~ Malden Musings ~ The Real-Life Adventures of Timmy Carey

By Peter Levine

One of Malden’s finest, Timmy Carey, has an amazing story to tell…”So 1984, I was a 16-yr old junior at Malden High School and the late, great former Mayor (and much more) Jim Conway gave my father 2 tickets for Game 5 of the Finals – Celts vs Lakers. They were very good friends and Mr. Conway was always great to me and my family.

“So, from watching Celtics games on TV, you could see the ball boys dressed in those green Celtic jackets and white pants. My parents got me one of those jackets for Christmas the year before. So, I had the jacket and a pair of white painters’ pants and looked just like a ball boy. So, I wore that to Game 5 and figured I’d give it a shot to get on the floor. And I did!! My father got the biggest kick out of it. One of the real ball boys obviously knew I wasn’t real, but he was awesome, and let me sit with him right under the hoop for all of Game 5, giving my father a wave every so often.

“So, the real ball boy told me the time and entrance the ball boys went to the Garden to get in. So those Finals games started at 9, he told me they got there around 3 hours before game time, and they entered through the bank on Causeway St. I took the train in and got to the Garden about 5:30, and the real ball boy came walking down the street around 15 min later. He started laughing when he saw me, but was like ‘let’s go for it’ and I followed him into the bank where the security guard at the desk asked, ‘who’s this?’ He just said he’s a playoff ball boy. I think the security guard knew it was BS but had kind of a smirk and said yea ok, go ahead.

“I walked about 20 feet down a hallway and took an elevator up to the Garden level…it was actually pretty eerie, because it was 3 hours before tipoff and there was nobody in the Garden except for the beer and food vendors setting up and some ushers and workers milling around. So, I got on a pay phone to call home to tell my mother and father it worked, and to look for me on TV.

“Anyway, the court was empty, and the kid said we could shoot around for half hour or so before players started arriving…I was in heaven. So, there I was shooting hoops on the famous parquet before a Celtics-Lakers Game 7, I’m thinking to myself, it doesn’t get much better than that! Then a guy came over to shoot with me making small talk and asking where I was from and so forth – it was [The Boston Globe’s] Dan Shaughnessy. So, I told him what I was up to and how I got in, he loved it, he got a big kick out of it. Then the real ball boy told me stay down the Lakers end, cause the equipment manager for the Celts, Wayne LeBeaux, was the one who ran the ball boys, and it would be better if I didn’t get close to him because he was a real (expletive deleted – LOL).

“The buses arrived, and players started coming out to warm up. I was rebounding for the Lakers, throwing balls back to Kareem, Magic, Worthy and all of them. It was pretty (expletive deleted) cool. I stayed right under the hoop again for the whole game, and as the clock ticked down, the Celtics just needed to hit some free throws at the last minute, and they would win. The kid tells me to go over to the Lakers bench, and when the game ends, just follow the players down the tunnel to the locker rooms.

“Well, what I couldn’t prepare myself for was the crowd was ready to explode and was ready to surge the court. It was actually pretty scary and intimidating so with like 10 seconds left I got behind Kurt Rambis and got ready to follow him to the locker rooms. The game ended and it was instant chaos, just pure craziness. People were screaming at Lakers, trying to grab stuff from them, swearing, spitting, it was bedlam. I grabbed the back of Rambis warm up jacket to stay close, and he whirled around ready to punch someone, he looked down and saw me and assumed I was ball boy and just said to me ‘follow me in!’ Just as we took the right to go down the tunnel, some guy jumps in front of Rambis swearing F this and F that and tried grabbing him and Rambis hit this guy with a right that knocked him out, I’ll never ever forget that sound it made – like someone smashing a watermelon on a sidewalk.

“We came down the tunnel and the picture you see of me is Gerald Henderson right in front of me screaming ‘I got the ball’ and there was the CBS camera guy right there with the red light on. That picture is a still shot from the live CBS telecast, and I followed Gerald Henderson right into the locker room. It was awesome! People were celebrating and champagne was flying, and I was right in the middle of it. I remember talking to [Boston Mayor] Ray Flynn in the locker room and Marvin Hagler came walking right by me (much shorter than I could have ever imagined).

