One-on-One With Sean McManus

Published in SBJ January 12, 2006

Sean McManus is wearing two hats these days. As President of CBS Sports since 1996, he led the acquisition (and later renegotiation) by the network of broadcast rights to the NFL and extended its broadcast rights for the NCAA Division I men’s basketball tournament and the PGA Tour. As newly named President of CBS News, he takes on a dual role so famously made at ABC in 1977 by Roone Arledge, with whom McManus’s father, legendary sports broadcaster Jim McKay, collaborated. That same year, McManus began his professional career at ABC Sports as a production assistant before moving to NBC two years later as associate producer and to Trans World International in 1987 as Senior VP. 

Update: McManus served as President of CBS Sports and News for five years. In February 2011, he was named Chairman, CBS Sports.

  

Q. The French writer Rabelais wrote, “One falls to the ground in trying to sit on two stools.” How will you be able to keep your balance as president of CBS Sports and CBS News?

McManus: Probably 95 percent of my time now is being spent in the news division. I’m fortunate in that my No. 2 in sports, Tony Petitti, is more than qualified to not only maintain what we have achieved at CBS Sports but indeed to take it to the next level. I’m involved in the PGA Tour negotiations directly, but other than that I’m going to be an overseer and let Tony run the operation. So, I’m not sitting on two stools right now. I’m sitting on one stool and I’ve got my hand on another one.

Q. As you know, there is a precedent for your move. In 1977, ABC placed Roone Arledge, its top sports executive, in charge of its news division. But as Jacques Steinberg wrote in the New York Times, “Arledge operated in a time in which the networks did not have to contend with the defection of viewers to newer outlets, like Fox News and Yahoo.” What unique challenges does that additional competition present?

McManus: The competition, for the best anchorman, the correspondents, and the best personnel behind the camera, is intense. The competition for viewers is far more intense. In Roone’s day, the first opportunity most viewers had to watch national news was in the national news telecasts. Now, with Fox News and CNN and MSNBC, anybody who wants to watch news 24 hours a day obviously can. So, the challenge is to put on a news program at 6:30 that not only gives the viewer a good summary of what happened in the day, but also presents an alternative to what not only the cable stations are doing but also what the other two networks are doing. And that is an enormous challenge.

Q. The technology has also come a long way since 1977.

McManus: The production values in news when Roone took over ABC News in 1977 were minimal. Graphics and music and production techniques that were common in sports were never used in news, nor were a lot of the technologies that Roone had developed in the sports area. By transferring those over from sports to news, Roone revolutionized the news business. But we’re all doing that now. We’re all using the technology to its fullest, so that opportunity was obviously exploited by Roone. 

Q. Of the time you as a youth spent with Arledge, you said, “I’d like to think some of his genius rubbed off on me.” What was his genius?

McManus: Roone’s genius was manifold. First and foremost, he understood the importance of on-air talent and building stars, whether it was a Peter Jennings or a David Brinkley or a Ted Koppel or a Jim McKay or a Howard Cosell. He understood how much of your identity really is placed in the people who are in front of the camera. That’s No. 1.

Q. And No. 2?

McManus: He understood that all good television, whether it’s sports, news, drama, or entertainment, comes down to good storytelling. And whether he was telling the story of a sporting event or of a major news event, he had the best storytelling sense of anyone I’ve ever seen in television. 

Q. In any discussion of Roone Arledge, the word “storytelling” always comes up. Dick Ebersol said it the most valuable lesson he learned from Arledge, and Jim Nantz has referred to storytelling.

McManus: Yes. 

Q. Who are the good storytellers, in sports and news, and what makes them good?

McManus: I don’t want to get into specific names in news or sports at the moment as far as on-air talent. That’s a tough question for me to answer, because I don’t want to mention just one or two of our guys.

Q. What is your biggest challenge?

McManus: To make CBS News the leader in this industry, both in terms of viewership and quality.

