It wasn't about rings

The titles were easier to win than the rings.

Frank Ramsey was a Hall of Fame forward on the Boston Celtics in the 1950s and '60s, an era when Bill Russell ruled in the paint and the Celtics won 11 NBA titles in 13 years.

Ramsey played on seven Celtics title teams -- he got only one championship ring.

"There wasn't enough money to buy them," he said.

For most of this period, the Celtics gave out rings only to players winning their first championship. The rest of the squad got cuff links, goblets, captain's chairs, or pendants with a shamrock and a little diamond. "My wife and daughter wore the pendants," Ramsey said.

When the Celtics won their first title in 1957, Ramsey's playoff check was $1,500. "That helped you get through the summer and buy groceries," he recalled.

Forty or 50 years ago, even players on championship teams had to take summer jobs to pay their bills. Contrast that to last year's Spurs championship team that received $2.5 million in bonus money for its players and support staff. This season the average NBA player salary is $5.4 million, which means after a week or two off they can train all summer.

Ramsey, 76, now a bank president in Dixon, Ky., has a businessman's eye and knows that when he played in the NBA it was merely a secondary league and the owners were a threadbare lot.

Red Auerbach, the Celtics' coach and general manager, drafted Ramsey and offered him a $6,000 rookie contract. Ramsey wanted $8,500 and said he'd rather go in the Army. Auerbach offered $8,000 and Ramsey signed.

"We didn't have many sellouts till the playoffs started because Boston was a hockey town," Ramsey said.

After his rookie season, Ramsey would sign a blank contract before leaving town and the owner would later tell him what he was going to make the next season.

Back then the NBA was an eight-team league, with teams in Syracuse, St. Louis and a club in Minneapolis called the Lakers. To draw extra fans, sometimes there were doubleheaders: two out-of-town teams played the first game, then the Celtics played another team in the nightcap. Rival teams flew on the same commercial flights. Players shared hotel rooms and their meal money was $7 a day.

Tom Heinsohn, a Hall of Fame forward, played nine seasons and won eight titles. His top salary was $28,500. He quit at 30 because he had nagging injuries and took over an insurance agency.

With the Celtics, the mantra was titles first, money second.