Playboy Interview: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

At the advanced age of 39, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar---a dinosaur by professional basketball standards---continues to act less like a lion in winter than like a stallion in spring. The National Basketball Association's only active player to have graduated from college before the start of the Seventies, Abdul-Jabbar, a graceful, 7'2" scoring machine, has virtually rewritten the league's record books. Now nearing the end of his 17th pro season (the only N.B.A. player ever to reach that milestone), Abdul-Jabbar adds to his fistful of career records each time he sets foot on court.

Before the start of the season, he had already become the N.B.A.'s all-time leader in scoring, in most field goals attempted and made and in most blocked shots. By the end of the current campaign, his one-man assault on N.B.A. stats will also include most minutes and most games ever played by a pro. Forget such items as his appearance in 15 straight All-Star games and his place as the N.B.A.'s all-time scoring leader in postseason play.

Oddly enough, Abdul-Jabbar cares very little about all of the above. He just wants to win, period. As the captain and heart and soul of the Los Angeles Lakers, he led his team last season to its third league championship in the past six years. He's intent on a repeat performance this season and, with Los Angeles having easily won the Pacific Division title, it seems likely that the N.B.A. championship series will again pit the Lakers against their archrivals, the Boston Celtics. Says Milwaukee Bucks coach Don Nelson, "The Celtics and the Lakers are head and shoulders above the rest of us, and we just have to face it."

Nelson and most other N.B.A. coaches have also wondered aloud how Abdul-Jabbar can continue performing without showing any signs of wear and tear. If anything, he has actually improved in recent years. Last season, he averaged 22 points per game---his highest figure since the 1981--1982 season---and his .599 field-goal average was the second highest of his career. Singer Neil Young used to complain that rust never sleeps; he obviously had never met anyone with Abdul-Jabbar's natural undercoating. Time simply refuses to dim his shooting eye. His sky hook, which Playboy once described as "the most beautiful basketball shot ever invented," remains as eerily accurate and unstoppable as ever.

Despite his athletic brilliance, however, Abdul-Jabbar has long been one of sport's most enigmatic---and least popular---superstars. For most of his career, he has had a distant relationship with the press and public alike. Much of that can be traced to his troubled adolescence. Born on April 16, 1947, in New York City, Ferdinand Lewis Alcindor was a studious, shy youngster raised by middle-class parents. Unfortunately, he grew up at a time when blacks were still subject to segregation, Jim Crow laws and lynchings, and all that left its mark. His parents wanted their son to get a good Catholic education and sent him to Power Memorial High School in Manhattan. Alcindor excelled at academics and basketball and was close to Jack Donohue, the school's basketball coach. But then, during half time of a sloppy game against a weak opponent, Donohue tried to fire him up by telling him, "You're acting just like a nigger!" Not a bright move. Alcindor went into a shell at that point.

While a student at UCLA, Alcindor renounced Catholicism and became a Moslem. In 1971, he publicly announced that he had changed his name to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Arabic for "noble and powerful servant" of Allah. Abdul-Jabbar then avoided the press the way Moslems avoid alcohol and barbecued ribs. It wasn't until after he split up with his personal spiritual advisor that he began opening up to people, a process that accelerated after his house burned down in January 1983. Abdul-Jabbar's fans knew that their man had lost thousands of jazz records in the blaze; when fans from cities around the league began sending him records, Abdul-Jabbar---almost like Sally Field at last year's Academy Awards---suddenly realized, "They like me." Since then, his view of America and the world has become much more sanguine.

To interview the man most experts consider the greatest player in the history of basketball, Playboy sent free-lancer Lawrence Linderman to meet with Abdul-Jabbar in Los Angeles. Linderman reports:

"Even though I'd suggested we interview Abdul-Jabbar, I regarded the assignment with more apprehension than I'd felt before any of my 22 previous 'Playboy Interviews.' Some years ago, I had interviewed him for a short Playboy feature and had come away thinking I'd never met a man so filled with gloom and icy anger. To my great surprise and relief, he no longer had a psychic chip on his shoulder. To his great surprise and relief, he had ended his isolated, alienated existence. In some ways, he's almost like a monk who, having observed a lifelong, self-imposed vow of silence, one day discovers how joyous it can be to get in touch with the world---and with himself as well.

"When we met, Abdul-Jabbar was in the process of moving into a huge stone mansion built on the Bel Air site where his ranch house had burned down three years before. During the couple of weeks we devoted to the interview, workmen were still putting the finishing touches on the outside of the house. Inside, the cavernous place was mostly bare: Although Abdul-Jabbar had bought furniture six months before moving in, a shipping company had misplaced his things; and when I saw him about a month later in New York, his furniture was still somewhere in transit.

"In any case, he had a table and chairs in his kitchen, and that's where we began our conversations. A few months before, he had announced his intention to bow out of basketball after the 1986-1987 season; that provided the opening subject for our interview."

[Q] Playboy: Not long after you said that the current season would be your last, the Los Angeles Lakers announced that you'd agreed to play one more year. Do you really intend to play next season, or was that announcement a smoke screen enabling you to duck a yearlong series of "Farewell, Kareem" nights?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Oh, no; barring injury, I'll probably play one more year; but I won't make that decision until the end of the playoffs. If I don't think I can play up to my expectations, then I'll quit. In all probability, though, I'll be out there again next fall.

[Q] Playboy: You've come close to retiring during each of the past three years. Why haven't you? Does the game mean more to you than perhaps you suspected?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Well, first of all, it's a great way to make a living; and even though I've probably had enough adrenaline rushes to last three lifetimes, I still enjoy the competition. I've also enjoyed proving certain people wrong. After the '83 season, the Lakers didn't sign me and I became a free agent---and no one offered me a contract for months. I was out there all alone, and a lot of people just wrote me off. They felt that at 36, I was on my way out; but eventually the Lakers and I got together and, lo and behold, here I am, still hanging around. We won the N.B.A. championship last year, and I had a very successful season, which dispelled all that talk.

[Q] Playboy: You'll be 40 before the end of next season. What inroads have the years made on your ability?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I really haven't seen any. In fact, because of my conditioning program, I think I'm probably realizing more of my physical potential than I did ten years ago. I always knew that I had to pay close attention to my cardiovascular condition, strength training and stretching, but I don't think I finally got all three of them straight until a few years ago, and that's what's kept me in the game. Believe me, if you don't have it physically, it doesn't matter whether you want to play or not---it just doesn't happen.