“So, I spent couple hours in the locker room. It was unbelievable and I wish cell phones were around then; I would have had amazing pics! But memories are good enough for me (and this article). I hit the Orange Line towards Malden, got home around 2 am (mom and pop were not thrilled – LOL) – they made me go to school next day!!”

Timmy Carey Postscript: “Dan Shaughnessy wrote a little something about me in the Globe the next day, so that was pretty cool. He couldn’t have been any nicer about the whole thing. 40 years! Amazing how fast time goes, and I did see years later that the guy Rambis knocked out, sued him (LOL). He should have got in touch with me, we could have compared notes from that day, cause that was something I’ll never forget (LOL).”

As Peter Falk’s iconic TV character Columbo would say, “Just one more thing, sir” – for those that don’t know the legend that is Timothy Carey, let me give you the Cliff Notes version on a kid I have called friend for over 40 years (yikes!). TC grew up on Naomi Street a stone’s throw from Malden’s Mr. Basketball, Cliff Cioffi. Timmy reminisced how his absolute two favorite park instructors were, Danny “Mr. Amerige Park” Meyers and Betsy (Class of ’75) Hanifan! Timmy says, “they were great to me down Amerige and mentored me as a kid.” TC’s dad grew up at 313 Highland Avenue between the Cavanaughs, Bradys and Grimeses. Timmy grew up “listening to all the great Edgeworth stories” handed down to him about his dad’s childhood – never boring according to TC! The last surviving family member (his dad’s sister Gert) lived at 313 Highland Ave. from 1921 until she passed away in November 2023 at age 102. Gert was proud of being the longest tenured employee at Malden Hospital (purchasing – 55 years) from 1940 until 1995. Simply amazing, Tim. His dad was an outstanding high school athlete graduating M.H.S. in 1949 starting at tailback on the 1948 M.H.S. Gator Bowl–winning team that defeated Robert E. Lee High School out of Florida (my note: yikes!). Timmy graduated in 1985 and lives the quiet and peaceful life of a gentleman farmer these days in Boxborough with the loves of his life, wife Andrea and son Eduardo. Timmy tells me, “Things couldn’t be better, Peter.” He also told me he enjoyed my article on “Malden 1985.” He told me that was also a good year for him. He was classmates with sports studs Bobby McVicar, Guy Prescott, Johnny DeBenedictis and Danny Valeri, but Timmy was awarded “Top Male Athlete” for 1985. He told me (with a wink and a smile), “all his buds were playing for 2nd!” The great Paul Leahy at the Malden Evening News coined the nickname “The Alphabet Athlete” during Timmy’s senior year because he earned the most Varsity letters by an M.H.S. athlete ever at the time (11). The never-at-a-loss-for-words Timmy Carey concluded, “all in all, Pistol, life is really good these days. I’m not bluffing my way on the Celt’s parquet any longer, and I’m happy I ain’t!”

Postscript 1: A quick email to Dan Shaughnessy and the estimable and legendary longtime sports scribe from the best sports page in the country – The Boston Sunday Globe Sports section – got right back to me: “Quite a story by Tim. I checked and can’t find any story or notes about it the day after Globe. Sounds true enough to me. I was always early and used to go out and shoot when the gym was empty. All best, Dan.”

Postscript 2: One more for the road…shortly after this epic adventure Timmy and one of his besties, Tommy Ruddock, jump in a car and road-trip nonstop to Terre Haute, Indiana. Sixteen hours later they reach their destination: “Larry Bird’s Boston Garden Restaurant.” Next on the hit parade, Larry Bird’s residence in French Lick. They arrive, scale LB’s fence and live out the dream of thousands of other youngsters throughout New England, shooting hoops on Larry Bird’s backyard court all afternoon. Pictures will become available once they are located. True story.

—Peter is a longtime Malden resident and a regular contributor to The Malden Advocate and can be reached at PeteL39@aol.com for comments, compliments or criticisms.