A brief history of pro basketball in Utah: 1971

“They Did It! Stars Are ABA Champs” proclaimed the Deseret News’ front page on May 19, 1971. In their first season in Salt Lake City, the Utah Stars won the ABA championship, which remains the only professional basketball title awarded to a team in Utah. So let’s take a quick look at how this amazing achievement was accomplished.

Everything begins and ends with Zelmo Beaty, seen here with the ABA championship trophy. (That trophy later had all the names of the players engraved on it. As far as I can tell, it remains in possession of Bill Daniels’ estate in Denver.) Beaty was forced to sit out the entire 1969-70 season due to a punitive NBA rule designed to prevent players from joining the ABA. This was bad news for the Los Angeles Stars, but it may have been exactly what Beaty and his aching knees needed. When he returned to the court for the 1970-71 season as a member of the Utah Stars, he played the best basketball of his life.

Beaty averaged 22.9 points and 15.7 rebounds per game, including a league-high 5.4 offensive rebounds per game. He also led the ABA with a .555 field goal percentage. Not only was he an All-Star, but he finished second in voting for MVP, falling to Indiana’s Mel Daniels. And after the championship was won, he was named the ABA’s Playoffs MVP. Talk about a Hall of Fame season!

Austin “Red” Robbins was traded to the Stars in September 1970 for BYU’s Craig Raymond. A lot of people were really excited to see the former Cougar play in Utah, especially since he was coming off a career year. But Stars general manager Vince Boryla decided to swap out the center for a power forward to play alongside Beaty. And I think he ended up finding a nice upgrade for Raymond in the process.

Robbins was a 6-8 forward from Florida, who played at Chipola College before transferring to Tennessee. In 1966, he was drafted in the sixth round by the Philadelphia 76ers, but he didn’t make the team, so he went to Italy for a year. In 1967, he joined the New Orleans Buccaneers, where he became a three-time All-Star and even received MVP votes in the 1969-70 season. In his first season with the Stars, he made his fourth consecutive All-Star Game behind averages of 12.6 points and 11.9 rebounds per game.

Donnie Freeman actually shares a lot in common with Red Robbins. He was a 6-3 guard from Illinois, who was also drafted by Philadelphia in 1966. Although he went in the third round, he still didn’t make the team. In 1967, he signed with the Minnesota Muskies, who became the Miami Floridians after just one season. Like Robbins, Freeman was an instant ABA All-Star, even receiving MVP votes in 1969 and 1970. Also like Robbins, Freeman joined the Utah Stars through a daring offseason trade. Despite Mack Calvin’s impressive rookie campaign, Vince Boryla went with a win-now mentality and swapped him for the more seasoned three-time All-Star.

Freeman played well for Utah, putting up a team-high 23.6 points per game, as well as 5.7 rebounds per game. But he only played in 24 games for the Stars before Boryla pulled off an even more daring trade. On January 8, 1971, (just two days after being named an All-Star) Freeman was packaged in a blockbuster trade to Texas for Glen Combs, Ron Boone, and the Chaparrals’ first-round draft pick. 

Apparently Freeman had been locked in the middle of a nasty contract dispute with the Stars front office — they even fined him $1,000 for failing to suit up for a game. I’m assuming he enjoyed his situation with Chaparrals, as he finished the 1970-71 season strong, receiving MVP votes for the third time in his career. And he made the All-Star Game for the fifth and final time in the following season. He then fell into a supporting role with Indiana and San Antonio before concluding his professional basketball career with the Lakers in 1976.

Glen Combs was a 6-2 guard from Kentucky who played at Virginia Tech. In March 1968, he was drafted by the Dallas Chaparrals and signed with them before also being drafted by the San Diego Rockets in the fifth round. Combs became an All-Star in his second season and even received MVP votes. Just like Freeman, Combs was named to the 1971 All-Star Game two days before being traded. Combs didn’t have the same all-around game that Freeman had, but he was a much better 3-point shooter and he still averaged 20.1 points per game in his first season with the Stars.

Ron Boone is a name very familiar to Utah basketball fans. He was born in Oklahoma City, but grew up in Omaha, Nebraska. Standing just 5-foot-7 after graduating from high school, he initially enrolled at Clarinda Community College in Iowa. He suddenly had a growth spurt that brought him up to 6-foot-2, which helped him earn a scholarship at Idaho State. After making the All-Big Sky First Team twice, he was drafted by the Dallas Chaparrals in 1968 before being picked by the Phoenix Suns in the 11th round.

Despite leading the ABA in turnovers as a rookie, he still had a strong debut and earned a spot on the ABA All-Rookie First Team. But he didn’t become an All-Star until 1971. Like Combs, he was honored for his work in Dallas, but ended up representing Utah at the ABA’s mid-season break. However, Boone was relegated to the bench in his season as a Star, putting up 15.8 points and 5.8 rebounds per game. He also prided himself on never missing a basketball game and ended up playing 86 regular season games this season because of the trade.

Now, before I can go on with the season, I need to talk about the 1971 ABA Draft. From the very beginning, the ABA had held their draft months ahead of the NBA Draft in an attempt to lock down their new rookies long before the NBA came calling. Of course, this didn’t work with the most elite prospects like Lew Alcindor, but that didn’t stop the ABA from trying. In fact, they just kept bumping up the date. Their first draft was in April, the next year March, then February. By 1971, the ABA Draft was in January, held one day before the All-Star Game.

This year, the ABA decided to get rid of the territorial pick system, which had allowed teams to acquire local college players before the draft officially began. The league also finally ordered its draft based on teams’ records — simply giving the top pick to the worst team. Of course, a mid-season draft meant they had to off whatever the records were at the time. This worked out marvelously for Utah, though, as the Chapparals’ first-round pick ended up being No. 1 overall. And there was only one player Vince Boryla had his eye on.

Jim McDaniels was a budding superstar from Western Kentucky. The 6-11 big man averaged 27.6 points and 13.8 rebounds over his three-year college career and was considered a can’t-miss game-changer. Some said he was as good a defender as Bill Russell. One of his coaches said he could score even if he was lying down on a stretcher. So Boryla didn’t hesitate to make McDaniels the first No. 1 pick in Utah Stars history. However, even before the draft, it was common knowledge that the Carolina Cougars were aggressively working to add McDaniels to their team. More on that later.

So one day after making the top selection in the draft, Utah sent four players to the All-Star Game in Greensboro, North Carolina. This strong roster guided the Stars to a 57-27 record, just one game behind the league-leading Indiana Pacers. In the first round of the playoffs, Utah was matched up against Texas. Although Don Freeman played well against his former team, the Stars still easily swept the Chaparrals.

Due to realignment, the rematch with the Pacers took place in the Western Division Finals. The two teams were evenly matched, ultimately ending up in a Game 7 in Indianapolis. Many years later, coach Dick Sharman said this game was his favorite memory of this season — gaining revenge on the Pacers’ home court, largely due to the inspired play of Red Robbins (25 points, 14 rebounds, and 11-for-13 shooting from the field).

The Stars met the Kentucky Colonels in the ABA Finals and we forced once again to play the full seven games. But this time, Utah had home court advantage and earned a 131-121 victory in front of a sold-out Salt Palace. Kentucky’s Dan Issel had a game-high 41 points, but the Stars got brilliant performances from each of their starters. Zelmo Beaty naturally led the way with 36 points and 16 rebounds, while Willie Wise added 22 points, 20 rebounds, and six assists. Red Robbins came up big again with 13 points, 15 rebounds, and five assists, while Glen Combs chipped in 20 points and five assists. And let’s not forget Merv Jackson’s 19 points, seven rebounds, and seven assists. This was a team with a lot of weapons, good ball movement, and even better rebounding. Although they lacked the raw power of superstar-led teams like Indiana and Kentucky, Utah had just enough of the right ingredients to pull off this most impressive feat.

