Al Tucker, in a promotional picture for the Chicago Bulls in 1970.
In Al Tucker’s last game as a Sonic, he registered 0 points and 2 rebounds. His denouement came in a 119-112 win over Atlanta; he spent the last three quarters of his Sonic career on the bench as a spectator in a frustrating end to a frustrating sophomore season.
Who knows why Coach Al Bianchi chose to sit Tucker – it could have been the 12 points he allowed Lou Hudson to score in the first period, or (more likely) it could have been that he had been traded to the Cincinnati Royals for John Tresvant.
The reasoning for the trade, as viewed by the Times’ Georg Myers, was simple – the Sonics needed to get tougher and “Supertwiggy,” as Myers and thousands of Sonic fans had dubbed Tucker, wouldn’t cut it anymore.
“The principal difference distinction between Tucker and Tresvant,” wrote Myers, “is that John has the heft and the temperament to be authoritative and aggressive, especially on defense.”
A withering portrait of Tucker, to be sure, and one echoed by an anonymous scout 40 years later. Tucker was “blessed with talent but not a lot of motivation,” the scout told the Times’ Bill Reader in 2006 (and if that scout isn’t Henry Akin, I’ll eat my keyboard).
Ironically, less than a year before, in June of 1968, Myers had nothing but good things to say about Tucker.
In the afterglow of his All-Rookie accolade, the rookie admitted to Myers his first NBA season was “tougher than I thought it would be. And I knew it was going to be tough.”
Tucker explained to Myers that he learned in his first year that the major difference between college and pro ball was that he was on his own.
“Nobody is looking after to you except yourself,” Tucker explained. “The coach isn’t going to hold your hand.”
Myers’ fawning piece went to great lengths to show how Tucker was going to bulk up over the summer, but, more importantly, that he understood what it took to be a successful NBA player.
How, then, did this strong relationship between young player and team fall apart so quickly?
---
When the Sonics ran off a win against Boston in mid-January, Tucker’s strong effort was counterbalanced by a comment in the Times that he had been a “major disappointment most of the season.” Almost every story the paper ran after the trade was consummated held some reference to the “slender” Tucker, how Seattle was a “tougher” team now that Tresvant was on board, how the Sonics were better at rebounding and defense, and so forth.
It’s a puzzler, isn’t it? On the one hand, you have Airline Al Tucker, hero to thousands in Shawnee, Oklahoma, where 40 years after he led OBU to a national championship he’s revered by one and all, not just as an athlete, but as a friend.
On the other, you have Al “Supertwiggy” Tucker, who apparently wasn’t interested in utilizing his “God-given” talents (a useless phrase if there ever was one).
Consider, for a moment, the obstacles Al Tucker overcame to become an NBA player:
- Not recruited by his hometown university because he was black
- Forced to play at an NAIA school
- Endures racial taunts by opposing fans and ignores them
- Battles people much heavier than he as a center, and dominates the competition, earning three All-American awards in three years
- Comes up huge in crucial games, including 47 (!) points in the NAIA championship his final year at OBU
- Rebounds like no one before or since a OBU
And we’re supposed to believe he just showed up at the Seattle Center Coliseum and quit trying? That he just took the money and ran? That he wasn’t capable of grabbing rebounds all of sudden?
Further, if we’re to swallow the notion that Tucker just didn’t care about anything, then explain why he spent the summer after his rookie year studying chemistry at Oklahoma Baptist? And if the idea that Tucker was a hindrance to the team were true, if Tucker was such a disastrous underachiever, why would Bianchi go with him for the entire 24 minutes of the second half just two weeks previous, a victory over Cincinnati?
I think the real answer is that the Sonics were falling apart. The team had gone 2-18 from mid-December until late January, and even though they rattled off three consecutive wins to end that streak of misery, the front office and coaching staff obviously had to do something. In the manner of the time, clichés ran the day and the Sonics needed to get “tougher.” Tucker, a 190-pound small forward with glasses, an art lover who loved sculpture, was deemed expendable.
Which is why, on January 31, 1969, Al Tucker found himself a Cincinnati Royal and John Tresvant found himself a Seattle Supersonic.
In a way, it was a homecoming for both players. Tucker, a native of Dayton, now found himself playing less than an hour’s drive from his parents’ home, while Tresvant, the former Chieftain, would now be able to play in front of his college classmates in Seattle.
Bizarrely, the two would meet on the court less than a week later when the Sonics and Royals faced off in Seattle. The Sonics, led by Lenny Wilkens’ 32 points and Tresvant’s 19 rebounds, knocked off Cincy 102-97, although Tucker had some small revenge with 13 points, including 11 in a short span of the second period.
“As long as we won,” Coach Al Bianchi said after the game, “I was happy to see Al have a good game.”
