You Let Some Girl Beat You? (3 page)

Holed up at an Indianapolis Ramada Inn at night and Butler University during the day, the Free Agent/Rookie training camp took place inside Hinkle Fieldhouse, the same gym made famous in the movie
Hoosiers
. The tryouts lasted three days in September, and were held in the morning and again in the late afternoon. At night, I would phone my mom, steering clear of the television and newspapers. I'd hoped to avoid all the negativity surrounding my bid, but in one phone conversation I learned that Veteran Pacers player, Mike Bantom, had been quoted saying that if I was going after his job, then he was going after me whether I was a girl or not, and he hoped I didn't get hurt. My brother, Dave, had been right.

Every morning, I rode over to the gym with my trainer, Davey Craig, and the top two draft picks, Tony Zeno and Dudley Bradley. At 6'8”, Tony Zeno had played for Arizona State as a forward, and he would go on to play for the Pacers for a year before playing in Italy, where in a game against Poland, he broke a backboard with a slam-dunk. Dudley Bradley had played for the University of North Carolina and was called “the Secretary of Defense” for his prowess at forcing turnovers. He would go on to set an NBA rookie record with 211 steals.

But for now, both men were simply competitors with whom I would share a ride and the court—all three of us sporting the same Pacers practice gear, complete with knee-high socks and Adidas high-top Superstars.

During the first scrimmage, a defensive player came up behind me and set a hard screen. I recovered, pivoted to the left, and sprinted down the length of the court. I cut into the lane on the break, received a chest pass from the wing and made a left-handed lay-up. It wasn't much different from what I had done thousands of times before, whether on the courts of UCLA, or the playgrounds and high school gyms, or at the Olympics or the Pan Am Games. But now the stakes were much higher; a place in the greatest league in the world.

As a little girl, my siblings and I would huddle around the television every Sunday, consumed by the plays of our idols Bill Russell, Jerry West, and John Havlicek. We'd wait for that one NBA game all week and when it was over, we'd go outside and try to emulate their moves. In my mind, I was John Havlicek. Looking back, I don't know who my brother, Dave, pretended to be, but he'd grown up to make the dream come true. Now, incredibly, there was a chance it might happen for me, too.

However, from the sidelines, I believe the press saw something entirely different: a woman amidst a dozen guys a foot taller and as much as 100 pounds heavier. They never thought I stood a chance.

A microphone was jammed into my face by someone with one of the local stations. “A lot of people say you're in over your head, literally and figuratively.” I immediately wondered if a question would follow his comment and why there weren't any women covering the tryouts. There were easily ten cameras and a couple dozen reporters in the Hinkle Fieldhouse, and not a woman among them.

“What about taking a charge from Bob Lanier?” he persisted. “How are you going to do that?”

“Who in the NBA is going to take a charge from Bob Lanier?” I asked back. It was a stupid question.

“The WBL is saying you should promote women's basketball rather than shame yourself. How do you feel about that?”

“People can say what they want,” I said on my way out. Rather than use the women's locker room, I headed toward the ladies' bathroom, where I knew I couldn't be followed.

On the way, I overheard one of the players talking to the press. “She's good, but she doesn't deserve to be here.”

Certainly, he had a right to his opinion, and I appreciated his honesty, but I didn't agree. While everyone on the court could play, some of them just didn't seem to fully understand the game. On defense, there was a guy who would get lost, another couldn't read a pick. One didn't understand how to run the floor on a fast break. I still liked my chances, regardless what this guy thought; what any of them thought.

I'd long developed the ability to brush off comments made by my male opponents. I'd heard them all through the years, whether from boys, young men, or seasoned pros. I'd seen them express every emotion possible, from awe to exasperation, heard every type of remark, from nasty to admiring, and I'd learned long ago not to let their feelings affect me. Now more than ever, though, I had to make certain nothing got inside my head. I had to play my best.