The ABA rewarded the Stars with $48,000, which was split evenly between the players and coaches. Frankly, I find that prize money embarrassingly small — even by 1971 standards. Utah’s governor declared the month of May to be Stars Month, and they did unofficially rename the road in front of the Salt Palace as Stars Avenue. But Salt Lake City didn’t throw an official parade for them. At least the players did get from fairly decent-looking championship rings.

Unfortunately, the good times didn’t last very long. The 1971 offseason proved to be little more than a series of misfortunes for the Stars. I’ll start with the least egregious one: the failed NBA merger. There had been serious talk of merging the ABA with the NBA since the formation of the ABA in 1967. By 1971, the NBA appeared to have been ready to welcome every ABA team into their fold with open arms (except for the Virginia Squires because they were too close to the Baltimore Bullets). But at the last minute, the courts put an indefinite hold on the merger due to a landmark lawsuit filed by Oscar Robertson against the NBA. That lawsuit would (eventually) overhaul free agency in the NBA and give the players more rights. It also illustrates the high level of uncertainty the courts had with professional basketball in the ‘70s. The sport had never had this much money flowing around and the complications caused by the rival league fighting for the same players’ rights left everyone scrambling. Teams were constantly suing other teams, and players frequently had to sue their team owners to reclaim their paychecks. Everything was quite dubious from a legality standpoint. And unfortunately for the Stars, the courts took a little too long to resolve everything. Had the 1971 merger been able to proceed, I think there’s a high probability the Stars would still be in Utah today.

The next big misfortunate was Jim McDaniels. The ABA’s No. 1 pick refused to play for the team that drafted him. That in itself wasn’t unusual, as all the ABA’s previous top picks also turned their team (Elvin Hayes, Lew Alcindor, and Pete Maravich). But McDaniels was unique in that he didn’t leave the ABA for the NBA — he simply wanted to play for a different ABA team, the Carolina Cougars to be specific.

McDaniels may have been the first basketball superstar to turn down Utah. He said that if he had to even dribble a basketball for Utah then he wouldn’t play in the ABA. So Carolina quickly signed him to what they boldly proclaimed the biggest basketball contract ever. The newspapers of the day knew how much Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was making, so they logically assumed that McDaniels’ contract was close to $3 million. Because all this happened before the NBA Draft, McDaniels fell to the second round, where he was picked up by the Seattle SuperSonics.

Vince Boryla was furious. He accused Carolina of stealing his property and sneered at their pitiful compensation offers. Boryla hyperbolically claimed that even an unlimited amount of No. 1 picks wouldn’t suffice because there’d be no guarantee any of them would be as good as McDaniels. I don’t think he fully believed that last bit, but I do think he was justified in his outrage. A fellow team just flat out stealing a draft pick completely undermines the integrity of the league. Unfortunately for Utah, no recourse was available. The ABA commissioner publicly downplayed the importance of the draft, saying all that mattered was a team’s ability to sign the player. And the Stars knew they wouldn’t be able to count on the courts to help them out. So in the end, they had no choice but to accept Carolina’s pitiful compensation: an inconsequential center named George Peeples, who the Stars quickly traded to the Chaparrals for a washed-up former All-Star named John Beasley.

McDaniels happily began his career with the Cougars and tried to smooth things over with Utah fans by diplomatically claiming that he only turned down the Stars because they had just won the championship and he preferred the challenge of bringing a title to Carolina. I don’t know if anyone actually bought this nonsensical reasoning, especially as it didn’t line up with the timing of any of this saga. I don’t know if it was ever proved, but many speculated that McDaniels actually signed his contract with Carolina as early as November 1970. But what we do know for sure is that his contract was nowhere near the speculated $3 million.

Turns out that Carolina had signed McDaniels to a six-year, $1.35 million contract. That wouldn’t have been so bad if it weren’t for the payment plan, which stretched out that $1.35 million over 25 years. McDaniels played brilliantly — putting up 26.8 points and 14.0 rebounds per game and making the All-Star Game — but that bad contract quickly began to weigh on him. He requested to shrink that 25-year plan to 15 years, but was denied. So, after just 58 games with Carolina, McDaniels made the shocking decision to join the Sonics.

It is my personal belief that the mental stress of this whole episode caused irreparable harm to McDaniels’ psyche. Once he arrived in Seattle, he was a shell of his former self, struggling to make any impact on the game he once so effortlessly dominated. I couldn’t find any reports of him suffering a major injury, so I think all his problems stemmed from the financial concerns and the feelings of both being betrayed and betraying others. Later in his life, McDaniels regretted his decision to leave Carolina, saying he should have given the ABA a few more years to sort things out. The rest of his basketball career was a bleak disappointment, bouncing back and forth between the NBA and ABA and overseas. He retired in 1978 and died in 2017 at age 69.

In hindsight, Artis Gilmore would have been the better pick, as he actually ended up having the type of career everyone thought McDaniels would have had. Even better would have been the greatest ABA player of all time, Julius Erving, but he hadn’t decided to leave college early at the time of the draft, so he wasn’t available. (This is why the NBA doesn’t hold the draft in January!)

And now for the final misfortune of the offseason. (This is starting to sound like a witch’s curse. “You will win the title, but then be betrayed thrice in the summer!”) Bill Sharman’s dream job of coaching the Lakers opened up. Just as he ditched the Warriors to coach the Los Angeles Stars, Sharman wasted no time in returning home.

This was a profound loss for Utah. He was a Coach of the Year and now an ABA champion. He brought credibility and stability to the club. And — more importantly from a legal perspective — he was still under contract with the Stars. This time Bill Daniels got involved and he filed a lawsuit against both Sharman and the owner of the Lakers. At first, the judge ruled in Utah’s favor. But after Sharman appealed, the Lakers emerged victorious and didn’t even have to pay Utah any damages.

Sharman promptly guided the Lakers to another championship, becoming the only coach to win titles in the ABL, ABA, and NBA. He then helped L.A. win five more titles as their general manager. He was elected to the Hall of Fame as both a player and a coach, ultimately collecting 17 championship rings. Even after he retired, the Lakers kept giving him rings up until 2010. He died in 2013 at age 87.

Anyway, back in 1971, the Stars had to scramble to find a new head coach. Wisely, they chose someone local. Not only so the fans would like him, but also so he wouldn’t pull a Sharman and seek to return home.

LaDell Andersen was born in Malad City, Idaho, and attended nearby Utah State University. He was just a good enough player to be invited to the Olympic tryouts, but not good enough to make the team. Or play professionally, for that matter. But he did discover he had a knack for coaching. He started as an assistant at the University of Utah in 1956 before taking the head coaching job at Utah State in 1961. He took the Aggies to the NCAA Tournament five times and the NIT once during his 10-year career there. So it seems like he was certainly ready and prepared to take the leap to the professional level. Next time we’ll explore how well Andersen adapted to the ABA and how the reigning champions overcame their summer of heartache.

