This is a reflective analysis of two real people: one I knew personally and the other that I knew of from afar. What makes this odd, and interesting, in my opinion, is that true to the standard of "truth being stranger than fiction", they had a lot in common, and this in some ways makes this story worth telling. You can look one guy up on the Internet and learn a lot more about him. The other one I changed his name because family is worried about his story not being known to his progeny. I have run into problems posting about him in the past and I do not want to do that, least of all hurt people's feelings or self-esteem.
Both these guys left us too young; I feel like they ought to be remembered: their lives had meaning. I feel good about recounting a bit of their lives for others to hear. Their lives had meaning beyond themselves, but also to their fans and friends. I count myself as part of that cadre. And of course, sympathies and condolences to the family that lost them much too soon. I also feel like their lives have meaning to me in the sense that I can learn from them and they are worth analyzing. Admittedly, there are parts of me that I think I can relate to and identify with them both; as I describe their situations some lectors may decide the same and possibly benefit from this. I truly hope someone does. Neil and Bobby were ultimately pretty cool guys, worth knowing about.
What is really compelling to me is that when I write, when I think about things and put them in print, I feel like I understand myself and life better. Not bad for a Saturday morning. Maybe I just use the contemplation of these two people of an extension of myself, my own identity. Maybe. So be it.
The fellow that I did not know personally, Neil, was someone who affected a team, a coach, a sport and fan base that I have supported avidly. And he had an impact on those things that I watch, take pleasure from, and have contemplated over the years. You don't have to relate to my sports enthusiasm to know that this guy had a unique life, left a legacy of sorts. The impact was a moment of time, but in some ways influenced millions over the years. It bespeaks generations of Americans, in my opinion. You'll understand as it plays out.
I'll start with Bobby. I knew him from when we were little kids, playing with toys in his back yard while our mothers visited. Bloomington back in the 1970s. Not a bad place at all.
However, things were a bit tougher for Bobby, I think, because his parents were split up; I was never sure how much his relatively wealthy dad supported this young guy: I think he deserved more attention. His mother did her best as his primary caregiver; because of church relationships and his natural affable spirit he had a lot of friends and associates that he would see and hang out with. But, I do think in retrospect he was rather lonely, and maybe never found a key group of friends that he could relate to or related to him.
He was gifted musically, talented enough to play drums in bands that were "cool", and that gave him some cred, some respectability as an artist. Bobby was artistic, at least he had the aspirations, and I know he dressed and groomed himself thus as a teenager. He had a favorite Christian hard rock band that was unique in the 1980s, Stryper: "To Hell with the Devil!" was their mantra. Bobby liked them so much he would visit them on tours in cities across the country. They knew and recognized him and they would pose with Bobby back stage. His mother doted on his likes and ambitions to the best of her ability, as I observed.
Later Bobby married young. His wedding was in an artistic fashion that had Medieval themes and dress. I missed it while living in South America. I saw Bobby a few times at church when I came back from my two year mission. He being married while I was single, and attending a different congregation, we did not see each other much and I don't recall talking with him substantially. He had hair in a pony tail usually, which maybe was something that superficially kept me more at a distance, I don't know. He left Indiana University with a practical science degree and moved to the inter-mountain west with his wife, and they had a child.
By the end of the 1990s I found myself with a new life and a sweet wife from California, living in the Inland Empire east of LA. I came to learn that Bobby still aspired work and creativity as an artist, now with career aims to be a movie writer. He had spent more of his time with friends and interests that lent toward films and narratives. His own marriage had drifted and he ended up moving to Los Angeles alone. A mere hour from me where I had established my West Coast home. We spoke on the phone; I intended to visit with him. I was moving to LA for school and I planned on having him over for dinner. My brother-in-law that knew Bobby and I since childhood also planned on catching up with him. Evan lived in the Bay Area four hours to the north, so for mid-western guys like us, being together in the Golden State was a fortuitous circumstance.
