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But I like to think an athlete is an athlete.

Oscar Robertson

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Oscar Robertson
Age: 86
Born: 1938
Born: November 24
Basketball Coach
Basketball Player
The Big O
Oscar Palmer Robertson
Athlete
Basketball
Think
Thinking
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More quotes by Oscar Robertson

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When you go into a game on offense, you make a couple moves and see what the defender is going to do. Then you pretty much can figure out what he is going to do against you - whether he carries his hands low or high, whether he is bumping or pushing, those type of things.
Oscar Robertson
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Now, I guess, people want stars. People are trying to invent stars.
Oscar Robertson
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When I started playing, I wasn't fast, I was gangly, my jumpshot was terrible.
Oscar Robertson
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The Olympics were great, because you had to make the team, and then go to the games. Now, I don't know, these guys today don't want to do anything like that.
Oscar Robertson
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We're all Americans trying to compete. Magic was competing for his team and Larry for his team.
Oscar Robertson
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People will think there are no other great ballplayers. Look at Garnett. Look at Duncan, Shaq, Kobe. Look at the players with Sacramento. The have a really good basketball team.
Oscar Robertson
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They should have a rule: in order to be a sportswriter, you have to have played that sport, at some level high school, college, junior college, somewhere. Or, you should have had to have been around the game for a long time.
Oscar Robertson
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But when I did it (the triple-double), I didn't even know it until someone told me.
Oscar Robertson
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But after that you don't see a lot of real good fundamental play. You see a showboat-type basketball which is almost parallel to street basketball.
Oscar Robertson
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It's a sad commentary when I have to say that sometimes in our country we are real sensitive to race.
Oscar Robertson
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People say that, but I think the NBA was bigger than Larry Bird and Magic Johnson.
Oscar Robertson
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I think no one has written a history of the great coaches who were around 30 to 40 years ago who taught the fundamentals.
Oscar Robertson
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It's like all guys want to do is make a dunk, grab their shirt and yell out and scream - they could be down 30 points but that's what they do. Okay, so you made a dunk. Get back down the floor on defense!
Oscar Robertson
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I'd like to think that the nature of the two teams - Boston being a championship team over the years and the Lakers, same thing - was a lot bigger than Larry Bird or Magic Johnson.
Oscar Robertson
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When you play against different people from all walks of life you can't do the same thing against every player defensively or offensively. You have to change up the way you go at a player.
Oscar Robertson
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I think that teaching coaches are the norm now.
Oscar Robertson
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I think that basketball players should get the job done no matter how it looks on the screen.
Oscar Robertson
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I don't think that players learn how to play any other aspect of the game in high school or college.
Oscar Robertson
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I played when I played, and played, I think, against the greatest players in the greatest time in the history of basketball.
Oscar Robertson
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Just fundamental things - I played guard and I played forward, so you get into a position where you are pivoting out on the court.
Oscar Robertson