Before Watchmen: One step forward, two steps back

Our cover by Adam Hughes is a haunting image of Dr. Manhattan serenely observing a nuclear explosion, while people burn and die all around him. What really makes this a frightening image is that it seems like he’s actually enjoying this carnage. For better or worse, J. Michael Straczynski is really challenging Alan Moore’s portrayal of Dr. Manhattan as an uncaring personification of passivity.

The variant cover is by Neal Adams and it’s just … fine. Nothing terribly interesting going on here. I’m not sure what all the dots on Dr. Manhattan are supposed to be. I guess Adams was attempted a transparent look? I don’t know. And I don’t really care.

The second issue of this series really blew me away — it was everything I could have hoped for in a Dr. Manhattan story. But the first issue left me flat. Unfortunately, so did this third issue. It brought back everything I hated from issue #1 and many elements that I hate from the broader Before Watchmen project. I guess I should have known that amazing issue #2 was just a fluke.

Anyway, this story begins with Dr. Manhattan fretting over the infinite realities he has discovered. For some reason, he has determined that he was the one who created all these realities, and that if he doesn’t get rid of them, then all of existence would be destroyed. And he believes that this all began at that fateful Crimebusters meeting when he changed Captain Metropolis’ paper so he could be paired up with Silk Spectre instead of Rorschach. Dr. Manhattan concludes that by altering reality in this way, he inadvertently created two versions of himself — one that went on patrol with Rorschach, and one that went out with the Silk Spectre. Of course, neither one of those realities happened in the original story, but Straczynski doesn’t care about that.

Straczynski also decided that Jon Osterman really needed a tragic backstory because heaven forbid a boring, ordinary person become the main character. So now, all of a sudden, Osterman is a Holocaust survivor. He fled Germany with his father and mother in 1939, but his mom was killed during their escape. She had a rather depressing motto she repeated during this ordeal: “You cannot make the world what you want because you want it.”

Dr. Manhattan decides to take his mom’s motto to heart and he begins to travel through time to undo all the changes he made to reshape reality into the way it’s “supposed” to be. He makes sure his mom is killed by Nazis and his grieving father becomes an obsessive watchmaker. He prevents his dad from taking a 17-year-old Jon to a baseball game, so he’d be in a bad mood when he learned about the atomic bombs and would subsequently force Jon into a career of science. Dr. Manhattan made sure a research scientist at Gila Flats would die of cancer so that Jon would be able to take his place.

He then carefully guides the pacing of people’s footsteps so that Janey’s watch would be stepped on and that Jon would forget the repaired watch in the particle chamber and that the door would lock him inside before he left. Dr. Manhattan then watches with satisfaction as Jon is gruesomely torn apart atom by atom — an image that transition thematically into the grotesque Crimson Corsair backup.

One of the most disturbing things about the original Watchmen story is how little Dr. Manhattan chooses to interfere in the affairs of men — even allowing the Comedian to kill a pregnant woman right in front of him. I think Moore deliberately made this disturbing. Here was a man who could literally do anything, but chose not to because he didn’t care. But that wasn’t good enough for Straczynski. He needed Dr. Manhattan to covertly be acting altruistically all this time — carefully choosing when and when not to act in order to guide the events of mankind in the best way possible. I hate this. And I also hate that he — and Nite Owl — suddenly have cliché tragic backstories. In my opinion, changes like that really undermine Alan Moore’s original intentions.

A brief history of pro basketball in Utah: 1970

In 1969, Jim Kirst was confidently telling everyone that he had the money and the determination to keep his ABA team in L.A. But by early 1970, he proved to have neither. Claiming losses of $1.75 million (a staggering amount for the day), Kirst sold the Los Angeles Stars to Bill Daniels for $850,000. So to recap: Art Kim and James Ackerman purchased the Anaheim Amigos in 1967 for $30,000. After losing $500,000, they sold the team to Kirst in 1968 for $450,000. And then less than two years later, Kirst was forced to dump the team again. The value of the franchise kept climbing steadily, but not nearly quick enough to keep pace with the rising cost of operation. Kind of like an old house in frequent need of costly repairs. Yeah, each year it’s technically worth more money, but is it really?

Luckily, money wasn’t much of a concern for Bill Daniels in 1970. Unlike Kim and Kirst, Daniels had periods of his life where he could be described as being fabulously wealthy. And how he got that money is a rather interesting story. It begins with him being a Golden Glove boxing champion in New Mexico before enlisting in the Navy in World War II. He continued to serve as a pilot through the Korean War before finally returning home in 1952. While visiting a bar in Denver, Daniels became fascinated with the technology that enabled the bar to air an out-of-state boxing match. He quickly learned everything he could about cable television and set up his own cable channel in Casper, Wyoming (where his family was running an insurance business at the time).

From there, Daniels kept growing and expanding until he gained the reputation of being a cable television pioneer. He also wisely diversified his business into brokering and investment banking, which gave him enough money to start buying some fun things. Things like race cars, amateur boxing teams, and, of course, a professional basketball team.

While Kirst believed that moving the Amigos to Los Angeles would save the franchise, Daniels saw it as a fatal mistake. The Stars simply didn’t have the, well, star power to compete with the Lakers’ Wilt Chamberlain, Jerry West, and Elgin Baylor. And despite Jim Hardy’s “Star trek” of dribbling a basketball 300 miles, the attendance at Stars games was dismal — frequently less than 1,000. Daniels knew he had to move the Stars to save them, especially if the rumored NBA merger were to happen, as he couldn’t envision the NBA accepting a second Los Angeles team.

But where to move the Stars? At this point in time, Daniels was based in Denver, Colorado, which already boasted an ABA team, the Rockets. So he couldn’t go there, but maybe he could go to Kansas City, where the Rockets were originally supposed to go in 1967. But that team moved to Denver before the season began because they couldn’t find a good arena. And that intriguing market still lacked a suitable place to play in 1970, so Daniels moved his search elsewhere.

Believe it or not, but Daniels actually became quite enamored with the idea of moving the Stars to Albuquerque, New Mexico. He spent months floating this idea — even before he officially completed the purchase of the team. Daniels readily admitted that Albuquerque also lacked a decent playing facility, but he just really wanted to return to the state he grew up in, I guess. Rumor has it that the only reason he backed off was because the owner of the New York Knicks protested. He said he’d refuse to merge with a league that had a team in such a small, remote city as Albuquerque. And I don’t think he was the only one.

So that left Daniels with Salt Lake City. I wish I could say it was Daniels’ experience in cable television that taught him Salt Lake was a growing market, capable of supporting a professional sports team. But I don’t think that was the case. In all the newspaper articles I read from 1970, Daniels’ primary focus was on the brand-new, state-of-the-art Salt Palace. He even went so far as to compare it favorably to the Lakers’ Forum and the Knicks’ Madison Square Garden. And I suppose that’s reason enough to justify the move.

Of course, all this negotiating was happening while the 1969-70 season was wrapping up. I didn’t find any quotes of the players grumbling about a potential move — I suppose they were all used to frequent relocations in this era. But I did see some of them praise the arrival of a new owner, as it meant their paychecks would be guaranteed. Apparently Kirst had also fallen into the same practice of Kim of not always paying his players! Anyway, let’s take a look at what these players were able to do this season.

Warren Davis made his second-straight All-Star Game, putting up 16.0 points and 10.9 rebounds per game. He was the only representative from Los Angeles — making it the first time in franchise history that the Amigos/Stars didn’t have two All-Stars. Oddly, Davis was traded away to Pittsburgh just one day after the All-Star festivities in Indianapolis. And with that, the last remaining link to Anaheim was gone.

