Bob Pettit (Total Basketball)

Bob Pettit was so ungainly that he didn't make his high school team until his junior season. But you wouldn't have known that once he turned pro. Pettit was the first rookie ever to make the NBA's All-League Team. In 1958, the "Bayou Bomber" hit for 50 points in Game 6 of the Finals and led the Hawks past the Celtics, the only interruption to Boston's run of titles from 1957 through 1966. Over his first nine NBA seasons, he never finished below fourth in either rebounding or scoring. When Pettit retired in 1965, he was the NBA's all-time scoring leader with 20,880 points.

Pettit had the dubious distinction of being cut from his high school baseball and football teams. He was 5-foot-9 as a freshman at Baton Rouge High School and his awkward play got him cut from the team. Then his father nailed up a basket in the backyard, and Pettit practiced around the clock. By his senior year he had grown to 6-foot-7; he scored 31 points per game and led his school to a Louisiana State title, the Bulldogs' first since 1932. Pettit mistakenly thought his success owed only to his stature. "I could stand in front of the basket and no one could reach the ball," he said.

After his freshman year at LSU, he met Ray Meyer, who had coached George Mikan at DePaul. Pettit studied movies of Mikan, with Meyer at his side. He averaged 25 points his sophomore year and by his senior season was an All-American, posting 31 points and 17 rebounds per game. Pettit's 785 points that year would have won him even more fame, but Furman's Frank Selvy scored 1209 and Bevo Francis, with the help of 84- and 113-point games (he had scored 116 in a game the previous year), scored 1254 for a second-division school.

The Milwaukee Hawks (who moved to St. Louis for the 1955-56 season) chose Pettit in the first round. He rejected owner Ben Kerner's initial offer of $9000 and weighed several offers from AAU industrial teams. He settled for a first-year salary of $11,000 with the Hawks.

Despite a 27-point college average, Pettit was surrounded by larger, more physical centers in the pros. Coach Red Holzman solved the problem by switching him to forward. Pettit was eternally grateful to Holzman, he said, because "he wasn't strong enough" to play center in the NBA.

In 1958-59 Pettit rewrote the league's record book by setting eight marks: most points (2,105), highest scoring average (29.2), most field goals (719), most free throws attempted (879) and made (667), and most 50-point games (3). During the 1961-62 season he became the fourth player to reach 15,000 points. Dolph Schayes, Paul Arizin, and Cousy got there ahead of him, but Pettit reached the milestone in fewer games than any of them. He had an amazing All-Star Game, posting 25 points and 27 rebounds, netting his third All-Star MVP award (the others were in 1956 and 1958). In 1959 he tied for MVP voting with rookie Elgin Baylor and handed the trophy to Baylor, saying, "Take it, I have two already."

By 1965, Pettit was plagued by back and leg injuries. Just 32, he retired at season's end. No other player had scored 20,000 points, and he was also the first to tally 20,000 points and 10,000 rebounds. The total of his career points (26 per game) and rebounds (16) is 42, a sum second only to Wilt Chamberlain's 30 points and 22 rebounds. In 11 All-Star Games he averaged 20 points and 16 rebounds.

Ten times Pettit was voted All-NBA First Team; only Cousy was selected as many times. He was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1970, and named to the NBA's 25th 35th, and 50th Anniversary Teams.

BOB PETTIT

Forward, Center 

Milwaukee 1954-55, St. Louis 1955-56 through 1964-65

Born: December 12, 1932 in Baton Rouge, La. 

6-9, 215 

High School: Baton Rouge 

College: Louisiana State

(*) Il soprannome "Bayou Bomber" (o più comunemente "The Bomber from Baton Rouge") combina le sue origini con il suo stile di gioco. 

Pettit è nato e cresciuto - anche cestisticamente - a Baton Rouge, in Louisiana, Stato noto anche per i suoi bayou (i tipici corsi d'acqua palustri e a lento scorrimento della zona meridionale). Ha inoltre frequentato la Louisiana State University (LSU), ateneo con sede proprio a Baton Rouge. [ndr]