Was I knocked down? You bet. But I knew how to fall and get back up because I'd done it so many times before. When a 6'10” center went up for a rebound, he brought the ball down below his waist, which gave me the chance to sneak in close, turn up my palm, and pop the ball loose in order to stop the fast break.

I had learned throughout my years playing that the majority of guys would bring the ball too low on a rebound. At UCLA, we were taught to bring the ball to our chests. Because of my size, I could sneak in there and give a little jab, and the ball would pop out of their hands. We both went for the ball, and in the scramble, he knocked me to the ground. I jumped right back up. I needed them to see it was no big deal because, to me, it wasn't. I had done my job, he was trying to do his. That's just part of basketball, and I needed both the coaches and the players to realize that I didn't require special treatment; the latter for their sake, as well as mine.

John Kuester, who was a free agent guard from North Carolina and played for Dean Smith, showed up for tryouts. Everybody called him “Q” because his last name was pronounced Q-ster. Q and I were in a one-on-one drill, and as I hustled back on defense, we collided and I went down. I was fine, but John's natural instinct was to worry that he'd hurt me.

He bent down next to me. “Are you okay, Annie?”

He was such a good guy and, like most of the players there, he'd been conditioned his whole life to take it easy on girls, not to play too rough. Now he was being asked to do just the opposite. We were both playing our hardest at what is a very physical game. We were going to get knocked down, but John wasn't prepared to knock a woman down. After his playing days, he became the head coach for the Detroit Pistons before going on to become an assistant coach for the Lakers.

Seeing John check to make sure I was okay brought on the ire of Jack McCloskey, Indiana's assistant coach. “That's it! Everybody over here!” Jack was running practice while Slick watched from the sidelines. He had been with the LA Lakers, and became the GM of the Detroit Pistons in the 80s during their heyday. But he was far from happy that day watching us practice. “You're gonna stop this bullshit now!”

He lit into all of us with the longest, saltiest tirade I'd ever heard. Cursing was a collateral skill developed on basketball courts the world-over, but Jack's pointed list of superlatives effectively worked to shake the reticence out of every player there and replace it with an unbridled determination to play at full throttle. By using the most over-the-top language imaginable, he didn't just give the other players permission to behave ungentlemanly around a woman, he demanded that they go out there and play without constraint of any kind.

“Forget about the cameras and the reporters, and the fact that they're here because of Annie. She's no different than any of us. Now get out there and play!”

His words got through, and I saw an immediate change in the players. It became a turning point in the tryouts. I could sense the relief. There was a freedom to the movement after that. The drills had more energy, more focus. From my perspective, it meant I was one of them. Jack had called me into the circle and spoke the same way to all of us. From that point on, I felt that I had Jack on my side.

“Fundamentally, she's better than half the guys out there,” he told one of the reporters at the break.

During the afternoon scrimmage, the opposing team made a lay-up on a fast break. Jack had been urging us to push the ball up the floor as quickly as possible. As I took the in-bounds pass, I looked up the court to see my teammate streaking down the wing. I wanted to fire him an outlet pass so we could put pressure on the opposing defense before they had a chance to set up. But he didn't even turn his head. On the next offensive possession, I was dribbling with my left hand at the top of the key and looking over the defense. I called for a pick from one of my forwards, planning to use the screen to either pull up for an open jump shot or hit him with a pass as he rolled to the basket, but he didn't move an inch from the block. He just sort of went “Huh?” After Jack's directive, it was impossible to believe that these guys were just playing dumb, knowing that it would jeopardize their own standing.

“How do you feel you played this afternoon?” one of the reporters asked me later that day. I told him I'd played well, but was a little slower at one point than I could have been. The following day the headline read, “Meyers Finds NBA Tougher Than She Thought.”

I wouldn't have seen it had the paper not been left open near the bench where our trainer, Davey Craig, taped my ankles every morning.

