A persistent piece of basketball trivia claims that Julius Erving’s character, the temperamental Pittsburgh Pythons star Moses Guthrie, was deliberately named after Moses Malone. The theory seemed plausible because Erving and Malone were two of the NBA’s most recognizable stars, and both eventually became Philadelphia 76ers teammates. However, the connection is historically unfounded: when The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh was made and released in 1979, Erving and Malone were not yet teammates, and the character’s name was not chosen as an in-joke about their later partnership. The coincidence became more tempting after Malone joined Erving in Philadelphia years later, allowing fans to read the real-life basketball relationship backward into the film. The supposed reference is therefore a retroactive bit of sports lore rather than a documented production decision.
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AI concept artworkArchive Record · 1970s
The Moses Malone Name Confusion in The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh
The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh / 1970s
A persistent piece of basketball trivia claims that Julius Erving’s character, the temperamental Pittsburgh Pythons star Moses Guthrie, was deliberately named after Moses Malone. The theory seemed plausible because Erving and Malone were two of the NBA’s most recognizable stars, and both eventually became Philadelphia 76ers teammates. However, the connection is historically unfounded: when The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh was made and released in 1979, Erving and Malone were not yet teammates, and the character’s name was not chosen as an in-joke about their later partnership. The coincidence became more tempting after Malone joined Erving in Philadelphia years later, allowing fans to read the real-life basketball relationship backward into the film. The supposed reference is therefore a retroactive bit of sports lore rather than a documented production decision.
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