But it would not end up that way, regrettably. People with promise, we find in life, do not always achieve their goals or hopes as designed.
Like Neil Reed.
Neil, like Bobby Pedronio, was a natural redhead. He was unique in ways that were more public than Bobby, thus you can check my story about him in the annals of television and the Web. Perhaps some books and magazine articles on file recount his rise and fall. Not just perhaps. It's there, Wikipedia and all.
Like Bobby, I think Neil was probably a loner. I don't know for sure, just making some guesses. I think a lot of guys are loners at heart. Maybe ladies, too; maybe that is simply the human condition for many of us.
I first saw Neil in person doing what made him both famous and notorious, or infamous. Little did we know when we saw him as a precocious basketball savant at Bloomington High School South, my hometown alma mater, what national implications were laid in store. He was merely a freshman in high school, and me a re-visiting returned missionary with younger high school buddies checking out the Purple Panthers. I got more of the basketball playing bug later in high school, but I had been a viewing fan since fifth grade. It was fun to see the old high school team, some of whom I had played against personally at the local YMCA. And some were college bound, always cool to see future talent prospects.
Reid was already tall for a first year high school baller, 6'2" or so. But more important than his height was his basketball acumen, his intelligence and wits, and natural ability. He was special on the court: he could shoot, he could pass, he could rebound. He could outplay people bigger, older, faster. He would help you win. He moved away to Louisiana with his family either as a sophomore or junior, and wound up becoming the Louisiana player of the year as a senior down south. And because of his previous Bloomington connection to Bob Knight and Indiana University, he matriculated back to Bloomington.
Good story. But it goes sideways.
Now if you do not know about Robert Montgomery Knight, legendary basketball coach and winner at every level of the amateur enterprise of roundball that is revered in the Hoosier State, I will allow you to find out more about that elsewhere. Small libraries contain those stories. Suffice to say, Coach Knight would assemble talented, dedicated, young college athletes and do extraordinary things.
And Neil fit the mold, or so we thought. Talented, dedicated, driven. Attributes of Knight's last benighted hero, Steve Alford. Slow of foot, overall, but money on the court game day. A natural-born hoops killer.
Reed was the heir apparent after a drought of no national championships, which was becoming uncomfortably long for us impatient Hoosier fans well into the decade. Reed would be part of the championship puzzle, we tantalized. High expectations, high pressure, and Knight was a fiery heavy laden coach, trying to bring back the glory of the 1970s and 80s, in a generation of the 1990s when times had changed.
Physical, or even mental abuse was now a hiss and byword throughout the sports world. People saw more, complained more, filmed more, reported more. John Feinstein, a nationally renowned sports writer now, did this with Knight himself in 1985-86, perhaps the harbinger of amplified attention and pressure towards success, ratings, money, power, prestige through sports.
Reed accused Knight of choking him during practice. I was a part-time student of IU at the time of the accusations. ESPN touted the headlines. It seemed serious, if true. We had public footage of Knight grabbing players, slamming desks and phones at courtside, "accidentally" head butting a star player, being very physical demonstrative and emotionally overbearing. And yes, throwing chairs. Knight was the tyrant, the bully, the general, the champion. In the 1978 Pan Am Games in Puerto Rico he was issued a warrant for arrest for assaulting a police officer. I think the claim is still pending in 2017, 40 years later and over a decade after Bob's retirement.
But in Indiana, basketball is a bit like a war. There are casualties, people get hurt. But the pains surpassed are worth the triumphs. Coach Knight was our General Patton: we loved him, warts and all. He didn't cheat, he required his student-athletes to attend class, and made them become something beyond disciplined ball players, come heck or high water. And Coach used the crude language of a military general as well.
But the Reid accusation changed things. And then the video tape of the "choking" was released, as there were questions if there were witnesses or tangible proof. Bob Knight did grab Neil by his throat during practice. I have seen it many times, regular time and slow motion. Of course, I could debate the meaning of that "hands on" act.