My interaction with the press in college had always been so positive.
People Magazine, Sports Illustrated, TIME,
whichever outlet it was, whenever I had been asked a question, I answered honestly. Though I wasn't big on reading about myself, the press had always been very kind, glowing even. Now I worried that no matter what I said, it would be misconstrued. If there was anything I was sure of, it was that I had never been better prepared; mentally, emotionally, or physically. I believed I had as good a shot as anyone. It surprised me that many sportswriters had made up their minds before the trials had even begun.

After all, it had only been three years since Billie Jean King beat Bobby Riggs on a national platform, and the press seemed to rally around what was the most widely anticipated tennis match of the year. There were His and Hers camps. Regardless of which side of the court you sat on in that battle of the sexes, there was almost universal support for the concept. Billie Jean became the face of feminist women everywhere. Why were things so different in this situation? Was the skill set really so different when it came to basketball? Sure, men can run faster and jump higher, but there were always exceptions to the rule.

If I found some of the press comments demeaning, the other players likely found them humorous. I was certainly not unaccustomed to feeling like an outsider. In fact, I was used to it. But these circumstances magnified my sense of isolation. Never once did I regret being there, though. It was the opportunity of a lifetime, and I was playing my heart out. While it was difficult having cameras come within inches of me out on the court, I realized they were just doing their jobs.

Late in the afternoon of the second day, someone shouted out a question at me. “Miss Meyers, I wonder, do you ever feel like Jackie Robinson?”

I was humbled by the comparison. He and I had both played several sports and held several records at UCLA, but my name didn't deserve to be used in the same sentence with Jackie Robinson's. He had opened doors for millions who had been shut out for too long. I wish I could say that I had had some greater plan, some burning desire to make inroads on behalf of all woman-kind, but that would be a lie. My only thought was making the team. Still, I appreciated that someone was acknowledging the historic aspect of what I was trying to achieve. I'm proud to be on the Board of Directors of Jackie Robinson's foundation, which generates millions of dollars worth of scholarships for minorities every year.

Pride and historic attributes aside, my body was aching by the afternoon of the second day, and I iced whatever hurt. Mentally, I stayed focused and willed myself to the next practice. By the afternoon session of the third day, the Hinkle Fieldhouse smelled of war; of the raw combat that had been the domain of men, of battlefields where women existed only as sweet distractions, and it was inconceivable that one might actually consider herself a competent warrior. Yet, there I was. Only I was no Joan of Arc; I simply wanted to play basketball, and I wanted to play with the best. In my mind it was a question of ability, of potential, of seizing the ultimate opportunity. Was I exhausted? Yes. Was I aching? Yes. Did I believe that I'd make the cut? Yes.

During a two-on-two drill, I had the ball when a defender reached in. I ripped the ball through, pivoted away, and blew past him. I got to the hoop, made a reverse lay-up, and scored.

Later in the session, Dudley Bradley stole the ball and exploded down court on a two-on-one fast break. I thought he was going to get all the way to the hoop, but the defender cut him off, and Dudley passed the ball back to me. I pulled up and hit a jumper from the top of the key, just as I had done hundreds of times before.

In the final scrimmage of the day, I pulled down a rebound and drove the ball quickly up the court. I faked a pass to the corner and then stepped into a three pointer, knowing it'd be difficult to get a shot off amongst the big trees inside. It looked good when it left my hand, but it went in and out.

When the session ended, Slick Leonard called me over. I followed him into one of the Butler University classrooms adjoining the gym. He pulled up a chair and sat with his back to the door so that the photographers, who were on the other side vying for a space in the small window of the door, couldn't see his face.

I sat on the desk across from him and watched the press jockey for position.
Location, location, location
, I thought. It seemed whether you were an investor, a photographer, or a basketball player trying to get a shot off, it always came down to real estate. At least that's what I kept telling myself. I was trying to think of anything to stay cool. I realized it could go either way.

“When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us.”
~ Helen Keller

“
Annie you did a great job.”

