George Karl will coach his 1,000th NBA game Friday night. He's equal parts proud and stunned by that achievement -- (and he does think it's an achievement.) Few who saw him in the 1980s in Cleveland or Golden State could have envisioned such a milestone. Few who see him now find it hard to believe it took this long.

	Karl's ways aren't always typical, but he's winning.

"You know, longevity in this profession is something special to me," Karl said. "How many guys have coached 1,000 games? I bet there aren't that many. This is a tough, tough business, so I'm actually a little proud of it."

Actually, Karl becomes the 20th coach to reach 1,000 games. Five of them are still coaching in the league (six if you count Del Harris, who is sort of coaching in Dallas.) But of those ahead of him, few have had some of the white-knuckle jobs that Karl has. We're talking about a coach who actually resigned his NBA gig to go BACK to the CBA.

He probably was destined to be a coach. He played for his father. He learned from the Dean at North Carolina. His first coaching job was as an assistant to Doug Moe, whose general approach to coaching is to damn-the-film, full speed ahead.

Karl's first head coaching job was a CBA gig in Montana in the early 1980s. He returned to the league in 1988, but this time in Albany, N.Y. He then went to Real Madrid, back to Albany, back to Real Madrid, all in the space of 3½ years. By then he also had gone through two NBA jobs with bad teams (Cleveland, Golden State) in bad situations but, for him, the third time was a charm. He took over an underachieving Seattle team and, well, the rest is history.

The Sonics were among the league's elite during Karl's seven years there. They were the best team in basketball in 1994, but inexplicably lost in the first round of the playoffs to Denver. They got to the finals in 1996, only to run into the 72-10 Jordan Juggernaut from Chicago.

He's now in his third year in Milwaukee. Prior to his arrival, the Bucks had gone seven straight seasons without making the playoffs. They've qualified in both of Karl's years there. After a horrible start this season, the Bucks have woken up and won 20 of their last 26 games to take over the Central Division lead. Karl admitted he was worried earlier in the season, allayed only by the realization that the team lost to some good opponents. Lately, the Bucks are playing better and the results show it.

	“	I'm starting to think that, for the first time, being free is maybe more important to me. That doesn't mean I will leave Milwaukee. I might just leave basketball for awhile. I don't have a hang-up about having to win a championship, things like that. ”
		— Karl

"In general," Karl said, "if we defend with any degree of pride and if we pass with any degree of unselfishness, we're a pretty damn good team. Unfortunately, the guys haven't bought into that totally, to the point where they do it every night. We still have nights where we don't defend or we don't pass. Then, we're not a very good team."

Just watching Karl handle the early season trouble was an event. He ripped into his players, wondering if they had the commitment. He lamented the loss of role players who were so critical to the team's late-season success last year. When asked if he might have an interest in coaching the Celtics, he quipped, "I already coach a team that doesn't play any defense."

He was at a crossroads -- trying to coach a team that was playing out of control even as a lucrative extension (his contract has one more year to run) sat there for him to sign. It's still out there, unsigned, but hardly unappreciated or unnoticed.

Karl isn't even sure he will sign it, though it would make him and many future generations of Karl's worry-free from a money standpoint. This is a guy who says he actually enjoys living on the edge.

"I want to keep that edge," he said. "I like the urgency of coaching. Having a one-year deal wouldn't bother me at all. Maybe the players would use it to weasel their way out of things, but I don't think I wouldn't like it.

"I'm starting to think that, for the first time, being free is maybe more important to me," he went on. "That doesn't mean I will leave Milwaukee. I might just leave basketball for awhile. I don't have a hang-up about having to win a championship, things like that. My kid is graduating from high school. I'm 51 and newly divorced. I think we'll continue the work here, and it probably will get done. But there isn't the urgency there. Maybe I'll take a longer look at it during the All-Star break."

He still toys with idea of coaching college, perhaps when he's in his late-50s and a shorter season is not only manageable, but preferable.

"Thirty games," he said, "sounds pretty good to me. One hundred games drains you."

His dream job, returning to Chapel Hill to coach the Tar Heels, is unlikely to happen, he now realizes.

"I think I'm getting too old for North Carolina," he said. "But it was a dream, a fantasy, to have it flash before you like that."

Back to life. Back to reality. The Bucks are in Charlotte Friday and Detroit on Sunday. Karl has a winning percentage of nearly 60 percent, despite those miserable years with the Cavaliers and Warriors. Among active NBA coaches, only Phil Jackson, Pat Riley and Jerry Sloan have a higher career winning percentage.

He may not make anyone's top 10 list for all-time great coaches and he won't make the best-dressed list. While he has undergone many changes since his early, hectic, days, he remains today what he was in Montana, Albany and Madrid -- a coach.

"I still enjoy the gym," he said. "I still enjoy playing H-O-R-S-E and all those kind of games. I like the locker room, I like to talk trash. All that stuff. I like it when you win and I don't like it when you lose. It's basically a very simple philosophy.

"I really enjoy the game now more than ever. It's the things around the game that are stressful and pressured. But I think I'm more secure in my coaching, I've matured, and I've got a great basketball situation in Milwaukee."

He said he got a boost when a friend called recently, after the Bucks had started to heed his words and played better basketball. The friend detected a change.

"He told me, 'George, you've gone from being childish to child-like,' " Karl said. "I liked that. I guess there is a maturity to my immaturity."

Peter May, who covers the NBA for the Boston Globe, is a regular contributor to ESPN.com.