They All Boo When Red Sits Down

"Like my wife would say," Loscutoff said, "Red's a diamond in the rough."

"In fact," said Mrs. Loscutoff, "Red's wife told me that."

"When you get down to serious coaching. Red's the best," says Bill Russell. "He's versatile, intelligent, astute, flexible and he has me on the team. He's made the most out of it. He's getting the maximum out of me. In order to be successful, you've got to believe in yourself, which is commonly known as egotism. Red's an egotist, just like me. He's a human being. He has his successes and his failures. He keeps his failures to a minimum—he tries to get along with me."

"I admire Russell because he's smart enough to understand me," Auerbach says. Indeed, the maintenance of the sometimes strained symbiosis of Auerbach and Russell is, by and large, responsible for the Celtics' good fortune. Auerbach had never won a championship until Russell joined the Celtics late in 1956, and of the 19 games Russell has missed during the past nine years, Boston has won only six.

Arnold Auerbach was born in "- Brooklyn 47 years ago. He is called Red because, as he explains 1,673 times a year, in a bygone era he had abundant auburn hair. Auerbach went to Eastern District High School in Brooklyn, where he was president of the student body. "I was no brain," he says. "I had no ability. It was a popularity contest." In his senior year Auerbach made the All- Brooklyn second team in basketball. His recital of this honor never fails to break up the Celtics—which, in turn, enrages Auerbach. "We got more high school kids in Brooklyn than most of you guys have in your whole state," he says.

At George Washington, Auerbach was the leading scorer in the metropolitan Washington area, with a 10.6 average, another achievement that greatly amuses the Celtics. "Through the years, I've been one of the three or four best shooters on the Celtics," he says. Auerbach was subsequently a high school gym teacher and basketball coach, a college referee, a member of the physical education staff at Duke and a physical rehabilitation officer in the Navy.

Auerbach is a true believer in fundamentals, by which he may mean spending half an hour demonstrating the proper way to throw a rock into a wastebasket: "Do I heave it underhand? If so, why? Should I put this foot forward or this one? Or should I stand with both feet together?" Or, on a slightly higher level: "You've got a basketball. It's round. The floor's even. If you bounce it, it's going to come up straight. You don't have to watch it. One of the most important things in basketball is the position of the head. The game is not played there," he says, indicating the floor. "It's played up there!"

Additional Auerbach aphorisms:

?Never bounce the ball without a purpose.

?Remember that passing is the fastest method of advancing the ball.