Q. How would you characterize your management style?

McManus: I’d probably want to ask other people who work for me. I would say I’m very involved in all aspects, whether its production or operations or business affairs or programming because I like all of those. I try to give the people who work for me a great deal of flexibility and liberty to do their jobs without interference, but I really want to be kept abreast of everything that is going on. I’m fiercely loyal to the people who work for me, but conversely expect just as much loyalty in return. And I want people who are working for me to really enjoy being at either CBS Sports or CBS News. I think I’ve accomplished that at CBS Sports, and I believe I will accomplish it at CBS News.

Q. What’s the best advice you received?

McManus:  It was from my father, which is to be true to yourself and to be your own man. And if you do that and you’re talented enough, everything else will fall into place.

Q. Let’s talk a little about your father, Jim McKay.

McManus: I learned a lot of lessons from him also. First and foremost, when you’re on television, you can’t fool anybody. Your personality and whatever’s inside you come out. You can’t fool the American viewing public, whether you’re doing sports or doing news.

He always told me that when he was on television, he never imagined that he was talking to millions of people; he imagined that he was talking to one or two people. He wanted to talk to the audience, not at the audience. And he also firmly believed that he was not [part of] the story of an event he was covering, that the athletes and the competition were the story. 

Q. A good lesson for any broadcaster.

McManus: That’s a lesson that I think is lost on a lot of the young sports commentators who are coming up through the business. You don’t want to be part of the story. You want to tell the story, you want to be a storyteller, you want to do your job well, but you want to get out of the way. He was great at doing that at the right times, and it’s a lesson that more young sportscasters should pay attention to.

Q. He went from sportscaster to newscaster without warning at the 1972 Olympics at Munich when terrorists seized and killed 11 Israeli athletes. You were there at the time. What do you recall most vividly about that day?

McManus: The surreal nature of being around a group of men I had watched produce television programs my entire life and, all of a sudden, this same group of men was producing one of the most dramatic and compelling news events in history, and the entire country was watching. I don’t think the magnitude of the event dawned on anybody until we got home a couple of weeks later and realized how big a story it was and how many people were completely reliant on my father and Roone’s production team for what happened that day.

Q. Your father got a lot of mail on that, didn’t he?

McManus: I don’t think any of us, especially my father, appreciated the magnitude of that until they got home and the hundreds and hundreds of letters and telegrams that people had sent him were waiting on his doorstep.

Q. Jim McKay was part of the New York Giants’ broadcast crew in 1963. 

McManus: I went to a lot of Giants games with my father. His broadcast partner was Chris Schenkel, and I would squeeze in the little radio booth and sit between Chris and my dad and afterward go down to the locker room and see players like Sam Huff and Y.A. Tittle and Erich Barnes. They were my heroes in those days.

Q. You were at the game the weekend JFK was assassinated. The NFL games were not cancelled. What do you remember about that day?

McManus: I remember the discussion that my parents had regarding whether we should go to the game. My father had promised me that we would go, and he was trying to balance that promise with what was the right thing to do. In the end, I think he made a decision that he might have regretted, much like Pete Rozelle regretted it. He might have made the wrong decision, but he did so purely out of, I think, loyalty and affection to me because he knew how disappointed I would be. When you’re an eight-year-old boy, you might not be able to comprehend what a devastating event the assassination of a president is.

Q. What do you think has been your best career decision?

McManus: Probably in 1979 to leave ABC Sports, where I’d been given a great break because of who my father was, and go work for Don Ohlmeyer and Jeff Mason at NBC Sports, which was a little scary since I had grown up at ABC. But to make that move really enabled me to develop as Sean McManus and not as Jim McKay’s son. 

Q. Where is the imagination in sports today?

McManus: It’s a lot more challenging because everyone is doing such an unbelievably good and sophisticated job, whether it’s cable or network sports television. It’s really difficult to distinguish yourself. You can try some new production techniques or new technology, but basically we’re all doing an excellent job, and it’s more and more difficult to use your imagination to come up with new ideas. A lot of the imagination is coming on putting together the best quality broadcast team that you can. 