[Q] Playboy: Are you saying you don't have to pace yourself differently during games?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I don't, no. I've found that it's better to play as well as I can for as long as I can. After that, the coach can take me out; but I think that if you check, you'll find that I've been playing more minutes than any other player on the team. I'm calling it quits after next season only because I want to spend time with my children, but I really think I could play a few more years at the same level.

[Q] Playboy: You're no doubt aware that most sports fans have long considered you enigmatic, if not downright sullen and hostile. How did that come about?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Basically, it was my own fault, because I never tried to communicate with sportswriters; and as a result of all the negative interaction between me and the press, I got a bad image. I was described as distant, cold, etc.---but it didn't matter to me. I knew that if I talked to these guys and decided to court the press systematically, I'd get certain benefits, but I just didn't care. I always had my guard up, and I was unapproachable.

I think I felt that way until a couple of years ago, when I finally got tired of being bum-rapped in the press. I found that when I worked just a little bit at trying to communicate and smooth things over, I got a great result: People seemed to feel a lot differently about me. Their image of me and their support of me have taken on a different tone. It's much more like, "He's one of us." I had to work for that, and I had to learn about that, and I'm glad I finally absorbed those lessons and made them useful in my life. Being liked and having people come up to me and feeling comfortable about it have made the adjustment worth the effort.

[Q] Playboy: Why had you decided not to talk to the press in the first place?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Probably because when I was in high school and then at UCLA, sportswriters assumed that the teams I was on would win championships. That idea of foregone success took the thrill out of playing. Because of all the attention and all the great expectations, there was just no sense of discovery, no surprises. They'd already put me at the top; they had said that's where I belonged, and by doing so, they took away the fun of it. Any success I had was going to be taken for granted, and a knew it. And I was right.

[Q] Playboy: You mean you got pissed off just because sportswriters correctly assessed your ability?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: It didn't piss me off, but it was a downer. In my senior year of high school, there were 60 other players at least seven feet tall who were going on to college, yet it seemed to be a foregone conclusion that I'd lead whatever school I went to to the N.C.A.A. championship. That put pressure on me; but fortunately, my coach at UCLA was John Wooden, and his whole thing was, "We'll ignore all that talk and just play basketball."

[Q] Playboy: UCLA did, indeed, win national championships during the three years you played there. When you graduated, a lot of sportswriters called you the greatest college ballplayer of all time, and nowadays they're calling you the greatest pro of all time. How do you react to such praise?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: It's very flattering and it's nice to be considered in that light, but I don't get too excited about it. I know that I've been very successful and that it's hard to measure success.

[Q] Playboy: Modesty aside, have you ever suspected that you might be the best player in the game?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: At times, yes, but basketball is a funny game: There are certain things forwards have to do, other things that guards have to do, and centers have something else that they have to do. It's hard for me to measure myself against players like Julius Erving, Dave DeBusschere, Chet Walker, Elgin Baylor, John Havlicek and all of the other great forwards I've competed against. Same thing with guards: I just can't find any basis for comparing myself with players like Oscar Robertson and Magic Johnson.

[Q] Playboy: You, Wilt Chamberlain and Bill Russell are overwhelmingly regarded as the three greatest centers of all time. How do you compare yourself with them?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Hard to say, because the game has changed since they left it. Today, N.B.A. teams have to shoot within 24 seconds, and the three-second lane is 16 feet wide. Wilt played a long time with a 12-foot-wide lane, which meant he could get closer to the basket before taking his shots, so it's hard to compare what he did with what I've done. Still, how many players are going to average more than 50 points a game, as he did one season? Bill Russell never had overwhelming individual stats, but he was the key ingredient in the greatest dynasty in the game. Yet I can't compare myself with him, either, because basketball is a team game, not an individual game. When I was in the seventh grade, I started going to Madison Square Garden regularly, and I learned how to win by watching Russell play. Bill played for his teammates. He passed the ball a lot, he rebounded and started the fast break and was always there plugging up the middle on defense---he was content to do that. Russell showed me that if you play for the other guys on the team, you get a lot more out of everybody.

[Q] Playboy: What did Chamberlain show you?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Chamberlain played the game the same way Russell did, except he scored so much more. But his teams had to get more points from him. He'd score 45 points and his teams would still lose.

[Q] Playboy: One year, Chamberlain led the N.B.A. in assists. Do you think it might have been a reaction------

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: To everybody's saying that he shot too much? Yes, absolutely. Wilt had to fight people's dissatisfaction that his teams didn't win. There he was, this great dominating player, and his teams didn't win championships. Well, Wilt wasn't playing for the right team. As an individual, he was in a class by himself, but his teammates---they were OK, but not the supporting cast Russell had.

[Q] Playboy: Do you think Chamberlain is still frustrated by the way people perceive him and his place in basketball history?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: If you want to get Wilt ticked off or bitter, just mention Bill Russell. You will incite him.

[Q] Playboy: In 1984, you supplanted Chamberlain as the leading scorer in pro basketball history, mostly on the strength of your hook shot, which your coach, Pat Riley, calls "the ultimate offensive weapon." Most followers of the sport---and players, as well---think your patented sky hook is the most difficult shot in basketball. Do you agree?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Not really, no. I think if you start shooting the hook early enough---and I had the form and release down pat when I was a freshman in high school---it becomes no more difficult than any other shot. And it has one built-in advantage: Because you release the hook from high up and behind your body, nobody can get a hand on it.

[Q] Playboy: No one has ever blocked your hook shot?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I think maybe once or twice somebody I hadn't seen came in from behind me and blocked it, but players who've guarded me, no, they couldn't get to it. Nate Thurmond, who played for the Golden State Warriors, was the best in the league as far as playing me one on one went, but even he never blocked the shot. These days, nobody gets to play me one on one anymore. The last time that happened was against Houston; they let Akeem Olajuwon play me one on one for a quarter, and that was it.

[Q] Playboy: How do teams defend against you?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Oh, every time I get the ball, at least two and sometimes three guys converge on me. That happens every night, because I'm a target, somebody who has to be taken care of.

[Q] Playboy: How do opponents try to take care of you?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Guys do anything they can get away with, such as using their shoulders and forearms---normal play includes just about everything short of throwing blows. Rick Mahorn, now with the Detroit Pistons, has a lot of lower-body strength, and he's one of the players who'll put a knee up under my behind and actually lift my feet off the floor.

[Q] Playboy: But they still don't shut you down. If you hadn't been so consistent with your hook, do you think you'd have been able to do more with other shots?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I would have had to, but I never really considered it, because my hook shot is very accurate. And when I sink it, it makes opposing centers mad. They really get angry. It's not like I'm somebody who's doing a physical number on them. I'm more like somebody with a foil who's sticking them every time.

