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7 1 Jackie Over the past twenty years, as Earl Lloyd finally began to be recognized nationally for the magnitude of his accomplishments, he often heard a familiar comparison from journalists, historians, and everyday fans. It is a comparison he refuses to accept, for reasons that say everything about Earl. I get asked about it everywhere I go. Almost sixty years ago, I walked out onto the basketball court in Rochester for a game I don’t even remember all that well. There are plenty of games that in memory seem much more important, but that is the game that put me down in history: the first black American to play in the National Basketball Association. All these years later, I think about it, and I want to start this book with one thought. I’ve always said, “Don’t compare me to Jackie Robinson.” I’ll always take polite umbrage when people bring that up. It’s an honor, but I don’t deserve that comparison. Jackie was unique. What he went through, no one should have to go through. Someone asked me once: What was the most important achievement for you in basketball? And I said, “Getting there.” Because by the time I reached the NBA, I’d already overcome most of the hurdles, even if I didn’t realize it. The game was ready at that moment, at that point, for some real change. I didn’t really see myself at that point in time as representing what was about to come, but you look at who’s playing professional basketball now, and you look at professional basketball then, and sure, you’ve got to stop and think. For me, in 1950, the most important thing was just getting to that first camp with all these guys of renown, and then sticking around. I’m at a point now where people will look back on those days, on what I did, and they’ll say: “You’re the Jackie Robinson of basketball.” 8 | Moonfixer Part of that, I think, is because I’m still here. If Sweetwater Clifton or Chuck Cooper were here with me, maybe it would feel a little different, a little better, if the three of us could sit together and reflect. Because all three of us went into the NBA in 1950. But I think they would agree with me on this: I can’t accept it when anyone compares me to Jackie. He was my idol, and I was in an all-black college when he broke in, and you can’t imagine what he meant to us—although I’d have to put Joe Louis in there with him, too. You think about those times, and what we couldn’t do: In college, at West Virginia State, we’d go on long road trips and couldn’t stop to use a restroom. In college, a lot of times, we’d sleep on cots in the gyms of the schools we were playing. One time we were getting on a bus to go to North Carolina, and the bus driver told us to get to the back. Our college coach, Mark Cardwell, stood up to the driver. He told us to stay in front, and we saw that driver reaching for his belt, and we wanted to say, “Coach. It’s all right. We’ll sit on the bumper.” Because in the end we all knew it was a fight we couldn’t win. Joe Louis—he did all our fighting for us when we couldn’t. Joe came through at a time when you didn’t dare hit a white person, no matter how bad things got, no matter what was said to you. You’ve got to think about that, and really appreciate what I’m saying: people could address us as less than human, could speak about us like animals, and there was nothing we could do about it. And then—in that environment—here’s Joe getting paid to knock white people out. He’s getting paid to hit white guys in the face. When he hit someone, man, I thought my knuckles were right inside that glove. He was the only guy in my time who could legitimately beat up a white person, and he did it all the time. The folks who ran the fights, they were constantly looking for a white hope, and time after time, Joe would dash that hope. When Joe Louis fought...

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