The Wizard of Odds: How Jack Molinas Almost Destroyed the Game of Basketball FROM THE PUBLISHER
Jack Molinas had it all — good looks, charm, an Ivy League education, a genius-level I.Q. of 175, and a huge talent for the game of basketball. He was also a gambling addict with a flair for larceny. The Wizard of Odds chronicles the rise and fall of this outstanding NBA All-Star who fixed games, cavorted with the Mafia, produced pornographic films, and was eventually murdered. Author Charley Rosen chillingly probes the life of a man who understood better than anyone around him the weaknesses of the system in which he lived — so much so that he convinced himself he could manipulate that system to his own ends with impunity. By the time he was arrested on January 9, 1954, for conspiring to fix NBA games, he was already deeply involved with the Mafia. After his release from prison, he would descend ever deeper into crime, a preoccupation that would end with a bullet in the head.
SYNOPSIS
A prolific writer of sports fiction and nonfiction, Rosen describes how Molinas, a rookie with the Fort Wayne Pistons, certified NBA All-Star, young, handsome, very suave, and very intelligent, made a fortune by betting on fixed games in high school, colleges, and the professionals. He was busted in 1954.
Annotation © Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
FROM THE CRITICS
Library Journal
Jack Molinas was a star college and professional basketball player in the 1950s who was expelled from the National Basketball Association in his rookie year for betting on games. He had been manipulating point spreads since his college days at Columbia, and after his expulsion from the NBA he attained his law degree and became a major wheel in the mob-influenced college basketball point fixing scandals of 1961. Eventually sentenced to 15 years in prison for his role as a fixer, he served five before being paroled, forging a new career in pornography, and finally being gunned down under mysterious circumstances. Prolific basketball writer Rosen quotes extensively from lengthy interviews Milton Gross conducted with Molinas in the 1960s for a never-published biography. Because of Molinas's duplicitous, self-serving nature, the reader is never sure how true certain allegations are. A fascinating view of the seamy side of sports gambling, this will be of particular interest to college sports and basketball historians. Recommended for all libraries. John Maxymuk, Rutgers Univ. Lib., Camden, NJ Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.
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