Jack Molinas

I'm pretty sure that Turnbull and SC will remember this guy; I'd be surprised if anyone else does.

He was a "nice Jewish boy" from the Bronx and Brooklyn, a high school basketball star at Stuyvesant, a college star later at Columbia, and an NBA All-Star in the league's formative years in the early-mid 1950's.

Expelled form the NBA for shaving points and fixing games, he later became a lawyer, and in the early 1960's was the prime guy in the resulting college basketball point shaving scandals.

He served time for that in Attica, and when he got out he moved to California, where he became involved in all kinds of shady deals, many with underworld characters, before he was murdered in 1975 for reasons which are still obscure.

Molinas also was a superb sports handicapper, and had a lengthy relationship over the years with Lefty (Sam "Ace" Rothstein from Casino) Rosenthal before his Las Vegas days.

Anyway, I dimly remembered him from the 60’s, but just finished an excellent biography by Charley Rosen (Seven Stories Press, NY, 2001). A great read, and highly recommended. This guy was quite a character..

I remember him. He was mobbed-up, too, with Tommy Ryan Eboli.

what was the title of the book?

I remember reading about him and that in one of his final games (before being banned) he was so visibly bad that it raised the suspicions of league officials.

I remember, too, that he became involved with the Mob's porno interests, and that had something to do with him being killed.

The title was "The Wizard of Odds".

You have a good memory, SC. You are right about the porno stuff and that it possibly led to his murder. One of the theories was that he had honed in on the interests of Johnny "Bump" Bompenciero in that area.

It didn't mention Eboli, though, TB.

I remember it only because Molinas was guarding against Bob Cousy and he (Molinas) flagrantly fouled Cousy twice in the last minute of the game.