Basketball superstar Wes Unseld, shown here in his rookie season (1968) with the erstwhile Balti- more Bullets, is a class act in humility even now.

THE BALTIMORE BULLETS/WASHINGTON
WIZARDS ICON IS IN A CLASS BY HIMSELF
WHEN IT COMES TO SUPERSTAR HUMILITY

21st CENTURY CELEBRITIES HAVE LESS AND LESS
IN COMMON WITH EVERYDAY PEOPLE NOWADAYS

Nationals must be counting on winning dispute with MASN
and the Orioles or they wouldn’t be so quick to pay
pitcher Max Scherzer’s $210 million contract
 
By David Maril
 
You can see why the Washington Nationals want their agreement with the Orioles and MASN renegotiated more in their favor.

Heck, if they keep up their spending spree with signing free agents, they may have to arrange for every word of their broadcasts to be sponsored by an advertiser. Can doubling the price of stadium hot dogs and sodas be very far away?

Signing former Tigers’ ace Max Scherzer to a seven-year $210 million contract is a reality slap to anyone who hoped there was still a chance professional athletes would maintain some connection to regular, ordinary working people.

When celebrities earn that kind of money, most hire armies of agents, advisers and lackeys to address their off-field tasks and responsibilities and, most importantly, rescue them from dealing with realities in the real world.

Even with the inflated television revenue figures that teams in the NFL, NBA and Major League Baseball receive, there will always be a need to raise ticket prices as long as fans keep squeezing into stadiums and arenas to watch these high-priced celebrities perform.

Who would have ever figured the minimum salary in the NFL would rise so quickly to $420,000?
 
Celebrity athlete contracts are going up in monetary value faster than the national debt. The market place for Major League Baseball, NBA and NFL stars, driven by the power of the celebrity market, has established an upper-class social group of athletes who are different from the type of sports heroes fans followed through the 1950s, 60s, 70s, 80s and even the 1990s.
 
Most pro athletes today make so much money, many feel they no longer have to deal with the public.

If you are putting on a charity or nonprofit function and want to have an athlete with a recognizable name appear, you should probably forget it unless you are willing to pay a not-so-small fortune. With high salaries and unlimited marketing opportunities, they can afford to isolate themselves.
 
THE PINNACLE OF SUPERSTAR SUCCESS

In the old days, when $100,000 was considered the pinnacle of superstar success, most pro athletes were not unlike you or me. They mixed and mingled in their neighborhoods and communities and even held off-season jobs in the regular work force to make ends meet.

One of my friends likes to reminisce about growing up in the old days when the Colts were here, watching Hall of Famer Gino Marchetti working with neighborhood kids on a Pop Warner-level team.
 
Years ago, my freshman year at a New England college, I put together a project during a January Independent Study Period, to examine the effects of media coverage on pro basketball.

I received full cooperation from the then-Baltimore Bullets and was allowed to attend games at the Civic Center and practices for a few weeks, with full access to the players.

Although the Bullets were not yet a championship caliber team, they had a roster of superstars that included league MVP Wes Unseld and all-stars like Earl Monroe, Gus Johnson, Jack Marin and Kevin Loughery. 
 
In those days, the team practiced at the old University of Baltimore gym in Mount Washington, off Rogers Avenue. My first day working on this project, I rapped meekly on one of the building doors and a player, without any questioning, let me in.

The Bullet players, arriving one by one in their own cars, wore winter coats, carried basketball sneakers in their hands and had sweatsuits on as they entered the rickety old gym. When Unseld sat down in the bleachers, tightening up laces, I asked the future Hall of Famer if I could talk to him after practice. He agreed.

SHUE WAS DRESSED IN A SWEATSUIT

Gene Shue, the Bullets’ coach, was also dressed in a sweatsuit, and in between blowing a whistle before making a point as they ran through drills and plays, he would take a few shots at one of the side baskets. Lean and in pretty good shape, he looked as if he could still bring the ball up court against Oscar Robertson and Jerry West, stars of that era.

When Shue came over to the bleachers and struck up a conversation, he agreed to be interviewed while watching the rest of practice. When the team workout ended 10 minutes later, I was in the middle of the Shue interview.
 
Unseld, seeing I was busy, went over and sat in the bleachers on the other side of the gym, waiting, after all the other players left, until I finished with Shue. When the Shue interview ended, 15 minutes later, Unseld walked over and sat down with me, spending nearly an hour answering questions.

Thinking about Unseld’s courtesy and graciousness boggles my mind today. Covering sports full-time after college for nearly three decades, I witnessed, for the most part, an increasing lack of tolerance and respect for media people trying to do their jobs.

Some players would hide out in the trainers’ room for an hour after a game to avoid being interviewed. A few would turn their backs on a group of reporters, even while talking to them.

Today, even if you were a famous national columnist or a prominent network sportscaster, what Unseld did, waiting on his own time to be interviewed, would never happen. And if you were a college freshman working on a school project, an NBA superstar wouldn’t even take you seriously. 
 
MEDIA CREDENTIALS TO SEE THE BULLETS

A month or so after my college project was published, I put in for and received media credentials to see the Bullets facing the Celtics at Boston Garden. When I walked into the Bullets’ visiting locker room to say hello to some of the players and give them copies of the report on the project, Unseld came over and asked if he could take a look at my copy of the Sporting News, which had a lengthy feature on him. But before he was able to return it, all the non-team personnel had to vacate the room.

Being a student on a limited budget, I wanted to get my sports newspaper back and decided to wait outside the locker room after the game. Yet when I explained to a mean-looking security guard why I was standing in the hallway, it was obvious he did not believe my story about knowing Unseld.

But before he could send me away, the players rushed through the hallway to the outside door. As soon as the 6-8, 260-pound Unseld saw me, he stopped and apologized for not returning the newspaper.

The security guard’s jaw dropped lower and lower while Unseld stood there talking. Then when the Bullets’ center reappeared moments later, handing me the newspaper, and remained there conversing for a few more minutes, I thought the guard would pass out from shock.

These days, you’d have to schedule even a 30-second one-on-one meeting with a superstar athlete months in advance and probably pay a hefty fee to an agent.

However, maybe I am being naïve and unrealistic, but I still have a feeling that if Wes Unseld was a star player today, he’d be the exception to the rule and wouldn’t change.

A terrific role model who never left the franchise — now called the Washington Wizards — Unseld would still give a student learning the ropes extra time and consideration.
 
davidmaril@voiceofbaltimore.org
 
“Inside Pitch” is a weekly opinion column written for Voice of Baltimore by David Maril.
 
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