Terry Pluto

¿Qué tienen en común Julius Erving, Larry Brown, Moses Malone, Bob Costas, los Indiana Pacers, los San Antonio Spurs o el Concurso de Mates? Que todos nacieron en la Asociación de Baloncesto Americano, la mitica ABA: la liga del balon rojo, azul y blanco; de los peinados afro, los mates por encima del aro, la linea de tres puntos, los pabellones vacios, la presion a toda pista y el espectaculo mas libre.Pero la ABA no fue solo innovacion y dificultades. Fue tambien una liga con una constelacion irrepetible de personajes legendarios: Marvin Barnes y su genio indomable; Connie Hawkins, el talento prohibido; Roger Brown, el heroe silencioso; y tambien George McGinnis, Mel Daniels, Rick Barry, Wendell Ladner, Maurice Lucas, Bob Netolicky, Artis Gilmore, Billy Cunningham, Swen Nater Puede que la NBA ganara la guerra del dinero y la estabilidad, pero la ABA gano la del arte, la imaginacion y la osadia."Bolas perdidas" es la historia definitiva de la ABA. Un viaje frenetico a una de las epocas mas libres, divertidas y surrealistas del deporte profesional, contado integramente con las voces de quienes la vivieron: jugadores, entrenadores, periodistas y narradores que, durante nueve años imposibles, cambiaron para siempre la manera de entender el baloncesto.

¿Qué tienen en común Julius Erving, Larry Brown, Moses Malone, Bob Costas, los Indiana Pacers, los San Antonio Spurs o el Concurso de Mates? Que todos nacieron en la Asociación de Baloncesto Americano, la mitica ABA: la liga del balon rojo, azul y blanco; de los peinados afro, los mates por encima del aro, la linea de tres puntos, los pabellones vacios, la presion a toda pista y el espectaculo mas libre.Pero la ABA no fue solo innovacion y dificultades. Fue tambien una liga con una constelacion irrepetible de personajes legendarios: Marvin Barnes y su genio indomable; Connie Hawkins, el talento prohibido; Roger Brown, el heroe silencioso; y tambien George McGinnis, Mel Daniels, Rick Barry, Wendell Ladner, Maurice Lucas, Bob Netolicky, Artis Gilmore, Billy Cunningham, Swen Nater Puede que la NBA ganara la guerra del dinero y la estabilidad, pero la ABA gano la del arte, la imaginacion y la osadia.Bolas perdidas es la historia definitiva de la ABA. Un viaje frenetico a una de las epocas mas libres, divertidas y surrealistas del deporte profesional, contado integramente con las voces de quienes la vivieron: jugadores, entrenadores, periodistas y narradores que, durante nueve años imposibles, cambiaron para siempre la manera de entender el baloncesto.

Unguarded reveals the Lenny Wilkens we have never seen before, the tough, strong, thoughtful, and analytical man who has spent a life in basketball making his teammates and players better than they knew they could be. Thought-provoking, candid, always honest, Wilkens shares all the secrets hes learned in his four decades surviving in the NBA storm.For forty years, he has been the Quiet Man of the NBA. As a rookie, he was overshadowed by two pretty fair guards who entered the league at the same time: Jerry West and Oscar Robertson. As a veteran, he wasboth figuratively and literallya coach on the floor, but he had the misfortune to play for several struggling teams. As a general manager, he won a championship and made back-to-back Finals appearancesbut he did it without superstars, a year before Magic Johnson and Larry Bird revitalized the league. And as a coach, he has won more games than anyone in NBA historybut spent his best years locked in the same division as Michael Jordans Chicago Bulls.Basketball connoisseurs have long appreciated the style and intelligence with which Lenny Wilkens played and the unflappability and class hes brought to coaching. The respect he has earned resulted in his joining the legendary John Wooden as the only men to be inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame twicefirst as a player, and then as a coach.Now, in Unguarded, Lenny Wilkens steps out from behind his placid demeanor to speak plainly and unequivocally on the enormous social and athletic changes hes seen in his career.Wilkens sounds off about the challenges he had to overcome in the course of his journey: the racism that left him off the 1960 Olympic basketball team and kept him from being chosen as head coach of the first Dream Team; the fatal miscalculation that kept his Cleveland Cavaliers from getting past Michael Jordan to the NBA Finals; the painful, frustrating task of coaching a troubled and troublesome J.R. Rider, a player who contributed to his departure from Atlanta. And he credits those who went out of their way to help him: the priests and nuns who taught him the value of discipline and reinforced his faith; the coaches who pushed him to develop his talents to the fullest; the selfless players such as John Johnson, Hot Rod Williams, Larry Nance, Steve Smith, and many others who sacrificed individual glory for the good of their teams; his mother, Henrietta, and his wife, Marilyn, who stood beside him in many trying times.

What do Julius Erving, Larry Brown, Moses Malone, Bob Costas, the Indiana Pacers, the San Antonio Spurs and the Slam Dunk Contest have in common? They all got their professional starts in the American Basketball Association.What do Julius Erving, Larry Brown, Moses Malone, Bob Costas, the Indiana Pacers, the San Antonio Spurs and the Slam Dunk Contest have in common? They all got their professional starts in the American Basketball Association.The NBA may have won the financial battle, but the ABA won the artistic war. With its stress on wide-open individual play, the adoption of the 3-point shot and pressing defense, and the encouragement of flashy moves and flying dunks, todays NBA is stilldecades later just the ABA without the red, white and blue ball.Loose Balls is, after all these years, the definitive and most widely respected history of the ABA. Its a wild ride through some of the wackiest, funniest, strangest times ever to hit pro sportstold entirely through the (often incredible) words of those who played, wrote and connived their way through the leagues nine seasons.