When the 16x World Champion Boston Celtics drafted Len Bias -the reigning 2x ACC Player of the Year out of Maryland- in 1986, Red Auerbach had his franchise poised to continue its NBA dominance for the next decade. Less than 40 hours later, history -and the life of a wonderful young man- were lost.
IT’S been almost 40 years now.
Nearly 40 years removed from the day my life forever changed. Basketball, as well, forever changed on June 19th, 1986; a day with events that I have never been able to grasp; and a day that saw the life of a truly special young man and basketball talent tragically end at the perils of cocaine.
It’s been almost 40 years since Leonard Kevin Bias -the great Len Bias- of the University of Maryland at College Park. The heir apparent of the Boston Celtics kingdom. The only man Micheal Jordan ever considered his equal..
It’s been almost 40 years since we senselessly lost Len Bias, the greatest basketball player I have ever seen, to a cocaine overdose.
I have thought about writing this essay for years. Truth is, it took me a while to even get to a dark enough place to be able to write this. You can’t be in a happy or celebratory state of mind when writing about one of the profoundly sad tragedies in American history.
Len Bias would have been the greatest basketball player that ever played. There, I said it. But because of his tragic death -not even two full days after being selected with the 2nd overall pick by the Boston Celtics in the 1986 draft- I only have the beliefs in convictions of what I saw with my own eyes to know this to be true. Len Bias, greatest basketball player of all time. My childhood idol and hero. The player I would go out in the driveway and shoot baskets for hours pretending to be. Dead at the age of 22.
Dead. Nearly 40 hours after becoming a Boston Celtic. Dead. Nearly 40 years later, and I still can’t process it.
I vividly remember where I was when I heard the news. It’s one of those events, similar to the Challenger explosion, 9/11, Biggie & Tupac assassinations, and the day we whacked Bin Laden for my lifetime; the JFK, MLK & RFK assassinations and USA landing on the moon for my parents generation: You just remember where you were, how you felt, and how you heard the news.
I was seven years old at the time. I was upstairs playing in my room. Summer vacation had just begun and I was happy to be done with the school year; able to finally focus on playing basketball six hours a day -at least for the next two months.
My Mom was down in the living room watching the Phil Donahue show, when it was abruptly interrupted around 9:15 am with an emergency special report. I heard my Mom scream and then shout for me to come downstairs.
I thought I had done something again –gotten into some sort of trouble. Then she told me Lenny was gone. I didn’t believe it. I wouldn’t believe it. I went and sat on the foot of our stairs and bawled my eyes out.
When my mother tried to console me I ran out of the house and up to my tree fort before going on my swing set for what was probably hours. I understood it then about as well as I do now -nearly 40 years later- which is not at all.
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“Bias was drafted by the Boston Celtics with the 2nd pick in the ’86 NBA Draft, something that in my mind, almost guaranteed the Celts an 80-2 record during the 86-87 season and maybe one loss in the playoffs – which would have made them the greatest team the world of sports –not just basketball- had ever seen.” — Scoop Jackson
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I wish you could have seen him. Long before I moved to Boston and was a Celtics season ticket holder, I used to attend University of Maryland basketball games on the College Park campus in Prince George’s County with my Dad.
I am a big believer in the “right time – right place – right guy” theory, and in the early/mid 80’s I was the right kid in the right time at the right place to be able to watch Len Bias play in person.
His skills were breathtaking. He was always the best player on the floor. And these were the days when the old ACC regularly had three teams ranked in the AP top 5. Back when the ACC was the ACC. If you know you know.
You should have seen Jordan try to score on Bias. You should have seen Jordan try to defend Bias. He couldn’t. Lenny was a bigger, stronger, and equally athletic version of MJ. Think along the lines of Lebron James in his prime, but with more basketball skills, a better jump shot and much more heart.
I was there. I saw this with my own eyes. Nobody could guard Len Bias. Nobody was as good as him. He was always the coolest player on the court too. He is the player the baggy shorts/trash talking/hip-hop generation of ballers in the 90’s most wanted to be like. Except Lenny didn’t go after this type of swagger, he had it naturally. His body chiseled from granite and his game silky smooth, he was IT. He was Prince George’s County.
And my Lord, you should have seen how he was able to take over a game. Like he did in leading his Terps to the 1984 ACC championship (the same year Jordan led UNC to the National title).
Or how he outplayed (and at times defended) David Robinson in a victory over Navy in the 1985 NCAA tournament.
