Hall of Famer Bill Walton passes away at 71 from cancer

[missiontrails]

I didn't know until reading about it today, that Coach Fisher would sometimes bring recruits to the Walton household to meet Bill and have him give a tour of his house and yard all the while pimping SDSU like nobody else can. I'd love to hear which players did that tour and also committed to play for the Aztecs.

RIP Bill - absolute San Diego legend and icon.

[naztec]

I valet parked his 4Runner in the gaslamp one time and no lie the Grateful Dead channel was on the satellite radio.

[longtimebooster]

Man, I was shocked by Bill's passing. Such a loss for both the sport of basketball and the city of San Diego. He was an absolute gem. I got to know him over the years, and ran into him many times whenever out and about in San Diego, probably mostly because he was so hard to miss. I'd see him at the airport getting on a plane, because he'd always be head and shoulders above everyone. I'd see him in the crowd at Humphrey's, or at a restaurant, or biking down the street.

The last time I saw him was about six months ago at the Mission Valley Y, where I play hoops a couple times a week. He looked fit and in good spirits. There's a bronze statue of him in front of the Y standing in front of his bike (with a faint Grateful Dead skull/lightning bolt etched into the front of his T-shirt, of course.) The plaque below the statue is a quote from Bill proclaiming that the Y saved his life. When he was recovering from back surgery about a 15 years ago, he would swim in the pool daily. There was a special chair in the locker room at the Y in which someone had attached wooden blocks to the base that elevated the chair about a foot, so Bill could sit on rather than the regular-human-sized benches that were far too low for him.

At any rate, last fall I was walking into the locker room while Bill was walking out.

I said, "Hey, Bill, how you doin'?"

He replied in his big, booming voice, "I'm doing great! I'm at the Y! I'm the luckiest man alive!"

I laughed and said, "Hey, I'm at the Y, too! I must be the luckiest man alive as well!"

A couple other Walton stories:

Sometime around 2007-ish, I think, I had a meeting in an office building in Scripps Ranch. I went to use the restroom and was walking down the hall when I saw this very large person shuffling slowly toward me at the far end of the hall. I arrived at the urinal and a minute or two later, this person shuffled up to the urinal next to me. It was Walton. I didn't say anything and was shocked because he was moving around like a 90-year-old man. it was really depressing.

About 3 years later, I went to a mixer for an entrepreneurship group and Bill was there as part of his work with the San Diego Sports Entrepreneurs. I started chatting with him and mentioned that I'd seen him a few years earlier and he looked like death warmed over. He said, yes, he'd been suffering terribly from back pain and thought many times about ending his life the pain was so bad. But then he met a guy who introduced him to the CEO of a local San Diego medical device company called NuVasive. One of Bill's vertebras had essentially started to crumble. Surgeons put a titanium mesh around the vertebra and miraculously, Bill was healed. He gushed about NuVasive and credited them for allowing him to resume normal activities and be free from pain for the first time since college.

I asked him how he hurt his back in the first place.

He said, "Oh, I was at UCLA and we were playing Washington State on the road my senior year. I went up for a rebound and (forgot the player's name), who was a miserable excuse for a human being and an offense to all that is good and graceful and just in the sport of basketball and makes it the most beautiful game in the world, and is still living and remains an existential stain on all of humanity, undercut me. Took my legs right out. I landed flat on my back and cracked a vertebra. Of course, I never told anyone how badly I was injured, and definitely didn't tell Coach Wooden. A week later, we traveled to South Bend to play Notre Dame. I could hardly move and the pain was excruciating. We lost and our 88-game win streak went up in smoke. We also failed to repeat as NCAA Champions that year, a failure that continues to haunt me to this day."

We continued to chat and I told him that I stilled played pick up ball and played hoops in high school, and mentioned that my high school team (where I played on the freshman team, not varsity at the time) won 47 games in a row and three straight state championships in Nevada. He quickly said, "Well, my high school team won 49 games in a row and two straight California state championships."

I said, "I know, Bill. I wasn't trying to say my high school team was better than Helix High."

It was a crack up. Still competitive after all these years.

[missiontrails]

May 28, 2024 4:44:57 GMT -8 longtimebooster said:

Man, I was shocked by Bill's passing. Such a loss for both the sport of basketball and the city of San Diego. He was an absolute gem. I got to know him over the years, and ran into him many times whenever out and about in San Diego, probably mostly because he was so hard to miss. I'd see him at the airport getting on a plane, because he'd always be head and shoulders above everyone. I'd see him in the crowd at Humphrey's, or at a restaurant, or biking down the street.