And with that, Al Tucker’s voyage through the nether regions of professional basketball circa 1970 began.
---
Up first, Cincinnati. With Oscar Robertson, Jerry Lucas, and Tom Van Arsdale, the Royals had a strong roster, but were in the midst of a seven-year absence from the playoffs. Fans didn’t exactly flock to Cincinnati Gardens to take in the games, either; the team ranked last in attendance for the ’68-’69 campaign.
Still, considering what Al Tucker was leaving behind, it wasn’t that bad of a deal. The Sonics were even worse than the Royals, and with Lucas averaging nearly 20 boards a night and Connie Dierking almost 10, Cincinnati didn’t need any help grabbing rebounds. They needed scoring, and the slender small forward from Dayton seemed to fit the bill.
It didn’t work, though. 27-25 when they acquired Tucker, the Royals went 14-16 down the stretch, finished out of the playoffs, and waived their new acquisition at the end of the season in an ignomious end to Tucker’s return to Ohio.
June ’68 to June ’69; America switches from Lyndon Johnson to Richard Nixon, and Airline Al switches from All-Rookie Team to nobody.
---
Tucker spent the summer wondering where his future would take him, before landing that October in Chicago for the woeful (29-53 the previous year) Bulls. Chicago had hired a new coach, Dick Motta, to replace the outgoing Johnny Kerr, but it made little difference in the club’s fortunes.
By the time January rolled around, the Bulls were well below .500 and in need of a change. So, figuring that Tucker – a bit player averaging 7 points in 17 minutes off the bench – was expendable, Chicago sent him to Baltimore for Ed (father of Danny) Manning.
Unlike Tucker’s previous stops in Cincinnati, Chicago and Seattle, the Bullets were a good club, and led by fellow draftee Earl Monroe and the previous season’s MVP, Wes Unseld, Baltimore was primed to improve upon their 4-0 flameout against the Knicks the previous year.
Al Tucker, however, was not to be a crucial part of that experience, though. While he managed to get his first taste of playoff action in Baltimore’s 4-3 loss to New York, the eventual NBA Champions, it was only five minutes in four games. Strictly mop-up duty.
Now 27, Tucker returned to Baltimore the next year, hoping to get some more action in what was his fourth NBA season. On his fourth team in as many years, the young man from Dayton must have been wearied from his nomad existence, frustrated at his lack of success.
31 games in, the Bullets had seen enough, waiving him and ending Tucker’s NBA career. The only thing left for him at that point – 27 years old, college superstar, professional washout - was the ABA.
So that’s where he went.
Part IV – The ABA and The End
Who knows why Coach Al Bianchi chose to sit Tucker – it could have been the 12 points he allowed Lou Hudson to score in the first period, or (more likely) it could have been that he had been traded to the Cincinnati Royals for John Tresvant.
The reasoning for the trade, as viewed by the Times’ Georg Myers, was simple – the Sonics needed to get tougher and “Supertwiggy,” as Myers and thousands of Sonic fans had dubbed Tucker, wouldn’t cut it anymore.
“The principal difference distinction between Tucker and Tresvant,” wrote Myers, “is that John has the heft and the temperament to be authoritative and aggressive, especially on defense.”
A withering portrait of Tucker, to be sure, and one echoed by an anonymous scout 40 years later. Tucker was “blessed with talent but not a lot of motivation,” the scout told the Times’ Bill Reader in 2006 (and if that scout isn’t Henry Akin, I’ll eat my keyboard).
Ironically, less than a year before, in June of 1968, Myers had nothing but good things to say about Tucker.
In the afterglow of his All-Rookie accolade, the rookie admitted to Myers his first NBA season was “tougher than I thought it would be. And I knew it was going to be tough.”
Tucker explained to Myers that he learned in his first year that the major difference between college and pro ball was that he was on his own.
“Nobody is looking after to you except yourself,” Tucker explained. “The coach isn’t going to hold your hand.”
Myers’ fawning piece went to great lengths to show how Tucker was going to bulk up over the summer, but, more importantly, that he understood what it took to be a successful NBA player.
How, then, did this strong relationship between young player and team fall apart so quickly?
---
When the Sonics ran off a win against Boston in mid-January, Tucker’s strong effort was counterbalanced by a comment in the Times that he had been a “major disappointment most of the season.” Almost every story the paper ran after the trade was consummated held some reference to the “slender” Tucker, how Seattle was a “tougher” team now that Tresvant was on board, how the Sonics were better at rebounding and defense, and so forth.
It’s a puzzler, isn’t it? On the one hand, you have Airline Al Tucker, hero to thousands in Shawnee, Oklahoma, where 40 years after he led OBU to a national championship he’s revered by one and all, not just as an athlete, but as a friend.