Q. For example?

McManus: It’s why we moved Greg Gumbel into the studio and Jim Nantz out to do the football games last season. That, I think, in some ways took more imagination than coming up with the next great graphic or piece of music to use. Imagination is trying to distinguish your telecast from what everyone else is doing, especially when everyone else is doing such a good job.

Q. What in sports would you not miss if it were eliminated?

McManus: That’s a good question. I would not miss any performance-enhancing drugs—an absurd phrase. I read that as cheating. It’s a stain that’s been put on the entire sports world.

Q. How do you assess the state of broadcast journalism today?

McManus: The job that reporters are doing is generally exemplary. One of the dangers, more on cable certainly than on network, is that in an effort to draw ratings, intelligent dialogue, to a large extent, has been replaced by shouting. I love good debates and I love opposite and divergent points of view being shared on television, but I think at times the rhetoric is dialed up too high just to attract more viewers. But if you look at the quality of the coverage of Hurricane Katrina, the war in Iraq, or any host of other events, I think the coverage is unbelievably good across the board.

Q. Steven Brill has referred to “the overall scream culture that is too often cable television.” CBS has always seemed more reserved, or less noisy, in its productions than the other networks. Is that an approach you strive for?

McManus: I wouldn’t say we have strived for that. It goes back to what I was saying about letting the story, whether it’s a news event or a sports event, be the important part of your telecast and not the person who is covering that story or the graphics or the music in that story. Doing the best job you can and letting the events play out as events. 

If anything in the last couple of years, Tony Petitti and I have tried to make our image at CBS Sports a bit more contemporary. I think that is clearly evident in our NFL and college basketball coverage, both in terms of the music and the production values. And I think we are drastically more contemporary than we were five or six years ago. That’s on purpose and was done with a plan in mind.

Q. What about CBS News?

McManus: I think the heritage of CBS News is of great journalistic integrity, great reporting, and great newscasting. I’m not going to ignore the fact that that image has taken a hit in the last year. That is clear, and it’s one of my jobs to help with the team here to restore that image that was so pristine for so many years.

Q. You said, back in 1998, that “because television generates the lion’s share of income in most sports, sports have to balance adjusting themselves to become more attractive to television and maintaining the integrity of the sport.” Has that been difficult?

McManus: I don’t think it’s been difficult at all. I think the leagues have done a good job of accommodating television without compromising the competitive balance. I think the one issue that is probably most arguable is start times of games. That’s the one area that all of us are a bit susceptible to. But quite frankly, it comes out of pure economics. If the leagues are going to get paid the kind of rights fees they are paid, it’s incumbent upon the networks, which are in fact a business—to maximize revenue. And regrettably, sometimes maximizing revenue means starting games later than any of us would like to.

Q. Anything else?

McManus: Other than that, I can’t think of too many instances where the competitive nature or the enjoyability (if that’s a word) of a sporting event has been compromised to satisfy television. Would we like fewer commercials in our football games? I’m sure we probably would, but I think people are getting used to commercials in all sports. So, from my point of view—and I’m probably not totally objective—I don’t see that’s it’s harmed sports irreparably.

  

Q. You said, “It’s not whether the Evening News is relevant. It’s whether I can make it more relevant to viewers.” Isn’t news by its very definition relevant? How do you make it more relevant?

McManus: You can do a story on rising interest rates that has all the facts regarding that particular story. But unless you explain to people how it’s going to directly affect them and hit their pocketbooks, and perhaps what they can do to avoid those high interest rates, unless you do that, I’m not sure you’re really engaging your viewers. 

We’ve all done stories on the Medicaid prescription benefit program, and we’ve all talked about how confusing it is and how difficult it is for senior citizens to understand it. Well, that’s half the story. The second half of the story is trying to explain to viewers what it is you can do to try to figure out this mess. That would be a much more relevant story than just saying “Here’s why this is so confusing.”

