the legends :: player cards

Artis Gilmore

Of all the stars of the American Basketball Association who attended the 50th ABA Reunion in Indianapolis on the weekend of April 6-7, 2018, no one shined more brightly than Artis Gilmore.

As players, coaches, and their families made their way into Indianapolis on Friday, the first face many saw was Gilmore in the hotel lobby. You quickly got over the pain of his bone-crushing handshake as you saw the bigger-than-life smile come to his face—or if you’re former Kentucky Colonels teammate Joe Hamilton, you may have summoned the nerve to jokingly threaten to “kick his tall butt” if he tried to break any more hands!

Players and coaches, milling around to start what would be the beginning of an historic weekend, immediately forgot about the years since that had passed they last saw each other and embraced the brotherhood camaraderie that defined the ABA.

The A-Train showed his trademark compassion and humility in every word he spoke, be it reminiscing with former teammates and league rivals or joking with fans at Saturday’s ring ceremony. His words held weight and made you appreciate the stories he told.

A 2011 (and very tardy) inductee to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, Gilmore brought a new level of play to the game from the first tip-off, earning both ABA Rookie of the Year and League MVP honors in ’71-’72. He led the league in rebounds in four separate seasons.

Blocked shots were not recorded in the ABA until Gilmore started playing for the Kentucky Colonels. He started blocking so many shots, the Colonels started keeping count and it spread throughout the league. He would finish as the ABA’s All-Time Leader in blocked shots with 750—287 of which came in ’73-’74 season alone, holding the record for most rebounds in a single ABA game, pulling down 40 against New York in 1974. Gilmore is also the ABA’s All-Time Career Field Goal Percentage Leader with a .557 shooting percentage.

By the time the league came to an end with the NBA merger in 1976, Gilmore would be a 5-time ABA All-Pro team member. He helped lead the ’74-’75 Kentucky Colonels to a league championship, and as his fellow teammate and Hall of Famer Dan Issel noted at the time, “There’s just no one else like him in the league. He’s devastating. He does devastating things.” At the ABA reunion, he just brought back great memories and a lot of smiles.