Bill Walton, the all-time high school, college and NBA champion and Basketball Hall of Famer, died Monday after a long battle with cancer, the NBA announced.
He was 71 years old.
“Bill Walton was truly one of a kind,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said in a statement. “A valued member of the NBA family for 50 years, he will be deeply missed by all who knew and loved him.”
American-born Walton led an extraordinary life on and off the court, excelling in basketball and dabbling in the counterculture scene of the late 1960s and early 1970s, and he remained associated with both throughout his life as a basketball player, TV commentator and lifelong fan of the Grateful Dead, Bob Dylan and Neil Young.
Standing 6’11”, he was one of the most skilled big men in the game. He could defend, rebound, block shots, pass and score. In 10 seasons, he averaged 13.3 points, 10.5 rebounds, 3.4 assists and 2.2 blocks, but a foot injury sidelined him from his best years, causing him to miss the 1978-79, 1980-81 and 1981-82 seasons.
Walton had a stellar playing career despite debilitating injuries. After a stellar career at UCLA, where he won two NCAA titles under the tutelage of one of his greatest influences, John Wooden, Walton was selected first overall in the 1974 draft by the Portland Trail Blazers. He led the Blazers to the 1977 NBA championship and was named Finals MVP. He averaged 18.5 points, 19 rebounds, 5.2 assists and 3.7 blocks while shooting 54.5% from the field in a six-game series against Philadelphia.
The following season, the league named him the regular season MVP after averaging 18.9 points, 13.2 rebounds, 5.0 assists and 2.5 blocks.
As one of the best players of his generation, he received numerous accolades, including being a two-time NBA champion, a two-time All-Star, a two-time All-NBA selection, a two-time All-Defensive selection, the 1985-86 Sixth Man of the Year, and named one of the NBA’s 75 greatest players.
John Wooden and the Grateful Dead Influence
What Walton learned from UCLA and Wooden, the NBA and the Celtics, the Grateful Dead and Dylan woven into his outlook on life.
He once wrote about Wooden, “Our practices were the most grueling I have ever been a part of — physically, emotionally, mentally and psychologically taxing — and yet there was always a sense of joy, of celebration, of people enjoying a simple game. Always positive, always constructive, John Wooden led us in ways and directions we didn’t even realize we were playing, always with the goal of making us better.”
He combined Zen serenity with the spirit of a warrior. He socialized with hippies and professional athletes. He assisted Larry Bird and partied with Jerry Garcia, Bob Weir and Mickey Hart. He loved music and song, especially lyrics. He could recite the stirring words of Dylan’s Boots of Spanish Leather as easily as he could recite the lyrics of the Dead’s Scarlet Begonias.
Known as Grateful Red, he attended hundreds of Dead concerts and in 1985 took members of the Celtics, including Byrd, Kevin McHale and Rick Carlisle, to a Grateful Dead concert in Worcester, Massachusetts.
“The Celtics and the Grateful Dead represent so much of what I believe in, what I live for and what I try to accomplish in life,” Walton told USA Today Sports in 2020. “The Celtics were a family organization because of the culture that Red[Auerbach]built. The Grateful Dead are a family too. They both have the power to inspire, encourage, be yourself and be something bigger and better and more important than who you are as an individual.”
I once asked Walton what his favorite Dead song was, and he answered with a mixture of disbelief and passion (but more passion) that “all of them.” In other words, whatever he was listening to at the time. Living in the moment.
As an announcer, he often strayed into fantastical ramblings, sometimes absurd, sometimes joyous, but that was Walton: off the beaten path.
Walton was born in La Mesa, California, in 1952 to Gloria Ann and William Walton, one of four children. His parents encouraged him to participate in the arts. Walton also loved sports, winning high school basketball championships in 1969 and 1970.
UCLA legend: Two 30-0 seasons, NCAA title
He attended UCLA and won two NCAA championships in 1972 and 1973, leading the Bruins to 30-0 records in two consecutive seasons. He was named Most Valuable Player in two Final Four appearances, was named National Player of the Year three times and was a key member of a Bruins dynasty that won 10 titles in 12 seasons. He also played a key role in UCLA’s 88 consecutive wins.
Walton had four sons, Adam, Nathan, Luke and Chris. When Luke won his second NBA title with the Los Angeles Lakers, they became the first father-son duo to win at least two titles. His older brother, Bruce, was also a standout athlete, playing in college at UCLA and in the NFL with the Dallas Cowboys.
Walton, who stutters, says it took him until his late 20s to get used to public speaking, when a chance meeting with New York announcer Marty Glickman changed his life.
“That day, in a very brief, private conversation (but one-way, since I literally couldn’t speak at the time), Marty patiently and succinctly explained to me that speaking and communicating are not a talent or a birthright but a skill, and that any skill — whether in sports, music, business or anything — must be developed through a lifetime of hard work, discipline, structure and practice,” Walton wrote.
He also overcame a lifetime of injuries and pain. A leg injury sustained during his playing days proved debilitating in later years, and the pain in his back was excruciating. In his book Back from the Dead, Walton wrote, “I can’t do this anymore. It’s too hard. It hurts too much. Why should I go on? What’s the point in going on? I’ve been down so long I don’t know where I am. I have no reason to believe that tomorrow will be better. If I had a gun, I’d use it.”
Spinal surgery in 2009 freed Walton from excruciating pain, and he cherished a pain-free life that allowed him to do the things he loved: cycling, announcing college basketball games and going to Dead concerts.
