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It’s been four months since the basketball world lost one of its most beloved figures after Bill Walton passed away at the age of 71, and the Trail Blazers have revealed their incredibly apropos plan to honor his memory with the jersey band they’ll be wearing this season.
The Portland Trail Blazers used the first overall pick in the 1974 NBA Draft to select Bill Walton, who had one of the most impressive college careers in history during his time at UCLA. He’d eventually spend some time with the Clippers and the Celtics, but the first NBA team he played for is the one most people associate him with.
Walton won a couple of championships as well as a regular season and Finals MVP award during the ten seasons he spent in the league, but his playing career is still one of the more notable “What Ifs?” thanks to the string of injuries that hampered a run that came to an end when he was 34.
However, Walton didn’t waste much time pivoting to a new venture after turning his attention to broadcasting, which marked the start of an incredibly entertaining second act primarily defined by his time working alongside Dave Pasch while calling Pac-12 basketball games.
Those contests routinely featured Walton deploying flowery metaphors while going off on rambling tangents that were pretty on-brand for a devoted Deadhead who was never shy about discussing his affinity for the various substances that tend to flow like the waters of Niagara Falls at the jam band’s concerts.
We lost a true gem of a human being when Walton died following a battle with cancer at the end of May, and there was an outpouring of tributes honoring a man who more than earned the right to be called a legend.
On Thursday, the Trail Blazers announced the approach they’ve opted to harness to keep his memory alive during the upcoming NBA season, as every player will be rocking a tie-dye patch with Walton’s #32 on their jersey.
Nailed it.