Badabing
,
Badabing
,
Badabing.
The way my heart raced I was afraid it might explode right out of my chest. Adrenaline. Great if you had something to do with it, lousy if you were just sitting there, waiting for test results. I exhaled slowly.
Was this really happening? Was I really about to become the first woman to make it into the NBA?

Then I heard Slick mumble something about wishing those guys had my heart.

I was so naïve. I still thought I'd made it. I didn't realize that some people like to prop you up before they lower the boom.

“I wish you had their height,” he said next.

Everything after that was just a jumble of sounds, the wonky-talk of Charlie Brown's teacher. He never said the words
you're cut.
But that was all I heard from that point on. I put my head down, and stared at the floor. I didn't ask why they weren't afraid to draft Charlie Criss at 5'8”. Why bother? We both knew what Slick was really thinking:
Hey you got your shot, now get lost
. I felt sick, it was hard to breathe. I could feel my throat tightening and the sting of tears forming around the backs of my eyes, tears that would spill over onto my cheeks if I blinked, confirming Slick's bible-like conviction that no woman, anywhere, was tough enough to play in the NBA. I kept looking straight down at that scuffed-up classroom floor, breathing through my mouth, eyes wide-open the whole time. There was no way I'd cry in front of Slick, and I refused to give the press the satisfaction. I waited until I got back to my hotel room to cry, where it was hard to stop.

I believed I had what it took to make it in the NBA, not as a starting player, or even a sixth player, necessarily, but as a team member. I couldn't justify Slick's decision. I knew I'd played hard, run the offense efficiently, and hit plenty of shots during the tryout. Had he not seen them? Sure, he'd have gotten all sorts of flak from the press and probably would have taken some nasty remarks from fans who thought the whole idea of a woman playing in the NBA was preposterous. But we both knew I had the support of the owner. It was doubtful Slick had missed the newspaper quote from assistant coach, Jack McCloskey, saying I was fundamentally better than half the players out there.

I had spent the last three days playing my heart out against the top NBA players in the country, and everything from my sneakers to my forehead showed the wear and tear. Yes, they were bigger and stronger, but I had played smart, the way any good, small player must. I had given it everything I had. I had forfeited my chance to play in the '80 Olympics (none of us knew then there would be no '80 Olympics), and I'd trained like never before. And I had prayed. I had done everything within my power to prove that I could play among the best. But none of it was enough to convince Slick. I felt empty, discarded, spent. I was devastated.

I realize now that it would have taken a Bill Veck, the owner of the Cleveland Indians who hired a midget named Eddie Gaedel to bat, or a Phil Esposito, or a Charley Finley to have made my dream happen. It would have taken someone who was willing to try something unusual and say “to hell with the flak”—a Barnum and Bailey kind of guy who realized that sometimes you have to shake things up to get people in the stands. And at that time, the Pacers were having trouble filling up the seats. Sam Nassi was exactly that guy. He believed in me. He knew I could get the job done. It was unfortunate his coach couldn't get beyond my size and plumbing. Of course, back then it didn't feel
unfortunate
, it felt like I'd taken a wrecking ball straight to the gut. I sank into my hotel bed that night and eventually drifted off to the sounds of metal springs and sobbing, and descended into a world where basketballs, coaches, and the Hinkle Fieldhouse didn't exist.

The next morning, I took a cold rag to eyes mercifully too young to fully reveal the previous night's anguish, then slipped into a beautiful crimson dress. Gazing at my reflection, I knew I looked pretty, which was a personal sticking point with me for this day. I broadened my shoulders, lifted my chin and forced the corners of my mouth to turn up. “Let's do this thing.”

The Pacers were hosting a luncheon for the sponsors, and I was expected to speak. Crestfallen as I was, I'd never let it show. And in this dress, anyone who suspected otherwise would have their proof that beneath the basketball jersey, I was 100% female.

