Wally Tinker was a 6'3 forward for Auburn 1967-69. He was one class ahead of me. Wally hailed from Pisgah Al., which is located on infamous Sand Mountain. Long recognized for its history of, shall we say, less than tolerant behavior. It had one of those warning signs about sunset. Wally was a good player. He averaged around 13 ppg and seven rpg. He was a pretty good leaper for a white boy.
The things about Wally was that he was as dirty a player as I ever played against and that's saying something. He'd go under you on rebounds, or a drive to the basket. But his favorite cheap shot was an elbow to the head, or gut when least expected. It didn't take me long to watch how high and when I jumped around him. And I was lucky to have very good peripheral vision that kept me from being surprised by one of his elbow shots. You never turned your back on ol wally if you were near him.
One night in the Steg after a score I was a few feet from Wally and sure enough here it came. But I was ready for it and leaned away as it sailed past my face while he's saying "take that you fu...ng Jew". I guess he assumed my fairly prominent nose was due to something other than my part native American heritage. My teammate Barry Cohen happened to be next to us in the lane and I pointed at Barry and said " Wally I'm not the Jew. Cohen's the Jew". Barry kind of looked at us and shrugged (Barry was cool) and Wally just stood there dumbfounded as Barry and I went up the court.
