Bill Russell achieved so much on an extraordinary scale in his 88 years that ordinary but interesting phases of his life became afterthoughts.
He was a devastating, one-of-a-kind basketball force, of course, the ultimate winner, the rebounding, shot-swatting fulcrum for 11 Celtics championships in his 13 seasons. He was a trailblazer in myriad ways, including as the first Black head coach in major American professional sports. Most important, he was a resolute civil rights activist who used his prominence to fight racial inequality.
And somewhere down Russell’s lengthy list of accomplishments … he was a broadcaster.