A former championship-winning Indiana basketball player named Todd Jadlow has written a book about his complicated, drug-affected life, and in it, also makes allegations of physical and emotional abuse against his former coach, Hall of Famer Bob Knight.
Jadlow's book, Jadlow: On The Rebound, includes details such as Knight punching Jadlow in the head, photos of bruises on Jadlow's body allegedly caused by Knight, claims that Knight grabbed and squeezed Jadlow's genitals and recollections of Knight mocking Jadlow's appearance frequently in front of teammates.
Knight was infamously fired from Indiana in 2000 after repeated breaches of university policy regarding personal behavior. A tape of him choking former player Neil Reid ultimately pushed the legendary coach out of Bloomington. Knight has previously been associated with acts of inappropriate physical or verbal behavior with his own players, opposing players, opposing coaches, his own coaches and multiple Indiana University employees.
Jadlow played at Indiana from 1985-89. His book is primarily about his long journey from being a major D-I basketball player, to losing control of his life, winding up in prison and battling thoughts of suicide. He says he went so far as to put a gun in his mouth.
Bob Kravitz's story at WTHR is bringing Jadlow's book to light and has sparked a lot of reaction over the its following allegations:
- That Knight punched him in the back of the head with a closed fist during a walkthrough for an NCAA Tournament game against Seton Hall.
- That inside a sideline huddle during a 1989 game against Louisville -- the game when Sports Illustrated famously captured a photo of the coach pushing Jadlow back onto the court -- Knight cracked a clipboard over Jadlow's head.
- That after an NIT game in New York City, an enraged Knight once dug his hands so deeply into Jadlow's sides, he left bruises. Jadlow includes a picture of the bruises Knight left; "It's weird because I never carried a camera," he was telling me Friday over a Stromboli at Nick's. "But I had this thought, 'You know, if I ever write a book about my experiences, I want to have a picture of what he did to me.' "
- That Knight made a habit, with Jadlow and others, of grabbing players by the testicles and squeezing.
- That Knight continually called Daryl Thomas a "(bleeping) p-----" and once instructed the managers to wallpaper Thomas' locker with pictures of female genitalia. Knight also liked to throw tampons at Thomas, who took more abuse than anybody on Jadlow's teams.
- That on the flight home after the 1986 NCAA Tournament loss to Cleveland State, Knight tore up the plane and ultimately grabbed Thomas by the neck and shook him violently.
- That Knight made sport of Jadlow's facial tic in front of the entire team; in the book, former IU teammate Mark Robinson wrote that Knight yelled at Jadlow, "If you don't stop the (bleeping) twitching, I'm going to throw your ass out of here."
- That during a practice, Knight forced Dean Garrett and Keith Smart to run hours of sprints while barking like dogs since they were, in his words, "playing like (bleeping) dogs."
Ultimately, he considers himself a big supporter of Knight.
"I still have a lot of respect for him and look at him as a father figure. I didn't do this to tarnish him," Jadlow told ESPN.com. "I went through my own struggles, but these things happened at Indiana. I will let people who read this book and consider if it's abuse or torment by today's standards. If things went on today like they did, then you would be in jail.''
Knight reportedly did not respond to Jadlow's attempts to contact him while writing the book.