Q. To find a way to better articulate the story?

McManus: I could go down a list and any story that you do, figure out a way to make the viewer at home either be more informed or more engaged. And say, “Boy, that really does apply to me; now I understand why rising interest rates or the prescription drug benefit program really does affect me. I better do X-Y-Z to avoid this problem.”

That to me is making it more relevant. If you talk about the war in Iraq, and you report the facts of what’s happening over there, that’s very good reporting. If you explain how that might affect America, either economically or socially or militarily, then you’re making it more relevant to the person who’s watching that program. 

Q. Is there a problem with the way the news is reported?

McManus: I don’t have a problem with the way anybody, including CBS, is reporting the news. I would just like to figure out a way that the person at home is better served by being told how this affects him or her directly. That’s a fine distinction, but I think it’s an important one.

Q. Everyone, from movies and television to newspapers and magazines, is after the younger audience. Les Moonves, in the Baltimore Sun, said: “For all three evening newscasts, the average age of viewers is 60 years old.” Letterman had a Top 10 list to attract younger viewers. Do you have your own list?

McManus: My primary goal is not to attract younger viewers to the Evening News. The Evening News viewers are always going to be older, and I’ve accepted that. Trying to get the 18- to-34-year olds to watch the Evening News is not a priority, and if it was, it would be an unrealistic priority. They just aren’t watching the news at 6:30. That’s not their viewing pattern. I’m trying to get a better share of the audience that is currently watching the three evening newscasts, and, secondarily, if I can lower the average age and attract some younger viewers, I’ll be satisfied.

Personal

Date & Place of birth: February 16, 1955 in New York City

Education: Duke University, 1977

Favorites

Vacation spot: The Breakers in Palm Beach and home with my family

Piece of music: “Maggie May” by Rod Stewart and “Johnny B. Goode” by Chuck Berry. My daughter’s name is Maggie, and those are my kids’ favorite two songs.

Author: Ernest Hemingway

Quote: It’s by Winston Churchill, and it’s on my desk in both News and Sports: “We make a living by what we get; we make a life by what we give.”

Sporting event: The Masters

Movie: It has to be The Godfather

Last book read: It’s going to sound like I’m making this up, but I’m not. It’s Bob Schieffer’s book, This Just In. And I just reread Roone.

Typical day off: The perfect day off for me is golf early in the morning with Tony Petitti and the afternoon with my family.

Athlete you most enjoy watching: Tiger Woods when he’s on CBS

One-on-One with Jerry West

Published in SBJ April 28, 2005

Jerry West turned 82 yesterday (May 28). It seems as good a reason as any to revisit my interview with him from 2005. 

When West retired from play with the Los Angeles Lakers in 1974, he had scored more than 25,000 points, only the third player at the time in NBA history to have done so. Known as Mr. Clutch for his consistent ability to make the pressure shot, West became the literal symbol of the league. (His silhouette is the NBA logo.)

A two-time All-America player at West Virginia and co-captain of the U.S. Olympic gold-medal team in 1960, West became an all-star in each of his 14 seasons in Los Angeles and a 10-time all-NBA first-team selection. Elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1980 and named one of the NBA’s 50 Greatest Players, West coached the Lakers for three seasons before moving to their front office.

In 2002, he ended a 40-year association with the Lakers and joined the Memphis Grizzlies as president of basketball operations. Under West’s direction, the team has reversed its fortunes, improving from 28 victories in his first season to 50 in his second.

Update: West joined the front office of the Golden State Warriors in 2011. Four years later, the team won its first NBA championship since 1975. It earned another in 2017 (the eighth for West), after which West left to join the Los Angeles Clippers as a consultant.

Q. After so many successful years with the Lakers, you walked away from the game. Now you are closer to your West Virginia home. What led you to go to Memphis?