General manager Jim Hardy didn’t really seem to value continuity, as he made several transactions this season that left me scratching my head. Like trading away last year’s top rookie, Larry Miller, after just 21 games. I wonder how much of a role finances had to play with the departures of Miller and Davis. Of course, unlike Miller, Davis’ career plummeted after this trade. He bounced around between four ABA teams and was out of the league by 1973. He then spent six years in the Eastern Basketball Association, where he won two EBA championships with the Allentown Jets. I guess it could have been worse, but I’m sure he dreamed of something much bigger.

Willie Wise may have been one of the reasons why both Miller and Davis were traded. Wise was a 6-5 forward from San Francisco, who played at the City College of San Francisco before transferring to Drake University. He was drafted by the San Francisco Warriors in the fifth round in 1969, but he was unable to make his home team’s roster. Remarkably, he was overlooked in the ABA draft, but he earned a spot on the Stars during their June tryouts.

As a rookie, Wise put up 15.2 points and 11.6 rebounds per game, earning a spot on the ABA’s All-Rookie First Team. He also became the first player in franchise history to receive MVP votes, finishing 11th in the contest. Wisely (get it?), the Stars decided to keep Wise so we’ll get to talk more about him later.

Mack Calvin also may have had a hand in Miller’s departure. The 1969-70 Stars media guide hilariously listed Calvin as standing half an inch above 6 feet — I guess they refused to admit he was a 6-foot-nothing point guard. Anyway, Calvin was born in Texas, but grew up in Southern California, where he attended Long Beach City College before transferring to USC. He made the All-PAC-8 First Team in 1969, but wasn’t drafted by the Lakers until the 14th round of the NBA Draft. According to the Stars media guide, he was selected in the “second five rounds” of the ABA Draft. I have no idea what that’s supposed to mean.

Calvin’s arrival proved most fortuitous to Los Angeles, as Merv Jackson suffered a significant injury that seems to have permanently robbed him of some of the explosiveness he demonstrated as a rookie. Calvin proved remarkably durable, becoming the only player on this roster to appear in all 84 games (it baffles me that this struggling league decided to go from 78 games to 84). Calvin averaged 16.8 points and 5.7 assists per game, joining Wise on the All-Rookie First Team. He eventually went on to have one of the best careers in ABA history — but not with the Stars, as he was traded to Miami in June 1970. However, we will see him again. It’ll just take a while.

Bill McGill joined Merv Jackson as one of two former Utes on the Stars roster this season. He was born in Texas, but grew up in Los Angeles, where he established himself as one of the best high school basketball players in the city. According to legend, he got to play a pick-up game against Wilt Chamberlain. Seeking to find a way to score over the much larger and more experienced NBA superstar, the teenaged McGill created a type of hook shot that proved extremely effective and helped him become a dominant scorer despite being an undersized (6-foot-9) center. Unfortunately, McGill also sustained a major knee injury during his junior year of high school. He ignored his doctor’s advice to have reconstructive surgery, opting instead to periodically have his knee drained in secret. This tactic worked for about five years, but not much longer.

McGill was highly recruited out of high school, and nearly went to Cal, but was denied due to his poor grades. Luckily for Ute fans, coach Jack Gardner had no such qualms about McGill’s academic record and made him the first Black man to play at the University of Utah. McGill thrived with the Utes, leading them to a third-place finish in the NCAA Tournament in his junior season. As a senior, he averaged a mind-boggling 38.8 points and 15.0 rebounds per game. Sadly, the Utes were banned from the Tournament that season because one of their players had accepted free plane tickets from a booster (this was back when the NCAA actually had some teeth).

In 1962, the Chicago Zephyrs made McGill the No. 1 pick in the draft. Unfortunately, he turned out to be a bust. Despite his incredible hook shot, that bad knee of his had rendered him too slow and weak to compete at the highest level. He bounced around between four different NBA franchises and was out of the league by 1965. He then played in the North American Basketball League before he landed with the ABA’s Denver Rockets in 1968. They traded him to Los Angeles in 1969, and he was quite excited at the prospect of returning home.

McGill averaged 11.5 points per game in 27 games before he was traded to Pittsburgh for Craig Raymond (more on him later). The Pipers quickly sent him to Dallas, where he played his final games as a professional basketball player. Sadly, he ended his career deep in debt and homeless until a sportswriter helped him land a job at Hughes Aircraft. Later in life, he assisted with the NBA’s Rookie Transition Program and published an autobiography. He died in Salt Lake City in 2014 at age 74.

Craig Raymond was a 6-11 center from Washington state, who attended Brigham Young University. He was drafted with the 12th pick by the Philadelphia 76ers in 1967, but he didn’t make the team right away, forcing him to play in Italy for a season. He then returned to America to play with the Wilkes-Barre Barons in the EPBL before he finally got called up by the Sixers at the end of the 1968-69 season. But he only lasted 27 games before he was traded to Cincinnati. The Royals didn’t want him, but the ABA’s Pittsburgh Pipers did … until they decided to trade him to Los Angeles for Bill McGill in January 1970.

The trade turned out to be the best thing for Raymond, who put up a career-high 15.4 points and 11.4 rebounds per game. Sadly, Raymond was unable to build on this momentum, as he was traded to Memphis in September 1970. Raymond then bounced around between four different teams before falling out of the ABA in 1973. I find it interesting when several players have breakout seasons with one team, then drop completely off the map once they’re traded away. I wonder if head coach Bill Sharman can take some credit for maximizing the potential of some of these players. Anyway, Raymond’s story ended in 2018, when he died in Provo at age 73.

The Stars really had a turbulent season. Their big acquisition, Zelmo Beaty, was forced to sit out the entire year. The team was sold and rumors of relocation immediately spread. Attendance lagged and revenue dropped. Injuries and trades required 18 different players to suit up, including former Anaheim Amigo Les Selvage for four games. But despite all that, Bill Sharman led the Stars to a 43-41 record, which was just barely good enough to get them into the playoffs for the first time in franchise history.

Los Angeles then put together a miracle playoff run, upsetting Dallas in six games before stunning Denver in five games in the Western Division Finals. But the Stars met their match in the ABA Finals, losing to Indiana in six games.

And while all this was going on, the relocation talk had finally solidified on Salt Lake City. It was the most logical choice, as it was the only city on Daniels’ short list to have a suitable arena. But then something interesting happened. The Stars were forced to play most of their playoff games away from the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena, as Kirst hadn’t scheduled the dates out that far. Some people say he never expected the Stars to reach the playoffs, but others speculate that he did this intentionally out of spite. Whatever the reason, the result was that the Stars played their two Finals games back in their original home at the Anaheim Convention Center.

The Convention Center officials suddenly saw how fun it was to host big-time basketball games in front of thousands of people — as opposed to the small-time games the Amigos had played in front of hundreds. They actually requested for the Stars to return to Anaheim and probably even revive the Amigos nickname. And Daniels strongly considered this offer. 

I think he had good reason for this. At this point in time, the Stars were the ABA’s only team in California, or even the entire West Coast. It would severely weaken the league to abandon such a large market. Leaving Southern California would also alienate the fan base that had finally begun to grow — making the Finals can do wonders for a team. Daniels was also oddly concerned with the cost of the Salt Palace transitioning between ice hockey games and basketball games — a challenge the Convention Center wouldn’t have had to deal with. Ultimately, though, Daniels chose to take a rather hands-off approach to his team and leave the final decision on relocation to his brand-new team president.