Or in 1986 when Bias twice led Maryland to victories over top ranked North Carolina, leading his coach, Lefty Driesell to proclaim: “If Lenny Bias isn’t the player of the world, I don’t know who is.”
Mike Krzyzewski, the same Coach K who has won four national titles with Duke and led the USA “Redeem Team” to Gold in ‘08, coached against Bias in college. Krzyzewski has either coached or coached against every elite player the game has seen since the 1980’s. The two best he has ever seen? Jordan and Bias.
“Other than Jordan, (Bias) is the player no team had an answer for, “ Coach K said. “He was that good.”
Coach K was not the only one to believe this sentiment either. Dean Smith, John Thompson, Michael Wilbon, and Bob Ryan –just to name a few- also all felt Bias was on par with Jordan.
It was transcending to watch Len Bias play. And not just for a wide-eyed 7-year old boy rooting on his idol.
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“I played against Len Bias in the ACC and he was a unique power forward/small forward because he was a guy who could play with his back to the basket and he had a body by Adonis, so to speak. He looked like he was sculpted. He also had great athleticism with a soft touch. To put him with Larry Bird and the Boston Celtics, you would think that his career would have been a 15-20 year career, NBA All Stars, MVPs, and probably one of the greatest players to ever play this game.” – Kenny Smith
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It’s the night of June 16th 1986 and I can’t sleep. “Honey, what in the world are you still doing up?” my mother asks me.
“I can’t sleep.” I tell her. “The NBA Draft is tomorrow night, and whoever drafts Len Bias is going to be my new favorite team. Even if Cleveland takes him (The Cavs had the first pick that year) that will be who I root for.”
Red Auerbach had known for three years that he was going to draft Len Bias. This is when Red had the golden touch for personnel moves and when he saw a player he felt would epitomize being a Celtic, he made whatever moves necessary to get him.
And one of his most shrewd came in the fall of 1984, after watching Bias dominate his summer camp in pickup games against NBA players -among them reigning NBA Finals and League MVP Larry Bird, who in 1984 was universally considered the best player on the planet- Red casually traded Gerald Henderson to the Seattle Sonics for the 1986 first round pick that would turn into Bias.
Bias had worked as a counselor at Red’s New England basketball camp, and Red and Driesell were good friends. It was a prefect fit. A couple of weeks earlier, Bias had even sat behind the Celtics bench for an ‘86 NBA Finals game in Boston against the Houston Rockets
The Celtic torch had been passed from Cousy to Russell to Havlicek to Cowens to Bird, and now Boston had just selected it’s next captain, it’s next leader who would honor the tradition of Celtic Pride and raise banners to the Garden rafters for years to come.
We were robbed of so much when Len Bias passed away. Upon drafting him, Auerbach immediately anointed Bias the sixth man for the upcoming season.
Bias would have been enough to lead the Celtics to the ’87 championship and God knows how many more after that. The Pistons would have never over taken the Celtics in the late 80’s and a Celtics-Bulls rivalry in the 90’s would have been fierce.
Bias would have extended the careers for both Bird and McHale by keeping their minutes down and the cringeworthy “ML Carr/Rick Pitino” era would have never happened in Boston in the mid/late 90’s.
All of it gone -never happened- because of June 19,1986.
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“He’s just a great athlete. I’ve seen him play many times. I’ve seen him practice many times. He’s got good work habits. He’s a good kid. He’s going to play. You ever hear of the word insurance? He’s pretty good insurance.” –Red Auerbach (before Bias’ death)
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The Basketball World didn’t just change; it was shaken up –historically altered- by the death of Len Bias.
Bias’ death probably resulted in us not seeing the greatest Michael Jordan we could have ever seen. Think about that.
Wilt had Russell, Bird had Magic, and Lebron had Kobe and to a slightly lesser degree. Steph.
Who did Michael Jordan have to challenge him and get him to constantly elevate and improve his game? Drexler? Barkley? Isaiah? Ewing? Reggie? Malone? Starks? None of these players ever offered anything more than an annoyance to Jordan’s dominance.
But it would have been different if Len Bias was around. Bias was the one player that could have kept Jordan’s competitive attention. Bias could match Jordan skill for skill, physical gift for physical gift. And even if Bias would not have been quite as good as Jordan, he would have been close enough that Jordan would have always had to keep him on the alpha dog radar.