[Q] Playboy: How mad have opponents gotten?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: To the point of being funny. Mahorn and I really got into it one night. I'd scored a lot of points, but toward the end of the game---a game that the Lakers had no chance of winning---Rick turned to me and said, "No, you can't shoot the hook anymore." Next time the Lakers came down the court, Rick positioned himself way up on my left side---the side I go to when I shoot the hook---so I immediately turned the other way and made a lay-up. Mahorn shouted, "Yeah, that's right, Kareem, but forget the hook---that's out!"

[Q] Playboy: Which players are difficult for you to guard?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: My defense in the pivot is pretty effective. The toughest guy for me throughout my career was Dan Issel, who's retired now. Dan could hit 20-foot jump shots all night long, so I'd have to get out there with him, which left the middle open for his teammates.

[Q] Playboy: You're the N.B.A.'s all-time leader in scoring and blocked shots; but in any given year, you're rarely among the league's top ten rebounders. Why not?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Well, I led the N.B.A. in rebounds the first year I played for the Lakers, which was also a year when the team did horribly. Our whole concept now is team rebounding, which is why I don't rebound numerically the way I used to. The idea is that if I get 20 rebounds and the rest of the team gets three, we're going to lose, so everybody on the team has to rebound. My biggest responsibility is to prevent the guy I'm guarding from getting an offensive rebound, because second shots are like nails in your coffin. When my man can't get near the basket, Magic or Maurice Lucas or Kurt Rambis will be there to get the rebound.

[Q] Playboy: Who are the league's toughest rebounders?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Oh, Akeem Olajuwon is very good because of his agility. Jeff Ruland and Jack Sikma are great rebounders, too. But if you asked us who's number one in that department, I think we'd all say Moses Malone. He never stops coming at you and he's strong as a bull.

[Q] Playboy: In his Playboy Interview [March 1984], Malone told us he sometimes feels he should wear boxing gloves on the court. Is that what it's like for all N.B.A. centers?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: No, that's just the way Moses plays. He's very physical and very smart. In 1983, the 76ers blew us out of the finals in four straight games, and Moses was just relentless. I had to appraise what I was doing wrong insofar as the way I played him, so I went to Pete Newell, who has a summer camp for teaching pros the fundamentals of whatever it is they're not doing right. Newell's the professor---about 25 years ago, when he coached the University of California, his team won the N.C.A.A. championship. Anyway, I took Pete some video tape of our '83 Play-off games against the 76ers and asked him to critique my performance against Moses.

[Q] Playboy: What were you doing wrong?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Specifically, I was holding my hands at my sides and, just before a rebound, Moses would lean against me and pin one of my arms to my side. He'd knock me off balance for a split second, which was enough to let him get the rebound. Moses makes his living doing things like that. Newell showed me that I had to keep my hands and arms up higher and use my butt to knock people's weight off me so that I didn't get thrown off balance. The next two years---'84 and '85---my rebound average went up.

[Q] Playboy: Basketball is supposedly a noncontact sport, yet it's become very physical in the past decade. Why?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Well, the closer you are to the basket, the more physical the game gets. Coaches generally want players to take shots from as close to the basket as possible, because the closer you are, the higher your shooting percentage. What happens is that everybody tries to get as close to the basket as he can. On offense, I'm not allowed anywhere near the basket. That's the book on me: Play me as physically as possible, to the point where you take a few fouls and see what the refs will let you get away with. I'll tell you, by the end of the season, I feel like a piece of chopped meat. The area under the hoop is serious, serious territory, and because centers play closest to the basket, they have the most serious job. There's very little levity under the basket. That's where most people end up bleeding.

[Q] Playboy: Don't you think you're confirming what Malone had to say about wearing boxing gloves during games?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Oh, I'm definitely not into fisticuffs.

[Q] Playboy: Then why have you been involved in fights on court?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I think you're probably referring to the Kent Benson episode, and if what led up to it happened again, I probably wouldn't react the same way. In 1977, in a game against Milwaukee, I was just standing in the lane, waiting for the ball to come down court, when Benson, who was then a rookie, looked at me, looked up court and then just fired an elbow into my solar plexus. That was one thing I wasn't going to tolerate.

[Q] Playboy: You'd never caught an elbow?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I'd never gotten one that was so blatant and that also knocked the wind out of me. I mean, when he hit me, I went down---and when I jumped up, about seven seconds later, I was outraged. I threw one right hand at him, and I've never decked anyone so badly. When the league finished its investigation, I got fined, and I'll never get over that, because it was as if I were the villain. The film clearly shows that wasn't the case.

[Q] Playboy: You once said that before games, you work up a sense of antagonism toward the center who'll be guarding you. Is it really as grim as all that?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: If I said antagonism, I didn't really mean it in a personal way against other players. And even though the level of competition is very high, I've gotten friendly with guys like Mahorn and Issel. Dan's a funny man, and he'd always have something ironic to say about what was happening. I've got to appreciate him as a person. His little daughter didn't know anything about basketball, but after she saw me in Airplane! and found out I played against her father, she asked Dan to get my autograph; so in his house, I'm a movie star. Bob Lanier, who played for Detroit, was also very funny. Bob wanted the refs to call every play his way, and he also wanted every rebound and didn't want you to run down the court too fast.

[Q] Playboy: Would he actually tell you that?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Oh, he'd get mad at me for running down the court too fast. And then he'd yell at his coach, too: "Hey, I'm in here trying to rebound---what do you expect, man, everything?" I knew that Bob used to smoke cigarettes at half time, so I'd make him run a lot, and by the fourth quarter, he'd always be out of it. During games, we got to the point of blows' being thrown; but away from the court, Bob and I always got along. Lanier said he loved the Bruce Lee movie I was in, Game of Death, because I got killed.

[Q] Playboy: How did you happen to be in that movie?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Bruce and I were buddies. I'd studied aikido in New York one summer while I was a student at UCLA, and when I returned to Los Angeles in the fall, the editor of Black Belt magazine introduced me to Bruce, and we began working out together.

[Q] Playboy: How much progress did you make in martial arts?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I did pretty well. Bruce wanted somebody to train with who could give him some problems, and he liked sparring with me because of my height and reach---that gave me enough of an advantage to make him work a little bit. Bruce graduated me a couple of times in his own discipline, which was called jeet kune do. Basically, it was boxing and kicking, plus a few blocking techniques.

