Word: player
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...just don't feel like playing any more," he wrote. "If I continued to play, I'd become a mercenary because I'm not involved any more." That is how Bill Russell, player-coach of pro basketball's champion Boston Celtics, announced his retirement in SPORTS ILLUSTRATED last week. By giving up his coaching job ("that prime incubator of ulcers") and his $250,000-a-year contract, Russell ends a career in which he helped the Celtics to eleven championships in 13 seasons. Russell says he is now considering a career in "the field of entertainment...
Cardinal Rule. If he thought he was putting pressure on Rozelle, he should have known better. A cardinal rule of professional football, spelled out plainly in Rule 3 of every player's contract, states that a player "must not associate with gamblers or other notorious characters." And because of his questionable associations, Namath was clearly guilty of breaking the rule. Rozelle understood only too well what such transgressions can mean to the name of the game. Sooner or later, rumors would start circulating that gamblers were getting too close to the shaggy-haired superstar who led his team...
...nature of professional tennis is such that is often invites prolonged domination by one performer. If a player can develop an impeccable technical style, if he can add to it a deceptive craftiness and sharpen it with a killer instinct, and if his legs and reflexes hold up, he can match younger, quicker opponents until he is well past 30, and still come out a champion. Tilden, Budge, and Gonzales all dominated professional tennis, but few have brought to the game such well-balanced excellence and natural panache as Australian Rod Laver, and none have ever reaped the financial rewards...
...away from the U.S. Pro Championships at Longwood with his fifth title in six years. While many professional athletes derive their charisma primarily from their personalities, Laver proved once again at Longwood that his springs solely from the magic he can perform with a wooden racquet. Every professional tennis player has perfected at least one aspect of the game which he can exploit with devastating effects. Rosewall has his overhead slam and a deadly backhand. Gonzales covers the court beautifully and groundstrokes well. Holmberg combines a feline anticipation with accurate placements shots. But Laver has all these qualities and more...
...fact that Australian tennis player Fred Stolle prefixes every sentence with "Shift," helps provide an insight into his personality...