THANKS TO YOU

PROLOGUE “I am writing this book because I think it must be done. I am not writing it because I was a great player like Oscar Robertson nor have a compelling story like Connie Hawkins nor have outlandish commentary such as Charles Barkley. I believe that the writing this book is required of me because I have and had a “black conscious” point of view when few other African American athletes did and that point of view colored and guided my life and activities as a professional basketball player and as a man. It is this black conscious point of view which deserves an airing because African American people have never shared sufficiently and appropriately with generations which follow them. Only by sharing in this manner could these subsequent generations be armed with the type of knowledge which would allow them to persist and persevere in the struggle with expertise and strategies derived other than from their own experiences. Not only does this lack of knowledge transference leave young black people at a disadvantage in terms of repeating the mistakes of the past it also causes a loss of vision wherein there is no particular purpose to the struggle of black people with which they can even identify. The inertia gained from the valiant efforts of so many comes to a standstill and eventually results in slippage backward. An example of this phenomenon for me personally was the lack of any personal knowledge on my part of John McClendon. John McClendon was a great basketball mind. He attended the University of Kansas and was mentored by James Naismith. He could not play for Naismith because of the segregation which existed at that time but he nevertheless gleaned valuable knowledge from him. John McClendon had a long and distinguished career. The early part of his career could have and should have been used to motivate me inasmuch as McClendon’s mother happened to be a teacher at my junior high school during my seventh, eighth and ninth grade years. During my eighth and ninth grade years I was the best basketball player on undefeated teams each year. I was in the school from 1958 until 1961. Not only did his mother not talk about her son to me, none of my other teachers nor my parents talked to me about him or the other great issues of the day. There was no communication across the class lines. There was no “lifting of the veil” as Booker T. Washington was ostensibly doing as depicted with the famous statue of him at Tuskegee. The students who were at the lower end of the stratum operated essentially in the dark; it was as though we were to be cast adrift in single space sail boats with the only destination of graduating from high school in mind because “they can’t take that away from you.” “They” was a designation generally understood to be white people. This admonition came with no further explanation, such as why “they” would want to take our education from us. The understanding of this our parents and teachers knew would come later as one grew into adulthood where one would realize that white people could take anything that they wanted from black people up to and including their lives without consequence to them. Tulsa, Oklahoma and Rosewood, Florida provided sufficient testimony of how the lives and property of black folk were indeed possessed at the discretion of white folk. This book is written because I was not given the type of preparation I believe I should have been given. I do not want to be included in the long black line of those who stood mute as our children and our people flailed around in life not knowing what it was that should be done until it was too late for them to do it themselves. I want to be able to say, “I told you so.” WHO WAS WARREN ARMSTRONG JABALI? “I was considered by some to be the best basketball player to come out of the Kansas City area. The basketball court on which I played in high school bears my name. I obtained a college basketball scholarship and made the Wichita State University Hall of Fame. I was employed by the American Basketball Association (ABA), which ultimately merged with the National Basketball Association (NBA); the American Basketball Association identified me as one of its 30 top players of all time. I have been encouraged by my friends and I have chosen to write this book. It is not however, a basketball book. Despite the aforementioned accomplishments as a player, of which I am extremely proud, I do not consider myself to have been a great player and therefore did not generate enough notoriety as to deserve to be written about in a book. Elgin Baylor, Oscar Robertson, Bill Russell and Wilt Chamberlain are the type of players who deserve basketball books. From my era, players such as Kareem Abdul Jabbar, who was dominant in high school, college and professionally, Julius Erving, who was the star of the American Basketball Association and George Gervin who was a master of scoring and of the “finger roll” would also be deserving of literary attention. These men were transcendent and actually have legendary accomplishments. If one is not of that ilk, his basketball story must then be ordinary. I will make mention of my basketball experiences here and there but I will write primarily about the opportunity and perspective gained from the exposure gained by working as an above average athlete. That perspective compelled me to question the status quo and in Red Holtzman’s estimation, “Did I have a problem with authority?” Without basketball, I would probably have been what my father was, a laborer who remained in the same position for his entire working career. I reflect and am convinced that I would not have had a problem with being that man. I had the utmost respect for my father as I do for my brothers Gregory, Antoine and Reginald who most closely followed my father’s footsteps as a working man. Basketball took me in another direction and exposed me to the ideas which have always streamed in the African American community but are only given voice in certain domains. The restriction of this voice, by African Americans themselves, is in my view the single most important deterrent to our advancement as a people. This book then is my contribution in an attempt to increase the flow of the stream.