No player wants to have his life reduced to a trivia question, but no other player ever had a career like Gene Conley.

Among his teammates were Hall of Fame players like Hank Aaron, Warren Spahn, Eddie Matthews, Bob Cousy, Satch Sanders, Bill Russell, Tommy Heinsohn, and Carl Yastrzemski.  He was coached by the legendary Red Auerbach.  

Gene won three NBA championships with the Boston Celtics in 1959, 1960, and 1961, and one World Series with Milwaukee Braves in 1957. He may be the only athlete with rings from two sports.

He had over 2200 rebounds off the bench, and he won 16 games for the Boston Red Sox one year.

That’s what happens when you play on three teams in two sports in one city.

He was known for being a free spirit and certainly preceded Bill Lee in that regard, though Gene was a right-handed pitcher.

He started with the Celtics in 1952 and with the Boston Braves the same season, the last year the Braves made a home in Boston.

Signing with two Boston teams was covered by the press in 1961, but would likely be a media circus nowadays.

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Gene signed two contracts at one table, one with the Sox and one with the Celtics, with the respective General Managers at his elbows: Walter Brown of the Celts and Dick O’Connell of the Sox.

However, Gene may have damaged his Boston credibility with his scandalous and abrupt departure from the Red Sox during the 1962 season.  He ran off the team bus with Pumpsie Green, the first black player in Red Sox history. They claimed to be heading for Israel.

A contrite Green returned a day later, facing a $1000 fine, and fearing his status on the Red Sox as he was their first black player a team that resisted black players until they were the last to the field. Conley missed a three-game series and was fined by Tom Yawkey $2000, which was a large sum when your entire salary is $30,000.   

Several years ago his wife Kathryn Conley wrote a biography called One of a Kind, in which more details about his interesting life as a professional athlete can be found. Gene, as befitting his life, is a modest man and easy to admire.

He’ll be 81 in November of 2011 and having lived most of his life in New England, he still spends time in New Hampshire each summer.