So, yeah, I said do your own research on Knight, but his story makes Neil Reid's story and Reid's life more significant, and now their narratives will forever be inextricably linked.
Neil left the school, ended up transferring to Mississippi State, then wound up in Santa Maria, California. He was leading a normal life and doing all right. Happily married and doing things out of the spot light, well distanced from this incredibly overblown scarred incident and past.
Us Hoosier fans resented him and the whole end of the Knight era more for the overall malaise of the program, not necessarily because of him as a person or player. That "choking" led the IU president to be put on a zero tolerance policy, which a couple years later got Knight fired unceremoniously. Reid became somewhat of a scapegoat; I recall reading and hearing (Bloomington is a small town, after all, people talk), that other IU players alongside Reid accused him of being lazy and not hustling, precisely what Knight was trying to affect in the exact practice incident in question.
But let bygones be bygones and live to another day, right? Live a good life with kids and grandkids, and reflect and wax nostalgic and perhaps counter-spin or reflect what could have been done better, said better, lived better.
But life is strange. Neil Reed died in his mid thirties. Tragic early death. He was living a normal life like the rest of us, perhaps occasionally approached by some sports historian or reporter, but beyond the old life of a culminating negative moment of drama and anguish, recriminations of different audiences and generations.
Alas, tough realities.
My friend Bobby died young, too. Alone, an overdose that may have been due to some medications that did not react right with his already weakened body, an illness that is still mysterious to me.
Neil and Bobby. One I knew, the other I didn't.
Both a part of me in different ways.
Both are like me in different ways. Both dads. Both with hopes to do something productive, significant. Both Hoosiers that ended up in California.
I left California a number of years ago. I could have died in the state a few times, I had a few health flare ups, nothing too serious, but sobering all the same. Cars and trucks were more likely to be my demise there, but fate did not choose me.
Neil and Bobby. I hope the best for you now, where you are, and your remaining family and friends.
Your lives had meaning; I only hope to find out more about what that could really mean.
Maybe others will too. Lives don't happen in vain. And brilliance in any arena is not forgotten.
Both these guys left us too young; I feel like they ought to be remembered: their lives had meaning. I feel good about recounting a bit of their lives for others to hear. Their lives had meaning beyond themselves, but also to their fans and friends. I count myself as part of that cadre. And of course, sympathies and condolences to the family that lost them much too soon. I also feel like their lives have meaning to me in the sense that I can learn from them and they are worth analyzing. Admittedly, there are parts of me that I think I can relate to and identify with them both; as I describe their situations some lectors may decide the same and possibly benefit from this. I truly hope someone does. Neil and Bobby were ultimately pretty cool guys, worth knowing about.
What is really compelling to me is that when I write, when I think about things and put them in print, I feel like I understand myself and life better. Not bad for a Saturday morning. Maybe I just use the contemplation of these two people of an extension of myself, my own identity. Maybe. So be it.
The fellow that I did not know personally, Neil, was someone who affected a team, a coach, a sport and fan base that I have supported avidly. And he had an impact on those things that I watch, take pleasure from, and have contemplated over the years. You don't have to relate to my sports enthusiasm to know that this guy had a unique life, left a legacy of sorts. The impact was a moment of time, but in some ways influenced millions over the years. It bespeaks generations of Americans, in my opinion. You'll understand as it plays out.
I'll start with Bobby. I knew him from when we were little kids, playing with toys in his back yard while our mothers visited. Bloomington back in the 1970s. Not a bad place at all.
However, things were a bit tougher for Bobby, I think, because his parents were split up; I was never sure how much his relatively wealthy dad supported this young guy: I think he deserved more attention. His mother did her best as his primary caregiver; because of church relationships and his natural affable spirit he had a lot of friends and associates that he would see and hang out with. But, I do think in retrospect he was rather lonely, and maybe never found a key group of friends that he could relate to or related to him.