[Q] Playboy: Was his death a shock to you?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: It was a terrible shock. I was on my way to see Bruce when he died---a blood vessel burst in his brain. I'd been traveling around the world and was coming home from Pakistan, and I decided to stop and see Bruce in Hong Kong. So I sent him a telegram and told him I was coming in, and three days later, when I got to the airport at Singapore to fly to Hong Kong, his death was reported in all the newspapers there.

[Q] Playboy: Did you continue studying martial arts after Lee died?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: No, but it wasn't because of Bruce's death, which I took as a personal loss. I'd mastered what he had taught me and wasn't that keen about going any further with it. Once you mature to the point where the prospect of combat doesn't obsess you, it changes you a lot. You don't worry "Can I kick this person's ass?" and you understand that you don't always have to be involved in life-and-death confrontations. The only thing I do now is a form of yoga taught in Los Angeles by Bikram Choudhury, who won the world championship in weight lifting. Bikram's yoga class is designed to enhance muscle elasticity.

[Q] Playboy: Let's shift gears. For the past several years, newspapers have reported widespread drug use in the N.B.A. Are such stories accurate?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I can only speak of what I've seen, which is that guys who do a lot of drugs don't last too long in the N.B.A. The physical demands made on a basketball player are so extensive that anything that detracts from your conditioning tells on you real soon.

If we're talking about players who keep their heads above water and who fool around a little at an occasional party, yes, I think we've seen only the tip of the iceberg. But if we're talking about guys who get heavily into drugs, they end up having serious problems and are out of the league very quickly.

[Q] Playboy: Would you level with us about your own drug use?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Well, I went to school in the Sixties and used grass when I went to movies and concerts---the usual profile. I tried LSD a couple of times in college, and that was definitely enough.

[Q] Playboy: Did you have bad trips on LSD?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: No, I never freaked out. I got a lot of laughter out of it---the absurdities of life are not that pronounced until you take a strong psychedelic. But your perception becomes obscured, and I didn't like that, because I wasn't in control. When I realized how easily you could lose your grip on reality, I said, "Whoa! I've had it with this stuff."

[Q] Playboy: You've admitted that you once tried snorting heroin. What were the circumstances?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I just wanted to try it---that's how bright I was. After my junior year at UCLA, I was back in New York for the summer, and I went up with some friends to Saint Nicholas Park in Harlem, which was a safe place for junkies to hang out. I had two or three snorts right around 11 o'clock at night, and after that, when the guys passed the stuff over to me, I pretended to snort more, but I'd had enough. More than enough: For two or three hours, I couldn't focus both of my eyes at the same time.

[Q] Playboy: Why did you want to try heroin? Was it a macho thing to do?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Yeah, I really wanted to show that I was one of the guys. Along with the other junkies, I sat in that park until four in the morning. I got home at seven and I had to go to work at 7:45.

[Q] Playboy: What kind of job did you have?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I was working for the city---my job was to talk to kids about not screwing up their lives. Nice, huh? My friend Julian Dancy, a guy I grew up with and went to high school with, picked me up in his car and immediately knew what I'd been doing. I suppose it was hard for him to miss it: During the drive over to where I was speaking, all of a sudden I said, "I have to throw up now," and I rolled down my window quick. I'll never forget the look on Julian's face: It was a combination of disgust, anger and disappointment. I knew I never wanted to see that look directed at me again.

[Q] Playboy: Did a lot of your friends have problems with drugs?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Yeah, and some of them are dead as a result. One guy I grew up with dealt cocaine and died of malnutrition---and when they found him, he had almost $5000 in his pocket. He was eating two or three hot dogs a day, but his main consumption was cocaine.

[Q] Playboy: What about your own consumption of cocaine?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: That started and really ended right before my rookie year in the N.B.A. A guy I'd known since we'd both been kids was dealing cocaine, and he had some great stuff. He said, "Hey, Kareem, let's do some hangin' out," and I said, "Right!" So I hung out with him for the better part of a day, and I did too much. I got real wired and, later on, I went for a drive. I wanted to get on whatever expressway it was, and you know how some on ramps begin as two lanes and then merge into one? Well, another driver and I got to the of ramp at the same time, and I just decided I was going to get to the expressway first. I mean, he was not gonna beat me! So I floored it, which was not a bright move: It had been raining and the highway was slippery. My car went into a skid, jumped the curb and then did one and a half turns on wet grass. I remember thinking, I could be wrapped around a tree trunk! Why did I do this? I definitely knew that the stuff had altered my personality. At that point, I realized it was best to leave cocaine to people who really wanted to do it. There were occasions after that when I fooled around with it, but I didn't get pulled in.

[Q] Playboy: Did you ever free-base cocaine?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: No, although when that started, some people tried to get me hooked on it. That wasn't something I wanted to try even once.

[Q] Playboy: The majority of N.B.A. team owners and officials would like to have players tested for drug use. What's your position on that?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I understand their sentiments---they want to do something to protect the sport and the business. There's been a public loss of confidence in the N.B.A. because drug use is so pervasive. The real problem is that they're just seeing what everyone else is seeing: Cocaine has hit the whole of American society. The military, the sports and entertainment industries, the legal and medical professions---anywhere you look, the more affluent parts of society are riddled with drug use. But because basketball players have had a lot of esteem, it's more disappointing to people. I think the N.B.A. is simply trying to do what it can to salvage the respect the public has had for its athletes.

[Q] Playboy: Would you object to mandatory drug testing of N.B.A. players?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Yes, I would. Aside from the constitutional ramifications, I think it's moving into an area where athletes would be treated like children. Basketball is not the defense industry or something that's absolutely necessary to our society. I'm not totally against mandatory testing, but I think the N.B.A. should find a less heavy-handed way to satisfy its need to monitor players.

[Q] Playboy: If you were put in charge of the problem, how would you try to eliminate drug use in the sport?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Jesus, that's tough to answer. I really think a good education program is always the way to go. Most people do not want to kill themselves or harm themselves. And if you can explain that to them in terms they can understand, usually they'll make the switch.

[Q] Playboy: Having had your own fling with it, what can you tell people who want to try cocaine or are having their first experiences with it?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I can tell them that cocaine is very attractive. And that it's insidious. You think you're having a nice time, and in reality, you're on the way to the gallows. As in most cases with things like this, you don't see it until it's too late. You don't realize you have a cocaine problem until the blood vessels in your nose burst, or your teeth fall out, or you're dying of malnutrition, or you've lost your job and your family. That's when you find out you have a problem. Ishmael Reed wrote the most ironic---not funny, just ironic---thing I've read on this subject. Reed says cocaine is the Incas' revenge on the Europeans.

