Kareem abdul jabbars biography

Kareem would later state that the reason he had converted to Islam and changed his name was that he wanted to latch on to something that was a part of his heritage, as many of the slaves that were brought to America were Muslims. Once again, he repeated as scoring champion with 2, points and became the first player to be named the NBA Most Valuable Player twice in his first three years.

Although, it was believed that he preferred to go to the New York Knicks. Kareem revealed that being in the midwest did not suit his cultural needs and he confirmed his desire to move to another city. In his first season with the Lakers, Kareem flourished and dominated as usual. He averaged Benson got a black eye and needed two stitches.

But he was not suspended. Even though Kareem continued to dominate the league with his exceptional performances, the Lakers failed to make it past the playoffs in During this period, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar upheld and reinforced his status as one of the greatest basketball players of all time. He won his 6th MVP in and averaged 20 or more points in the following six seasons.

In his last three seasons at the Lakers, they reached the NBA finals all three times, defeating Boston in and Detroit in , but losing to the Pistons in After winning Game 7 of the finals, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar announced in the locker room that the season would be his last one. In his last season, he received standing ovations in both home and away games.

He also received several gifts, such as a yacht named Captain Skyhook , framed jerseys, and a Persian rug. At the time of his retirement, Kareem was the all-time record holder for most points 38, , most minutes played 57, , and most field goals made 15, Fourth and fifth MVP awards — Playoff disappointments — Last MVP award and championship success — Final playing years and sixth ring — President's Council on Fitness, Sports, and Nutrition.

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He returned to Los Angeles following an eye examination in Dallas early Saturday. Doctors explained that because Jabbar was poked in the eye so many times in the days before he wore goggles, scar tissue had formed on the cornea. Houston Chronicle. Archived from the original on October 4, Los Angeles Daily News. The Independent. Pasadena, California.

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Kareem weighed 12 lb 5 kg and was His unusual size continued as at the age of nine, Kareem was already 5 ft 8 inches. When Kareem was in his eighth grade, he could slam dunk, having reached a height of 6 ft 8 in.

Kareem abdul jabbars biography

He was the only child born to his parents. His father, Ferdinand Lewis Alcindor Sr, worked as a transit police officer as well as a jazz musician, while his mother, Cora Lillian, worked in a shop as a departmental store price checker. Kareem went on to set a New York high school basketball record after he recorded 2,, throughout his high school career.

He went in to recount that his people originates from the West African tribe Yoruba. He also has six MVP to his name. In , Kareem made his acting debut in the late martial art, Bruce Lee movie, entitled, Game of Death. He also starred in the movie, Airplane where he was identified as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in the movie. C, was held at dawn, according to Muslim custom.

When mosque officials refused to allow Jabbar's parents to wit ness. They had traveled all the way from New York to see their only child get married, and the incident caused a serious rift between the Alcindors and their son. Jabbar felt badly; he had not been told until after the ceremony that his parents were barred from entering the mosque.

The rift between him and his parents was slow to heal, and nearly ten years passed before he made amends with his family. After that time Jabbar always made sure to point to the camera and say, "Hi to Moms and Pops in New York," whenever he appeared on national television. His marriage to Habiba, however, did not fare as well, and the couple was divorced in Jabbar spent the summer of at Harvard studying the Arabic language, and that year Habiba gave birth to the couple's first child, a daughter also named Habiba.

Jabbar, who was raised as an only child, had difficulty conforming his life to accommodate a significant other person and a child. The union between Jabbar and his wife had weakened early in the marriage. He and Habiba separated permanently in December of Separation notwithstanding, Jabbar and his wife remained close with one another. Their son, Kareem, was born in In , the year of Jabbar's divorce, he met Cheryl Pistono, and she later gave birth to their son Amir.

A second daughter, Sultana, was born to Jabbar and Habiba in , two years after their divorce. A third son, Adam, was born to Jabbar and an unnamed woman. Although Jabbar's luxurious Bel-Air home was destroyed by a fire early in , he found his faith in Islam and took a philosophical approach. Jabbar's later memoir, Kareem, was written with Mignon McCarthy and published in This book documents his final season with the NBA.

Between and Jabbar made ten film appearances. Most of them were as himself, including his roles in Fletch and Forget Paris. He served as the executive producer of The Vernon Johns Story, a made-for-television movie about a civil rights pioneer. After retiring from the NBA Jabbar took a ten-year hiatus from basketball, returning in Among his more visible projects during that time, in he researched and published a book, Black Profiles in Courage.