On the other, you have Al “Supertwiggy” Tucker, who apparently wasn’t interested in utilizing his “God-given” talents (a useless phrase if there ever was one).
Consider, for a moment, the obstacles Al Tucker overcame to become an NBA player:
- Not recruited by his hometown university because he was black
- Forced to play at an NAIA school
- Endures racial taunts by opposing fans and ignores them
- Battles people much heavier than he as a center, and dominates the competition, earning three All-American awards in three years
- Comes up huge in crucial games, including 47 (!) points in the NAIA championship his final year at OBU
- Rebounds like no one before or since a OBU
And we’re supposed to believe he just showed up at the Seattle Center Coliseum and quit trying? That he just took the money and ran? That he wasn’t capable of grabbing rebounds all of sudden?
Further, if we’re to swallow the notion that Tucker just didn’t care about anything, then explain why he spent the summer after his rookie year studying chemistry at Oklahoma Baptist? And if the idea that Tucker was a hindrance to the team were true, if Tucker was such a disastrous underachiever, why would Bianchi go with him for the entire 24 minutes of the second half just two weeks previous, a victory over Cincinnati?
I think the real answer is that the Sonics were falling apart. The team had gone 2-18 from mid-December until late January, and even though they rattled off three consecutive wins to end that streak of misery, the front office and coaching staff obviously had to do something. In the manner of the time, clichés ran the day and the Sonics needed to get “tougher.” Tucker, a 190-pound small forward with glasses, an art lover who loved sculpture, was deemed expendable.
Which is why, on January 31, 1969, Al Tucker found himself a Cincinnati Royal and John Tresvant found himself a Seattle Supersonic.
In a way, it was a homecoming for both players. Tucker, a native of Dayton, now found himself playing less than an hour’s drive from his parents’ home, while Tresvant, the former Chieftain, would now be able to play in front of his college classmates in Seattle.
Bizarrely, the two would meet on the court less than a week later when the Sonics and Royals faced off in Seattle. The Sonics, led by Lenny Wilkens’ 32 points and Tresvant’s 19 rebounds, knocked off Cincy 102-97, although Tucker had some small revenge with 13 points, including 11 in a short span of the second period.
“As long as we won,” Coach Al Bianchi said after the game, “I was happy to see Al have a good game.”
And with that, Al Tucker’s voyage through the nether regions of professional basketball circa 1970 began.
---
Up first, Cincinnati. With Oscar Robertson, Jerry Lucas, and Tom Van Arsdale, the Royals had a strong roster, but were in the midst of a seven-year absence from the playoffs. Fans didn’t exactly flock to Cincinnati Gardens to take in the games, either; the team ranked last in attendance for the ’68-’69 campaign.
Still, considering what Al Tucker was leaving behind, it wasn’t that bad of a deal. The Sonics were even worse than the Royals, and with Lucas averaging nearly 20 boards a night and Connie Dierking almost 10, Cincinnati didn’t need any help grabbing rebounds. They needed scoring, and the slender small forward from Dayton seemed to fit the bill.
It didn’t work, though. 27-25 when they acquired Tucker, the Royals went 14-16 down the stretch, finished out of the playoffs, and waived their new acquisition at the end of the season in an ignomious end to Tucker’s return to Ohio.
June ’68 to June ’69; America switches from Lyndon Johnson to Richard Nixon, and Airline Al switches from All-Rookie Team to nobody.
---
Tucker spent the summer wondering where his future would take him, before landing that October in Chicago for the woeful (29-53 the previous year) Bulls. Chicago had hired a new coach, Dick Motta, to replace the outgoing Johnny Kerr, but it made little difference in the club’s fortunes.
By the time January rolled around, the Bulls were well below .500 and in need of a change. So, figuring that Tucker – a bit player averaging 7 points in 17 minutes off the bench – was expendable, Chicago sent him to Baltimore for Ed (father of Danny) Manning.
Unlike Tucker’s previous stops in Cincinnati, Chicago and Seattle, the Bullets were a good club, and led by fellow draftee Earl Monroe and the previous season’s MVP, Wes Unseld, Baltimore was primed to improve upon their 4-0 flameout against the Knicks the previous year.
Al Tucker, however, was not to be a crucial part of that experience, though. While he managed to get his first taste of playoff action in Baltimore’s 4-3 loss to New York, the eventual NBA Champions, it was only five minutes in four games. Strictly mop-up duty.
Now 27, Tucker returned to Baltimore the next year, hoping to get some more action in what was his fourth NBA season. On his fourth team in as many years, the young man from Dayton must have been wearied from his nomad existence, frustrated at his lack of success.
31 games in, the Bullets had seen enough, waiving him and ending Tucker’s NBA career. The only thing left for him at that point – 27 years old, college superstar, professional washout - was the ABA.
So that’s where he went.
Part IV – The ABA and The End
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