Kevin Duckworth and Wayman Tisdale: Remembering the Good Times

This article was written by George Irvine of Basketball.org. George was a long-time NBA Head Coach, Executive and Player.

In the past couple of days, there have been a couple of sad stories relating to retired NBA players. First was the story about the untimely death of Kevin Duckworth, of which Jaime wrote.

I knew Kevin a little bit, about as much as an opposing coach gets to know players on other teams. Kevin was a solid player, a big guy who could cause problems for the opposition because of his size, and he possessed a nice shooting touch. He was an integral part of those very good Blazer teams in the 80’s.

Kevin was a very nice person. Polite, humble, but with a fun personality. He was liked and respected, not only by his teammates and coaches, but by opposing players and coaches. A gentle giant of a man.  I was very saddened by the news.

Today, I learned about Wayman Tisdale needing to amputate part of his right leg due to bone cancer. I know Wayman very well. I was the head coach of the Pacers when the Pacers drafted Wayman in the 1985 NBA draft—the first year of the draft lottery.

Of course, the big  prize in that lottery was Patrick Ewing, a potential franchise center, which he turned out to be. The Knicks won that lottery, amidst some speculation, especially in Indiana, that there was a fix in to ensure the Knicks having the first pick and obtaining a great center.

While we at the Pacers organization were disappointed about not having the chance to draft Ewing, we were thrilled to have the second pick in the draft and the right to draft Wayman.

Most everyone in the NBA felt Wayman was the second-best player in the draft. He was the first freshman to be named to the All-American first team, and, I believe, the only player ever to be named first team All-American his freshman, sophomore, and junior seasons.

If Wayman had stayed for his senior year, he probably would have become the all-time leading scorer in college basketball history, surpassing the great Pete Maravich—who, by the way, also only played three seasons (freshman were ineligible back then), and without the three-pointer.

That 1985 draft was a strange one. First was the controversy surrounding the lottery. Second were the players themselves.

Tisdale had a solid, but not a great NBA career. Some were near-busts, especially considering where they were taken, in the top six, like Benjamin, Klein, Koncak. Then Chris Mullin at No. 7 (terrific pick), the solid Schrempf and Oakley at No. 8 and No. 9.

The big questions about the draft ended up being how could Karl Malone fall to No. 13? And how could Joe Dumas fall to No. 18, behind Hughes, Rasmussen, Wennington and Blab? Two fine players closed out the first round—A.C. Green at No. 23 and Terry Porter at No. 24, both of whom had fine NBA careers.

Drafting Tisdale ahead of Malone turned out to be a mistake, because Malone just may be the best power forward ever. Did I lose sleep over it? No. There were questions pertaining to Malone that caused 10 more teams after us to let him slide by.

However, if we would have been picking later in the top ten, and let Malone slide, I would have done some serious re-evaluating of my analysis. And I would have lost sleep over that judgment. A couple of years later, I had a highly respected GM tell me if his owner ever read his report on Malone, he’d be fired.

I wishing the best for Wayman in these tough times.  Wayman is a good guy. Fun to be around, easy to coach.