 OCTOBER 15 • 2020 | 29

itzing with friends.
Each day before leaving the 
JCC, Flusty stopped at the 
Hall of Fame plaques of two 
longtime personal and family 
friends, Sam “Sonny” Taub, 
who died in 2019, and Ralph 
Goldstein, who died in 1988.
Flusty touched each plaque 
then kissed his hand, like one 
does after touching a mezu-
zah.
“The three of us, all lefties, 
played a lot of basketball at 
the JCC while we were grow-
ing up,
” Flusty said.
Taub, who was inducted 
into the Hall of Fame in 1992, 
was an all-city basketball and 
baseball player at Detroit 
Central High School, bas-
ketball and baseball player 
at the University of Detroit, 
member of three slow-pitch 
softball national champion-
ship teams, college basketball 
referee in the Big Ten and 
Mid-American conferences, 
and Detroit Mumford High 
School basketball coach and 
athletic director.
Goldstein, who was induct-
ed into the Hall of Fame in 
1983, was an All-State basket-
ball player at Detroit Central, 
captain of the U-D basketball 

team and the first U-D guard 
to score more than 1,000 
points.
Flusty worries about 
not being able to continue 
remembering his friends 
in such a traditional Jewish 
manner.
He’
s already experienced 
a bad day, he said, when he 
and his wife Marilynn, who 
celebrated their 60th wedding 
anniversary in January, recent-
ly cleaned out their lockers at 
the JCC.
Maynard Flusty doesn’
t 
have the basketball resume of 
his Hall of Fame friends, but it 
isn’
t shabby.
He was playing for 
Highland Park Community 
College when he was drafted 
into the Army in 1952 during 
the Korean War. After being 
discharged in 1954, Flusty was 
a player and coach at Detroit 
Institute of Technology.
No discussions about the 
Hall of Fame’
s future at the 
JCC had taken place as of last 
week.
“
As important as the Hall of 
Fame is to us at the Michigan 
Jewish Sports Foundation, 
we understand the JCC has a 
lot on its plate these days and 
we’
re further down the line,
” 
Raider said.
Raider has been a JCC 
health club member for more 
than 35 years, running on the 
indoor track every morning 
he’
s there. 

Stuart Raider

SUSAN ADAMS PHOTOGRAPHY

MARILYNN FLUSTY

Maynard Flusty

 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


 

 

 

 

 


 

 


 

 