He was gifted musically, talented enough to play drums in bands that were "cool", and that gave him some cred, some respectability as an artist. Bobby was artistic, at least he had the aspirations, and I know he dressed and groomed himself thus as a teenager. He had a favorite Christian hard rock band that was unique in the 1980s, Stryper: "To Hell with the Devil!" was their mantra. Bobby liked them so much he would visit them on tours in cities across the country. They knew and recognized him and they would pose with Bobby back stage. His mother doted on his likes and ambitions to the best of her ability, as I observed.
Later Bobby married young. His wedding was in an artistic fashion that had Medieval themes and dress. I missed it while living in South America. I saw Bobby a few times at church when I came back from my two year mission. He being married while I was single, and attending a different congregation, we did not see each other much and I don't recall talking with him substantially. He had hair in a pony tail usually, which maybe was something that superficially kept me more at a distance, I don't know. He left Indiana University with a practical science degree and moved to the inter-mountain west with his wife, and they had a child.
By the end of the 1990s I found myself with a new life and a sweet wife from California, living in the Inland Empire east of LA. I came to learn that Bobby still aspired work and creativity as an artist, now with career aims to be a movie writer. He had spent more of his time with friends and interests that lent toward films and narratives. His own marriage had drifted and he ended up moving to Los Angeles alone. A mere hour from me where I had established my West Coast home. We spoke on the phone; I intended to visit with him. I was moving to LA for school and I planned on having him over for dinner. My brother-in-law that knew Bobby and I since childhood also planned on catching up with him. Evan lived in the Bay Area four hours to the north, so for mid-western guys like us, being together in the Golden State was a fortuitous circumstance.
But it would not end up that way, regrettably. People with promise, we find in life, do not always achieve their goals or hopes as designed.
Like Neil Reed.
Neil, like Bobby Pedronio, was a natural redhead. He was unique in ways that were more public than Bobby, thus you can check my story about him in the annals of television and the Web. Perhaps some books and magazine articles on file recount his rise and fall. Not just perhaps. It's there, Wikipedia and all.
Like Bobby, I think Neil was probably a loner. I don't know for sure, just making some guesses. I think a lot of guys are loners at heart. Maybe ladies, too; maybe that is simply the human condition for many of us.
I first saw Neil in person doing what made him both famous and notorious, or infamous. Little did we know when we saw him as a precocious basketball savant at Bloomington High School South, my hometown alma mater, what national implications were laid in store. He was merely a freshman in high school, and me a re-visiting returned missionary with younger high school buddies checking out the Purple Panthers. I got more of the basketball playing bug later in high school, but I had been a viewing fan since fifth grade. It was fun to see the old high school team, some of whom I had played against personally at the local YMCA. And some were college bound, always cool to see future talent prospects.
Reid was already tall for a first year high school baller, 6'2" or so. But more important than his height was his basketball acumen, his intelligence and wits, and natural ability. He was special on the court: he could shoot, he could pass, he could rebound. He could outplay people bigger, older, faster. He would help you win. He moved away to Louisiana with his family either as a sophomore or junior, and wound up becoming the Louisiana player of the year as a senior down south. And because of his previous Bloomington connection to Bob Knight and Indiana University, he matriculated back to Bloomington.
Good story. But it goes sideways.
Now if you do not know about Robert Montgomery Knight, legendary basketball coach and winner at every level of the amateur enterprise of roundball that is revered in the Hoosier State, I will allow you to find out more about that elsewhere. Small libraries contain those stories. Suffice to say, Coach Knight would assemble talented, dedicated, young college athletes and do extraordinary things.
And Neil fit the mold, or so we thought. Talented, dedicated, driven. Attributes of Knight's last benighted hero, Steve Alford. Slow of foot, overall, but money on the court game day. A natural-born hoops killer.