The last time I saw him was about six months ago at the Mission Valley Y, where I play hoops a couple times a week. He looked fit and in good spirits. There's a bronze statue of him in front of the Y standing in front of his bike (with a faint Grateful Dead skull/lightning bolt etched into the front of his T-shirt, of course.) The plaque below the statue is a quote from Bill proclaiming that the Y saved his life. When he was recovering from back surgery about a 15 years ago, he would swim in the pool daily. There was a special chair in the locker room at the Y in which someone had attached wooden blocks to the base that elevated the chair about a foot, so Bill could sit on rather than the regular-human-sized benches that were far too low for him.

At any rate, last fall I was walking into the locker room while Bill was walking out.

I said, "Hey, Bill, how you doin'?"

He replied in his big, booming voice, "I'm doing great! I'm at the Y! I'm the luckiest man alive!"

I laughed and said, "Hey, I'm at the Y, too! I must be the luckiest man alive as well!"

A couple other Walton stories:

Sometime around 2007-ish, I think, I had a meeting in an office building in Scripps Ranch. I went to use the restroom and was walking down the hall when I saw this very large person shuffling slowly toward me at the far end of the hall. I arrived at the urinal and a minute or two later, this person shuffled up to the urinal next to me. It was Walton. I didn't say anything and was shocked because he was moving around like a 90-year-old man. it was really depressing.

About 3 years later, I went to a mixer for an entrepreneurship group and Bill was there as part of his work with the San Diego Sports Entrepreneurs. I started chatting with him and mentioned that I'd seen him a few years earlier and he looked like death warmed over. He said, yes, he'd been suffering terribly from back pain and thought many times about ending his life the pain was so bad. But then he met a guy who introduced him to the CEO of a local San Diego medical device company called NuVasive. One of Bill's vertebras had essentially started to crumble. Surgeons put a titanium mesh around the vertebra and miraculously, Bill was healed. He gushed about NuVasive and credited them for allowing him to resume normal activities and be free from pain for the first time since college.

I asked him how he hurt his back in the first place.

He said, "Oh, I was at UCLA and we were playing Washington State on the road my senior year. I went up for a rebound and (forgot the player's name), who was a miserable excuse for a human being and an offense to all that is good and graceful and just in the sport of basketball and makes it the most beautiful game in the world, and is still living and remains an existential stain on all of humanity, undercut me. Took my legs right out. I landed flat on my back and cracked a vertebra. Of course, I never told anyone how badly I was injured, and definitely didn't tell Coach Wooden. A week later, we traveled to South Bend to play Notre Dame. I could hardly move and the pain was excruciating. We lost and our 88-game win streak went up in smoke. We also failed to repeat as NCAA Champions that year, a failure that continues to haunt me to this day."

We continued to chat and I told him that I stilled played pick up ball and played hoops in high school, and mentioned that my high school team (where I played on the freshman team, not varsity at the time) won 47 games in a row and three straight state championships in Nevada. He quickly said, "Well, my high school team won 49 games in a row and two straight California state championships."

I said, "I know, Bill. I wasn't trying to say my high school team was better than Helix High."

It was a crack up. Still competitive after all these years.

Thanks for sharing your encounters. What a character he was.

I played a lot of basketball at the MV Y' back in the early to mid-90's. If you were playing there during that era, I'm sure we faced each other a few times.

[sdsuball]

May 28, 2024 4:44:57 GMT -8 longtimebooster said:

Man, I was shocked by Bill's passing. Such a loss for both the sport of basketball and the city of San Diego. He was an absolute gem. I got to know him over the years, and ran into him many times whenever out and about in San Diego, probably mostly because he was so hard to miss. I'd see him at the airport getting on a plane, because he'd always be head and shoulders above everyone. I'd see him in the crowd at Humphrey's, or at a restaurant, or biking down the street.

The last time I saw him was about six months ago at the Mission Valley Y, where I play hoops a couple times a week. He looked fit and in good spirits. There's a bronze statue of him in front of the Y standing in front of his bike (with a faint Grateful Dead skull/lightning bolt etched into the front of his T-shirt, of course.) The plaque below the statue is a quote from Bill proclaiming that the Y saved his life. When he was recovering from back surgery about a 15 years ago, he would swim in the pool daily. There was a special chair in the locker room at the Y in which someone had attached wooden blocks to the base that elevated the chair about a foot, so Bill could sit on rather than the regular-human-sized benches that were far too low for him.