When I walked into the room, heads turned, and I'll admit I was glad.
Let them see that I'm not some freak. Let them understand that I'm a basketball player who just happens to be a woman.

Bob Lamey, the play-by-play radio announcer for the Pacers games, was the first to congratulate me on my brief talk at the Pacers luncheon. “Nice speech, Ann.”

Giving a speech was okay, but what was next for me? Since I'd signed a three-year contract with the Pacers, it took several weeks for the organization to decide what they were going to do with me. Eventually, they decided I'd make appearances across the country and capitalize on the publicity. I signed with the William Morris Agency and did a Seven-Up commercial with Magic Johnson (who, along with Larry Bird, comprised that year's most eagerly anticipated college draft picks). In between appearances and commercials, I sat in the booth with Bob Lamey as the Pacer's color analyst, a position my brother, Mark, had negotiated into the personal service agreement should I not make the cut. Seems I was still carving new territory, since no woman had ever broadcast an NBA game before.

“So you're my new sidekick, huh?” Bob said the next time I saw him. He'd never worked with a color analyst before, not during his announcing the Pacers games, or those of the two Indiana hockey teams. Now he would have to share the microphone, and with a woman no less. It was clear from the start that Bob liked sitting next to some dame delivering her bent on the finesse of the game about as much as Slick had liked the idea of my playing with the Pacers. They'd both have preferred to see a proctologist.

It didn't take long for the letters to flow:
“
W
hat's a woman doing broadcasting a man's game?”
I had taken a broadcasting course at UCLA with Professor Art Friedman and had broadcast two UCLA Men's Basketball games, but I still had plenty to learn.

“Did you see that?” I'd yell into the radio microphone and Bob would turn to me with this distressed look, mouthing
“Huh?”

And the letters kept coming. “
You don't know what you're talking about, lady
.”

The Midwestern mores that had bred men like Slick and Bob, and which permeated the region, weren't much different from the values my siblings and I were raised with, except with one big exception: Men and women were equal. We grew up with gender-blind parents, who believed their six daughters could do anything that their five sons could do. In return, we didn't balk when the full force of an older brother's tackle was felt. There was no complaining, no “fairer-sex” allowances. We learned to hold our own. Now I hoped to hold my own with Bob Lamey in the broadcasting booth, but it wouldn't be easy. Bob didn't like it, and neither did the fans. “
Whose lame idea was this?”
one of the letters asked. It could have been worse. It could have been a radio call-in show. The talk around the water cooler wasn't much better.

Sandy Knapp, the head of public relations for the Pacers and the first woman in the NBA on the corporate side, put it succinctly. “I'm going to be straight with you, I didn't like the idea of you going out for the Pacers any more than anyone else.” The tone of her voice set my hair on end. Sandy had been the one assigned to fly back and forth with me to do the New York City morning shows when the news of the bid first surfaced; and at 6'1”, everybody thought
she
was the basketball player.

“What if you get hurt out there?” she asked during one of our flights.

“Well, I don't expect to get hurt. I've learned not to think that way.”

“What about all this publicity? Is that why you're doing it?”

“Gosh no! I wish I didn't have to fly to N.Y. for these interviews because it's taking away from my workout time.” I didn't know what she expected me to say.

Once Sandy realized I wasn't hunting for the limelight, and that I had no intention of capitalizing on the publicity or trying to turn it into some sort of money-machine, she warmed up, and we became close friends.

I think the fact that I was doing the color commentary kind of tickled her and her husband, who both decided to let me live with them while I looked for an apartment in Indiana. Broadcasting the NBA games may have invited the same kind of backlash that the tryouts had, but at least this time it wasn't from the press, and now I had Sandy in my corner.

The Knapps were very kind about helping ease the transition to living out-of-state and away from my family. Best of all, they insulated me from the fanged barbs of those few in the Pacers organization who were still vexed at the thought of having me around for the next three years.

