badger
5/10/2011, 04:11 PM
Link (http://www.tulsaworld.com/blogs/sportspost.aspx?/Phil_Jackson_From_Laker_boss_to_Bossypants/9-11383)
Way back in April of 1990, a few months after I joined the Tulsa World, I volunteered to trek to Dallas to write a feature piece on Stacey King, a former Oklahoma player whose Chicago Bulls were visiting Reunion Arena. (Volunteering for things is what you do when you are chained to a sports copy desk from 4 p.m. to midnight and you want to show you are possibly worthy of having a byline in the newspaper.)
Jackson was the Bulls’ coach. I approached him courtside before the game to see if he would take a few questions about King, the sixth overall pick in the 1989 draft. Not only was Jackson agreeable, he dropped the word “mastiffs” (you don’t hear that one every day) into an answer and I got the idea he would have talked to me all night, if that’s what I needed.
In fact, my chat with Jackson was better than my chat with King because I made the rookie mistake of telling King that, when not on the court, he at least he had a front-row seat to watch Michael Jordan.
King nudged B.J. Armstrong, who was seated in front of an adjacent locker, and said “Did you hear that?” But we got past that minor turbulence and it was a smooth ride after that.
Stacey King will "always remember this as the night that Michael Jordan and I combined for 70 points." :)
Way back in April of 1990, a few months after I joined the Tulsa World, I volunteered to trek to Dallas to write a feature piece on Stacey King, a former Oklahoma player whose Chicago Bulls were visiting Reunion Arena. (Volunteering for things is what you do when you are chained to a sports copy desk from 4 p.m. to midnight and you want to show you are possibly worthy of having a byline in the newspaper.)
Jackson was the Bulls’ coach. I approached him courtside before the game to see if he would take a few questions about King, the sixth overall pick in the 1989 draft. Not only was Jackson agreeable, he dropped the word “mastiffs” (you don’t hear that one every day) into an answer and I got the idea he would have talked to me all night, if that’s what I needed.
In fact, my chat with Jackson was better than my chat with King because I made the rookie mistake of telling King that, when not on the court, he at least he had a front-row seat to watch Michael Jordan.
King nudged B.J. Armstrong, who was seated in front of an adjacent locker, and said “Did you hear that?” But we got past that minor turbulence and it was a smooth ride after that.
Stacey King will "always remember this as the night that Michael Jordan and I combined for 70 points." :)