West: I retired. The stress and pressure are something I feel. I had just given about all I could give to [the Lakers] franchise. I needed to get away for a while. And within about a year and a half, I started to feel not as stressed and harried as you would feel when you’re working for these franchises. 

Q. How are things now?

West: When the season starts, there’s no in-between. You’re happy if you win; you’re miserable when you lose. [In L.A.], winning was always expected. You didn’t worry about winning games; you worried about winning championships. The Lakers have been such a dominant part of the Los Angeles sports scene. I believe that added even more pressure to all of us, but particularly for me. I was there so darn long, as a player, coach and executive, and it just got to the point where it didn’t feel good. Winning was not fun and losing was even worse. 

Q. Do you have a basic business philosophy?

West: I’ve always felt that players should not be underpaid. Nor do I think that they should be overpaid. I just think that in today’s world, with the agents playing such a prominent [role] and free agency being so important, all of us would tend to overpay if we want a free agent. And paying money to players does not make you win. It’s been pretty evident in all sports. Does it give you a better chance? You would think it would. But you look out around the league today and some of the teams with the biggest payrolls have not accomplished very much. I think it’s almost a testament to the agents: They can get people to buy into how great their players are when they might be average players, wanting these average players to make enormous salaries, which a lot of them do.  

Q. What’s the best business call you have made?  

West: It’s really hard to say. I live my life almost by my instincts in terms of players that we might try to acquire and players that are available to us. There might be some players on the free-agent market who want $10 million-plus that I don’t like at all as players, and there might be some that I think are really undervalued. Depending on the market you are in and the resources you have available to spend, I think you have to judge accordingly to what those players might be and what they may not be. 

Q. Roger Staubach said that running a business can be tougher than running an offense, and Joe Dumars said that running a team is far more satisfying than playing. What do you say?

West: It’s probably a combination of both. I think it’s so much easier to play, particularly if you have the ability to play in the league at a high level. For the people who are fortunate enough to be able to work for franchises, our work behind the scenes allows us—if we do a good job and the owners think we do a good job—to have some life expectancy other than just as a player. 

Q. What about the personal satisfaction of building a team?

West: There’s a tremendous amount of gratification in helping to build a team. It’s a challenge every day because the talent pool is not as high as people think. There are 30 people competing on, hopefully, a level playing field, trying to attract and draft the same kind of players. That, to me, is very interesting, and also the challenge of the different markets that are in the league. 

Q. For example?

West: The big markets certainly have an enormous advantage because of the revenues involved. We have to try to spend our money a little more wisely if we can, but, more importantly, to have the fiscal responsibility to put these teams in a position to have value other than just having a huge dollar loss every year. That’s a challenge here in Memphis as opposed to Los Angeles and something that we are really going to concentrate on this year: How do we get to the point where we can become a profitable franchise.

Q. Attendance through January at the Grizzlies’ home games was up nearly 13 percent. Has it been a tough sell in Memphis?

West: I work pretty much on the basketball side, but certainly I’m very aware of the business side here, and it is a tough sell. This is a very, very small market. Our revenues have increased greatly here. We have a new building. We had some success last year. We’re playing pretty well under the circumstances, with the most injuries I’ve ever been associated with on one team. We’re still hanging in. But for the most part, I have seen some growth here. 

Q. What’s next?

West: We need to continue to build this team to make it better so that we attract more people. And if we attract more people, then the ancillary income from some of the local industries will be greater than it is today. We’re still really limited, compared to the major markets, in what we can try to go out and sell to: potential customers and, more importantly, potential businesses that want to get involved with the Grizzlies and be associated with the Grizzlies.

Q. The business of the game has changed since your playing days, hasn’t it?

West: Oh, it was like the stone age when I played. The Lakers are now wearing five different uniforms. It’s mind-boggling to me that somebody would even want to make that many uniforms, but it tells you the marketing of the league is obviously important. It brings great community pride to see people from the community that you’re in wear player shirts that identify them with the local product.

