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NBA FINALS: SPURS v HEATJune 11, 2013Rick CarlisleBill FitchMichael GoldbergSAN ANTONIO, TEXAS: Game Three THE MODERATOR: Good evening, everyone. Welcome to the announcement of the 2013 Chuck Daly Coaches Lifetime Achievement Award. To begin here is executive director of the NBA Coaches' Association Michael Goldberg. MICHAEL GOLDBERG: Thank you very much. Good evening. Michael Goldberg, executive director of the NBA Coaches' Associations, all of our head assistant coaches and our lovely alumni group. We're here for a special evening. It's been about five years since Chuck Daly passed. And we have a great honoree tonight. We're going to let Rick Carlisle, president of the Coaches' Association take over. Have a nice evening. RICK CARLISLE: Thanks, Michael. Thank you, Adam, Mark and Brian McIntyre to allow us this opportunity every year at The Finals to present this award that we feel is important. It honors the memory of one of our great coaches in history, Hall of Famer Chuck Daly, who brought great integrity, competitive excellence and he was always a promoter of our game and our sport. So this award yearly goes to someone who has a body of work that mirrors those great qualities. Tonight it's my pleasure‑‑ first of all, I want to go through the guys on the committee. We've got a committee of eight guys that have some sort of connection to Chuck: Billy Cunningham, Donnie Walsh, Gregg Popovich, Lenny Wilkins, Pat Riley who is here, Joe Dumars who is new on the committee, obviously was part of those great teams in Detroit, Bernie Bickerstaff and Phil Jackson. As Michael mentioned, this is the fifth year of the award. The first year went to Tom Heinsohn. Second year co‑winners Tex Winter Jack Ramsey. In '11 it was Lenny Wilkens. Last year it was Pat Riley in Miami, which was a great event for us. This year goes to the guy on my right. I'll tell you one quick story, if I could: In the fall of 1989 I was finishing up a very unillustrious playing career in New Jersey, playing for a team that was headed for the deep lottery. And I made the team and I was there for about a month. Coach Fitch was the head coach of the team. I was so sure that I wasn't going to be around long, that I was staying with my future in‑laws at their house in Hoboken, New Jersey. So the phone rang one day, and I always thought my mother‑in‑law had it in for me. She goes Rick, "It's Coach on the phone." I knew there was bad news coming. So Coach got on the phone. He said, "Well, you're waived." He kind of had that tongue‑in‑cheek tone to his voice. I started to thank him for the opportunity. He said, "No, no, no, no, wait a minute." He says, "You're waived. You know we're bringing back this other guy, who is a good player." He goes, "But you know, I only have one assistant coach here. So if you're interested, I have an assistant coaching job. It won't pay much but it will be an opportunity for you to get in the business. And you know, you might like it. You may be good at it. Who knows. So think about it, and let me know what you think." So had it not been for Coach Fitch, I certainly wouldn't be here. It was a great break in my career. I'll tell you one other story which I think typifies his personality and one of the reasons that he was such a beloved guy in this league: Our first year we won the first two games, I became a coach, and we went 15‑65 the rest of the way. So we're sitting in a hotel room post game in Phoenix, Arizona in the spring. We're on a big huge losing streak. So he says to me, he turns off the film‑‑ and this is the days before charters, so we weren't leaving the town that night. So we're sitting there looking at the film, he turns it off and he says, "Rick, I have one question for you: How does it make you feel to know that you weren't good enough to make this team?" (Laughter). And I don't remember my exact response. But I was thinking, I hope coaching goes better. I want to mention a few facts about Coach Fitch. He was a 25‑year head coach in this league. He amassed over 900 victories. In each situation that he was in, he was a guy that took broken franchises or expansion teams and turned them into winners. And because of that, he absorbed a lot of losses. But he was in Cleveland for nine years. Took them from beginning expansion to Conference Finals in '76. In Boston at that time he took over a team that had the biggest turnaround in NBA history to that point and Larry Bird, Robert Parish and Kevin McHale will all tell you that he had great impacts on their careers becoming Hall‑of‑Fame careers. He took them to the championship in his first year. In Houston he took a 29‑win team to the NBA championship in the third year. In New Jersey he took a 17‑win team to the playoffs, and with the