RIP Curly Neal

They’ve somewhat modernized their act. Instead of the Generals being a group of random faceless opponents, they get hyped up a little more as a threat in the pregame. They’ve had one guy, who has some height and a pretty good game, play a pro wrestling-like masked heel to get the kids interested.

I’ve seen them institute a “penalty box” for fouls, which gave them a different storyline. They’ve done four-point lines and spots, which gives some added excitement to the basketball portions of the act.

One year I went, the Generals hit a couple of four-point shots in the last minute and actually led by a point with a few seconds to go. The Trotters had to hustle the ball down the court with minimal opposition and did their finishing dunk at the last second to win. I remember thinking how nuts it would have been if they’d flubbed that dunk.

 

The Washington Generals get too much credit. What about the great New Jersey Reds or the Boston Shamrocks?

 

My twin nieces, then 7-8, were pulled out on the floor to be part of the Trotter warmup show 6-7 years ago.
Their mom (StarSis) said afterwards, "they had a lot of fun," but there was a lot of butt/bathroom humor plus a fair number of pelvic thrusts she didn't think were really ideal for grade schoolers.
I said, "what about Uncle Tom/Stepin Fetchit blatantly racist stuff," she said, "it didn't take up too much of the show, but when they did it, they laid it on thick."
Nowadays they've shifted away from the old style shuck and jive screaming-darkie skits (although they still run a few of those) to badass thug-life ghetto-dawg role playing episodes.
She said they played about half the game as semi serious straight basketball.

 

I caught this 1978 airing of a Globetrotters game on Wide World of Sports. The game was in Sierra Vista, Ariz., and in between game action they had a couple skits in nearby Tombstone. One of them was Geese Ausbie in the process of being "lynched" by a western gang when some actors playing the Earp brothers intervened. It's at about the 22-minute mark, but I was amazed by the scene of a black basketball player being surrounded by white guys with a noose around his neck; that really wouldn't have gone over in this day and age.