Boston Celtics (1966–2006) Russell took over as a player-coach for the
1966–67 NBA season, becoming the first
African American head coach in the four major North American professional team sports. Soon after, heading a team press conference, and with his typical bravado, Auerbach puffed on his trademark cigar and stated: "I'm not going anywhere. We're going to sign
Larry Bird and we're going to be on top again." Despite knowing that Bird, a talented young player from unheralded Indiana State, had a year of college eligibility remaining, he had drafted Bird as a junior eligible in the
1978 NBA draft. He waited for a year until the future Hall of Fame forward Bird arrived, finally setting aside his team salary rules when it became clear that his choices were paying Bird a record-setting rookie salary or watching him re-enter the 1979 draft. Bird then became the highest-paid Celtic as a rookie, with a $650,000-per-year deal. Auerbach knew the brilliant, hard-working Bird would be the cornerstone of a new Celtics generation. He convinced the
Golden State Warriors to trade him a #3 overall pick and future Hall-of-Fame center
Robert Parish in exchange for two picks in the
1980 NBA draft: #1 overall
Joe Barry Carroll and the #13 pick
Rickey Brown. With the #3 pick, Auerbach selected the player he most wanted in the draft,
Kevin McHale, who would also be inducted into the Hall of Fame. The Parish-McHale-Bird
frontcourt became one of the greatest in NBA history. Auerbach also hired head coach
Bill Fitch, who led the revamped Celtics to the
1981 title. In 1983, Auerbach named former Celtics player
K.C. Jones as the coach. Starting in 1984, Jones coached the Celtics to four straight appearances in the
NBA Finals, winning championships in
1984 and
1986. Auerbach also made a pair of shrewd trades that led to those titles, acquiring
Dennis Johnson before the 1984 season to strengthen their backcourt defense, and
Bill Walton before the 1986 season to provide much-needed bench scoring. Auerbach, as a part-time side gig, was the
color analyst on NBA and college basketball games for
TBS Sports from 1982 to 1987. In 1984, after he relinquished his general managing duties to
Jan Volk, Auerbach focused on continuing as president and later vice-chairman of the
Boston Celtics. In a surprising move after winning their 15th title, he traded popular guard
Gerald Henderson, the Game 2 hero in the Finals against the Lakers, for Seattle's first-round draft pick in 1986. Two years later, after the Celtics defeated Houston in the finals for their 16th championship, he used the second overall pick in the 1986 draft, the pick acquired from Seattle, to take college prodigy
Len Bias from Maryland, arguably the most brilliant coup in Auerbach's stellar career. With the team's star players still in their prime, the defending champions appeared set to compete at the top for years. However, tragedy struck just two days later, when Bias died of a
cocaine overdose. Several years later, Celtics star player
Reggie Lewis died suddenly in 1993. Without any league compensation for either loss, the team fell into decline, not seeing another Finals appearance in Auerbach's lifetime. In an interview, Auerbach confessed that he lost interest in big-time managing in the early 1990s, preferring to stay in the background and concentrating on his pastimes,
racquetball and his cigar-smoking. He would, however, stay on with the Celtics as president until 1997, as vice chairman until 2001, and then became president again, a position he held until his death, although in his final years, he was weakened by heart problems and often used a wheelchair.{{cite web |title=A Tribute to Red |url=http://www.nba.com/news/auerbach_tribute.html ==Personal life==