[Q] Playboy: The subject of religion has come into the conversation tangentially; do you mind talking about what caused you to become a Moslem?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I don't mind at all. That came about after a long search. I always went to Catholic schools, because they were the best schools in New York at the time and my mother wanted me to get the best education possible. I hadn't truly been indoctrinated into the religion until I went to school, and when I learned about Jesus Christ at Power Memorial, well, it was a wonderful and illuminating encounter. But what they ended up teaching had nothing to do with the life of Jesus.

[Q] Playboy: What did you think you were being taught instead?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I couldn't verbalize it at the time, but in hindsight, it was more like thought crime, and I put up with it because everybody else did. After all, this was our connection with the eternal and all that, and there were certain things you weren't supposed to think about.

[Q] Playboy: Such as?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Sex. But then puberty showed up, and that was it: From that point on, I knew that Catholicism wasn't for me. We were being told that it was a sin to think about sex, and meanwhile, you'd have these hormones racing through your body at five times the speed of light.

[Q] Playboy: How did you deal with those attacks of wild male hormones?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: At first, I tried telling myself, "Don't even think about sex," but that was impossible; it's called adolescence. And, of course, I didn't know that all my friends who were supposedly getting all these women were lying to me. There I was, envying my friends and at the same time thinking, If it happens, it means I'll have to go to hell.

[Q] Playboy: Were you ready to sacrifice your soul?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Oh, yes, but only for Sophia Loren. She never seemed to be around, though, and I didn't lose my virginity until I was 17.

[Q] Playboy: Did you feel as if you had come late to the party?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: No, because everybody else was dying, too. There were certain girls we'd see and we'd all go, "Ohhhh!" I had plenty of company in those days. When it finally happened, I knew it had to get better. And it did, too---as they say in Paris, "Eventuellement."

[Q] Playboy: What went wrong the first time?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Nothing, except for the effect it had on my nervous system: I had the shakes for about five minutes afterward. It was probably more like 30 seconds, but it sure felt like five minutes. You know, I really did have a religious conflict about premarital sex, and it wasn't until later that I found out it was a charade everybody played, but I took it seriously. I was one of those kids. [Laughs] I suffered for my idealism.

[Q] Playboy: Would it be fair to suggest that you were more naive than most of your classmates?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Oh, yeah. But at the same time, I was truly curious as to whether or not there really was a Supreme Being and what, if anything, made human beings unique. I wanted to get some rational, in-depth knowledge about the subject, so in my senior year in high school, I started reading just about everything I could get my hands on---Hindu texts, Upanishads, Zen, Hermann Hesse---you name it.

[Q] Playboy: What most impressed you?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Hesse's Siddhartha. I was then going through the same things that Siddhartha went through in his adolescence, and I identified with his rebellion against established precepts of love and life. Siddhartha becomes an aesthetic man, a wealthy man, a sensuous man---he explores all these different worlds and doesn't find enlightenment in any of them. That was the book's great message to me, so I started to try to develop my own value system as to what was good and what wasn't. And then, in my freshman year at UCLA, I read The Autobiography of Malcolm X, and that made more of an impression on me than any book I'd ever read.

[Q] Playboy: And that attracted you to the Islamic religion?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: It was a combination of Malcolm and my Catholic upbringing, because Moslems are very affirmative about the Old Testament. It's the same basic tradition; the dispute comes as to who was going to be the final prophet that Jews, Christians and Moslems all believed was coming. Basically, Jews, Christians and Moslems all believe in the God of Abraham. That's a common thread.

[Q] Playboy: Then how do you explain the deep divisions among the three religions?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: That's the baffling thing about it: None of the people who hold up these causes are acting the way Mohammed or Jesus or Moses or David taught people and showed people how to act, with the examples being their own lives. It's a strange thing to observe.

[Q] Playboy: Did you consider becoming a Black Muslim?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: No, but after my sophomore year at UCLA, I went up to a Black Muslim rally in Harlem, because Muhammad Ali was the speaker, and I'd always admired him. I was a college all-American by then, and when the rally was over, I was invited to have dinner with Ali at Louis Farrakhan's house in Queens. We didn't really discuss religion that night, but when I started reading about them, the Black Muslims didn't appeal to my sense of what was really true.

[Q] Playboy: With what did you find fault?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: The Black Muslims were xenophobic. It also seemed to me that the people at the top of the pyramid were doing great, but the people at the bottom were out selling newspapers in the freezing cold. I knew some of those guys, and they had to buy whatever they didn't sell. I didn't see any need for that. But what the Black Muslims talked about as far as black people's helping one another improve our conditions in America went made sense. That was the one thing about the Black Muslims that appealed to me, because Christian churches, for all their strength and ability to organize in the black community, have never seemed to mount anything economic or political that can protect and advance black people's interests.

[Q] Playboy: What do you think of Farrakhan's views today?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I think he's misleading. I don't feel it's possible for blacks to have a separate society within America. Black society has existed in America as a different kind of mini society, but what the Black Muslims are talking about---a kind of independent nation-state---well, I just don't think it can be achieved. I would be overwhelmed with joy if black people could achieve economic and political independence and strength, and I think those are realistic goals. But they won't ever be achieved through Farrakhan's insular, separatist, hostile attitude. I believe that's going to create a polarization that'll take black people back several steps before they can walk past that point again.

[Q] Playboy: Many people see Farrakhan as an anti-Semitic demagog, whipping up racial hatred. Do you agree with anything he stands for?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: There are certain things I definitely agree with him on. Black people do need to be economically and politically more sophisticated and capable. That's absolutely correct, but the stuff Farrakhan tacks onto that; well, I just can't deal with it. The whole thing about white people as devils---was John Brown the Devil? A lot more like him would have really helped black people in America. I just don't agree with the Black Muslims' racist delineation of who's good and who's evil.

[Q] Playboy: What induced you to become a convert to the Islamic faith?

[A] Abdul-jabbar: When I started learning about it, I read the Koran and different things Moslem mystics had written, and there was this body of knowledge that perhaps wasn't black, but it wasn't European, either. I think a lot of black people are attracted to Islam in this country because the religion espouses egalitarianism, and the morality is basically the same that you find in Christianity. But the religion itself is a little more realistic. There's no hierarchy of priests that can rip you off.

[Q] Playboy: That's pretty strong; why do you feel so hostile toward Catholicism?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: When I was a freshman at UCLA, I did a lot of research and learned that Arab Moslems had enslaved black people in East Africa and that Christians had enslaved black people in West Africa, so no one can point a finger. But I also came across a papal bull, written in the 15th or 16th century, that basically said, "It's all right to enslave blacks and make them Christians. Let the slave trade roll." And the Catholic Church received a percentage of the profits. That was really it for me and Catholicism.