Vince Boryla was a 6-5 forward from Chicago, who played at Notre Dame while serving in the Army. When the Army transferred him to Denver in 1946, he began playing basketball at the University of Denver. In 1948, he helped Team USA win the gold medal in the London Olympics. After graduation in 1949, he signed with the New York Knicks and became an All-Star in 1951. But a wrist injury and a knee injury quickly robbed him of his effectiveness on the court, and he retired in 1954.

Boryla became the head coach of the Knicks in 1956, then moved to the general manager role in 1959. He only held that role until 1961, which probably indicates he was fired, but I can’t say for certain. What I can say for certain was that he returned to Denver in the 1960s and met Bill Daniels through his amateur boxing club. When Daniels purchased the Stars, he decided to make Boryla the team president and general manager.

That picture above is from the Deseret News on June 10, 1970, showing Boryla excitedly signing the contract to bring the Stars to the Salt Palace. He said Salt Lake was always his first choice because of its amazing new arena. So this really feels like a “if you build it, they will come” situation. The Salt Palace failed to land the Winter Olympics, but it did bring in a hockey team and a basketball team.

Boryla explained that they were keeping the Stars name because they just had a lot of success with that name. And I agree — you shouldn’t change your team name after you reach the Finals (I also think you shouldn’t relocate your team after a Finals trip, either, but there you go). Daniels explained that they named the team the Utah Stars instead of the Salt Lake Stars because he intended to play home games in the arenas of Utah State, Weber State, and BYU. The five-year contract he signed with the Salt Palace only required a minimum of 33 games, just so the Stars could travel around the state. As far as I can tell, they only played outside of Salt Lake City a handful of times.

The new logo preserved the old as much as possible, only dropping the Los Angeles for Utah. I really miss the whimsical font Los Angeles was in, and I think Utah is a little hard to read. But I do like that the UTA matches the STA of Stars.

Unfortunately, the Utah Stars did not preserve the wonderful Los Angeles Stars uniforms, which included the unique lettering from the logo and had some sharp stripes up the sides with stars on them. I do like that they settled on a standard shade of blue instead of awkwardly trying to incorporate the light Carolina blue, but that’s about it. These jerseys are boring and basic. Boo!

Despite the efforts from some serious naysayers, most notably Ute coach Jack Gardner, the state of Utah came out to support the Stars. They played their first game on Oct. 14, 1970, beating the Denver Rockets 134-99 in front of a crowd of 9,185. It wasn’t a sellout, but it was much more than they could have fit in Anaheim. I know I’m biased here, but I think Bill Daniels and Vince Boryla made the right decision.

Before Watchmen: I wish I could love you

The Rorschach covers have consistently been some of the best of this whole enterprise. This one almost borders on being cheesy, but I think the stellar execution keeps it grounded. Plus, I will always appreciate how Lee Bermejo followed Dave Gibbons’ example of using the cover as the first panel of the comic. This issue begins with a goon kicking in a door and, for a brief moment, the wood and his boot formed a resemblance to Rorschach in his famous trench coat and hat. And I think that’s kind of neat.

The variant cover by Chip Kidd is a fairly interesting photorealistic rendering of Rorschach assaulting someone. I know some people praise this level of violence against bad guys, but looking at the terror in this man’s face shows me that Rorschach isn’t that far off from being a bad guy himself. I really appreciate that.

I also appreciate how Brian Azzarello wasn’t afraid to show Rorschach’s weaknesses here — of which there are many. Yeah, he’s pretty good in a fight, as he’s able to escape Rawhead’s men thanks to a can of tear gas. But he’s not terribly ethical, as he steals a wad of cash from one of the henchmen on his way out. This, of course, is a blatant contradiction to his famous black-and-white absolutist moral code, but Alan Moore made sure to include many contradictions to Rorschach’s code in the original story. So I appreciate that little detail.

Azzarello also remembered to show that Rorschach really isn’t that great of a detective. After he flees Rawhead’s men, he catches a ride in taxi driven by a big fan of his. The cab driver actually says some really disturbing things, all but confessing to being the serial killer known as the Bard, but Rorschach is too preoccupied and dense to put two and two together.

While the Bard was busy killing another beautiful young woman and carving cryptic messages into her body, Walter Kovacs was awkwardly trying to find a way to thank the diner waitress for taking him to the hospital. He offers to take her on a date, even clumsily brandishing the cash he stole to prove he can buy her a dinner. The waitress takes pity on Walter and agrees to go out with him after her shift ends at 11.

Meanwhile, Rawhead decides to lure Rorschach back into his lair by parading out in the open with his prostitutes. Rorschach is just smart enough to realize it’s a trap, but not smart enough to avoid walking right into it. While he involves himself in a bloody battle (bizarrely involving a tiger), the waitress sadly realizes that Walter has stood her up. But she’s approached by a familiar face, who has a 99% chance of being the Bard. And then The Curse of the Crimson Corsair attempted to outdo itself in its grossness.

I really wish I could love this series more than I do. I was surprised by how much I found myself enjoying this issue. The best thing it has going for it is Bermejo’s stunning artwork — and Azzarello’s script gave that art plenty of room to breathe. But that’s a two-edged sword. Giving too much room for the art leaves not enough room for the story. And this is a very brief, very obvious story. And that’s a shame, too, because artwork this stellar deserves an incredible story. This … just isn’t it.

A brief history of pro basketball in Utah: 1969

Los Angeles Stars general manager Jim Hardy was tasked with expunging as many traces of the Anaheim Amigos as possible. He fired the entire front office staff, burned the uniforms (allegedly), and got rid of almost all the players. Of the 20 people who suited up for the Amigos, only three remained on the Los Angeles Stars roster for the start of the 1968-69 season. So let’s take a quick look at these guys.

Steve Chubin was a 6-3 point guard from New York who played at the University of Rhode Island, becoming the school’s all-time leading scorer (he’s now eighth on the list, but is still in the school’s hall of fame). In 1966, “Chube” was drafted in the third round by the San Francisco Warriors, but he didn’t make the team, so he went to Italy for a year. In 1967, he signed with Anaheim and actually led the Amigos in points (18.2 per game) and assists (4.7 per game). As hard as it is to believe, he was second in the ABA in total assists, behind only Larry Brown, who later went on to have a Hall of Fame coaching career. Brown also may have been the reason Chubin was passed over for the All-Star Game, as Brown was chosen as a late replacement for Dallas’ Bob Verga, who had military service.

Despite Chubin’s strong season, Hardy wanted him off the roster. But I don’t think it was just because Chubin was a sore reminder of the dark Amigo days. Chubin simply became obsolete. Los Angeles had drafted a new point guard, who turned out to be much better from Day One (more on him later). So despite opening the season with a somewhat respectable 16.6 ppg and 4.6 apg, Chubin was traded to Minnesota after just 17 games as a Los Angeles Star. The rest of his career became rather turbulent after that trade. He played for four different teams in 1968-69, and four teams again in 1969-70. In 1970, he joined the Hamden Bics of the Eastern Basketball Association then played in Israel for a couple of years.

I talked about Ben Warley last time, so I won’t go through his whole story again. The 6-5 forward had a bit of a letdown after his All-Star season with just 14.0 points and 5.5 rebounds per game. He was traded to New York after just 35 games and the Nets promptly waived him. I can’t confirm this, but I strongly suspect he may have suffered a season-ending injury, which prompted the trade and sudden release. An injury also explains his lackluster return to the ABA with Denver for the 1969-70 season, where he averaged a mere 4.6 points per game.

