I’m not a Bob Knight supporter, nor am I a Bob Knight enabler. But I can fairly say that Bob Knight will definitely be missed. He had many negative moments while coaching college basketball, both with his players and with the press. But Bob Knight also represented a lot of good about college basketball. He had no recruiting violations on his record, and his players were student-athletes, not merely athletes. I won’t pat him on the back, but I do recognize how amazing his career was. 900 wins is absurd. A 32-0 season is perfection. He wore out his welcome at Indiana and quite simply was a jerkoff, but at least he had values. And most importantly, he had integrity and he cared about the integrity of the game.
It’s not often that the sports world loses a polarizing figure like Knight. He’s one of the few characters that makes you stop what you’re doing when you see him on TV. He’s one of the few guys that makes you hit the unmute button. He’s one of the few guys that captured our attention. He had that Mike Tyson quality; he was always capable of creating a must-see trainwreck, but it all started with a reputation built by amazing achievements on the field of competition. And I’ll say this much for Knight: if nothing else, he gave us some of the best soundbites of all time. I can’t help but chuckle every time I’m at the gym and one of his rants pops up into my headphones. And this would be my absolute favorite (language NSFW, duhhh):