[Q] Playboy: How did you feel about white people at that point?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I went through a period of angry racism and was affected by it for a little while, but then I realized that it was making me ill. My parents had always subscribed to Jet magazine, and well before I had had any personal experiences with whites, I had read about black people's being lynched. I remember when the black church in Birmingham was bombed, and that really got to me for months. When I was 15, my parents sent me down to North Carolina by bus to attend the high school graduation of a family friend's daughter. It was 1962, and I saw Jim Crow signs [whites only] all the way through Virginia and North Carolina. Black people couldn't drink at the same water fountains, use the same rest rooms or eat at the same restaurants as whites. It was hard to understand it, and the more of it I saw, the less trust I had for white people other than the ones I'd known.

[Q] Playboy: The exceptions?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: [Laughs] Right, the exceptions. I'm very thankful for those exceptions, because when I started to think logically about the subject of race again, I realized there had always been exceptions in my life, so I had to throw that theory out. I got some help with that.

[Q] Playboy: From whom?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: A man named Hamaas Abdul-Khaalis. My father had known him in the late Forties and early Fifties, when they were both very active as musicians. He told me that if I wanted to know more about the Moslem religion, I should talk with Hamaas, so I went to see him. Hamaas was then working for a Harlem agency that helped high school dropouts get their equivalency diplomas. He showed me that being antiwhite or anti-Semitic was ridiculous and an infection---that's the best word I can use for it. He was a sincere, down-to-earth guy, and he understood how to live as a Moslem in America and still function as an American.

[Q] Playboy: Is that difficult to do?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: No. The Prophet Mohammed said that the faith can't be a burden on you, so if you have to work and can't make all your prayers, that's not a big deal. There's a lot of pragmatism and flexibility in Islam, but most of the world doesn't know that, because the people who make headlines and support the Islamic cause are coming from a very radical political position.

[Q] Playboy: Are you referring to Lebanon and Khomeini's Iran?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Yes, and that situation really saddens me, because there's a lot of senseless slaughter going on there, and I share so much with a lot of those peoples. There's nationalism of all types, political fervor of varying degrees, and none of it is really based in logic.

[Q] Playboy: What do you think should be done about the Palestinian problem?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I don't see any solution to it at all. There's just going to be more senseless death and destruction among people who really shouldn't be at odds. The most eloquent explanation of what's going on over there was given to me by a Hasidic Jew from Brooklyn. He quoted David Ben-Gurion as to how the Israeli state should evolve and said that what the Israelis are now doing is a little crazy.

[Q] Playboy: In what way?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: In essence, he said that Jews had had to forcefully make a place for themselves, but now, having done that, they've become too caught up in the theory that might is right. To keep a people under your heel just because it feels good or it's convenient or whatever---well, it's eventually going to work against Israel. I can see, 30 or 40 years from now, the same type of incidents that led to the uprising in the Warsaw Ghetto happening someplace in the West Bank. And for what? Those people---the Palestinians---are human. They will react to suppression the same way any people do, the same way Jews finally did.

[Q] Playboy: Yet organizations such as the P.L.O. still won't recognize Israel's right to exist. What would you have Israel do?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I just think it's time for Israel to lighten up a little; but I'm saying that as someone who lives 7000 miles away from the situation, and I'm not trying to preach a sermon. I do know that the two things needed in the Middle East are tolerance and restraint on the part of all concerned, and those two things just don't exist there. And so there's going to be more tragic loss of life.

[Q] Playboy: Soon after you met Hamaas Abdul-Khaalis, you bought a house in Washington, D.C., that he used as an Islamic center. In 1973, a group of Black Muslims---intent on murdering your mentor---invaded that house and killed seven people, including three of Hamaas' children and his grandchild. Why were the Black Muslims after Hamaas---and were they after you, as well?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I don't think I was in any real danger, but they wanted to kill Hamaas because he'd written letters to them and to other Moslems saying that Elijah Muhammad, the Black Muslims' leader, was a sham and a fake. I'm assuming that was an affront that couldn't be tolerated by the Black Muslims. They sent some people to kill him, but he was out of the house when they came, so they killed his family. From that point on, Hamaas just kept building a bigger and thicker wall around himself. Four years later, in 1977, Hamaas and some other people from my house in D.C. took over some buildings, held hostages, and one person died.

[Q] Playboy: Why did he do it?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: That was Hamaas' way of protesting the opening of a film called Mohammad, Messenger of God---it's forbidden to create any likeness of the Prophet or alter the teachings or facts of his life. I went to visit Hamaas in jail before the trial, which was the last time I saw him. It's hard to know what's going on in somebody else's mind, but it seemed he was maintaining his usual demeanor and attitude.

[Q] Playboy: Do you think he would have tried that take-over if his family hadn't been murdered?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Hamaas claims that had nothing to do with it, but I don't believe that. It just seems to me that he ended up doing something really destructive---there was loss of life, and all the brothers involved in the take-over with him were separated from their families. I didn't see any logic in what he'd done, only harm. It finally made me realize you can't give your life over to anyone. It's much better to make your own decisions and live with your own mistakes than to allow someone else to make decisions for you.

[Q] Playboy: Had you done that with Hamaas?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Yes, I gave up way too much. I'd been seeing two women, both of whom converted to Islam because of me and studied the religion with Hamaas. When I decided to marry one of them in 1971, Hamaas strongly advised me to marry the other one instead---and I did as I was advised, even though I knew I wasn't in love with her. The wedding ceremony was held in the Washington house I'd bought for Hamaas, and it was a personal disaster: Because they weren't Moslems, my mother and father weren't permitted to attend. I knew they were outside in the hallway while the ceremony was going on, but I didn't know how to challenge Hamaas. After the wedding, I split. I went and saw my parents, and my mother was very upset, and that wound didn't heal until recently---I'm talking, like, within the past two years.

[Q] Playboy: You left your wife in 1973. Was the marriage itself a disaster?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: It wasn't a disaster, no. My ex-wife is a wonderful lady and a sincere Moslem, and after the divorce we still saw a lot of each other. I'm very fortunate in that we've eliminated our differences and we have a very positive relationship and beautiful children. I'm thankful for that. I couldn't ask for more.

[Q] Playboy: How many children have you?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Habiba and I had three children, and I have a fourth from my relationship with Cheryl Pistono.

