Being a harsh taskmaster, in and of itself, isn't all that egregious. We've all heard the foul language -- friends routinely circulated by e-mail one particular recorded halftime tirade by Knight whenever some new spot of trouble popped up. Yelling at your players in private is fine; even cursing at them in private isn't that big of a deal to me. You can establish your own ground rules (within limits) as to what your communication style is going to be. Physical abuse is over the line, however. Publicly badgering your players in games is over the line. Cursing out reporters in press conferences has no place. There's just no call for so much of his behavior yet the unversity repeatedly looked the other way. Even the "zero-tolerance" policy was a cop-out. Neil Reed's accusation of being choked followed by the videotape proof of the incident should have been plenty reason for dismissal. Knight's denial that it happened compounded by his refusal to review the videotape was just more evidence of his defiance of any authority other than his own.

The irony of the "last straw" incident of Knight's overreaction to a student's failing to address him with proper respect is beyond ludicrous. When did Knight ever show others the proper respect they deserved?

I was always uncomfortable with the aspect of Knight's players' (especially the black players) defending his methods so adamantly. After years of images like seeing Knight manhandle a teenage Isaiah Thomas on the sidelines during the '79 Pan Am Games, hearing people like Quinn Buckner be his apologist always rubbed me the wrong way. Not that I'm any fan of this kind of thinking but there was always an element of Uncle Tom and "Master only beats us 'cause we deserve it" swirling around underneath those statements in his defense. Thomas did leave Indiana early, but you don't hear him openly criticizing Knight or his methods. Steve Alford had no love for Knight either, but somehow there never seemed to be any black players with the fortitude to stand up and demand to be treated better. Michael Lewis, another white player, will forever be my hero for one moment: a couple of seasons back, Knight pulled Lewis from a game and yelled at him as he made his way to the bench (presumably for missing a defensive assignment); Lewis stopped, turned back before sitting down, got in Knight's face and yelled right back at him defending his case. It was excellent, but only one moment on the players' side to counterbalance numerous ones on the coach's side. Unfortunately, I can't even conceive of a black player with enough gumption to yell back at Knight so publicly like that. (We've still got a long way to go in terms of things being on equal footing in terms of stature and self-esteem.)

Oddly enough, I started out as an Indiana defender myself. 1976 -- the first year of the post-John Wooden era -- was the first time I sat down and plotted out the full NCAA tournament draw and tried to guess who was going to win it. Undefeated Indiana was the clear favorite, but when they met Alabama early on, all the kids in my neighborhood were backing the Tide because it was a black team. I protested, "But Scott May's black" and insisted that Indiana was going to win the game. When they did win (after that big charge/block call between Kent Benson and Leon Douglas, both of whom had 4 fouls, went against Douglas) I guess I must have rubbed it in 'cause people started calling me "Scott 'Bay" after that. (There's two guys who, to this day, still call me "Scott" although I think they've long since forgotten why.)

As much as I loathe Knight's methods, there's one thing that I always had to grudgingly give him his due for. Not his record. So what if he wins. The Cuban Women's Olympic Volleyball team used to win all the time but I had no respect for them after seeing that famous exposé on how the coach abused them in practice in order to get them to perform. The one thing I'll give him credit for is that he did always have one point that I agreed with: that people never truly give their full effort to anything. No matter how much people say they're doing their best, it never really is true. Through his belligerent methods, Knight was able to get his players to break down and admit (even to themselves) that there was a much greater effort they were capable of. They were always holding something back. The reason his teams excelled in man-to-man defense is that it's entirely about desire. You don't actually have to be quick or athletic to play defense. You just have to have enough willpower not to quit. There's always a moment in which you quit and concede the move or the shot to your opponent. The best defenders are those who don't give in and won't give up at a very high threshold. Look it: Bob Knight was able to get Dan Dakich to D up Michael Jordan (in the famous 1984 NCAA tournament game between Indiana and North Carolina -- Jordan's last college game). Nobody played that good individual defense on Michael ever again.

I also give Knight some credit in the NBA success of Michael Jordan. Jordan was always a self-motivated player. The improvement he showed from one season to the next at North Carolina surprised even Dean Smith. But I always thought that passing through the tutelage of Knight (on the 1984 Olympic basketball team) gave Michael that final push of never settling for less than his own best effort from himself, even when the rest of his teammates and coaching staff on those early Chicago Bulls teams weren't anywhere near his level of dedication.

It doesn't much matter to me whether Knight gets another head-coaching job. I'm sure that he will (mainly because I think he really wants to break Dean Smith's record for all-time wins so that Knight can claim he's the greatest college coach ever). Whether he does or not, this episode of his being fired from IU will always come up in the conversation. He brought it upon himself. It's like Ty Cobb: you may be one of the greats but that doesn't mean people will praise you for it.