Q. Does the fact that you competed at such a high level give you an advantage in dealing with your players?

West: I would never say that. I would like to say that I’m very candid and straightforward with players. I have my own feelings, and just as we get criticized for what we do in the newspapers, we certainly want to protect our players. But I think internally you have a right to say [to the players], “You’re letting us down in this area here and we need to pick it up.” And I think most of our players would tell you that I’m very candid about stuff like that.

Q. Dumars said the most difficult thing for him in the transition from player to front-office executive is having to trade a player.

West: To me, the worst thing is when you have to say goodbye to a player that you don’t feel is good enough to play in the league. That is a cold feeling because these dreams have been there since they were kids. They get drafted and you have them on your squad and you decide that maybe somebody else is better. You feel like judge, jury, and executioner. 

Q. What about trading a player?

West: Trading players that you know is very difficult because there are always mixed emotions. Some players want to be traded and some players don’t want to be traded. Those emotions are very difficult to deal with. And more importantly, when you go home at night, I think we get the reputation of being cold and callous because that’s part of your job—just a horrible part of the job. 

But I think saying goodbye to a player that maybe has played a long time in the league and doesn’t have much left, or you feel he doesn’t have anything left, and you say, “Congratulations. You had a great career, but we’re going to move in another direction now.” When you tell another player, “We’re going to cut you or waive you,” that is a difficult thing. You are probably waiving or cutting a player at a very early age in his life. It affects a lot of people. That, to me, is the worst.

Q. You have had a good eye for talent evaluation, especially with the Lakers, who didn’t always have a high pick in the draft. Is there something in particular you look for in a player?

West: I think we all look for different things. The one thing to me that is very evident is obviously skill, and physical capabilities are vitally important. But I think the skill that is sometimes overlooked is the ability to work hard. To me, hard work is a skill. Some players just don’t have the same energy levels as other players; they don’t bounce back as quickly from playing so many games in so many days. And some players seem to play well for 60 games and 22 games they take off. 

Q. They take off?

West: I don’t mean take off from not being able to play. They just can’t get anything accomplished. They don’t seem to have the energy. But yet we pay them for 82 games. It really is a players’ league. They have an enormous advantage today because of all the rights and things that have been negotiated with the advent of the players association.

Q. Who or what has had the biggest influence in your professional life?

West: Oh, boy. You know, I’ve always been a person who tried to learn something every day. I have some friends who have been very successful away from the basketball arena. And I marvel at the differences in personalities and the incredible instincts that they seem to have for making financial deals and acquiring companies and stuff like that. I had a pretty good education working for Jerry Buss for the Lakers when the league was not as prosperous as it is today. 

Q. About the NBA, you said, “We expanded very fast and we’re getting younger and younger players in the game.” Is that a good thing? How do you assess the state of the league today?

West: We’re a league that has started to kind of reinvent itself. What has driven this league in the past has been our personalities and our stars. And we certainly have those. But they just don’t come along every day, and those types of players are few and far between. 

Now, all of a sudden, we have a wealth of young talent. We’re hopeful that they‘ll grow into the kind of citizens that represent the league the way that I think the people who care about the league would like to see it: to see it presented not only publicly but particularly in print and also when people get in front of news cameras. I think some of these kids have done a nice job in that. I think they’re getting better. In some ways, we are bringing along the next group of stars. The league does a great job in promoting those players. 

Q. Would you favor an age minimum for the NBA?

West: I think all of us feel that there’s a lot more work in having younger kids, but that’s not for me to say. I think that’s something that has to be discussed behind closed doors. We’ve had some wonderful young kids come in and play extremely well and be a viable part of the league. 

Q. Do the colleges serve as the minor leagues for the NBA?

West: At one time, very definitely yes. But now, because so many kids bypass the college system, it’s certainly not that way anymore. At one time, players used to be able to brand themselves with a college team. That meant that the league inherited a bunch of players that were kind of household names already throughout the country, particularly among basketball fans. It’s a little bit different job for the league now, I believe. 

