(EDITOR'S NOTE: This is the first in a three-part series exploring the
elusive concept of team chemistry in sports: What it is, how it develops
and the different packages it arrives in.)
It was the afternoon of April 15, 1965, and the greatest winner in the
history of professional sports had just screwed up royally.
All Bill Russell needed to do was get the ball inbounds. But with five
seconds left and the Celtics clinging to a 110-109 lead over
Philadelphia in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference finals, Russell had
mistakenly thrown the ball off a skinny metal guy wire hanging over the
Boston Garden parquet. Turnover. Sixers ball. Timeout.
In the Celtics' huddle, Russell looked into the eyes of his teammates.
He asked if someone would bail him out.
"You have got to sublimate the individual ego," Tommy Heinsohn, one of
the players in that huddle, would say 37 years later. "When you have the
acknowledged best player in the game saying, 'I made a mistake, I need
help,' it makes it easy to do that. That's why Havlicek responded [the
way he did], instead of saying, 'You're getting all the money, you're
getting all the publicity, win the game yourself.'
"That's the essence of chemistry."
The Havlicek that Heinsohn was speaking of would be John. The way he
responded was to pick off Hal Greer's inbounds pass, sending the Celtics
to the NBA Finals (where they'd win for the seventh straight time) and
Johnny Most to the brink of an aneurysm.
Did chemistry make it possible for Havlicek to break on the ball like
the NFL defensive back the Cleveland Browns thought he could have been?
Or was it athletic ability?
Did those 1950s and '60s Celtics have great chemistry because they had
10 Hall of Fame players (and, if you count Russell, two Hall of Fame
coaches) who helped the franchise win 11 NBA titles between 1957 and
1969, or did the chemistry spur them to those titles and elevate those
players to Hall of Fame status?
Is chemistry a real entity in sports? (Hand down, Mr. Caminiti.) Does
chemistry breed success? Or is it more logical to conclude that good
teams are happy teams and if a bad team started winning, they'd have
good chemistry too?
The concept of chemistry has been floated frequently in conversations
about the Patriots, Red Sox and Celtics.
The Patriots stunk in 2000. By rights, they should have been marginally
less rank in 2001 and maybe, possibly, with some good moves, a playoff
contender in 2002. Instead (and maybe you've heard about this) they lost
their starting quarterback and most talented receiver before the season
was three weeks old, then went on to win the Super Bowl against a team
that had (arguably) the most potent offense the game's ever seen, along
with a very good defense. The 2001 Patriots' whole was greater than the
sum of their parts and the chemistry the team had has been credited for
that.
The Red Sox had an assemblage of superstars last year but an unsettled
clubhouse. There was the walking distraction named Carl Everett, issues
with the manager and suspicion about the front office. The Red Sox also
had serious injury problems . . . but, unlike the Patriots, their
personnel losses eventually laid them low. But this year, with new
ownership and a new manager and an influx of new players, they've been
reborn. Even a June slump that spun them out of first place hasn't
diminished the team's feel-good vibe.
The Celtics got Rick Pitino off the island in mid-2000, put the less
stressful Jim O'Brien in charge, let their superstars flourish and
complement each other and -- voila! -- they got to the Eastern
Conference finals.
Don't think the people in charge aren't aware of the power that
chemistry holds.
"It's something that definitely has to be managed," asserts O'Brien.
"Like in any marriage or relationship, you make sure you deal with
issues and do it in a timely manner. You need to understand what respect
is all about within the context of how people work together."
Or, as O'Brien's point guard Kenny Anderson says: "Guys have to be on
the same page talent-wise, with X's and O's and mentally. It comes down
to: 'Do you want to win?' When that is decided, you have to make
sacrifices. In basketball, two guys are going to get the bulk of the
shots or have plays called for them. The rest have roles. You have to
know them and accept them, and you can't falsely accept them. If you
think you can get eight all-stars on a team and win, you can't do it.
There's too many egos."
The Patriots of 2001 were, in large part, an egoless entity on the field.
"In our case, the chemistry came first, then the success," says
Patriots' head coach Bill Belichick, "but there's other examples of
teams that had the talent and found a way to work out the personalities.
The Raiders [of the '70s], for example."
For a team to get the right kind of chemistry, it seems there have to be
some important building blocks. Trust and support are near the top. So
is being selfless.
"Each individual has to realize that it's not him who can or has to do
it all," points out former Patriots center and current radio analyst
Pete Brock. "It's very freeing for a player when his role is defined. I
could want to win as badly as I wanted, but I couldn't snap the ball to
myself and throw it 70 yards downfield and then catch it. I had to keep
the bad guys off the guy who could throw 70 yards.
"There's a trust and a confidence and a love that has to exist," he
continues. "You have to care about the guy next to you or behind you.
You don't have to like him or want to be with him socially, but you have
to be able to count on him and he on you. He has to know your strengths
and weaknesses and you need to know his."
"Trust is definitely a big part of it," said Patriots' fullback Marc
Edwards. "When you know what other guys will do, it makes you a better
player yourself."
After almost a quarter-century in the major leagues, there have been
times when Rickey Henderson's been regarded as an impediment to good
chemistry. His current Red Sox teammates don't seem to feel that way.
And neither does Rickey.
"I have never been on a team with bad chemistry," he contends. "I take
pride in that. And we spoke about that in spring training this year when
the team was trying to find a manager and a general manager. We knew we
were the ones who had to [pull together]. It had nothing to do with the
people upstairs. You have to be able to respect everybody on the
ballclub because one day during the course of the season you'll need
everybody. Someday everyone will have a chance and if he feels
comfortable, the chances are good he'll perform."
It's easy to find players and coaches at all levels who'll preach the
importance of chemistry. But the non-believers -- the practical,
logical, rational ones -- are out there. And they persuasively argue
that chemistry is overrated.
"It's not very critical if you can't play, is it?" asks Tommy Harper, a
former Red Sox player and current first-base coach. "Tom Brady can play,
right? Lawyer Milloy can play. I can have good chemistry, but I can't
hit anymore.
"[Chemistry] helps, but it's not critical. The Oakland A's [of the early
'70s] proved that. They fought. They argued. They won. It's nice to have
people who get along, but it's better when they can play. Chemistry is
oversold as far as I'm concerned."
"We get fooled a lot by saying this team has great chemistry, and
players themselves say it," says Jerry Remy, a former Red Sox second
baseman and current TV analyst. "Meanwhile, there's some players who
might not talk to three or four guys all year. If you're winning,
everybody's happy. And those who are not happy keep their mouths shut."
Even Belichick, who's a strong believer in the concept, knows there's no
such thing as a bad team with good chemistry.
"Without results, you're just a lot of hot air," he admits. "You need
something to reinforce the points you're hitting on."
