Its always interesting to me when great players fall through the cracks. Its a fascinating discussion, even among hall of famers: what causes certain players to live on for casual basketball fans? Many times its the numbers, the titles, or the iconic plays that stand out so brightly that nobody can ignore them. I guess to put it simply, quiet greatness doesn't stand out.
Death seems to force us to remember the best about a person. We seem to be in that stage now with Moses Malone. There have been the obligatory career summations on ESPN and other sports outlets,
covering his tremendous rebounding, longevity, and MVP seasons. All very significant points in the historical player discussions that he is so often left out of, but they all seem to ignore the color and incredible story of his career. If someone were to look back 50 years later at the obituaries produced for basketball players in the September of 2015, they would conclude Darryl Dawkins and Moses were about the same in terms of impact on the league. I love chocolate thunder as much as anyone, but this is an attempt to prove them wrong.
This is a young Moses Malone. Much has been made about him being the first player to go straight from high school to the pros, and while that is historically significant, the ride that young Moses went on between his first and third year of pro basketball is one of the most incredible and "what if?" worthy in the history of not just basketball, but all of professional sports. It was sort of a perfect storm. Moses entered the ABA in 1974 signing a 1 million dollar contract (one of the famous back loaded ones that had payouts 25 years down the line) with the Utah Stars, who promptly folded the following season. He was picked up by the immortal Spirits of Saint Louis, the ultimate head case team, featuring Marvin "Bad News" Barnes (who unfortunately also passed away relatively
recently) of "I'm not getting in that damn time machine!" fame when asked to get on a plane that, because of a time change, landed before it took off. Along with the rest of the zany crew (See Terry
Pluto's Loose Balls for details) its a miracle a 19 year old Moses didn't end up showing up to games 2 minutes before tip wearing a mink coat, with only his uniform on underneath, and a bag of
Mcdonalds (yes Barnes did this also, and it is the writers opinion this moment should be immortalized in bronze).
So it was probably for the best when the ABA reached a merger agreement with the NBA, which set the stage for Moses Malone to switch teams five times in less than a year. It began when the New Orleans Jazz picked him first in the NBA's pre-merger draft of "underage" players at the expense of a first round pick. They quickly went back on their decision, however, and asked for their pick back. They received it, and Moses was thrown into the general merger dispersal draft. The pick and 3 others were used to "pry" Gail Goodrich away from Los Angles, and even though its almost impossible to justify choosing a 33 year old shooting guard over a future 3 time MVP or Magic Johnson (the 1979 first overall pick by the Lakers from the Jazz) I guess when you've got a chance to get a past his prime shooting guard for 3 first rounders you've got to do it.
Moses next found himself in Portland when they picked him in the dispersal draft, but the Blazers refused to pay his 300,000 dollar a year salary. So they didn't read much into the only 21 year old Malone challenging Bill Walton and Maurice Lucas (at the time the most dominate big man pairing in the league) in training camp. He played one tremendous exhibition game for them, which finally caused everyone involved to realize that they had a potential super star on their hands. They rushed to stop the trade talks, but as fate would have it, higher ups had already agreed to traded him to buffalo for a first round pick and 232,000 $ (lord knows why that number).
This obviously leaves the most haunting impression. The 77' blazers are revered for playing some of the best team basketball of the last half century. They won the title even after loosing Moses, but as we know, Walton s feet fell apart, and the hopes of a franchise crumbled with them. Its impossible to say what the exact impact would have been, but we know that with Malone there to take Walton's minutes (and a lot of his production) they wouldn't have felt pressured to rush him back. He was exactly what the Blazers needed, they just didn't know it yet.
The Braves (now Clippers) were also not interested. Its a miracle this picture exists because Moses only played 6 minutes over two games for them before they sent him to Houston for two first rounders. The question lingers for Buffalo/San Diego/Los Angles, With Bob McAdoo steaming about his contract and likely to be traded, why not just keep Moses around? The picks didn't pan out because Moses finally found a franchise willing to give him a chance in Houston, and his production there was obviously a huge part of what would quickly making those picks irrelevant.
The rest, to some extent, is history. Moses would go down a the best statistical offensive rebounder ever (its not close he holds the career, season, and game, records along with having lead the league nine times and finishing top three another five) third most total rebounds, and 8th all time in scoring. Throw 12 time all-star, 8 time first or second team all NBA, and the Championship and Finals MVP with the Sixers (what makes the Moses poster is the Nike staff, and also just the shear amount of basketballs) and Moses made an incredible career for himself despite the early instability. He stayed committed even in situations like the ABA where anything went, and believed in himself enough not to be discouraged by the ridiculous turn of events that kept him hopping from one team to another when the leagues merged. He played 21 years in the NBA retiring with the spurs in 1995. But his significance can only really be grasped by the number of teams that didn't realize what they had. Bill Simmons puts it best in the Book of Basketball: "so if you're scoring at home, Moses hot potato ended up swinging the destinies of six franchise in fewer than five months: New Orleans, Los Angeles (drafted Magic), Buffalo, Houston (made 81 finals with him) and Philly (acquired from Houston won title)." So many of us are in the same stage now all those unwitting executives were when Moses entered the league. They didn't realize his significance until he was already gone.
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