Q. How is it different?

West: We have to help brand those kids ourselves. The system seems to work best when you have an attractive college team and you inherit those players who are proven and who established tremendous records and have identified themselves as being the best players in America. We don’t do that quite often anymore. If you look at the last four years, I believe the No. 1 player in the draft, three of them have been high school kids and the other one has been from China. 

Q. Players today slap hands with a teammate after he misses a foul shot. You once said you’d be embarrassed if anyone did that to you.

West: I also think it’s distracting. I don’t think anything needs to be said. But again, it’s just part of today’s game. If I were a coach, I wouldn’t want it to happen. I would discourage that. It has nothing to do with the game. I think every player feels bad enough about missing shots, but I don’t think you have to acknowledge a miss.

Q. You were not a demonstrative player, but in today’s game the culture is a little different. Players celebrate dunks, scores, blocks and so forth. Is showtime an inextricable part of the game now? 

West: I suppose it is. You see it all the time. You see some guy go do something and you watch his man kick his ass the whole game, and you start to say, “Hey, that guy after the game is probably laughing at you.” But we do have excitable and emotional players and, again, that’s part of the game today. We’re seeing the changing culture of the game a little bit. 

Q. Seeing yourself on SportsCenter.

West: If you watch ESPN, which is kind of the sports junkie quick review of a game—always showing you dunks or spectacular plays—they don’t show the nuts and bolts of the game, and I think that’s created the other side of the game, glorifying the spectacular but ignoring the substance of the game.

Q. You said, “I like substance over style, always, and I think that wins for you in this league.” 

West: I still say it wins. In many cases I think style darn sure gets publicized a lot more than substance. If you look at the teams at the end, they might have players that play the game with some style, but they also have a lot of substance, and at the end of the year the champion pretty much represents that.

Q. The game requires so much individual skill, and yet the team can’t succeed unless everyone plays as a unit. What is the key?

West: If you watch a well-drilled, well-schooled team, it looks like all the players are thinking alike, playing with one mind. If you watch teams where a bunch of individuals are out there, or inexperienced players or poor teams, you’ll never see that. The real good teams make the extra pass. Everyone helps each other defensively, everyone is running back defensively, everyone is playing smart basketball. The good teams do that; the poor teams don’t, and the young teams don’t. And I think that’s the essence of the game. It’s like one mind playing the game, and when you can get that, you’ve got something special. 

Q. It can’t be easy trying to predict how young players will turn out.

West: It’s getting more and more difficult. I don’t think there’s any question. We’re drafting on talent, and talent is sometimes not good enough. You see a kid who’s really gifted physically, and I think everyone gets enamored with dunking. Unfortunately, there are not many dunks made in a game. I think we’re all victims of that because we understand the fans want to be entertained. They want to see something spectacular, which often happens in the flow of a game.

Q. Any college seniors you particularly like?

West: You know, I would say no. The NCAA will probably whet the appetite of more NBA people, but I would say that probably the players who are the most attractive will be the underclassmen, as they have been for the last few years.

Q. Does the game need any changes?

West: I wouldn’t think so. The advent of the three-point shot has put the game out of doubt, but sometimes it’s a license to shoot shots that players shouldn’t be shooting. One big change I see in players today, in almost all players of all sizes, is that they can all handle the ball pretty well. But I think the biggest difference is the way the game is taught today. The positive part of it is that we seem to be getting back to where we’re scoring more points. We’re in the entertainment business. I would much rather see a game where there are some points scored as compared to the games where there are not many points scored.

Q. What happened to the violations that used to be called “traveling” and “palming?”

West: It’s in marketing the league. We have great players who walk every time they get [the ball], and they don’t call it. We have players who get every call. It’s just part of the league—and it’s not meant to be critical. But officials know that the extraordinary skill that some of these incredible players have is greatly responsible for their team’s success. There’s no question that those things exist to some extent. It’s not done deliberately; it’s not done with people sitting around thinking. But it’s just watching the amazing skills that these people have. And they do it so cleverly. It gives you a tremendous advantage if you’re a good offensive player. 