Warren Davis was a 6-6 power forward from Atlantic City, who attended North Carolina A&T. He was drafted by the Knicks in the sixth round of the 1965 draft, but he didn’t make the team, so he signed with the Wilkes-Barre Barons of the Eastern Professional Basketball League. After two seasons in Pennsylvania, Davis joined the Amigos and actually had a fairly strong season with 17.0 points and a team-high 10.5 rebounds per game. But he only played 54 games, which may have prevented him from making the All-Star Game.

In the 1969-70 season, Davis put up 12.7 ppg and 10.0 rpg, but he did play in all 78 games and he did become an All-Star. And when the season ended, he was the last remaining former Amigo on the Stars. Since he stayed with L.A. for one more season after this, I’ll save the story of the rest of his career for the next blog post.

So now that we’ve gone over the three former Amigos, let’s meet the two new rookies who made a major impact this season.

Merv Jackson was a 6-3 point guard from Savannah, Georgia, who chose to play at the University of Utah (making him the only player with Utah ties on this roster). Jackson had quite the career for the Utes, earning a spot on the All-WAC First Team twice. In March 1968, he was drafted by the Los Angeles Stars. The ABA didn’t keep records of their first few drafts, so we don’t know exactly when he was drafted. He signed a contract with the Stars in May, which was still a full month before the NBA had its draft. He was selected by the Phoenix Suns, but not until the ninth round. I suspect he may have slipped that far because he had already signed with the ABA.

Jackson was a huge hit right away. Not only did he force out Steve Chubin, but he became the only rookie to participate in the All-Star Game this season. Ironically, Jackson was relegated to the All-Rookie Second Team at the end of the year. He actually spent quite a few years with the Stars, so we’ll be seeing plenty more of him.

Larry Miller (not to be confused with Larry H. Miller) was a 6-4 shooting guard who was the highest-recruited college prospect out of Pennsylvania. He chose North Carolina, where he was named ACC Player of the Year twice. With that resume, I highly suspect he was the Stars’ first-round pick in 1968. Just like Merv Jackson, Miller signed with Los Angeles well before the NBA draft was held. Miller was picked by the Philadelphia 76ers in the fifth round, but he never played in the NBA.

Miller averaged 17.0 points per game and led the Stars in total points. He also pulled down an impressive 7.7 rebounds per game. Even though he missed out on the All-Star Game, he was named to the All-Rookie First Team. And we will see him again, too.

So, how did the Stars do in their new city with their new coach and their new roster? Not much better than before. Bill Sharman had 15 players suit up in the scarlet, Carolina blue, and white. Eight of them were rookies and the rest (except for Warley) only had one year of professional experience. The Stars finished with a 33-45 record and missed the playoffs once again.

Despite having a much better home court arrangement than the Amigos had, attendance at Stars games lagged and revenue was sparse. Jim Kirst insisted that he had enough cash to keep the Stars in L.A. (unlike Art Kim) and he batted away NBA merger rumors by insisting that the league would need to accommodate both the Stars and the Lakers. Unfortunately, neither Kirst nor Hardy had a gift for promotion. Hardy’s big publicity stunt over the offseason was to dribble a basketball for 300 miles while talking to people about the Stars. He called it his “Star trek” and it sounds utterly pathetic. The Stars did, however, develop a real logo this year.

There’s some nice movement to this logo, and I still find the font quite charming in its simplicity. But I wouldn’t call this a dynamic design by any means. And I find it ironic that the team named Stars only has one tiny star in its logo. I guess the implication was that the stars would be the players themselves.

And to the credit of Kirst and Hardy, they realized their team needed star power — and bad. Desperate times call for desperate measures, and with the Stars bleeding money, they decided to offer a huge contract to a genuine NBA All-Star. Since they missed out on Wilt Chamberlain, they chose the next best thing. Or the next, next, next best thing.

Zelmo Beaty was a 6-9 center from Texas, who attended Prairie View A&M University. He led his small school to the 1962 National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics championship before being drafted third overall by the St. Louis Hawks in that same year. Beaty thrived for the Hawks, earning two All-Star honors in his seven years with the franchise (six in St. Louis, one in Atlanta). The only problem was his knees, which may have prevented Atlanta from giving him the long-term contract he was looking for in 1969.

But Kirst and Hardy were willing to gamble on Beaty’s health, and on Oct. 7, 1969, they signed Beaty to a massive four-year contract that paid him more than $200,000 a year. But there was a catch. Beaty could not legally play for the Stars in the 1969-70 season. You see, the NBA had rules in place to discourage this exact type of scenario — and they had the rulings of the courts to support them. Even though Beaty’s contract with Atlanta had expired, the Hawks still owned his rights for a full year afterward.

Beaty was well aware of this before signing with the Stars, and he seems to have made the most of the “gap year” he suddenly inherited. In addition to resting his aching knees, he took a job at a bank in Southern California to begin preparing for his post-playing career of financial planning. The Stars were quick to proclaim him as a bona fide superstar and praised the display of his dedication by moving his family with him to California. But I don’t think too many fans got terribly excited by this signing. At the very least, I can say it certainly didn’t help the Stars sell more tickets in Los Angeles.

I also have to point out another bizarre connection to Utah basketball. In February 1970, the Atlanta Hawks traded Beaty’s contract to the San Francisco Warriors for a future draft pick. And that pick ended up being Pete Maravich. It’s truly delightful how many little connections one can find in the world of basketball!

Meanwhile, in Utah …

The Salt Palace opened on July 11, 1969. The $17 million building boasted a capacity of 10,725. Although it never got to host the Winter Olympics as intended, it was able to open with winter sport tenant. The Salt Lake Golden Eagles were an expansion team of the Western Hockey League, made entirely possible by the construction of the arena. But just one year later, the Eagles would have to learn to share the Palace with a basketball team.

Before Watchmen: A most welcome surprise

Our cover by Darwyn Cooke showcases the Silk Spectre. It’s a perfectly competent image, but not terribly exciting. And the timing for it is completely off. Sally left the team last issue and has almost nothing to do in this issue. This is even more misleading than the Mothman cover.

The variant cover by Michael Cho is a very nice, standard image of the entire Minutemen lineup. However, by this point in the story, the team’s ranks have diminished quite a bit through death and dismissal. I just want my comic book covers to do a better job of reflecting the story inside — is that too much to ask?

Thankfully, our story is a big improvement over the last two Before Watchmen issues I reviewed. We begin in 1962, with Hollis asking Sally for her blessing to publish his book. Sally chews him out, calling him stupid and says he needs to pull his out of his behind. She storms away in tears, leaving a 12-year-old Laurie to awkwardly try to comfort the stunned Hollis.

We then head back to 1947, where the death of Dollar Bill has brought the Minutemen’s membership down to four. Captain Metropolis started calling fewer meetings, while Nite Owl and Mothman stalled out on trying to solve Silhouette’s missing children case. The four superheroes fell into a rut of merely going through the motions … until the Minutemen suddenly reassembled for a surprising mission. Two mysterious figures had brought them a dire warning of a possible nuclear-powered terrorist attack. Bizarrely, the figures are dressed as Bluecoat and Scout, who were comic book characters in this universe.

