. Jones was named to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1984.
In 1970 he was named to the NBA 25th Anniversary Team, in 1996, he was named as one of the 50 Greatest Players in NBA History. After retiring from basketball, Jones coached at Federal City College from 1969–73 and at North Carolina Central University, his alma mater, in 1973–74, he was an assistant coach for the New Orleans Jazz in 1974–75. Jones resides in Jacksonville, Florida. In 2013, he gave an inspirational talk to players for North Carolina Central after the Eagles played a game in Florida. List of National Basketball Association players with 50 or more points in a playoff game List of NBA players with most championships List of NBA players who have spent their entire career with one franchise Sam Jones - Hoophall Biography Hoopedia bio Sam Jones Statistics
Philadelphia 76ers
The Philadelphia 76ers are an American professional basketball team based in the Philadelphia metropolitan area. The 76ers compete in the National Basketball Association as a member of the league's Eastern Conference Atlantic Division and play at Wells Fargo Center. Founded in 1946 and known as the Syracuse Nationals, they are one of the oldest franchises in the NBA, one of only eight to survive the league's first decade; the 76ers have had a rich history, with many of the greatest players in NBA history having played for the organization, including Wilt Chamberlain, Hal Greer, Billy Cunningham, Julius Erving, Moses Malone, Charles Barkley, Allen Iverson. They have won three NBA championships, with their first coming as the Syracuse Nationals in 1955; the second title came in 1967, a team, led by Chamberlain. The third title came in 1983, won by a team led by Malone; the 76ers have only been back to the NBA Finals once since then: in 2001, where they were led by Iverson and lost to the Los Angeles Lakers in five games.
In 1946, Italian immigrant Daniel Biasone sent a $5,000 check to the National Basketball League offices in Chicago, the Syracuse Nationals became the Midwest-based league's easternmost team, based in the Upstate New York city of Syracuse. The Syracuse Nationals began play in the NBL in the same year professional basketball was gaining some legitimacy with the rival Basketball Association of America, based in large cities like New York and Philadelphia. While in the NBL with teams consisting of small Midwestern towns, the Nationals put together a 21–23 record, finishing in fourth place. In the playoffs, the Nationals would be beaten by the fellow upstate neighbor Rochester Royals in four games. In their second season, 1947–48, the Nationals would struggle, finishing in fifth place with a 24–36 record. Despite their struggles, the Nationals would make the playoffs, getting swept by the Anderson Duffey Packers in 3 straight games. Several teams began to leave the NBL for the BAA; the Nationals "recipe for success" began by recruiting Leo Ferris.
Staying in the NBL, Ferris signed Al Cervi to be player coach and outbid the New York Knicks for the services of Dolph Schayes who made his professional debut, leading the Nationals to a winning record for the first time with a record of 41–22. In the playoffs the Nationals would make quick work of the Hammond Calumet Buccaneers, winning the series in 2 straight games. However, in the semifinals the Nationals would fall to the Anderson Duffey Packers for the second straight season in four games. In 1949, the Nationals were one of seven NBL teams that were absorbed by the Basketball Association of America to form the NBA; the Nationals were an instant success in the NBA, winning the Eastern Division in the 1949–50 season, with a league best record of 51–13. In the playoffs the Nationals continued to play solid basketball, beating the Philadelphia Warriors in 2 straight. Moving on to the Eastern Finals, the Nationals battled the New York Knickerbockers, beating their big city rivals in a 3-game series.
In the NBA Finals, the Nationals faced. In Game 1 of the Finals the Nationals lost just their second home game of the season 68–66; the Nationals did not recover. Despite several teams leaving the NBA for the National Professional Basketball League before the 1950–51 season, the Nationals decided to stay put. In their second NBA season, 1950–51, the Nationals played mediocre basketball all season, finishing in fourth place with a record of 32–34. However, in the playoffs the Nationals played their best basketball of the season as they stunned the first place Warriors in two straight, taking Game 1 on the road in overtime 91–89. In the Eastern Finals the Nationals were beaten by the New York Knickerbockers in a hard-fought 5-game series, losing the finale by just 2 points. Cervi, playing less and coaching more, emphasized a patient offense and a scrappy defense, which led the league in the 1951–52 season by yielding a stingy 79.5 points per game as the Nationals won the Eastern Division with a solid 40–26 record.
In the playoffs the Nationals knocked off the Warriors again in a 3-game series. However, in the Eastern Finals the Nationals fell to the Knickerbockers again, dropping the series in four games; the Nationals would finish in second place in a hard-fought 3-way battle for first place in the Eastern Division for the 1952–53 season, with a record of 47–24. In the playoffs the Nationals would face the Boston Celtics dropping Game 1 at home 87–81. Needing a win in Boston to keep their hopes alive, the Nationals would take the Celtics deep into overtime before losing in quadruple OT 111–105, in what remains the longest playoff game in NBA history; the Nationals acquired Alex Groza, Ralph Beard as the Indianapolis Olympians folded leaving the NBA with just 9 teams for the 1953–54 season. Once again the Nationals would battle for the Division title falling two games short with a 42–30 record. In the playoffs the Nationals would win all four games of a round robin tournament involving the three playoff teams from the East.