Q. I was surprised to see palming called in a recent college game. I can’t remember the last time that was enforced.  

West: In the NBA you could start calling palming from the time they go out to warm up. But I think the thing that’s interesting about it is now they allow everyone to carry the ball, not just one person. 

Q. Is there anything is basketball you would not miss if it were eliminated?

West: There are some things that I would certainly like to see different, but if I talk about it, I’ll get fined. I wouldn’t miss the three-point shot, even though I think it adds intrigue.

Q. Too bad the three-point shot was not around when you played.

West: I wish it were around, yes. It would have won a few more games for us, that’s for sure. Oh, and I can do without the dunk shot, too, by the way. One point for a dunk.

Q. Your old backcourt teammate Gail Goodrich said that what he enjoyed most in sports was the camaraderie. What do you think is the best thing about sports?

West: The harshest lessons learned in life are probably through sports. There is no gray area. You either win or you lose. And I think it tests the character of all players. It tests the character of the people working internally. And it can lead to hastily made decisions that sometimes damage a franchise more than they would ever help because people don’t want to lose.

Q. A daunting challenge.

West: I think management has a great responsibility to the ownership, almost to the point where I believe that you should lose your job if there’s something that the owner wants to do and it’s just not the right thing to do because it is an emotional thing. I do think that we’re all at risk sometimes because we’re opinionated and we think we know what’s best for the team, and we don’t own the team. I like to think I’d never work for money in my life. I do it because I love it. Obviously, it’s important to get paid if you’re in a business like this. But I think the most important thing is, if somebody hires you, they should trust your instincts enough to let you run the team and for them to not interfere with some things that maybe they’re not very familiar with.

PERSONAL:

Date & Place of Birth: May 28, 1938 in Chelyan, West Virginia

Education: University of West Virginia

  

FAVORITES

Movie: I had a brother killed in Korea, and not a week goes by that I don’t think of him in some way. I like to read, and I like to examine historical things. There have been two or three movies regarding wars that sometimes you scratch your head [and think,] “Why does this make sense? Why does that make sense?” Movies about conflicts have always probably emotionally tuned me in. I thought Apocalypse Now was a great movie. I thought Band of Brothers was a very good series on the horrible nature of war. Seabiscuit was tremendously inspirational to me. Finding Forrester, about a young kid getting involved with someone who had this great wealth of knowledge, was a touching move. 

Athlete you most enjoy watching: Tiger Woods. Golf is the most challenging sport for me. Not only are you playing against the course, but you are also trying to control yourself. And you watch Vijay Singh and the incredible work ethic he has. There are some players in the NBA I greatly admire: Magic Johnson and Michael Jordan from the past, Bill Russell and Larry Bird. Among the current players: I’m a great fan of Tim Duncan. He’s probably the player that has what I think is most important. He has style and he has a substance. He also plays the game with class and grace. And Kevin Garnett is very much the same. Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant. Lebron James—the sky is the limit for him. Those are just some of the ones I’ve most enjoyed, watching them compete and excel.

Vacation Spot:  The Greenbrier in West Virginia

Sporting Event: The Ryder Cup. We don’t have as much nationalism in this country. I think everyone wants to say we do, but we don’t. And I think that’s one thing where nationalism come to fore

Music: Growing up in West Virginia, everybody used to listen to country music. I like classical music. Now my tastes run to soft rock and some jazz. I like some of the old, traditional people. I like Elton John. I think he’s a tremendous entertainer. I listen to a lot of music from different areas.

Smartest player: Oscar Robertson

Greatest competitor: Bill Russell

Last book read: I read a lot. I just read a book on George Washington. I’m reading a book on Germany in the last part of the war. I’ve just about finished The Kite Runner, a very touching book. My reading tends to vary. I learn a lot through reading.