In late September, with the Pacers' blessing, I accepted a three–day invitation to compete in ABC's
Superstars
competition, a televised decathlon-type event held in the Bahamas in December. I'd seen the show before. There were the men's
Superstars
and the women's
Superstars
. Both popular shows created all-around sports competitions and showcased elite athletes like Mark Spitz, Joe Frazier, O.J. Simpson, and Mark Gastineau in the men's competitions; and the likes of Mary Jo Peppler, Anne Henning, and Linda Fernandez for the women's competitions. It looked like something I'd be good at. The broadcasting booth wasn't getting any cozier with Bob, and my body and soul were aching for athletic competition. It had been my lifeblood for as far back as I could remember. Without it, I was still me, but an anemic version.

The weeks passed as I waited for December and the
Superstars
. But by November, I couldn't stand it anymore. I was itchy to play basketball, and the only way that was going to happen was if I played with the WBL, which meant breaking my NBA contract. I asked my agent at William Morris to quietly contact the WBL to discuss the possibility of reconsidering their offer. That's when we learned that the New Jersey Gems had gained me in a swap with the Houston Angels.

My agent asked me if I'd like to play for the Gems. It was a tough decision. On one hand, I sorely missed playing basketball. On the other, I had entered into an agreement with the Pacers, and I considered myself a woman of my word. I wouldn't break the contract lightly. Besides, the WBL had attacked me in the press after I'd declined to join their league, and now I was finding out that, for whatever reason, I'd been traded. I suppose in their eyes, I'd rebuffed the WBL only to turn around and go out for the NBA, and that was a slap in the face.

Would I like to play for them? Enough to break my contract with the Pacers?

I wanted to play basketball, that much I knew; but at what cost? The WBL commissioner, Bill Byrne, had publicly skewered me after I'd spurned his league to try out for the Pacers. One paper quoted him as saying, “There are ten people better than she is. Her time has come and gone.”

At twenty-four?
I was at the top of my game, and I knew I had another ten years, easy, before I'd peak. He also said that I was embarrassing myself in the bid to play with the big boys. Little did I realize this was his way of using the press to get exposure for the upstart WBL.

I, however, took it very personally. My whole life, I'd been raised never to speak ill of anyone, even in response to something nasty they'd said about me. It was difficult to think this man, whom I'd never met would lie about me. To my way of thinking, Sam Nassi had given me a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to pursue my dream, and it was fundamentally, almost morally, wrong to pass that up. Commissioner Byrne and I both knew there was no WBL player alive who, given the same opportunity, wouldn't leap out of her league to get a stab at the NBA if she really thought she was good enough. Furthermore, she'd do it so fast, she'd leave a whirlwind in her wake.

Now, after all the things Byrne had said about me in the past, suddenly, he was saying, “Annie, we're so glad you're going to come on board.”

Well, I wasn't buying it. It was the WBL who was doing an about face. They still wanted me in their league, even though there was lingering resentment about my bid for the Pacers rather than signing with the Houston Angels. The praise continued. Lynette Sjoquist, the PR director for the Philadelphia Fillies after being waived as player during the '78-'79 season, told the press, “We were anxious for a player of Meyers's caliber to join the WBL.”

It was odd how quickly things could change. She responded to a press clip that stated the WBL might actually have a bona-fide star now that I was considering joining by saying, “That's what the league certainly needed, was talent—all the talent we could find for us to cultivate a following.” Only months earlier, her boss had publicly said that I'd given up my integrity for $50,000 (the press wasn't aware that my brother had negotiated a three year contract for $150,000) by insinuating, as much of the media had, that my NBA bid was an attempt to remain in the limelight after what was considered a spectacular college career. It was hard to keep up.

In all honesty, had I been truly seeking the limelight, I definitely would have capitalized on the publicity after the trials. It wasn't like there was a booming job market for a Sociology major that would pay $50,000 a year. I knew that if any woman could play in the NBA, I could.