Just like me, Hollis strongly suspected this was another elaborate setup by Captain Metropolis, just like the infamous firework factory. But each of the Minutemen were so desperate for this mission to be real, they went along with it. Much to their surprise, it was real! A group of Japanese terrorists actually had taken over the Statue of Liberty and were about to trigger a nuclear device inside it. Mothman was wounded in the battle, and Bluecoat was killed. But Scout ended up being the hero, disarming the device, but exposing himself to a lethal amount of radiation in the process.

Scout turned out to be a teenaged Japanese boy, and Bluecoat was his father. Scout’s grandfather was the mastermind of the attack, which is how Scout and Bluecoat were able to know so much about the plan. Much to the disgust of the Minutemen, the government was too embarrassed by this incident and refused to acknowledge the heroism of a couple of Japanese men, so they immediately buried all record of the Minutemen’s finest moment. Hollis stayed with the boy as he died painfully in the hospital, choosing to give him a comforting lie in his final moments that the whole world knew of the heroic sacrifice of him and his father.

The government’s cover-up destroyed Captain Metropolis. He saw no point in being a superhero without the glory, so in 1949, he officially disbanded the Minutemen. But in 1952, the four of them were called to testify before Congress as part of the Red Scare hearings. The Hooded Justice refused to come in for questioning and simply disappeared. The other three did their part and even agreed to sign loyalty oaths and reveal their secret identities to a select few officials. Hollis correctly speculated that the Comedian was secretly one of those officials.

By 1955, we see that Hollis still hasn’t progressed in his life. Still single and childless, still a lowly police officer forced to walk a beat, and still unable to keep his promise to Silhouette. Until he finally received a tip that brought him back to the scene where he found that first boy 15 years ago. To Nite Owl’s surprise, Hooded Justice was also headed to that building. Hollis tried to assure himself that Justice was also working to solve the case, because the alternative was too horrible to consider.

While entering the building, Hollis is attacked from behind by the Hooded Justice and knocked out. When he finally awakes the next morning, he’s in a terrifying room full of blood, surgical tools, and a young boy stripped down to his underwear, blindfolded, gagged, and tied down to a table.

Now that’s what I’ve been waiting for! Sadly, that amazing cliffhanger ending was slightly spoiled by the stupid two pages of The Crimson Corsair that followed it. But we can overlook that to bask in Darwyn Cooke’s greatness. This was a man who understood the assignment. And by that, I mean Alan Moore’s original intention to tell a story about deeply flawed, unlikable characters. I almost was worried that Cooke was making the Minutemen too heroic with the Statue of Liberty mission — kind of like how I felt he did with Silhouette’s story. But the Cooke nailed the ending by having the team disband as a form of silent protest for not receiving the public adulation they craved. That selfish behavior lines up perfectly with Moore’s story.

And I have long been annoyed by Hollis’ self-righteous vanity and gossipy nature. But Cooke gave me another reason to despise him: his incompetence. Hollis really was just bad at his job. After 20 years of serving on the police force, he should have received some sort of a promotion by now. And after 15 years of working on Silhouette’s missing children case, he should have been able to come up with some tangible leads. But no, he is just a rather stupid guy. And I love that Cooke put that on full display in this issue and chose Sally Jupiter as the one to tell him because she was too upset to take the time to spell out all the reasons why Hollis should not have published his book. Not that she could have dissuaded him even if she tried. Hollis craved attention almost as much as Nelson Gardner — though he’d never admit it.

I recently got into an (almost) interesting argument on Bluesky about how I believe there are no heroes in Watchmen. The person pushing back on me insisted that the minor characters, the civilians who were vaporized at Ground Zero, were true heroes. I didn’t find that argument compelling, and I don’t need to go into it here. I only bring it up because this particular issue did include two truly heroic minor characters — Bluecoat and Scout, the nameless Japanese father-son duo who selflessly gave their lives to prevent a nuclear disaster. I don’t think these characters quite fit in with Moore’s vision, but I do at least applaud Cooke for using them as a sharp contrast to Nelson and Hollis.

A brief history of pro basketball in Utah: 1968

On December 30, 1967, Art Kim named Harry Dinnel as the new coach of the Anaheim Amigos. But Dinnel failed to the team around, guiding the Amigos to a 25-53 record in their one and only season in Anaheim. One of the many problems facing Kim’s team was his roster. Between injuries and Kim’s penchant for quickly releasing players, 20 different people suited up for the Amigos. Coincidentally, four of them had ties to BYU and one came from Utah State. Anyway, I want to quickly highlight five of these Amigos.

Ben Warley was a 6-foot-5 small forward who averaged 17.4 points and 8.6 rebounds per game, which was good enough to earn him a trip to the ABA’s inaugural All-Star Game. At 31 years old, he was the eldest Amigo and one of the few who actually had NBA experience. The Tennessee State star was drafted in the fourth round by the Minneapolis Lakers in 1960, but he failed to make the team and had to sign with the Cleveland Pipers instead. Warley thrived there and helped the Pipers win the 1961 National Industrial Basketball League championship. This caught the attention of the Syracuse Nationals, who drafted Warley with the sixth overall pick of the 1961 draft. But they didn’t call him up until 1963, giving Warley time to help the Pipers win the 1962 American Basketball League championship under head coach Bill Sharman (remember that name).

Warley joined Art Kim’s Long Beach Chiefs for the 1962-63 season, but the entire ABL abruptly folded on December 31, 1962. So he finally got to begin his NBA career in January 1963. Unfortunately, he didn’t make much of an impact for the Nationals (later renamed the Philadelphia 76ers). He averaged a career-high 8.2 points per game in 1963-64, but his contract was sold to Baltimore in 1965. In 1967, he was picked up by Seattle in the expansion draft, but he chose to return to Art Kim instead. 

His one season in Anaheim was the best of his professional career, and he was one of the few Amigos to remain on the roster after they moved to Los Angeles (although he was traded away to Denver in January 1969). Warley was out of the ABA by 1970, but he did excel in the Eastern Basketball Association, making the 1971 All-EBA Team while playing for the Camden Bullets. He bounced around in the minor leagues until 1974, when he became an assistant coach for the Philadelphia Kings of the Continental Basketball Association. In 1980, a player shortage forced him to suit up for one final time and he scored four points in his last game as a semi-professional basketball player. In 2002, he died of liver cancer at the age of 65.

Larry Bunce was Anaheim’s second All-Star — a feat that’s less impressive when you factor in the fact that the league only had 11 teams at the time. And Bunce’s selection may have been more a factor of his size than his production (12.1 points and 8.3 rebounds per game). At 7 feet tall, Bunce was the tallest player in the ABA. And I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to suggest that ABA officials were desperate to show off at least one 7-footer in their first All-Star Game.

In 1966, Bunce transferred from Riverside City College to Utah State. In 1967, he was drafted in the fourth round by Seattle, but chose to follow Ben Warley down to Anaheim. Bunce was part of the purge when the Amigos moved to Anaheim, being traded to Denver for a draft pick. Denver sent him to Dallas after 23 games, and Dallas cut him after 24. Houston picked him up for the final 11 games of the season, and Bunce’s ABA career came to an end. He then apparently tried to use his massive size to earn money through illegal ways. He was arrested in 1970 for extortion and placed on five years probation. Once that ended, he tried to revive his basketball career in Sweden in 1975.

Les Selvage was one of professional basketball’s first 3-point specialists. He led the ABA in 3-pointers made (1.9 per game) and attempted (5.9 per game, for a .319 percentage). In one game against Denver, he attempted a dizzying 26 3-pointers, making 10 of them to finish with 38 points (while the Amigos lost 142-108).