Reed was the heir apparent after a drought of no national championships, which was becoming uncomfortably long for us impatient Hoosier fans well into the decade. Reed would be part of the championship puzzle, we tantalized. High expectations, high pressure, and Knight was a fiery heavy laden coach, trying to bring back the glory of the 1970s and 80s, in a generation of the 1990s when times had changed.
Physical, or even mental abuse was now a hiss and byword throughout the sports world. People saw more, complained more, filmed more, reported more. John Feinstein, a nationally renowned sports writer now, did this with Knight himself in 1985-86, perhaps the harbinger of amplified attention and pressure towards success, ratings, money, power, prestige through sports.
Reed accused Knight of choking him during practice. I was a part-time student of IU at the time of the accusations. ESPN touted the headlines. It seemed serious, if true. We had public footage of Knight grabbing players, slamming desks and phones at courtside, "accidentally" head butting a star player, being very physical demonstrative and emotionally overbearing. And yes, throwing chairs. Knight was the tyrant, the bully, the general, the champion. In the 1978 Pan Am Games in Puerto Rico he was issued a warrant for arrest for assaulting a police officer. I think the claim is still pending in 2017, 40 years later and over a decade after Bob's retirement.
But in Indiana, basketball is a bit like a war. There are casualties, people get hurt. But the pains surpassed are worth the triumphs. Coach Knight was our General Patton: we loved him, warts and all. He didn't cheat, he required his student-athletes to attend class, and made them become something beyond disciplined ball players, come heck or high water. And Coach used the crude language of a military general as well.
But the Reid accusation changed things. And then the video tape of the "choking" was released, as there were questions if there were witnesses or tangible proof. Bob Knight did grab Neil by his throat during practice. I have seen it many times, regular time and slow motion. Of course, I could debate the meaning of that "hands on" act.
So, yeah, I said do your own research on Knight, but his story makes Neil Reid's story and Reid's life more significant, and now their narratives will forever be inextricably linked.
Neil left the school, ended up transferring to Mississippi State, then wound up in Santa Maria, California. He was leading a normal life and doing all right. Happily married and doing things out of the spot light, well distanced from this incredibly overblown scarred incident and past.
Us Hoosier fans resented him and the whole end of the Knight era more for the overall malaise of the program, not necessarily because of him as a person or player. That "choking" led the IU president to be put on a zero tolerance policy, which a couple years later got Knight fired unceremoniously. Reid became somewhat of a scapegoat; I recall reading and hearing (Bloomington is a small town, after all, people talk), that other IU players alongside Reid accused him of being lazy and not hustling, precisely what Knight was trying to affect in the exact practice incident in question.
But let bygones be bygones and live to another day, right? Live a good life with kids and grandkids, and reflect and wax nostalgic and perhaps counter-spin or reflect what could have been done better, said better, lived better.
But life is strange. Neil Reed died in his mid thirties. Tragic early death. He was living a normal life like the rest of us, perhaps occasionally approached by some sports historian or reporter, but beyond the old life of a culminating negative moment of drama and anguish, recriminations of different audiences and generations.
Alas, tough realities.
My friend Bobby died young, too. Alone, an overdose that may have been due to some medications that did not react right with his already weakened body, an illness that is still mysterious to me.
Neil and Bobby. One I knew, the other I didn't.
Both a part of me in different ways.
Both are like me in different ways. Both dads. Both with hopes to do something productive, significant. Both Hoosiers that ended up in California.
I left California a number of years ago. I could have died in the state a few times, I had a few health flare ups, nothing too serious, but sobering all the same. Cars and trucks were more likely to be my demise there, but fate did not choose me.
Neil and Bobby. I hope the best for you now, where you are, and your remaining family and friends.
Your lives had meaning; I only hope to find out more about what that could really mean.
Maybe others will too. Lives don't happen in vain. And brilliance in any arena is not forgotten.
