Look around. Listen. Death is an omnipresent metaphor in sports.
There’s sudden death and do-or-die plays and suicide squeezes. Teams avoiding elimination are said to live for another day. Tough losses are said to be killers.
There is death, and then there is death.
And here’s a chilling thought: No male member of Tim Floyd’s family has lived past the age of 53. None of them. We’re talking Floyd’s dad, Lee, who died at 52 when Tim was a sophomore at Southern Mississippi. We’re talking Lee’s dad, Leo, who also had heart problems.
We’re talking Lee’s brother and Leo’s two brothers and Leo’s father–Tim’s great-grandfather–and his three brothers. Heart trouble claimed all of them before the sunset years, the ones where you spend a relaxing retirement.
That is why 46-year-old Tim Floyd works 18- and 19-hour days–to pack more in. That is why the longtime tobacco user chews Nicorette gum. That is why he has learned to control what he can control and developed a sense of humor toward the rest.
“The great thing about my family history is at least I’m not in a high-stress job,” Floyd says with a rueful smile.
Look around. Listen. Anguish is everywhere in sports.
There are dropped passes and torn anterior cruciates and splintered dreams. Glaring mistakes in the heat of competition are said to be tragic. A steady diet of losing is said to be painful.
But there is anguish. And then there is anguish.
Lee Floyd, a fine athlete, broke his back performing on a trampoline in World War II and was handicapped for the rest of his life–able to walk but completely hunched over and unable to turn much from side to side. We’re talking real pain. We’re talking real heartbreak.
This didn’t stop Lee from coaching for 14 years at Southern Mississippi. It didn’t stop him from moving through airports, where players would carry him. It didn’t stop him from doing what he loved most.
That is why Tim Floyd will never once complain about his 30-102 career record as an NBA coach. That is why he won’t say a negative word about presiding over a roster with seven rookies. That is why self-pity doesn’t exist in his world.
“I was raised with a man who was crippled from the time he was 27 years old until he the day he died at 52,” Floyd says. “When you grow up in that kind of home, you don’t look at yourself every day and say, `Why me?’ You say, `Why not me?'”
Tim Floyd, as competitive as they come, is one of those coaches who takes losing hard. And he has had plenty of practice at it as he prepares for his third season as coach of the Bulls.
So much, in fact, that as Tuesday night’s regular-season opener against Sacramento looms, questions exist. Is Floyd a good pro coach? Can he endure another season of trying moments? Has he ever stopped and asked himself just what he got himself into?
“A couple hundred times,” Floyd says, and then he laughs. “I think it’s human nature to sit there and say, `Oh, my God.’ I think that for about three seconds and then you regroup and you look at it and understand what a privilege it is to be coaching here in this organization. It’s the organization of the ’90s in professional sports. The magnitude of what’s at stake here never leaves me and the challenge never leaves me. As a result, the blood flows every day because it is new and it is fresh.
“In retrospect, there is a staleness that overcomes everybody after they’ve done something for as long as I was at the college level–22 years. Things become second nature. Something new and fresh really becomes stimulating. And as long as you don’t pity yourself, which I’ve never done to myself nor have I wanted from others, then you’re fine. You can grind and get through it.”
Floyd’s father was living proof of that. And based on his first two seasons in Chicago, so is Floyd. Whether Floyd is a good pro coach seems an unfair question, or at least warrants an incomplete answer, given that the Bulls are in a major rebuilding phase and the talent level of his teams has been well below NBA standards.
His teams play hard. Players say his practices are organized and that he is a good motivator. Floyd seeks input from people who have far more experience in the pro game than he does–assistant coaches Bill Cartwright and Bill Berry, for instance.
And to a man, his players say they have never seen him down.
“If something’s not going right, he’ll find a way to get it done. That’s just his personality,” says guard Fred Hoiberg, who also played for Floyd at Iowa State. “That’s the way he is, and that’s the way he’ll always be. Or else he’ll get out of it.
“A lot of coaches might have quit or got out of it if they had to go through what he’s gone through. But he finds a way to get better. That’s a great quality.”
Not much scares Floyd. Snakes do, which is why rookie Marcus Fizer was fined $50–albeit laughingly–for bringing his brand new python to the team’s annual bowling party. Losses don’t. Heights do–“I couldn’t be a window washer,” Floyd says–but getting fired doesn’t.
Harm to his family–wife Bev and daughter Shannon–does. But dying young? Nope.
“Again, I don’t feel I can control that,” Floyd says. “You try to control what you can control. I understand that there’s been a family history in that area. But I’ve been checked and I do what I can. And you understand that things happen along the way.”
This relinquishing of control is all well and good for mental health. But it hasn’t been an easy lesson to learn for someone who came from the college game. There, coaches have more control over their destiny–which players they recruit, who works for them.
In the pro game, a lot less is under a coach’s control. He doesn’t make all the decisions.
“I understood that coming in, but dealing with it on a daily basis is something you have to work through,” Floyd says. “I’m a very impatient guy by nature, one who wants everything to happen today. It’s probably a good thing that I’m not in control. Our roster would’ve probably looked a lot different the first two years. And we maybe would’ve won a few more games. But I don’t know if we would’ve been as positioned for the long haul as we are now.”
That had served as the carrot at the end of the stick for Floyd’s career–the future. Losing almost seemed part of the plan for his first two seasons. But now that a summer with ample salary-cap room came and went and the Bulls landed only Ron Mercer and Brad Miller, the transition period and honeymoon seem to be over.
A young corps is settling into place. Elton Brand is rock-solid. Mercer has the talent for a breakthrough season. Rookies Fizer and Jamal Crawford flash some potential. The Bulls are still frighteningly young and will take their lumps and suffer their growing pains.
But now is the time for Floyd to shine. Now is the time for Floyd to teach.
“He’s never had a record like this because he’s been successful wherever he’s been,” Hoiberg says. “So I’m sure the [30-102] record does bother him. But he’s made some changes this year. He’s back to being himself as far as getting on guys when he has to. I think he let some things slide last year because we had an older team and he left the discipline to those guys. Now that we have so many young guys, he’s taking an approach like he did in college where if somebody is in the wrong spot, he’s going to let them know.
“He’s grown as a coach, and I think he’ll continue to do so because of his work ethic.”
Like many former college coaches, Floyd still loves and lives for practice time. That and hearing from old players and old assistant coaches, enjoying the bonds made from being part of the coaching fraternity.
Floyd takes that position seriously, just as he takes his current responsibility seriously. At his introductory news conference, he made this vow when asked what fans could expect of him: “I want them to expect energy. I want them to expect knowledge. And I want them to expect the love of the game.”
Just before his third NBA season opener, Floyd was read these words back and asked what he thought about them.
“I stand by those words,” Floyd says. “I mean, I’ve got pride.”
