Bobby Knight: Still bitter, angry, and vengeful for firing
… "I hope they're all dead"
So, when the team had its 40th anniversary last year, the players expected to celebrate with their coach. They were wrong.
When the 1981 team had its 35th reunion of its national title last year, the players expected to celebrate with their coach. They were wrong.
And so it went. Their coach snubbed them, and they are irate about it. He was part of them, called them a team forever, said that he would do anything for them, and now he has rejected them.
All because he is bitter and vengeful … not towards them, necessarily, but toward those who fired him years ago.
Legacy of Bobby Knight
When college basketball experts are asked today about who the best coaches in history have been, they could list some legends. John Wooden of UCLA usually heads the list, followed by Dean Smith, Adolph Rupp, and Mike Krzyzewski -- in any order.
Twenty years ago, another name would have been in the mix: Robert "Bobby" Knight. What has happened to his reputation despite having 902 wins and three national championships?
At the age of 36, Knight won the first of three national titles at Indiana. He added two more, compiling three in 11 years and appearing to be at the top of his profession in his 40s, a relatively young age to have experienced such success.
However, percolating under that success were a number of issues that have dragged down Knight's reputation, finally erupting into public domain after his success had run its course in the 1980s.
One person who loved the man had this to say in a piece published in Sports Illustrated. "With Knight, the ironies and contradictions always wreathed around each other. The same man who demanded discipline from his players, showing so little impulse control himself. The figure who demanded unwavering loyalty from those around him, quick to excommunicate friends from his inner circle and turn on allies (read: Mike Krzyzewski, among many others). The coach who sometimes spoke in the most profane terms imaginable, prudishly forbidding the Assembly Hall crowd from chanting BULL-SHIT. The teacher who stressed attention to detail, going about his own business with active disdain for nuance," wrote Jon Werthiem in a piece first published in the Indianapolis Monthly.
The enigma
Knight was an enigma, a man who was brilliant in his knowledge of the game but could not control his temper, his angry impulses that resulted in his lashing out at everyone, even those close to him.
He is notorious for throwing a chair across the court when he differed with the call of an official. He is notorious for having assaulted a police officer in Puerto Rico during the Pan Am games. He is notorious for grabbing players, even choking one of them. And that list goes on and on.
Knight appeared to be on top of the world after winning those titles. However, his insatiable lust for control and the anger that seemed built up in him over the years simply destroyed him. "It was in the 1990s that the firmament began to crumble," Werthiem wrote. "Knight seemed to grow crankier by the year, and a string of coveted Indiana kids (Glenn Robinson, Zach Randolph, Eric Montross) decided against heading to Bloomington. Depending on where you stood, Knight’s marriage to his dictatorial ways was either costing him recruits, or Knight, alone among his peers, wouldn’t compromise his standards to cosset entitled 18-year-olds. Either way, Big Ten titles—much less national titles—were slow in coming. Those were seasons on the brink."
[Some players just could not tolerate him, even Hall of Fame players. When Larry Bird, one of the greatest players of all time, left Indiana after just 24 days on campus, Knight did not even blink an eye. He had other players, and while Bird has not criticized Knight, he could not play for a coach with Knight's temperament. Best decision Larry ever made.]
"I hope they're all dead"
Showtime presented a documentary on the 1976 team last night, something that led to Knight putting forth an appearance on the Dan Patrick Show.
Patrick asked Knight why he refused to go back to Assembly Hall at Indiana University. "Well, I think I’ve always really enjoyed the fans, I always will," the coach who spent 29 years at Indiana said. "On my dying day, I will think about how great the fans at Indiana were. And as far as the hierarchy at Indiana University at that time, I have absolutely no respect whatsoever for those people. With that in mind, I have no interest in ever going back to that university,” according to the Indianapolis Star.
Patrick then asked why he continued to hold that grudge even after all of the people who were there when he was fired are gone.
Patrick: "Aren’t those people all out of there, coach?"
Knight: “I hope they’re all dead."
Patrick: "Some of them are …"
Knight: “Well, I hope the rest of them go.”
In other words, his vengeance, which he will probably take to the grave with him, outweighs his love for his former players.
Firing in 2000
Overall, the administration at Indiana often looked the other way where Knight was concerned. After all, he was a hero in the state, could have been elected governor if he had wanted.
However, over the years, his dictatorial, arbitrary and capricious ways -- and what some would call bullying today -- became hard to take for even the more fervent of his fans. He was reputed to have put tampons in lockers of players he felt were soft, which was mild. Then he head-butted players, threw a potted plant at a secretary, used profanity that even the most hard-core fans could not accept.
Times had changed, but Bobby had not. When the video of him choking a player broke nationally, Knight was outraged, but unrepentant. He did not apologize, but he was warned by the university to change his ways.
He did not. The crowning blow was when he grabbed a student whom he believed had disrespected him on campus, put him up against the wall -- if some stories are to be believed -- while threatening him, the die was cast.
President Myles Brand, who passed away in 2009, recommended that the board of trustees fire Knight. They supported his decision to fire Knight for ''uncivil, defiant and unacceptable'' behavior, according to a 2000 New York Times story about it.
The decision divided Indiana, but not the country, which was tired of his shenanigans. He had worn out his welcome in NCAA basketball, and even though he coached again at Texas Tech, his reputation was forever tarnished.
Disrespected 1976 team
When Knight did not show up for the 1976 celebration, even those who had supported him through the tough times turned against him. According to the SI story this week, "[T]he ceremony was not an endorsement of IU as an institution or even of the current team. It was simply a celebration, a happy occasion, centered on a dynastic team that recalled Knight at the peak of his powers. It was the perfect opportunity for reconciliation. And Knight’s stubbornness and ego prevented it from happening."
Knight did not have to go to Assembly Hall. He could have met with the players somewhere else in Bloomington, at a private party at a club or restaurant. Just to show that he appreciated them.
Instead, he disrespected them, those who had given so much to him.
And that is the sad part of Bob Knight's coaching legacy.
Comments
Post a Comment