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Maravich Legend
Enjoy Rebirth (From the "Heir to a Dream" Autobiography)
by Gil LeBreton
Dallas-Pistol
Pete. That wasn't just a nickname. That was a basketball state of
mind.
It was floppy
socks. Between-the-legs dribbles. Between-the-legs passes. Show time.
Swish. Forty-four points swishing through, game-after-game, every
game, for three collegiate seasons.
That name launched
a thousand shots. OK, make that 3,166 shots.
Pistol Pete
Maravich didn't just play basketball. He spray-painted it, just
so we'd all remember.
"Maravich?
Pistol Pete?" the hotel operator chirped Friday. "Ooh,
is he staying here, too?"
So you see,
Earvin Johnson, with all due respect, this dude was making magic
while you were still making mud pies.
Likewise, with
all due respect to Julius Erving, Maravich was anesthetizing basketball
minds when the kind doctor was still changing bedpans.
How appropriate
Pistol Pete should join us this weekend for a gathering of National
Basketball Association legends. His pro career never reached the
heights that his seasons at Louisiana State did, but Maravich did
get picked for five NBA All-Star games.
And how ironic
that Pete Maravich, who touched millions during his college years,
wonders these days why, playing a different role, he can't touch
a few more.
That's the Pete
Maravich story now. You watched, so now he'd like you to listen.
You put a spotlight on him, so now he'd like to show you the light.
"Money
didn't change me," Maravich said Friday, on the eve of the
NBA Legends Classic. "Money didn't change me, or power, or
fame, or All-Star games or being Pistol Pete. Those were only brief
interludes of ego gratification."
"The only
thing that ever changed me was Jesus Christ...." |
