was Elvin Hayes, a malcontent prima-donna? http://www.truthaboutit.net/2009/09/elvin-hayes-versus-wes-unseld.html It seems that Hayes didn’t exactly endear himself to owner Abe Pollin either. With the Wizards returning to China this year, we were reminded of a story the Washington Post’s Michael Lee wrote two years ago: When Abe Pollin led the NBA’s first venture into China in the summer of 1979, not every member of the Washington Bullets shared the team owner’s enthusiasm. As players and their wives poured off a bus to take in the splendor of the Great Wall, Elvin Hayes and Dave Corzine refused to budge. Pollin peered back and asked Hayes if he was coming. “I’ve seen a big wall before, Mr. Pollin,” Hayes told him. Wes Unseld tried to persuade Hayes by telling him the wall was the only man-made structure that can be seen from outer space. To which Hayes responded, “I’m never going into outer space.” Pollin was so infuriated afterward he swore that he’d never take his team on another trip. “One of the wonders of the world,” Pollin said recently in a telephone interview, “and they didn’t get out of the bus.” Hayes was immensely popular with fans, who appreciated his dominating style of play as well as his persona off the court. But he was less endearing to coaches and teammates. Critics felt he had an attitude problem that sometimes short-circuited the teams he played for and gave him a Jekyll-and-Hyde personality. “For some players and coaches, being around Elvin every day is like a Chinese water torture,” John Lally, a trainer with the Washington Bullets when Hayes was with the team, told the Washington Post. “It’s just a drop at a time, nothing big, but in the end, he’s driven you crazy.”