He returned to White River in season to serve as an assistant coach, at Alchesay High School on the reservation. Jabbar accepted only one dollar in compensation for the five-month assignment. He documented the experience in in a book with Stephen Singular, called Season on the reservation: my sojourn with the White Mountain Apache.

He coached a training session with the Indiana Pacers in , and in joined the United States Basketball League as the head coach of the Oklahoma Storm. He led the Storm to its first league championship but resigned just a few days later without explanation. Observers suggested that he wished to return to coaching in the NBA. Phone: Morrow and Co.

Cobourn, R. Cooksey, G. Original name, Ferdinand Lewis Alcindor, Jr. Religion: Hanafi Muslim. Avocational Interests: Wind surfing, jazz, yoga, collecting rugs, horseback riding. Actor and producer. Cranberry Records, president. Roger Murdock, copilot, Airplane! A Salute to the Newport Jazz Festival , Man stuck in car, " Foreign Trade ," Emergency!

Tavis Smiley , PBS, Jet, June 26, , p. Sports Illustrated, October 19, , p. Height ran in the family. Abdul-Jabbar's mother was nearly six feet tall, and his father was six feet, two inches. Abdul-Jabbar's parents told him that his grandfather, who had come from Alcindor Trace, a section of the Balandra district of Trinidad, was over six feet, eight inches in height, and Abdul-Jabbar was over twenty-two inches long at birth.

Abdul-Jabbar's mother read to him constantly, hence he learned to love books at an early age. His father, who played the trombone, often took Abdul-Jabbar to the Elks Club at 5th Avenue and th Street, where the senior Alcindor joined other musicians for long jam sessions. From his father, who graduated from the Juilliard School of Music in , Abdul-Jabbar gained a lasting love of jazz music.

When Abdul-Jabbar was three, his father thought the area around Seventh Avenue and th Street was becoming too dirty and dangerous, so in he moved his family to the Dyckman Housing Project in Inwood, a section of northern Manhattan. Between the first and second grades at P. When he was eight years old his parents, devout Catholics, transferred him to Saint Jude 's, a private Catholic boy's school nearby, where he was one of only two blacks.

When Abdul-Jabbar was ready to enter fourth grade, his parents were both working, so they enrolled him in Holy Providence, a Catholic school in Pennsylvania. The five-foot, four-inch boy was teased for his height, shyness, and bookish habits. He participated in swimming, track, baseball, and basketball and soon learned to love the last sport.

Most of the other students at Holy Providence spoke and behaved in a rough manner. After one year his parents withdrew Abdul-Jabbar, returning him to Saint Jude 's in the fall of He joined the basketball team and, although he was six feet tall, spent most of the season on the bench. Farrell Hopkins, his coach, helped him improve his skills, allowing the eager youngster to continue practice after regular hours.

When Abdul-Jabbar was in seventh grade, Hopkins got the team new uniforms. Abdul-Jabbar's new number was 33, the number he wore for the remainder of his basketball career. Encountering racial prejudice from whites, he concentrated on his studies and basketball. By the eighth grade, when he was fourteen, he was six feet, eight inches tall and could dunk.

In one game he scored thirty-three points, more than the entire team usually scored. Abdul-Jabbar's friend and neighbor Arthur Kenny, a freshman at Power Memorial Academy, a Catholic high school for boys in Manhattan, took Abdul-Jabbar to practice at the high school, where the coach, Jack Donohue, offered Abdul-Jabbar a full scholarship. Donohue ran a summer camp at Friendship Farm in Saugerties, New York , and he invited Abdul-Jabbar to spend the summer before his freshman year there.

The only black player at the camp, Abdul-Jabbar was shunned by the other boys, and he returned home after only three weeks. Abdul-Jabbar played on the varsity team at Power Memorial Academy in his freshman year, and by his sophomore year he had become a great player, leading the school to the New York City Catholic high school championship. He was named to numerous All-America high school teams and had his picture in national magazines.

By his junior year the sixteen year old was seven feet, one-and-a-half inches tall and almost unstoppable on the basketball court. During halftime of a game against Saint Helena's in the Bronx, Coach Donohue scolded his team for a lackadaisical performance and hurled a racial epithet at his star center. Abdul-Jabbar was stunned. He eventually led Power Memorial to another city championship, but he refused to work during the summer at Friendship Farm.

