As originally aired on the Rochester Press Box
There’s a photograph of Bill Walton hung on the walls of the Titus Tavern in Irondequoit. There has to be a story attached. Because everyone who came in contact with this 6-foot-11 giant of a man, who passed away last week at the age of 71, came away with one.
Walton first appeared on our radar in 1970 for his basketball abilities. He won his last 44 games in high school. His last 88 in college. Won two national championships, two NBA crowns. A league MVP. A finals MVP. He was the Sixth Man of the Year in his next to last professional season. And a Hall of Famer. Obviously. But among the week’s many tributes, few had much to do with basketball.
Walton’s was a life of comebacks and reinventions. He first hurt his knees playing playground ball and claims he peaked as a twelve-year-old. He overcame a stuttering problem in his thirties and went on to become a legendary, if somewhat unorthodox broadcaster and public speaker. Said Walton once, “If you think you’re too small to make a difference, you’ve never spent a night in bed with a mosquito.”
He contemplated suicide while suffering under the agony of constant back pain. In 2009, spinal fusion surgery brought him back to life. And he spent his last fifteen years here making good on that second chance. Befriending everyone he met. Signing every autograph. Shaking every hand. He called himself, the luckiest man in the world.
When Walton texted friends, he always ended the same way. “Thank you for my life.” A simple way of stating, thank you for the contributions you made to my existence. He was called, “An amazing human with an incredibly generous soul.” “A nonconformist in the most positive of ways, always seeking to make the world better for others.” And from his idol Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, “He was the best of us.”
Tough to beat that.
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