Len Bias — 20 years later

What a tragic, tragic story, and the passage of time doesn't make it any less so.

My favorite memory of Bias was when he inbounded a ball under his own basket off a player's back and made an easy basket to ice a win. I think it was during the ACC tourney, but I'm hazy on the details.

 

Not the biggest Simmons fan (who on this thread is), but I've always liked his Bias piece a few years back.

http://proxy.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?id=1216986

 

I was out riding my bike or something (hey, it WAS 20 years ago) and I came home and my mom said "Your father called and said some NBA draft pick died of a drug overdose."

I said a name--can't remember who it was, but it wasn't Bias--and she said "Yeah, him."

Then I put on the TV and it was Len Bias.

Can you imagine the dynasty the Celts might have had if Bias and Reggie Lewis had stayed alive? Wow.

 

Well, they might have supplanted the Knicks or Pacers as the team that lost the Eastern Conference finals to the Bulls or Pistons every year. But that's about as far as their dynasty likely would have gone.


I'll always remember Red Auerbach's feigned disgust when a reporter asked the "inappropriate" question of whether the Celtics would petition the NBA for another draft pick to replace Bias.

A while later . . . the Celtics petitioned the NBA for another draft pick to replace Bias. And were denied.

 

Like BYH, I don't remember Bias. (must have been collecting Garbage Pail Kids)

How good was this guy?

 

Maybe.

But that entire draft was loaded with problem players who weren't anything near what they were projected to be . . . or who contributed to their own demise.

Some of the top 16

Chris Washburn
Kenny Walker
William Bedford
Roy Tarpley
Brad Sellers
Johnny Dawkins
John Salley
Hot Plate Williams
Pearl Washington
Walter Berry
Mo Martin

 

I was going to say you can't assume Bias wouldn't have done anything because of the other guys drafted with him, but then again, none of those guys OD'd and died.

I think we can agree the 1986 draft was not the proudest moment for the NCAA.

 

Not for lack of trying.

 

No kidding.

Pearl Washington's had health problems, right? I want to say a brain tumor or a blood clot.

 

He had a benign brain tumor in the mid-90s but overcame that, I believe.

Haven't heard anything else about him in years.