He didn’t think he had a chance. Al Attles understood the system. He was a fifth-round pick. From North Carolina A&T. Up against an unspoken but understood racial quota. In a league that in those days was as unstable as a willow in a windstorm.
“You’re not very good,” Ed Gottlieb, owner of the Philadelphia Warriors told Attles in the fall of 1960, “but we’re going to keep you.”
And they’ve never let him go.
For 57 years, as a player, a coach (who won a championship), a general manager and an ambassador, Attles has been with the Warriors, whether they were in Philadelphia, in San Francisco or in the mythical land of Golden State (OK, Oakland, but that’s not how they were labeled).