In the Eastern Finals the Nationals would stay hot beating the Celtics in 2 straight games. However, in the NBA Finals the Nationals would lose to the Lakers in a hard-fought 7-game series where the 2 teams alternated wins throughout. With the NBA struggling financially and down to just 8 teams Nationals owner during the 1954–55 season, Biasone suggested the league limit the amount of time taken for a shot thus speeding up a game that ended with long periods of teams just holding the ball and playing keep away. Biasone and Nationals' general manager
Cliff Hagan
Clifford Oldham Hagan is an American former professional basketball player. A 6-4 forward who excelled with the hook shot, nicknamed "Li'l Abner", played his entire 10-year NBA career with the St. Louis Hawks, he was a player-coach for the Dallas Chaparrals in the first two-plus years of the American Basketball Association's existence. Hagan played college basketball at the University of Kentucky under legendary coach Adolph Rupp; as a sophomore in 1951 he helped Kentucky win the NCAA Championship with a 68-58 victory over Kansas State. In the fall of 1952, a point shaving scandal involving three Kentucky players over a four-year period forced Kentucky to forfeit its upcoming season, the senior year of Hagan, Frank Ramsey and Lou Tsioropoulos; the suspension of the season made Kentucky's basketball team, in effect, the first college sports team to get the "death penalty", nothing more than the NCAA asking members schools not to schedule Kentucky, not mandating it. Hagan and Tsioropoulos all graduated from Kentucky in 1953 and, as a result, became eligible for the NBA draft.
All three players were selected by the Boston Celtics—Ramsey in the first round, Hagan in the third, Tsioropoulos in the seventh. All three returned to play at Kentucky despite graduating. In Kentucky's opening game that season, an 86-59 victory over Temple on December 5, 1953, Hagan scored what was a school single-game record of 51 points. After finishing the regular season with a perfect 25-0 record and a #1 ranking in the Associated Press, Kentucky had been offered a bid into the NCAA Tournament. However, then-existing NCAA rules prohibited graduate students from participating in post-season play. Upon graduation from Kentucky, Hagan had scored 1475 points, which ranked him third in school history, grabbed 1035 rebounds, which placed him second, three fewer than Ramsey. In 1952 and 1954, he was named both First Team All-Southeastern Conference, his uniform number 6 is retired by the University of Kentucky. Upon graduation, like Ramsey before him, was drafted by the Celtics. Unlike Ramsey, Hagan served in the military for two years after being drafted.
In both of his years in the military, stationed at Andrews Air Force Base, won Worldwide Air Force basketball championships. After his military service, Hagan and Ed Macauley were traded to the St. Louis Hawks for the draft rights to Bill Russell. In 1958, his second season in the NBA, the Hawks, led by Hagan and Bob Pettit, won the NBA championship, defeating the Boston Celtics 4 games to 2 in the NBA Finals. Hagan was named to play in five consecutive NBA All-Star Games from 1958 to 1962. In his 10 NBA seasons, Hagan scored 13,447 points for an 18.0 average. Hagan achieved renown and respect well after his career ended, when David Halberstam wrote in his classic book The Breaks of the Game that Hagan was the only white star on the Hawks who welcomed African American teammates like Lenny Wilkens to the team and did not treat them with prejudice. In 1967, the Dallas Chaparrals of the newly formed ABA hired Hagan as a player-coach, he scored 40 points in his team's first game. He played in the first ABA All-Star Game that season, becoming the first player to play in All-Star Games in both the NBA and ABA.
He retired as a player after playing three games during the 1969–1970 season and remained as Chaparral coach until midway into the season. Hagan scored 1423 points for a 15.1 average. Hagan was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1978, the first ex-University of Kentucky player to be so honored. In 1972, Hagan returned to the University of Kentucky as the school's assistant athletic director and took over the top job in 1975, he was forced to resign due to recruiting and eligibility violations in November 1988 and was replaced by one-time Kentucky teammate C. M. Newton, the head basketball coach at Vanderbilt University the year before. In 1993, the University of Kentucky renamed its baseball field in honor of Hagan, it had been known as the Bernie A. Shively Sports Center. Cliff Hagan at Basketball-Reference.com
Bob Burrow
Robert Brantley Burrow was an American basketball player. The son of a lumberjack, Burrow was considered the nation's No. 1 junior college player in 1954 at Lon Morris, where he scored 2,191 points. Adolph Rupp gave Burrow a scholarship without seeing him play in person, he played collegiately for the University of Kentucky and was selected by the Rochester Royals in the 1956 NBA draft. Burrow played for the Royals and Minneapolis Lakers in the NBA for a total of 81 games. Burrow died on January 3, 2019 at age 84. List of NCAA Division I men's basketball players with 30 or more rebounds in a game Career statistics and player information from Basketball-Reference.com
United States
