He was known as the Destroyer for his gritty intensity as a player. He later coached Golden State to an N.B.A. championship and served as its general manager.
Al Attles, the Basketball Hall of Fame guard who was among the most prominent figures in the history of the Golden State Warriors and their forerunner franchise in Philadelphia, died on Tuesday at his home in Oakland, Calif. He was 87.
His death was announced by the Warriors, the team Attles served as a tough, defensive-minded guard, an N.B.A. championship-winning coach, a general manager and, until his death, a community relations representative. His career spanned the Warriors’ Philadelphia years and their decades in the Bay Area.
When Attles was selected by the Philadelphia Warriors in the fifth round of the 1960 N.B.A. draft, he was a newly hired junior high school gym teacher in his native Newark.
As a little-known player out of a historically Black college, he knew that his chances of making the Warriors’ lineup seemed slim.
But he decided to give it a shot at training camp, and for six decades he remained an enduring face of the Warriors’ franchise.
The Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass., presented Attles with its John W. Bunn Lifetime Achievement Award in 2014 and inducted him in 2019. Although he was never an All-Star in his 11 seasons in the backcourt, he was among six players whose numbers have been retired by the Warriors.
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Source: Basketball - nytimes.com
