Actor Chuck Connors: TV's Rifleman, A Favorite of Leonid Brezhnev, Infielder For The Chicago Cubs, And As The First Center Of The Boston Celtics He Became The First NBA Player To Shatter A Glass Backboard
Even for us aging baby boomers, it's easy to forget the variety of roles Chuck Connors had as an actor, including Old Yeller, Roots, and Murder, She Wrote. And what an interesting guy.
The backboard story:
His claim to fame in the NBA is that he was the first player to break the glass backboard through no fault of his own, as a very important part of the backboard was missing, and he took a simple set shot that shattered the board. The game was being played at the Boston Arena (not the Boston Garden since a Gene Autry rodeo was being held there). As luck would have it, the backboards were stored in an area behind the bulls, but luckily two drunken cowboys were found and paid a couple of bucks who dodged the bulls and brought out the backboard they needed.
And his real strength for the Celtics, as well as his break into acting:
Connors signed to play with the Celtics for the inaugural 1946-47 season. Connors averaged 4.6 points per game in 49 games for the Celtics that season. He was no major offensive threat, as he sank less than one in four field-goal attempts (94-for-380) and less than half of his free throws (39-for-84). Connors explained to author George Sullivan about his role on the Celtics that season:
I'm positive my greatest value to the Celtics was as an after-dinner speaker. It seems to me I did more public speaking for the team than playing that first season. They sent me all over New England on speaking engagements. I'd pick up $25 or $50 an appearance, whatever the traffic would bear. When I wasn't apologizing [for the few wins the team had], I was doing things like "Casey at the Bat" and "Face on the Bar Room Floor." I did "Casey" at the Boston Baseball Writers Dinner that first winter, and Ted Williams was there too after winning the 1946 American League MVP Award. Ted was very kind to me and laughed his head off at my rendition. Afterward, he said to me, "Kid, I don't know what kind of basketball player you are, but you ought to give it up and be an actor." So doing those after-dinner speeches was my raison d'etre.
It was also the beginning of an acting career for Connors. ...
"I owe baseball all that I have and much of what I hope to have," Connors said in 1953 when he retired as a ballplayer. "Baseball made my entrance to the film industry immeasurably easier than I could have made it alone. To the greatest game in the world I shall be eternally in debt." For Connors, the turning point in his life came during spring training in 1951 when the Chicago Cubs demoted him to their Los Angeles Angels farm club in the Pacific Coast League. "Greatest break I ever got," Connors said in 1954. "I'm out there right in the middle of the movie business where, if a guy has anything, he's got the chance to break in."
And the Brezhnev connection, from a 1973 Time magazine article:
At a presidential get-together in San Clemente last June, Leonid Brezhnev hit it off so well with Actor Chuck Connors that the Soviet party leader invited Connors to look him up sometime. Connors leaves for Moscow next week. He stopped by White House to say dosvidaniya to the host whose party say started it all, and who is counting on the trip to help repair some of the damage to East-West détente caused by the Middle East war. "The President gave me about two dozen presidential tie clips and ladies' pins, with instructions to spread them around when I thought it appropriate," said Connors. Brezhnev will get more than a tie clip. "I've ordered two engraved Colt revolvers or for the General Secretary," Connors added. "Brezhnev is quite a western buff."
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