Clippers he took a 17‑win team to the playoffs. So he's had a massively successful career. We humbly hope that Hall of Fame Committee is maybe peeking in on this, because Coach Fitch is one of the guys we feel is still deserving of consideration. This is a guy that's eighth all time in wins. Eighth all time in coaching wins and third all time in games coached, over 2,050 games coached. So it's my privilege, he's a two‑time Coach of the Year, NBA champion in 1981, to introduce the 2013 recipient of the Chuck Daly Lifetime Achievement Award, Bill Fitch. (Applause). Okay, Coach, you're welcome to say a few words now. BILL FITCH: It's like anything else, I'm sitting here and listening to Michael and listening to Rick and the good Lord might know what I'm going to say, and then they put the mike in front of me, and just the good Lord knows. So I find it is really‑‑ I'm very blessed and humbled with this award because Chuck was a good friend of mine. The guys that have been rewarded before me are all great guys and great coaches and guys that I've been proud to participate against. Pat sitting there. A guy sitting in the front row that beat the heck out of me in Oakland and in Japan. It's just a great honor to get an honor that's given to you by your peers, by the coaches. We don't have enough time for me to name all the great assistant coaches, the great trainers, team doctors, all those people that really combined their efforts to get me a few of those wins that I wrote in Rick's notes for him to read. It's something that I never felt I ever had a job. It was always I wasn't going to work. Coaching was just a continuation of competing, and from the day I was eight years old and I gave myself to Jesus Christ as my savior, and every night I've prayed since then just giving thanks that I was able to participate in sports and then to coach. I've got one thing that I asked, and I hope that they do it, I asked if you give me a trophy, for God's sake, get somebody to help me and guard me, because if George Gervin is around here, he'll take it from me. I never come to thiscity‑‑ Old Gerv could spoil a good night. Again, all I can say is thanks. Michael, you've done a great job. I can remember the days when we couldn't spell comp, pension or anything like that. And between you and Russ Granik and Tommy Heinsohn, it was something that none of us at the time ever thought that we would have. And now you have to carry on. RICK CARLISLE: I have a couple of other facts you might find interesting: Coach Fitch coached Phil Jackson at the University of North Dakota. Do you remember what year that was? BILL FITCH: I went there in 1973. Got him in '74. RICK CARLISLE: University of North Dakota. What year was that? He played for you, right? BILL FITCH: Yes. I went there '69. '73, how can I remember that? I'm 91 years old, I can't remember what I did yesterday. RICK CARLISLE: Here's the other one: Coach Fitch coached Bob Gibson in baseball and basketball, correct? BILL FITCH: Correct. RICK CARLISLE: At North Dakota, correct? BILL FITCH: No, in Creighton. RICK CARLISLE: This guy has done a lot of things. BILL FITCH: Gibby, he came out in basketball the same year‑‑ he and Dave Bing. You would have to flip a coin to see which one of those guys won. Gib could throw a curveball, and finally started throwing that thing. Somehow or another he made it to the Hall of Fame but in a different sport; he made it in baseball. Actually I started out scouting Phil as a baseball player. He ended up in the Hall of Fame as a basketball player. THE MODERATOR: We can open up to questions. BILL FITCH: There's a good‑looking young man over there with his hand up. RICK CARLISLE: Mr. Commissioner, how are you, sir? COMMISSIONER DAVID STERN: Would you like your fines back? BILL FITCH: (Laughing) You couldn't afford to do it. You couldn't afford to give them all back to me. I was just telling a true story. You got Steve Javie on television now, and I've got a whole toilet room papered with just the technicals that he sent with your name on it (laughter). COMMISSIONER DAVID STERN: Is it true that you went through every game to make sure that the team you were playing didn't have more rest than your teams did? BILL FITCH: True. MICHAEL GOLDBERG: Touché. BILL FITCH: We're going to miss‑‑ I got some stuff I'm sending you in the mail, quotes and so forth. I give Brian McIntyre some information for you to take out and pass along. I've already warned your predecessor he's got really a tough job ahead of him. Q. When you think about all the things you have accomplished in your career, what stands out in your mind that you see as the legacy that people will remember you by? BILL FITCH: I would imagine the fact that we had some real turnaround teams. But I would hope that‑‑ go back to just the