Damn I’d like to choke him again
In 1997: Latrell Sprewell of the Golden State Warriors was suspended for one year by the NBA for assaulting his coach, PJ Carlesimo. During a practice, Carlesimo supposedly criticized Sprewell’s passing, and after Carlesimo confronted him, Sprewell choked his head coach until he was pulled off by teammates. He later came back to practice and took a swing at Carlesimo. Not only was Sprewell suspended, but he was cut by the Warriors and his contract of four years, $32 million (that he had just signed in the offseason) was terminated. The suspension would later be reduced to 68 games (remember, he had a family to feed). Sprewell would not play a game (due to the lockout the following year) until he became a member of the New York Knicks in February of 1999. (nba.com/player file/Sprewell)
In 1968: Due to a lack of offense in Major League Baseball, the Rules Committee lowered the pitcher’s mound from 15 inches to 10 inches and the strike zone was modified from shoulders-to-knees to armpits-to-knees. In the “Year of the Pitcher,” the league batting average dipped to a paltry .236, runs scored per game were just 3.4, only three players drove in more than 100 runs, Bob Gibson of the Cardinals had a 1.12 ERA, Denny McLain won 30 games for the Tigers, and Don Drysdale of Los Angeles set a record by pitching 58.2 consecutive scoreless innings. The following year–aided by expansion, as well–saw the overall batting average increase by 20 points and scoring increased by 20 percent. (baseball-almanac.com, The Baseball Encyclopedia).
In 1956: Wilt Chamberlain made his college basketball debut for the University of Kansas as a sophomore (the rules at the time prohibited freshman from playing on the varsity). If you thought Greg Oden, the Ohio State phenom, was impressive in his debut on Saturday (14 points, 10 rebounds, 5 assists), get a load of Wilt‘s numbers. He scored 52 points and grabbed 31 rebounds in a win over Northwestern. He would go on to average 30 points and 20 rebounds in his career at Kansas, and he led the Jayhawks to the 1957 NCAA title game. He also won the high jump at the Big Seven (the conference which precluded the Big 8 and Big 12) Track and Field Championships. No word on how far along the number of women (of the 20,000) the “Big Dipper”’s odometer was at this time. (www.kuconnection.org)