Selvage was a standout point guard at Kirksville State Teachers College and made the First Team for the Mid-America Intercollegiate Athletics Association in 1963. But that wasn’t impressive enough for any pro teams to come calling, so Selvage got a job at Douglas Aircraft in California. He continued to play amateur ball on the side, and was discovered by the Amigos. He was waived as part of the Los Angeles purge, but the Stars re-signed him for four regular season games and one playoff game in 1970. In 1991, Selvage got sick and died at the young age of 48.

Dick Lee has perhaps the funniest story of this roster. Although this 6-foot-6 forward did play three seasons at the University of Washington, he was never good enough to play professional basketball and joined the Amigos as a public relations worker. But as the season progressed and injuries mounted, the cash-strapped Kim didn’t want to sign any more players. So he asked Lee to suit up just to give Anaheim the minimum required active players. Lee was never intended to actually play any minutes, but foul trouble forced him off the bench in two separate games. He recorded one rebound and one assist and zero points in his ABA career.

Bill Crow may have the saddest story of the Amigos. In 1961, he transferred from Cerritos College to BYU, but only played in five games for the Cougars and scored a total of 10 points. So he transferred to Westminster College in Salt Lake City. Like Dick Lee, Crow was never professional basketball material, but the 6-foot-1 point guard did prove useful on Art Kim’s Washington Generals, who were specifically designed to lose to the Harlem Globetrotters. It really shows how desperate Kim was to fill his roster that he called up some of his old Generals players.

Crow played in only one game for Anaheim, scoring three points of 1-for-8 shooting from the field and 1-for-4 from the free throw line in 16 minutes of action. Afterward, according to Crow, he was waived from the team but nobody told him. He showed up to the next game with his uniform on and everything. Just moments before tipoff, one of Kim’s staffers noticed him on the bench and told him he didn’t belong there since he was no longer a member of the team. The embarrassed crow allegedly begged to stay on the bench for the game since he had friends and family in the crowd, but the staffer wouldn’t relent.

This story should give you a good sense of the kind of franchise Art Kim was running. Although he had a co-owner, James Ackerman, he simply did not have enough funds to support a professional basketball franchise. Some players, like Crow, say they were never paid. Others had to sue Kim for their paycheck. When it was all said and done, Kim and Ackerman claimed the Anaheim Amigos had lost $500,000 in its first season. However, Kim luckily found a buyer to keep the team alive.

James J. Kirst purchased the Anaheim Amigos for $450,000 — a massive increase from the $30,000 that Kim and Ackerman paid just a year prior, but not quite enough to make up for the money they claim they lost. Kim apparently was under the impression that Kirst, who owned his own construction company, would keep the Amigos in Anaheim. Instead, Kirst relocated the franchise to Los Angeles and did everything he could to distance himself from the train wreck that had been the Amigos. 

Jim Hardy was Kirst’s right-hand man and was promptly named the team’s general manager. He was tasked with cleaning house, from laying off the entire managerial staff, to waiving or trading away most of the players, to even (allegedly) burning the Amigos uniforms. To signify that this was a new franchise as much as possible, they changed the team colors from orange and black to red, white, and blue. Oh, and they picked a new name: the Los Angeles Stars.

The old Amigos logo used an orange basketball, which was rather ironic as the ABA distinguished itself by using a red, white, and blue ball. So on that alone, this logo is an upgrade. I also find a charming simplicity in the lettering. And, of course, the name is vastly better — referencing all the movie stars in and around L.A. It’s a redesign that brings a lot of optimism with it. And it was the right time to relocate.

The Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena had been home to the Lakers from 1960 to 1967. Once the Lakers moved to The Forum in Inglewood, Kirst was free to claim the 16,000-seat arena for himself. No longer would this franchise have to fight for dates at the Anaheim Convention Center.

Of course, the arena wasn’t the only reason for relocation. NBA superstar Wilt Chamberlain had grown so upset with Philadelphia that he demanded to be traded to Los Angeles (primarily so he could rub shoulders with celebrities). Chamberlain was so determined to move to L.A. that he even threatened to join the ABA. I’m not certain if Kirst ever extended an actual offer to Chamberlain, but I have no doubt it was in the back of his mind. Ultimately, though, the Lakers did make the trade and they rewarded Chamberlain with a record $250,000 contract — which Kirst never would have been able to match. He did, however, manage to land a big name for his head coach.

Bill Sharman was born in Texas but raised in Southern California, where he excelled at basically every sport he played and was named California’s Outstanding Athlete as a high school senior in 1944. After serving in the Navy for two years during World War II, Sharman played basketball and baseball at USC. He was decent at baseball, but better at basketball, where he was twice named to the All-Pacific Coast Conference First Team. In 1950, he was named a consensus first-team All-American before being drafted by the Washington Capitols in the second round. He also signed a contract with the Brooklyn Dodgers and spent the next five years playing basketball in the winter and minor league baseball in the summer. He never got called up by the Dodgers and decided to quit baseball after he broke his hand in 1955.

Sharman only played 31 games for the Capitols before the franchise folded. Ironically, he may have played a small part in the destruction of that franchise. Since he had signed with the Dodgers first, he was able to negotiate for one of the highest rookie contracts in the NBA by threatening to become a full-time baseball player. After Washington collapsed, Sharman was picked up by Fort Wayne in the dispersal draft, then immediately traded to Boston where his career took off.

During his 10 years with the Celtics, Sharman won four championships, made eight All-Star Games (winning the game’s MVP in 1955), four All-NBA First Teams, and three All-NBA Second Teams. He was later named to the NBA’s 25th, 50th, and 75th Anniversary Teams. In other words, he was an all-time great.

Sharman retired from the NBA in 1961, but he wasn’t quite done with playing basketball yet. He returned home to Southern California, where he became a player/coach for the ABL’s Los Angeles Jets. But that franchise folded in January 1962. Sharman was quickly scooped up by the Cleveland Pipers, where he focused entirely on coaching and helped the Pipers win the ABL title. Before they folded, as well.

So Sharman went back home and coached the Los Angeles State basketball team for two seasons before trying his hand at broadcasting for a couple of years. In 1966, he finally returned to the NBA as head coach of the San Francisco Warriors. Rick Barry led that team to the Finals in Sharman’s first season, but they lost to Philadelphia. In Sharman’s second season, Barry abruptly joined the ABA over a contract dispute, which may have played a role in Sharman’s departure in 1968.

Sharman actually listed several reasons for why he left the Warriors. One, he really wanted to return home to Los Angeles (this won’t be the last time he made this choice). Two, General Manager Jim Hardy was an old college buddy of Sharman’s. Three, he genuinely believed the ABA and NBA would soon merge. As strange as it sounds, there was already a lot of talk about a merger. Jim Kirst went on the record saying that when the merger occurred, the new league would simply have to have two L.A. teams because he intended to keep the Stars there forever. Hardy also liked to refer to the Lakers as Inglewood’s team, arguing that the Stars would soon become the “true” basketball team of Los Angeles.

And finally, Sharman seems to have been quite optimistic about the future of the ABA. Although the league missed out on Wilt Chamberlain, Rick Barry did headline a trend of NBA stars switching leagues. And many people (Sharman included), believed it was highly likely that Lew Alcindor (later to be known as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar) would join the ABA. Of course, none of those hopes would pan out quite like Sharman had hoped. We’ll start exploring how and why things collapsed in our next post. But just remember: the struggles of the Amigos and the Stars were only good news for the dream of professional basketball in Utah.