Pete Maravich was one of the greatest scorers the NBA had ever seen. He was a silky guard capable of manipulating entire defenses with his dribbling and scoring ability. Many believe Maravoch’s game would fit perfectly in the modern NBA, with Kyrie Irving often compared to the man known as Pistol Pete.
Maravich was an extremely principled man. He had a great relationship with his father and he had health with personal demons from alcoholism in his life. He also had a self-admitted temper problem and espoused ideals of equal distribution of wealth and the violent means he could take to get there if he didn’t have the platform of being a basketball player.
In the same interview he revealed all of this, Maravich was talking about dealing with his father’s death, Press Maravich, where he spoke about how he wants children to idolize their fathers and not athletes.
“I really don’t have any pain. I was there for his last breath, watched his last breath being taken, my wife and I. It shocked my wife ry, but my dad, I was with him for five straight months, 24 hours a day. I traveled 20,000 miles getting him treatment at some places, I carried him like he used to carry me to camps in the backseat of the car to summer camps. We were very very very close. I think that’s good. I think a father and son should be that close. Heroes of the day should be the fathers, not athletes. You can admire an athlete, Rockstars, but it should be fathers who are the heroes of kids today.”
The message to not idolize athletes has been echoed by many others like Charles Barkley and Derrick Rose. Maravich was unfortunately taken from the world at a young age and was the only player who had passed away from the NBA’s 50th Anniversary team ceremony in 1997.
