When John Thompson Jr. died on Aug. 30 at age 78, it robbed the world of one of college basketball’s truly titan figures, a Hall of Fame coach whose presence and outspokenness on the issues that face the game left a lasting mark on not only college basketball but also society and sports in general. Not quite four months after Thompson’s death comes “I Came As A Shadow,” the long-awaited autobiography chronicling Thompson’s life and career, written in the legendary Georgetown coach’s characteristically direct and illuminating manner. The Undefeated senior writer Jesse Washington, Thompson’s co-author on the project, talked to ESPN.com about the book, its themes and the process of writing it: (Read an excerpt from “I Came As A Shadow“)
How did you become involved with this project? What was your relationship with Thompson before you started?
I had no relationship with Coach before we started. They were looking for a writer, and [former ESPN president] John Skipper was asked whether he knew anybody who would do a good job, and he put my name into the hat. Skipper suggested me to literary agent David Black, who was putting the project together for Coach. Then I got to go meet Coach, and I had, like, an interview, an audition of sorts. [The interview] was Coach, his son John and his daughter, Tiffany. Apparently I did OK because he decided to choose me. Much later, I was asking Coach about why he chose to sign with Nike rather than Adidas or Converse, which were the biggest shoe companies at that time in the late ’70s. And he said, “Well, you know, I liked Phil [Knight]. They were scuffling around. They didn’t have much of a name or a reputation. You know, kind of like why I chose you.”
What was the timetable? From the time of your first meeting to publication, what was the window?
Two years.
There can be tension in co-author situations between what the subject thinks is most important to include and what the co-author thinks the reader wants or needs to know. Were there topics in “I Came As A Shadow” that you had to push to include or push back to not include too much?
Coach Thompson told me many times during the process, “Everybody has a public life, a private life and a secret life. I’m no different.” What he was saying was, “Yeah, I’m not giving y’all everything in this book. I’m saving some for myself.” And he wrote that in the book. Nothing was more precious to him than his family, and you could see that by what he got from his parents, and then that love and deep connection was so apparent in his interactions with his own children — both ways. Part of that he wanted to have just for himself, but that said, he did discuss things pertaining to his children that he had never said publicly before, particularly about his son John being fired as Georgetown’s basketball coach, and I hope he was glad that he did.
For as outspoken a figure as Thompson was, “I Came As A Shadow” underscores what a private person he was in his personal life.
You don’t accomplish what he accomplished without putting on your armor every day against a hostile world. So it was difficult, but over time, as he got more comfortable with the process and he saw how the book was reading, he was more willing to reveal more of his personal feelings, and he did so to a greater extent than anything I had seen him do before. Coach spent his whole career protecting his players and himself from a pretty hostile environment, so it went against his nature to be vulnerable.
It is striking how much pain Thompson experienced. Nuns at his Catholic grade school insulted his intelligence, he encountered numerous slights because of his race during his playing career, he lost a child, and he went through a bitter divorce. How much do you think Thompson’s world view was driven by that pain? Could he have become the John Thompson we knew without it?
I think that pain he experienced and those trials and tribulations absolutely shaped his view. Another thing that he liked to say was, “Yeah, Jesus told us to forgive. But he didn’t say to forget.” Coach Thompson didn’t want to forget those things because he said, “Not forgetting makes you strong.” He never let on to the public these painful moments. He took it on the chin his whole life. And it did make him strong. It made him John Thompson. I’m glad he finally told us, “Yeah, these things were hurtful. It was hurtful to be segregated into the back of the church when I was a kid. It was hurtful for me to have to compete against one of my best friends, who happened to be Black, for the last spot on the Celtics, where we were competing for five or six spots, and the white players were competing for 12.”
I’m glad that he revealed that hurt because it shows the more human side of him, and it shows that he wasn’t Superman, that he did pay a price. I think one of the big things that comes across in his book is “I paid a price to do these things and reach these heights and make these points, and I paid it so you guys can carry the torch forward.” He was very appreciative of athletes who are speaking out in this modern era, from LeBron on down. When we know the price people paid, it makes it worth more, and we can give them their full acknowledgment. I hope that’s part of what this book does.