teaching of some of the players that were developed and I had the pleasure of coaching. The things that always bounce back, you know is, ‑in fact I got one in the mail, that might have come from Florida. You might still be working against me on that Sampson shot. I threw that chair. And this was in 1971 or 2. I threw a chair from me to you. The official‑‑ I turned around and I was talking to my team. I turned around and the official was standing right behind me listening to what I was telling the team. And I turned around and looked him in the face and he put a technical on me. He walked away and he got about as far as you are in a perfect pronation, toss, lit right behind him. That's what I wanted to do, was just scare him. I got this letter, picture, "Would you please sign this?" A 14‑year‑old kid has got it and it doesn't go away. So I suppose it will be throwing chairs. Van Lier ranks second in distance and Bobby Knight gets famous and he didn't even get his in the air. His slid across the floor. The next morning I got up‑‑ we had two papers in Cleveland, we had the Plain Dealer Morning and Afternoon. When I threw that chair, it was perfect. Jimmy Rodgers was sitting right on the bench just like that, stop me or whatever. Nothing. I told him, I said, "Jimmy, that was your raise I just threw." Anyway how, the next morning one of the writers in the Morning Deal just really cut me up in little pieces and spit me out. And I felt bad about doing it. It was dumb. But yet we had to do some things like that in Cleveland at the time to make sure people didn't think that basketball was the only thing that had to be done there. And then the afternoon paper comes out, and it's a story, and the guy that wrote the morning story is sitting at a table just like this, and he's laughing up a storm at me throwing that chair. So I got a mark there on the press. But I paid $3,000, David. $3,000 for that. And Nick Mileti, who was the owner at the time, fined me another $100 because I missed. RICK CARLISLE: To give you one other fact, the magnitude of his career, he started out as the first coach in Cleveland history. He was there for nine years. Eventually after Coach left, Chuck Daly would get his first NBA coaching job and he lasted 93 days before he was fired. So you and Chuck got some things in common. BILL FITCH: I got one Chuck Daly story: We were working in Detroit, we were working a clinic up there, and there was a big golf tournament.  One of the majors was Grosse Pointe. So Chuck says, I got us on at Grosse Pointe. We have to be there right at such and such a time. We're working in Detroit. Chuck would come by and say, "Don't be talking so much." I'm doing the clinic along with him. And he's correcting me, we have to get out of there. So we get up there, we get up there, and he's really happy. This is a great course at the time. We were two hackers. We open the trunk up, and I said, "I don't have any shoes, Chuck. No shoes." He says, "Don't worry about it. Don't worry about it." So he give me a pair of his shoes and I put them on. And we went out and played golf. I wiped him out for a whole dollar. So when we finished, I wouldn't give him his shoes back. And so every time you see a picture of Chuck and I coming and shaking hands in a game or whatever, I'll guarantee you we're not talking about the game. He's saying, "Where are those shoes? When are you going to give me back my shoes?" I think I gave them back to him the first year that they won a championship in Detroit. Q. How did you not burn out? We hear about coaching being a 24/7 job. Coaches talk about burnout all the time. You never did. Why do you think you never were a victim of burnout? BILL FITCH: Well, I think part of it goes back to the philosophy. To me it was tough. You know, we lost our first 15 ballgames in the NBA. I coached 15 straight losses before we won a ballgame. You know, talking about prayers, praying every night, you learn very quickly in the NBA that most of the time the answer is no. And we had 15 straight noes before we finally won one at Portland. If you're ever going to get burned out, I suppose that would have been it. Because coming out of college and whatever, I don't think I ever lost more than two games in a row at any college that I was at. I can remember locking myself in a room and staying away from people for a few hours. Again, you're competing, and it's like‑‑ as a coach, you're actually the 13th player. Right now I'm enjoying‑‑ I'm coaching all 30 teams in the NBA. I haven't lost a game in five years, and I haven't had one technical. THE MODERATOR: Congratulations, Coach. Thank you, everyone, for joining us. (Applause). BILL FITCH: Thank you. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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