[Q] Playboy: Cheryl Pistono has been depicted as the person most responsible for getting rid of your shyness and reluctance to deal with people. Do you think that's true?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Cheryl definitely helped, and she was the right person for that. But it was something I wanted for myself, and if I hadn't wanted it, it wouldn't have happened. We started living together in 1979, and by then I was no longer dealing with the Moslems in Washington, D.C. When I'd go out, Cheryl would go out with me, and there was a reaction in the press that was like, "He's with a woman. We can talk to this woman." And they could talk to Cheryl---she has quite a personality.

[Q] Playboy: Was she a social buffer for you?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Yes, she played that role. We stopped living together at the beginning of 1984, when... let's just say the relationship ran its course. I'd rather not talk about that in public. I don't want to minimize anything Cheryl did for me, but I remember when people started writing that Cheryl was the reason I was happy, and then other people started writing that Magic Johnson was the reason I was happy. The truth is, I was happy just because the Lakers were winning.

[Q] Playboy: Before last year, your team hadn't beaten the Celtics in eight N.B.A. finals, including the 1984 championship series. Did you think the Celtics were some kind of jinx for the Lakers?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: No, they're just an excellent team; but I thought we should have beaten them in 1984, and we would have if not for two critical mistakes. We lost two games to them in the '84 series because we threw the ball away at crucial times. We really beat ourselves and knew it, and we wanted another shot at them last year, because we had a lot to prove.

[Q] Playboy: The Lakers and the Celtics seem to be in a league by themselves. How do the Celtics try to beat you?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: The same way they beat everybody else. The Celtics play tough defense and they rebound well. They pride themselves on being a tougher team than we are; at least, they did last year.

[Q] Playboy: Tougher in what sense?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: That they were more physical and could outrebound us. They thought they had an advantage there, and so did a lot of sportswriters, who'd portrayed the Lakers as quiche eaters. But we knew that if we limited McHale's post-up baskets and played tough defense on Bird and didn't give him any second shots, we could beat them, and that's what happened. It's very rare for a team to win two championships in a row, and it's very important to me that we do it again this year.

[Q] Playboy: If the Lakers get to the finals this season, do you think Boston will be there waiting for you again?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: It wouldn't surprise me.

[Q] Playboy: The Celtics have a team that's two-thirds white in a league that's 70 percent black. Does that strike you as odd?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: [Laughs] We're not supposed to talk about these things. That's a really loaded question.

[Q] Playboy: It's not loaded at all; we're being straightforward here. Do you think that Boston's management has a policy of keeping the team predominantly white?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Well, some teams do seem to relish the prospect of having a star player who's white. The Celtics certainly have a couple of star players who are white, and they're great basketball players. If I were a coach or a general manager, I'd want them on my team no matter what their color was. I'm not trying to put racial overtones on this, but as far as what Boston's policy really is, we'll never know.

[Q] Playboy: Still, basketball fans often debate whether or not the racial make-up of an N.B.A. team affects its popularity. What do you think?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: If race were so important, the N.B.A. wouldn't have set new attendance records the past two seasons. But there's something else to remember here: Whenever you have a winning team, people seem to forget about race very quickly. We get very tribal, but when push comes to shove and the heat gets turned on, we're all about the same basic things and our humanity overcomes all that other crap. A book I read called Bloods, about black soldiers, really brought that point home to me. A black guy who'd never really dealt with white people and resented them got put together in Vietnam with a white guy from the Deep South who considered himself Klan material. When they found themselves out there fighting Charley, they suddenly didn't care who the other guy was---they were on the same side, and screw all that other stuff. Vietnam changed everybody's thinking about who's OK and who isn't. You know how they say there are no atheists in foxholes? I don't believe there are a whole lot of racists in foxholes, either.

[Q] Playboy: What about in the rest of American society?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: I think it's changing and for the better. For example, a teammate of mine for several years on the Lakers was a guy named Norman Nixon. Norman grew up in Macon, Georgia, and is eight or ten years younger than I am---and he attended an integrated high school and never saw a whites only sign. That, to me, is a monumental change, especially in view of what I told you about my trip down to North Carolina when I was in high school. Certain things have definitely changed for the better. The racist structures that were supported by law have pretty much been struck down, and any that remain are very vulnerable to attack when spotted. As far as the battle for men's hearts and minds is concerned, that continues. But that always will continue.

[Q] Playboy: Are you optimistic about the eventual outcome of that battle?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Yeah, I am. People are starting to understand what it means to have a free and open society that respects the rights and appreciates the contributions of all its citizens. Our democracy has never been perfect, and it was hard for Americans to admit that in respect to blacks. Maybe that was understandable, given the fact that blacks weren't brought here to become presidents of corporations. We were brought here to tote that barge and lift that bale. We were brought here to be a convenience. Our men did manual labor and our women slept in their masters' beds. George Washington had something like 18 children with women who were his slaves. You know how people are always wondering, "Why are they all named Washington?" [Laughs] Well, it's legitimate. Jefferson also had a lot of black kids with his slaves. We are, within our population, the children of American Presidents. [Historians have concluded that Washington had no such children.]

[Q] Playboy: Did you change your name from Lew Alcindor as a stricture of your religion or was it a conscious decision to rid yourself of a slave master's name?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: It was a combination of both. As far as I was concerned, I was latching on to something that was part of my heritage, because many of the slaves who were brought here were Moslems. My family was brought to America by a French planter named Alcindor, who came here from Trinidad in the 18th Century. My people were Yoruba, and their culture survived slavery---there are still traces of it in New Orleans and throughout the West Indies, Cuba, Puerto Rico and French-speaking islands like Trinidad. My father found out about that when I was a kid, and it gave me all I needed to know that, hey, I was somebody, even if nobody else knew about it. When I was a kid, no one would believe anything positive that you could say about black people. And that's a terrible burden on black people, because they don't have an accurate idea of their history, which has been either suppressed or distorted. And I'm speaking from experience.

[Q] Playboy: You weren't taught black history in school?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: The history books I read throughout grade school and high school contained absolutely nothing about what black people did for this country. The only thing I learned was that black people were slaves and that Lincoln freed the slaves and then black people got dumped on during the Reconstruction. I was almost an adult before I found out that Crispus Attucks, a black, had been the first American to die in the Boston Massacre. And it wasn't until I was playing in the N.B.A. that I found out that the Battle of Bunker Hill wasn't decided until Peter Salem, a black guy, shot Major John Pitcairn. Thousands of black people fought hard for America in the Revolutionary War. You know how the cavalry always shows up on time in the movies to save the settlers? Those were really black troops of the Ninth and Tenth cavalries, the buffalo soldiers. They chased Geronimo, they fought Pancho Villa along the borders, and during the Spanish-American War, they fought under General John J. Pershing at San Juan Hill. When you find out things like that, your attitude changes. When I understood what blacks had done here, it was like, "Hey, we've always been involved in meaningful things in America, but nobody's aware of it." Black kids need to know that; they need to know they belong here and have something to offer. Right now, it seems to me that black people only get credit for urban crime and welfare fraud, with a little rhythm-and-blues thrown in. I think that if our contributions to America became better known, it would give young blacks the incentive to do something. It would also give whites an appreciation of what we've contributed, and they would stop looking down on us as baggage.