He would not have been bored with the game as a whole in ’93 and taken a two-year hiatus. And he would have unquestionably engaged a 12-year duel with Bias for basketball supremacy. Is that not enough to have Jordan push his legendary game to even greater heights than he already did?
“He’s the best player I ever played against,” Jordan once said. “It would have been very interesting had we had the chance to compete in the NBA.”
From a market standpoint, who would have gone on to become the greater global icon? Bias had just signed a three million dollar contract with Reebok. Would his appeal; his skillset, charisma, and good looks have been enough to propel Reebok into the athletic and apparel giant that Nike is today? Remember, in 1986 Nike and Reebok were virtually on the same playing field. Nike had just signed Jordan, and was about to leave its competitors in the dust, but if Reebok had Bias, could that have changed things?
We will never know.
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“He probably improved as much or more than any player I ever coached. He could take you inside and dunk on you, shoot a jump shot, a turn-around jumper, a hook shot, he could do anything. And he was an excellent defensive player. Leonard worked so hard. I used to have to pull him out of practice he would dominate so much. I’d say, ‘Leonard get out. Let’s see how we can do without you in there.’ “ -Lefty Driesell
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To me, Len Bias is the most influential athlete of my lifetime. And this is where that dark place is, because Bias’ influence was not just on the basketball court, but in lessons learned with the consequences and the dark side of temptation; those lingering vices in life.
I can honestly say as much as it is a result of the way my parents raised me, Len Bias is equally responsible for me having never experimented with any illegal drug ever in my life. If drugs could kill Len Bias, they could kill anyone.
Most would argue Michael Jordan is the most influential athlete because of his global impact on commerce, or Babe Ruth because of his role in making baseball an American institution, or Muhammad Ali for his defiant stance against the war in Vietnam and his appeal in the Third World. Or even Lebron James for all his goofiness as the first superstar in the social media era.
They were reflections of cultural movements and represent periods of time, but those men didn’t directly change the way people behaved.
Prior to Bias’ overdose, cocaine was considered a social drug; a party drug that was fairly safe and widely used.
By dying, Bias did something that no public service announcement, after school DARE program, or Nancy Reagan could accomplish: his death made cocaine no longer cool.
If cocaine could stop the heart of Len Bias, God knows what it could do to the average person.
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“When I first heard the news about Len’s death, I was at home in bed. I was asleep when we received the call and I remember thinking it was a dream and I would awaken soon. It was early in the morning when we got the call. I remember going to the hospital after that and just not believing it. It was only after all the outpouring of emotion from around the country that I remember grasping for the first time that my son was a star. Up to then, he was just my son.
Len was my pride and joy and losing him was one of the most difficult, challenging times of my life. I believe that Len died so that others might live.” – Dr. Lonise Bias (Len’s Mom)
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I have struggled with Len Bias’ death my entire life. I think America has too, no one knows quite how to put it in perspective.
In some circles, it is almost as if Bias is being pushed out of the conscience of American thought. His death, almost viewed as the signifying moment of a “dark era” and easier to be forgotten than remembered.
At the University of Maryland, there are no books in the library about Len Bias and most books on Amazon and the Internet are out of print.
These are all forms of denial. A country and a community that –even as we approach 40 years- is still struggling with the inconceivable death of Len Bias and cannot come to peace with what we lost.
I have been in denial since June 19th 1986 as well. I often close my eyes and think about him in the NBA. I think about what the League and the game would be like today had Bias played. I picture him and Jordan going into Springfield (Basketball HOF) together and being forever linked through footage, documentaries, books, and friendship the way Bird and Magic are today. Their head-to-head rivalry would have been one for the ages.
I was in denial too for a while that Bias even used cocaine. I would make up stories and tell my friends that it was marijuana he was smoking that fateful night and someone –unbeknownst to Lenny- had laced his weed with pure cocaine.
Anything to convince myself that my idol did not knowingly risk and throw away his future the way he had.
This essay has not been easy for me to write. Even now, having relived all of these memories, I once again have that gnawing feeling in the pit of my stomach. The death of Len Bias is something I will never come to grips with. I need to one day accept that.
Rest in Peace, Leonard Kevin Bias. I want to thank you for giving me something that too few people in this life had. And that was the opportunity to watch you play basketball in person. To watch the greatest basketball player ever play ball.
Growing up in Prince George’s County, you learn at an early age that basketball is life. At seven years old, you taught me that if we’re not careful, it can also be death.
You will never be forgotten.
Len Bias (Nov. 18, 1963–June 19, 1986)