At any rate, last fall I was walking into the locker room while Bill was walking out.

I said, "Hey, Bill, how you doin'?"

He replied in his big, booming voice, "I'm doing great! I'm at the Y! I'm the luckiest man alive!"

I laughed and said, "Hey, I'm at the Y, too! I must be the luckiest man alive as well!"

A couple other Walton stories:

Sometime around 2007-ish, I think, I had a meeting in an office building in Scripps Ranch. I went to use the restroom and was walking down the hall when I saw this very large person shuffling slowly toward me at the far end of the hall. I arrived at the urinal and a minute or two later, this person shuffled up to the urinal next to me. It was Walton. I didn't say anything and was shocked because he was moving around like a 90-year-old man. it was really depressing.

About 3 years later, I went to a mixer for an entrepreneurship group and Bill was there as part of his work with the San Diego Sports Entrepreneurs. I started chatting with him and mentioned that I'd seen him a few years earlier and he looked like death warmed over. He said, yes, he'd been suffering terribly from back pain and thought many times about ending his life the pain was so bad. But then he met a guy who introduced him to the CEO of a local San Diego medical device company called NuVasive. One of Bill's vertebras had essentially started to crumble. Surgeons put a titanium mesh around the vertebra and miraculously, Bill was healed. He gushed about NuVasive and credited them for allowing him to resume normal activities and be free from pain for the first time since college.

I asked him how he hurt his back in the first place.

He said, "Oh, I was at UCLA and we were playing Washington State on the road my senior year. I went up for a rebound and (forgot the player's name), who was a miserable excuse for a human being and an offense to all that is good and graceful and just in the sport of basketball and makes it the most beautiful game in the world, and is still living and remains an existential stain on all of humanity, undercut me. Took my legs right out. I landed flat on my back and cracked a vertebra. Of course, I never told anyone how badly I was injured, and definitely didn't tell Coach Wooden. A week later, we traveled to South Bend to play Notre Dame. I could hardly move and the pain was excruciating. We lost and our 88-game win streak went up in smoke. We also failed to repeat as NCAA Champions that year, a failure that continues to haunt me to this day."

We continued to chat and I told him that I stilled played pick up ball and played hoops in high school, and mentioned that my high school team (where I played on the freshman team, not varsity at the time) won 47 games in a row and three straight state championships in Nevada. He quickly said, "Well, my high school team won 49 games in a row and two straight California state championships."

I said, "I know, Bill. I wasn't trying to say my high school team was better than Helix High."

It was a crack up. Still competitive after all these years.

I had the privilege of coaching him swimming at the MV Y. What a great guy, such a positive person.

[chris92065]

I loved seeing him at Aztecs games. You could always tell it was bill because he took up 3 seats. His legs were long enough that he would have his feet rest on the row in front of him.

[myownwords]

Very sad, and WAY too soon.

[William L. Rupp]

In 1970, when I was teaching at El Capitan High School, I saw Walton play as a high school senior. I noticed that, though he was really tall, be brought the ball into the front court as if we were a point guard.

Much too young to die.

WLR

[mojo56]

Wow. I can't believe Bill is gone. I was shocked when I heard the news last week. I was huge college BB fan growing up in the NY area and I remember watching in awe as he and the Bruins dismantled Memphis St for the National Championship. 20-21 From the floor! Are you kidding me?

I moved to SD in '79 and me and some friends had 2 apartments right on the boardwalk in Mission Beach during the off season. My buddy and I were sitting on the porch early one morning when Bill came jogging by in the sand. He had just signed with the Clippers but was already on the DL with foot issues. My buddy still had a lot of NY in him and yells at Bill: "When are you getting back in the lineup brittle boy"? Bill smiled and waved "How you doing fellas"? What a great comeback. As the years went on I learned this was typical Bill. Just a genuine nice guy.

His son Chris and my son went to Uni HS and SDSU at the same time so I would see Bill at BB games. I couldn't believe how bad he looked and how he could barely shuffle across the court. A poster above explained the issue and I was so glad to see him in much better health a few years later. The last time I saw him was at a Roger Daltry concert that my daughter and I went to. Of course Bill was in the front row center stage. RIP Bill. You will be missed.