[Q] Playboy: Why haven't the educational systems in predominantly black cities been able to do that job?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: No city's educational system is capable of dealing with what black kids have to overcome in order to get an education. The black family structure is a mess, and because there's no supervision outside the school, whatever the kids are taught is rarely reinforced at home. It's a vicious cycle, with child pregnancies being one of the biggest problems. Kids are great at producing babies, but when they see that raising them is an 18-year job, they say, "Screw that." So then we have more kids with no supervision, kids who end up being just like their parents. Until that can be overcome, blacks are not going to be very well educated.

[Q] Playboy: Have you tried to do anything about that?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Yes, I worked with Arthur Ashe when he tried to start a literacy program, which consisted of having prominent blacks go around the country to promote literacy. We tried to do whatever we could to make kids deal with books and have some vision of what they'd like to do with their lives. It's proved to be more of a task than Arthur or I or anybody else could overcome.

[Q] Playboy: Is it fair to say you're one of the nation's leading role models for black kids?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Yes, but for the wrong reasons. Black kids all want to go out and play basketball or football, and they should be thinking that there's an easier way to make a living. They should be thinking about going to school and having a career that lasts as long as they want it to last. They should be thinking about careers in law, in medicine, in accounting, in various technologies. Unfortunately, you have kids hoping for careers that hinge on their physical abilities, and that's not going to make it. You know how many jobs there are in pro basketball? About 275. And the average pro's career lasts about four years. It's so redundant and depressing. It's the only thing these kids talk about. It's part of the vicious cycle much of the black community has lived with.

[Q] Playboy: Do you feel that that kind of thinking may be changing in the black community?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: In terms of black people's moving to help themselves, it's a slow process. And understandably so, because until about 20 years ago, the political and economic development of black communities had been stymied by Jim Crow laws and de facto racism and a long history of suppressing black voting rights. It's changing, but it's like we're going from A to B, and the rest of the country has been around the alphabet twice. Blacks still don't have too much faith in the political process, and that's hurting us now.

[Q] Playboy: How?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: We're not using the political process as effectively as we could to improve our position. A lot of people were surprised when Harold Washington---another one of George's descendants---got elected mayor of Chicago and Wilson Goode got elected mayor of Philadelphia. It's an important new phenomenon, and an encouraging one, and we're going to have to understand what political power means on a local basis and then project it nationally. But because of all the mistrust, I don't know how quickly the black community will exploit its political power. I remember that when I was at UCLA, one of the things we used to say was that if we had James Brown and The Temptations down at the Coliseum, you couldn't keep black people out of there. But if we went down and said, "Look, we're gonna get together and organize to liberate black people," nobody would show up. That used to be a tirade we'd go on for days. But, again, black people don't trust the political process, because we've been zapped by it too many times.

[Q] Playboy: Among contemporary politicians, who do you think has been most helpful to black Americans?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: President Jimmy Carter, primarily because of his fantastic effort to establish Federal guidelines for hiring minorities.Unfortunately, the current Administration is trying to eliminate all that.

[Q] Playboy: How do you feel about Ronald Reagan?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar:I see a lot of indifference there. I think his attitude is that since the Constitution is such a great document, we don't have to force anybody to do anything, because the Constitution will protect everyone. But if that were true, there would have been no need for the Voting Rights Act, because all the rights blacks were supposed to have were clearly defined in the Constitution. Yet we couldn't exercise those rights, which is why the Voting Rights Act was necessary. I just think Reagan is out of touch. He doesn't know what reality is for a black person, and maybe that explains his indifference.

[Q] Playboy: You have a lot of credibility with the public, so you may very well be asked to lend your name to various politicians' Campaigns. Do you plan to become more active in politics?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Well, I'd like to keep that credibility, which will make it real hard for me to get involved. But there are certain politicians I respect, such as Mayor Tom Bradley of Los Angeles and Senator Bill Bradley of New Jersey. I don't know that much about Bill's politics, but I know he's honest, which is why I sent him money for his first Senatorial campaign. There are several politicians from California whom I like, and I also respect a guy from Brooklyn named Al Vann, who's done very well organizing black political groups in order to get access to the reins of political power in New York. I think that's what the black community really needs---people who can organize them and show them there's some blood to be gotten out of the turnip. It takes patience and a lot of demonstration before some people understand it, but when they do, it makes for meaningful change.

[Q] Playboy: Is there a place for you in that process?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Not at present, but in the future, maybe.

[Q] Playboy: When athletes retire, there's a vacuum in their lives that has to be filled. Will you miss the challenges, competition and life of a basketball player?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Sure I will. Fortunately, I still have the friends I made, so that'll take the edge off it; but the life---moving around the country like we do and knowing the people we know---yeah, I'll miss it.

[Q] Playboy: In the world of sports, is it important to you how people perceive what you've accomplished?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: No, because I've already gotten enough recognition to the point where I know I've impressed a few people. More than a few people. So there's no need for me to go on and on and on. I've played professional basketball longer than anyone else, and it's been great fun just fighting off the inevitable for as long as I have. I've achieved enough to back off without any regrets. I just hope that in remembering me, people will acknowledge my professionalism and consistency.

[Q] Playboy: If you're able to control the next 20 years of your life the way you have the past 20 years, what would you like to accomplish?

[A] Abdul-Jabbar: Well, first I'd like to continue to have a positive relationship with the people who are important in my life, especially my kids. And I want to be able to maintain my business and financial entities. Beyond that, it's hard to say what I'd like to achieve. You're talking about the larger scheme of things, and that's still a big question mark. That's the adjustment I'm going to have to make---finding a direction and being able to move. Right now, I don't know where to direct my social thoughts, religious thoughts, political thoughts and thoughts about uplifting my people. I'm just one person, and at this point, all I know is that I'll play basketball for one more season, and then I'm going to rest for as long as it takes to rid my system of those 5:30-a.m. wake-up calls---the ones you get so that you can catch that next plane to that next game.

"I went through a period of angry racism for a while, but then I realized that it was making me ill."