Bobby Knight, the irascible and controversial basketball Hall of Famer, found great success doing things his way in life, coaching and sometimes fishing.
Knight, who died last week at 83, was perhaps best friends with Jerry McKinnis, making the most appearances in the 44 years of The Fishin’ Hole and working several times with B.A.S.S.
“The guy loved fishing, especially when he was done coaching,” said Mike McKinnis, B.A.S.S. VP of TV. “Even when he was coaching, he’d rather be fishing. He was as passionate about fishing as anything.”
McKinnis recalls his father’s introduction to “The General,” who was blunt, profane and hot-tempered. In typical Knight fashion, it came via a fiery phone call after a show with Arkansas coach Eddie Sutton. Knight took umbrage.
“Bobby saw that, ‘What are you doing taking him fishing?! He’s not a fisherman! I’m a fisherman,’” he said. “They became thick as thieves. They just clicked.”
As JM Associates’ resident turkey hunter, Steve Bowman got the privilege to guide Knight and his boss. As luminaries in their fields, they saw a lot of themselves in each other, he said.
“You’re talking about two of the same kind of people, same generation,” Bowman said. “Jerry and Bobby, those guys always respected winners, and a good person, that was another step.
“Bobby respected Jerry for what he had done, with good reason. Jerry obviously respected Bobby for those very same things. In some ways, kindred spirits.”
While Knight’s exterior was surely surly, Bowman said there was a less-known, softer side, like his millions in donations to help causes like diversity and education. He saw that 98% of his players graduated, doubling the national norm, and he quietly did things like caring for talented player Landon Turner after he was paralyzed in a car wreck.
“A lot of people see Bobby Knight as this chair throwing, cussing guy,” he said. “Once you get to know him, you realize he had such a kind heart and did so much for so many people. And he never said, ‘Hey, look what I’m doing.’”
The public saw abrasiveness in Knight while he guided Indiana to three national championships and retired as the winningest coach. The Indianapolis Star detailed Knight’s humanitarian exploits in a Nov. 2 article titled, “‘He never really let the world see the good side.’ But it was there.”
“You had to know Bobby and dig a little bit deeper to know how super it was,” Bowman said. “I was in awe of him all the time because he was worthy of that.
“He reminds me of every coach I ever had. They don’t exist anymore. He was just a dinosaur from a different time.”
Mike McKinnis, who got to know Knight on several trips, said Knight was as coarse and stubborn as advertised. But like his father, Knight was a force, a man who let little get in his way.
“He was a bizarre individual – ‘I’m going to go fishing on that body of water,’ and that was it. He’s going to do it,” Mike McKinnis said. “He was going to cancel things, charge over things, beat things down to catch that fish.”
On one of their trips to Wyoming, Mike McKinnis said Knight was getting skunked but kept with his program.
“Coach had to have a certain fly he would fish with,” he said. “Everyone else was catching them on a different one. He would not change. He’s catching one to our 10, but he’s so stubborn and determined that that was the way he wanted to catch them.”
Jerry McKinnis would suggest tyring another bait, but Knight never would budge.
“Coach had his mind made up, he wanted to play his game the way he wanted to play his game,” Bowman said. “You let people like him do that.”
There’s no arguing Knight’s innovative motion offense was a game-changer in college basketball, but Mike McKinnis said his thoughts might not have translated to other sports. One night, the crew was watching Monday Night Football, and Knight said if he were coach he would have his cornerbacks spy on the quarterback.
“I charged him up on that,” Mike McKinnis said. “‘As soon as the cornerback takes his eye off the receiver, Davante Adams or whoever, is gone. You’ve lost him.’ We got into a huge battle. As domineering the perception people have of him, you can go at him and have fun with him.”
Before the 2008 Bassmaster Classic, Knight agreed with Jerry to do a TV spot, giving a pep talk to a group of competitors. After making several buckets in Texas Tech’s arena, Knight challenged Gerald Swindle to play horse for boat/vehicle titles. G-Man impressed Knight by asking what he was driving.
“You could play for me,” Knight said. “You’re pretty smart to find out. What I’m driving is a Schwinn.”
Knight might have done better riding a bicycle. Mike McKinnis’ brother, Matt, said Knight elbowed his way into the driver’s seat on fishing trips with their father and it wasn’t relaxing for the passengers.
“According to Matt, he always had to drive,” Mike McKinnis said. “He was the absent-minded professor behind the wheel. Matt was always frightened for his life, with being all over the road, looking at stuff as he’s driving.”
Knight also spoke at a Classic Night of Champions, addressing the crowd with his salty swagger.
“In Bobby Knight fashion, he offended everyone with his language,” Mike McKinnis said. “He kept saying things that the whole crowd would groan. But it was great. It was really entertaining. It was who he was.”
In his book, Bass Fishing, Brown Dogs and Curveballs, Jerry McKinnis gave Knight billing as the third most important person in his life, behind his father and Forrest Wood. He wrote how Coach berated a chamber of commerce shill interrupting dinner to beg Jerry to promote their area, and how Knight, after losing a fish, flung a paddle toward a cameraman who had the gall to tell him, “Sutton would have landed it.”
Even though Jerry’s presence toned Knight down some, the Coach seemed to always have the last word. Bowman said he was proud to receive even a back-handed compliment on a turkey trip. With the two icons close to 70, Bowman set out to do the impossible of calling in a gobbler in the rain. He impressed Knight with his knowledge as he apprised him of the turkey’s every move.
“I wanted Bobby to kill the turkey,” Bowman said. “I knew it was one in a million to get this. I could have killed it, but I was trying to get Bobby in there. The turkey realized something wasn’t right and was gone.”
That’s when Knight eased Bowman’s disappointment. Bowman quoted Knight in this ESPN Outdoors Turkey Trek article:
“Jerry, you don’t know jack$&@% about turkey hunting and you are a rank novice. I only know half of jack$&@% and I’m half a novice. But we both got to see a really good turkey hunter screw up.
“You don’t get to see that every day, so I think it was a good day.”
In future encounters, Knight would refer to Bowman as the “guy who ran off that turkey.” They’d talk hunting, Knight asking when they would go again. Bowman said the Coach was a regular guy who enjoyed the outdoors, and he was lucky to ever share a sit under a cedar tree.
“I feel like, of all the places and all the things my job as an outdoor communicator has taken me, around presidents and governors, Bobby and Jerry are on top of the list,” Bowman said. “I not only knew them, I hung out with them.
“We scratched our backs on an oak tree, sat in a boat. That’s a different level. To get in a boat with Forrest Wood, or Jerry McKinnis, or you go in the woods with Bobby Knight, those are different level things.”
Knight was a different level person.