During his senior year Abdul-Jabbar broke the New York City high school basketball records for career points 2, and total rebounds 2, He graduated in and won a New York State Regents' scholarship. He spent most of his time with black friends, like Lucius Allen, his roommate and teammate on the freshman basketball team, and J. Johnson, who introduced him to black literature.

Shunned by many whites, Abdul-Jabbar devoted himself to basketball. In his first season he broke the previous UCLA freshman records for total points , total rebounds , and single game total points Off the court he was not so successful. Because he refused to give interviews, reporters described him as moody and surly. The white girl he was dating received threatening calls, forcing the couple to break off the relationship.

As a sophomore Abdul-Jabbar set a school single game scoring record 56 points in his first varsity game. To compensate, Coach Wooden helped Abdul-Jabbar develop a hook shot, which over the years developed into the famous skyhook, a modification of the traditional hook shot in which the ball travels downward from the peak of an arch. Joining other black athletes, he boycotted the Olympics because of the discrimination that black athletes who had won medals in the Olympics faced at home.

As a result he received a great deal of hate mail. He took refuge again in Operation Sports Rescue over the summer. At the same time he converted to Islam. His new name became Kareem noble and generous Abdul servant Jabbar powerful. Abdul-Jabbar's senior year capped a significant college career. He had scored a total of 2, points Writing his senior thesis on Islam in North America , he graduated in with a B.

By the end of his first season he had earned NBA Rookie of the Year honors for the — season and had carried the Bucks to the Eastern Division playoffs. Shortly thereafter he changed his name legally to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. His wife also changed her name, taking the Islamic name of Habiba. They had one daughter. In December , after suffering an eye injury while going for a loose ball, he began to wear goggles when he played.

By the end of the — season, Abdul-Jabbar's marriage had soured. Habiba, beleaguered from the pressures of being a pro basketball wife, took their three-year-old daughter and moved back to Washington, D. Abdul-Jabbar had never liked Milwaukee and asked to be traded. Although the Lakers' new team did not make the playoffs that year, Abdul-Jabbar won his fourth MVP award in six years as a pro basketball player.

The Lakers had their star center, and all they needed was a playmaker. They found that person in the — season, when they added a rookie, Earvin "Magic" Johnson. Taking over as head coach in , Pat Riley developed a running game based on the fast break known as "show time," which won the Lakers their second NBA title in three years in On 5 April Abdul-Jabbar surpassed Wilt Chamberlain to become the league's all-time leading scorer with 31, total career points.

By the offensive leadership of the Lakers had passed to Magic Johnson , and while the team continued to win NBA titles, Abdul-Jabbar struggled for points. In his streak of consecutive games in which he scored in double figures came to an end. By this time he was averaging only eight points and four rebounds per game. He was still suffering financially from a fire that had destroyed his Bel-Air home and ruined his beloved, valuable jazz record collection.

In addition he had lost millions of dollars in bad business investments. In , at age forty-two, Abdul-Jabbar decided to retire. He had won six world championships and six MVP awards. In he was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame. Frustrated by retirement and devastated by the death of his mother, Abdul-Jabbar sought work. He made many movie and television appearances, including memorable Hollywood roles as the copilot named Flying High in Airplane!

He had two sons in relationships after Habiba left they divorced in , and he has spent most of his retirement time with his three children, traveling between his homes in Los Angeles and Maui, Hawaii. Most of his earnings have come from speaking engagements, signing autographs at trading card shows, and product endorsements. Abdul-Jabbar's pro basketball career statistics are staggering.

His regular-season numbers averaged He had a lifetime shooting percentage of. He established NBA records for most seasons of 1, or more points 19 , most minutes played 57, , most field goals 15, , most field goal attempts 28, , most points 38, , and most personal fouls 4, as well as several NBA All-Star Game records. Abdul-Jabbar authored three autobiographical memoirs, Giant Steps , Kareem , and A Season on the Reservation , along with a chronicle of the lives of famous African Americans , Profiles in Black Courage Thomas R.

Cobourn, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar , is the most recent biography and contains an extensive bibliography. He grew up in middle-class circumstances in Inwood, an upper Manhattan neighborhood. A Roman Catholic, he attended the St. Jude's parish elementary school , where he excelled in baseball, swimming, and ice skating.