Willis Reed is most famous for his legendary appearance in Game 7 of the 1970 NBA Finals, in which it was obvious that he was too injured to play. What Reed is less famous for is his brawl with the Los Angeles Lakers four years earlier in which he practically fought the entire squad by himself.
Footage of the fight recently surfaced for the first time in decades in Michael Rapaport's 30 for 30 documentary "When the Garden Was Eden."
You can view the video here.
Two players suffered broken jaws in the fight and several players who weren't even involved in the altercation got hit by blows.
New York Times writer Dave Anderson recapped the brawl in his 1966 game story:
"In the confusion Reed flattened [Darrell] Imhoff, a 6-foot-10-inch, 220-pound center, with a punch over the left eye. [John] Block, a 6-9, 210-pound rookie center, suffered a bloody nose, which turned out to have been fractured.
Imhoff, holding a bloodied towel to his face, lay sprawled in front of the Laker bench for several minutes while the police restored order among a few of the 15,755 spectators who had run onto the court for a ringside view.
Imhoff needed one stitch to close a cut on his left eyelid. LaRusso, who is 6-8 and weighs 225, later admitted that 'Reed hit me a couple good ones.' Both were ejected from the game."
As if fighting an entire team by yourself wasn't tough enough, Reed reportedly warned his teammates to never restrain him if he was in another physical altercation.
Neither player was suspended. Instead, a fine of $50 each was doled out because in 1966 things like brawling one-on-eleven was just part of being an NBA player, I guess.