For a man who was known for never mincing words, Thompson writes frequently about feeling misunderstood and having his intentions misinterpreted. He laments that he was viewed as intimidating, suggesting that people saw a 6-foot-10 Black man with a booming voice and drew conclusions. He expresses a lot of frustration about the fact that people interpreted his feelings on race as evidence that he was racist. How much do you think writing this book was about setting the record straight on such matters?
A significant amount. The perception of him as intimidating and a bully, it was very important for him to address that. Because he never really did address it. Deliberately, he chose not to during his career because he didn’t want to give oxygen to that conversation. I could tell in the two years that we spent working on the book that it hurt him to be portrayed that way, but he could never let on. But he was deeply wounded by that, and it caused him a lot of pain, so this book was definitely an opportunity to express how he felt about it. His description of how and why that misperception came to be was dead accurate, very accurate, and I hope people read that and really think about how we still stereotype Black people today.
The story of Thompson’s confrontation with D.C. drug kingpin Rayful Edmond has become a thing of legend, and Thompson wrote at length about Edmond but seemed pretty intent on demythologizing that episode. Did that surprise you? He certainly could have doubled down on the myth — and any number of other myths about his life and career.
I was surprised! I grew up thinking he ran Rayful down on the street and pointed his finger in his face and yelled at him [laughs]. That’s the legend, and it fit with what we thought we knew about Coach Thompson. So yes, I was surprised, but when he described it, it made perfect sense. And he said, “Jesse, why would I do that? This man had all the leverage. My program was teetering on the brink. Why would I make him angry?”
Everybody really respected Coach Thompson’s intellect and knew he was a smart person. But the level of depth of thought and layers of thought that he applied to everything and how he analyzed situations from multiple angles at all times really became evident when I was working with him on this book, and it was really amazing to sort of get that up close and personal. I tried to convey it in the book. He could see things from multiple angles, like when he said, “Martin Luther King was right, but he was also wrong.” That was characteristic of how he thought about things. So for him to analyze the Rayful Edmond situation that way was exactly in keeping with how he approached all of his problems.
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Michigan State head coach Tom Izzo and Rob Murphy honor legendary coach John Thompson with a towel over their shoulders in the Spartans’ season opener.
“I Came As A Shadow” drives home how much Thompson loved to compete. His battles with Jim Boeheim, Lefty Driesell, Morgan Wootten are chronicled in the book, as well as his non-basketball disagreements with figures including Rev. Jesse Jackson and Arthur Ashe. How important was it to Thompson that he could beat people intellectually, as opposed to just beating them in a game?
You know, I don’t think he wanted to beat them. I think he wanted to engage with them. Particularly with Arthur Ashe, he said, “I can test the courage of my convictions by having a debate with someone I respect.” And the same thing with Jesse: “I didn’t agree with Jesse in what he was doing, but I respected his bigger goals.” Intellectually, Thompson really enjoyed smart people. He enjoyed being around and talking to smart people, and he enjoyed bringing out the intellectual aspects of his players. He would challenge them: “Come on man, think about this. Have an intelligent thought. Learn how to express yourself. Read what’s in the newspaper, and then let’s talk about that.” What kind of basketball coach would pop up at practice and say, “What’s going on in Iran today?”
He was an extraordinarily intense competitor when it came to basketball, and he told me again and again how important winning was to him — to the point that he had to guard against his own impulses to throw education out the window when it was time to win a basketball game [laughs]. He set up safeguards for himself, like when you try to hide the dessert from yourself in your house, you tell your wife to hide the dessert so you don’t eat it. When it came to basketball, he absolutely wanted to win every single time he stepped on the court.
Thompson bristled at the notion that he wielded any kind of influence at Georgetown in the years after he left the head-coaching role. Yet his name is on the basketball facility. All three coaches who have followed him have direct Thompson ties, including his son, John Thompson III, and current coach Patrick Ewing. What do you think the reality was in terms of Thompson’s influence at Georgetown?
