Coach picks Wilt as greatest ever

Legendary coach and recent Manila visitor George Raveling made a startling “ravelation” when he chose Wilt Chamberlain over his good friend Michael Jordan as the greatest basketball player ever. Raveling explained his choice during a dinner with friends and Nike executives at Abe’s, a popular restaurant in Serendra at the Fort.

“Nobody had as much impact on the game as Wilt,” he said. “He caused several rule changes like the three-second violation, widening of the lane, leaving the free throw line to go for the rebound only after the ball hits the rim and no inbounding behind the board. Bill (Russell) won more championships but that’s not the criterion when choosing the best player of the game.”

Raveling said during his high school days, Chamberlain used to deliberately miss a free throw so he could get the rebound and score two points on the put-back. His teammates also used to inbound behind the backboard and loop the ball over the top for Chamberlain to grab and dunk for an easy field goal. Basketball officials changed the rules to negate Chamberlain’s tricks. Those deliberate free throw misses could’ve resulted in Chamberlain’s atrocious marksmanship from the 15-foot line that haunted his pro career, chuckled Raveling.

As for Jordan, Raveling said he’ll always remain a close friend. They became intimately acquainted when Raveling was an assistant coach on the 1984 US Olympic team where Jordan starred. Eventually, they were both contracted by Nike. Raveling is now Nike director of international basketball for global sports marketing while Jordan is CEO of his exclusive signature Nike brand.

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Raveling said Jordan is probably now more passionate about golf than basketball. “He’ll play 36 holes a day under any weather condition,” said Raveling. “When I need to talk to him, I text him to expect my call in like, five minutes. He always picks up when I call. We don’t really talk about Nike. We just catch up and talk about family. The last time I saw him was during his recent wedding (with model Yvette Prieto) in Florida.”

Raveling was in coach Bobby Knight’s staff with the US team that won the Olympic gold medal in 1984 in Los Angeles. Others in the staff were Don Donoher and C. M. Newton. “We invited 86 players to try out and three who didn’t make it were future Hall of Famers, Karl Malone, John Stockton and Charles Barkley,” said Raveling. “I learned a lot from Bobby. His plan was to use basically an eight-man rotation so that the last four players on the team were picked on the basis of attitude, that they wouldn’t bitch if they didn’t play. After picking the 12 players, Bobby visited everyone’s home and talked with each player’s parents. Just before leaving each home, Bobby told the parents it was the last time they’d talk. Bobby would sometimes kick a player out of practice and one day, it was Leon (Wood). It happened that Leon’s mom came to practice that day and saw him sitting on the steps outside the gym.” Wood became an NBA player, ended his career in the PBA and is now an NBA referee.   

Raveling said the last four players on the squad – Steve Alford, Joe Kleine, Jon Koncak and Jeff Turner – wound up logging minutes because the US swept the tournament with an average winning margin of 32.1 points. In the first game against China, Jordan scored 16 straight points to open the fireworks. With the US up 18-0, Knight called a timeout. “Bobby asked every player what was written on his jersey, he asked Chris (Mullin), Sam (Perkins), Pat (Ewing), everyone,” said Raveling. “USA was on the jersey, not Michael Jordan and the All-Stars. That was Bobby’s way of sending the message that it wasn’t Michael’s team, that it was a USA team, that nobody would be the star on the team.”

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A fighter who was at the Wild Card Gym during The Star’s recent visit to Los Angeles was Nigerian Wale Omotoso, a welterweight like Manny Pacquiao. Omotoso, 28, turned pro in 2006 and lived in Australia before relocating to the US with his family two years ago. He said he’s sparred with Miguel Cotto but never with Pacquiao.

“It would be an honor to spar with Manny,” said Omotoso whose record is 23-1, with 19 KOs. The 5-10 1/2 Nigerian suffered his first loss in Carson City last March, bowing to Jessie Vargas on points for the vacant WBC Continental Americas welterweight title. Vargas was down from a body shot in the second round but Omotoso couldn’t finish him off. Omotoso now lives in Oxnard, California.

While in Australia, Omotoso demolished a variety of fighters from the Philippines, Thailand, Korea, Indonesia, Argentina, New Zealand and the US.  Two of his knockout victims were Filipinos Glen Masicampo and Ariel Omongos.