ATLANTA — Jonathan Walton, a professor of religion and society at Harvard University, received a phone call last September from Danny Ferry, who had recently taken a leave of absence as general manager of the Atlanta Hawks.
Walton and Ferry had gotten to know each other through Tommy Amaker, the men’s basketball coach at Harvard. Walton is the team’s faculty fellow, and Ferry played with Amaker at Duke in the late 1980s. The conversation between Walton and Ferry that day formed the foundation for more substantive ones over the coming weeks and months.
“You could just tell that he was reeling,” Walton recalled in a recent telephone interview.