They sure listened to him! He couldn’t make them do what he wanted because as he said, “If I could, they wouldn’t have fired my son.” But he definitely had a say. As he should have. Number one, he was a smart guy, with a lot of wisdom. Over the course of working on the book with him, I saw so many people … his phone would ring, and it would be one of his former players who was, like, the commissioner of an athletic conference somewhere calling him for advice or, like, a broadcaster who we see on TV every week, checking in just to say hello and ask his opinion on something. Also the current president of Georgetown, John DeGioia, who has been president for almost 20 years now, he tremendously respected Coach. They didn’t do what he said to do, and he was not so arrogant as to try to tell them what to do, but they absolutely did listen to him and were better off for it. He continued to have a significant influence at Georgetown — well-earned — until the end of his life.
Eventually, there will have to be a post-Thompson era at the coaching position. Coach Ewing, if and when he’s successful, isn’t going to be there forever. But [Thompson’s] statue is in the building. His name is on the building. This season, they are playing on John Thompson Court. The university itself would not be the Georgetown that we know without what he did as an educator and as a coach. In that sense, I hope there never is a post-Thompson era at Georgetown. He put his mark on that university and on college athletics in a way we should remember for all time.
Thompson died on Aug. 30, just a few days shy of his 79th birthday. What stage was the manuscript in when he died?
Complete. We were able to finish, and he went over everything in great detail before he died. He remained an auditory person. And a lot of the ways that we went over the material in the book, from the very beginning, was I would show up and sit down with him and say, “OK, I’ve got some new material,” and I would just read it, and then he would make comments and adjustments. So when COVID hit, we did lots and lots of work on the phone and spent hours on the phone, reading and talking about it, and that was how we finished the book.
I read it to him in its entirety more than once, which was why he asked me to do the audiobook, because he said, “You understand the feeling behind it.” It was a little bit surreal — that’s an overused word in our business — but the only surreal moment was when I was reading John Thompson’s words to John Thompson and actually sort of feeling like John Thompson [laughs]. But he appreciated it, and he went over every word in the book. He cared extraordinarily about this book, and he knew on some level it was his public last will and testament. He put everything into it, and I think the result will speak for itself.
Have Thompson’s three children seen the book? What kind of feedback did they give you?
John III, Tiffany and Ronny were involved in the process from the very beginning. They’re the ones who convinced him to finally write the book, and they were some of the motivating factors behind it. Tiffany was the person who came up with the title [a line from a poem written by Thompson’s uncle], which still just blows me away, the title of the book. They read it all the way through, the whole way.
We met most of the time at Georgetown to do our work at the basketball office or near the basketball office, and Ronny works for the team, so I saw Ronny probably more frequently than anybody else, but I talked to them all, and it was really beautiful to see the relationship Thompson had with his children. I’m a father of four, but my children are younger. Coach Thompson’s children are my age, so just to see that relationship and how much love they shared … even though he had to sacrifice — as he writes in the book — a lot of family time in order to do the things that he did and to win games and to fight for black empowerment, that love was still so strong.
One thing I noticed: Coach Thompson could walk, but he used a chair to get around most of the time. Ronny would come into the room where we were working and kiss his dad on the head. That’s not what we think of John Thompson. His children were intimately involved in the book. He frequently asked their advice on things that should be in the book, and the book is much better for it.
He leaned on them for a lot of stuff, and they were lovingly provided for at every turn. They knew that it was important for him to tell his own story. They knew that’s what he wanted to do, so they nudged him along the path to doing that, and then while the book was being written, they helped him figure out what he wanted to say and how he wanted to express it.
You played college basketball. After working with him on this project, do you think you could have played for John Thompson?
I was never light-years close to being good enough to play for Georgetown, but when I was writing the book, I felt like I was a player [laughs]. Coach Thompson was a coach to the end and a teacher to the end, and so just by the nature of our interactions, I wanted his approval, and I understood why guys played hard for him. I understood why he would get the best out of his players because he got the best out of me as a writer. I wanted to do well for him. I couldn’t have played for Georgetown, but there were a few fleeting moments writing the book where I felt like I had “Hoyas” on my shirt. And I’m grateful for it.