Out of print for more than 30 years, now available for the first time as an eBook, this is the controversial story of John Wooden's first 25 years and first 8 NCAA Championships as UCLA Head Basketball Coach. This is the only book that gives a true picture of the character of John Wooden and the influence of his assistant, Jerry Norman, whose contributions Wooden  ignored and tried to bury.

Compiled with more than 40 hours of interviews with Coach Wooden, learn about the man behind the coach. The players tell their stories in their own words.

Click the book to read the first chapter and for ordering information. Also available on Kindle.

Sports Medley: Cris Carter Should Suspended by both ESPN and the NFL 31 Aug 15

by Tony Medley

The Incident: As reported in ESPN The Magazine in a profile on San Francisco linebacker Chris Borland whose resignation from the NFL at age 24 was influenced by what Cris Carter said below, this is what NFL Hall of Famer Carter told NFL rookies at an NFL-sponsored Rookie Symposium in 2014, over a year ago. The video was on the NFL website for a year, until August 24, 2015, when it started to be reported and criticized and was taken down.

Wearing his NFL Hall of Fame jacket, Carter addressed the Symposium of impressionable rookies,

“And just in case y’all not going to decide to do the right thing, if y’all got our crew, you’ve got to have a fall guy in the crew. (NFL Hall of Famer Warren Sapp, standing next to him, erupts in laughter).

(Carter calls Miami rookie quarterback Terry Bridgewater up to the stage). Now, I let my homeboys know, y’all wanna keep rollin’ like this, then I need to know who gonna be the fall guy.

Who gonna be driving? Because y’all not gonna do the right stuff, now. Alright? So I got to teach y’all how to get around this stuff, too. If you gonna have a crew, one of them fools got to know, he goin’ to jail. We’ll get him out. (Sapp adds, “We’ll get him out,” to laughter among the audience).

(Addressing Bridgewater) Now, you from Miami, now. Okay? Y’all take care of each other. Now, don’t you got a guy that would take care of you and that would be, out, a good deal? (Bridgewater returns to his seat)

If you’re goin’ have a crew, make sure you know who gonna be the fall guy. Okay? I know none of y’all gonna never drink late. I know none of y’all gonna never use no drugs, and all of you gonna go to Bible study. I realize that. But still get you a fall guy. Okay? If you’re gonna have a crew, make sure they understand can’t nothin’ happen to you. Your name can’t be in lights, under no circumstances. All right? Y’all understand that?”

When it went viral, and, remember, this is a year later, Carter issued a tweet, “seeing that video has made me realize how wrong I was. I was brought there to educate young people and instead I gave them very bad advice. Every person should take responsibility for his own actions. I’m sorry and I truly regret what I said that day.”

After displaying Carter’s talk on its website for a year, the NFL then issued a statement, “the comment was not representative of the message of the symposium or any other league program. The league’s player engagement staff immediately expressed concern about the comment to Chris. The comment was not repeated in the 2014 AFC session or this year’s symposium.”

Again, a year after the remarks were made and displayed on the NFL website, ESPN issued a statement, “we completely disagree with Chris’s remarks and we have made that extremely clear to him. Those views were entirely his own and do not reflect our company’s point of view in any way.”

Sorry, but that’s too little too late. In his presentation to the symposium, Cris Carter unmasks himself to be a man totally devoid of a moral compass. This is not the same as someone appearing before a group who is drunk and spontaneously makes a fool of himself (like USC coach Steve Sarkasian). To the contrary, Carter is a man who is scheduled to make a planned presentation to NFL rookies to give them the benefit of an older, experienced person on how to make things better for themselves and to give them a set of rules by which to live. He thought about it; he planned it. After such thought and planning, this is what he chose to say, “get a fall guy to take the blame when you do something wrong, which I know you’re going to do” (wink, wink).

Cris Carter attended the University of Michigan for three years, yet he insists on speaking Ebonics instead of normal English when he is performing on TV. But please notice that when he made his “apology” (more on that below), he was speaking perfect English. Choosing to speak Ebonics when he appears on shows (he is a regular on many ESPN shows, including “Mike and Mike in the Morning”) tells a lot about the content of his character.

His apology is hypocritical, as phony as a three dollar bill. He made these statements in 2014. It wasn’t until they were made public a year later and criticism cascaded down on him that he tried to retract what he said and “apologized.” It didn’t occur to him to apologize until he found himself the target of criticism and his career in jeopardy. Then he says, “I’m sorry.” What he really means is, “I’m sorry y’all found out about what I said, and I’m sorry that it’s come back to kick me in the butt, and I’m sorry it might really jeopardize my career.” But the fact is that he was chosen to speak to young, inexperienced men to help them and he chose to make the disgusting presentation set forth above. He didn’t decide to retract and “apologize” until they became public and he could see his career going down in flames.

Now let’s go on to ESPN. Curt Schilling recently sent out a message "It's said only 5-10% of Muslims are extremists. In 1940, only 7% of Germans were Nazis. How'd that go?" What Schilling said was factual, but because it was not politically correct, ESPN immediately suspended him. So far Carter has not been suspended, only barely slapped on the wrist for what he said. In fact, on Monday, August 31, 2015, Carter appeared as co-host on Mike and Mike in the Morning (speaking normal English, abandoning his Ebonics shtick) while Schilling was booted off his job as announcer for the Little League World Series on ESPN. What Carter said is morally damaging to impressionable young men who look up to him, and disgraceful. All Schilling did was simply tell a truth that is unpalatable to today’s political correctness police who dominate the media.

Finally, there’s the NFL. Carter made these statements at the NFL’s rookie symposium. Not only was there not a hint of criticism, the NFL had it posted on its website for a full year! Like Carter, only when it became a cause célèbre did the NFL take it off the website and issue a self-serving, holier-than-thou, criticism of Carter. But because the NFL waited a year and had the video prominently displayed, apparently the NFL either didn’t care that Carter gave this advice to its rookies, or it agreed with the advice.