The Right Time with Bomani Jones - Howard Bryant on How the 1986 NBA Draft Changed the NBA Forever | 06.23

Episode Date: June 23, 2026

Bomani Jones and Howard Bryant break down the 1986 NBA Draft and why it remains one of the most important turning points in NBA history. This Time Machine Tuesday episode covers Len Bias, Dennis Rodman, Brad Daugherty, Arvydas Sabonis, the Boston Celtics, the Los Angeles Lakers, and how the 1986 draft changed the league forever. If you’re looking for NBA history, Len Bias analysis, 1986 NBA Draft context, or a deep dive into the Bird vs. Magic era, this episode goes all the way there. Bomani and Howard Bryant unpack the NBA’s rise in the 1980s, the tragedy of Len Bias, the fallout of the so-called cocaine draft, and why this draft reshaped the future of pro basketball. Topics include: 1986 NBA Draft Len Bias and the Celtics Dennis Rodman’s draft class Bird, Magic, and the NBA boom Arvydas Sabonis and international basketball How the NBA changed in the late 1980s #BomaniJones #HowardBryant #NBAHistory #NBADraft #LenBias #DennisRodman #Celtics #Lakers Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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The 26 tracks, start your build at Chevrolet.ca. Wave. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the right time, a wave original. My name is Beaumani Jones. Thanks for listening wherever you get your podcast. Thanks for watching us on YouTube. Subscribe, like, rate us, review. us give us five stars. You only give us four stars. I'm inclined to believe you are a

hater. It is time machine Tuesday. We got the NBA draft coming up. And so we will start here with talking about not the 1996 draft. We'll get to that, the 1986 draft. Talk about that with our good buddy. Check him out. Well, check out Kings and Pauls. It is so great that I still keep this copy of Kings and Paws on my desk so I can always pull it up, tell people to go check this out. Howard Bryant was going on, man. My man, how we doing? Hey, man, we are good. 1986 draft. I feel like before you can talk about the 86 draft, you kind of got to walk up to it. And I think part of the walk up to it that is interesting is every draft before, like a nice long run of drafts prior to that, 1978, it takes a year of delay, but you get Larry Bird

out of the 78 draft. You get Magic Johnson out of the 79 draft. You get Kevin McHale out of the 1980 draft. You get Isaiah Thomas in 81. You get James Worthy, Dominique Wilkins in 82. You get Ralph Samson, Clyde, Drexler in 83. You get Elijah Wann, Barkley, Jordan in 84, 85. I think you wind up getting Carl Malone, but you also got Patrick Ewing at the top of the draft. 1986 comes and not until the year 2000, is it even possible that we could have a worse draft in the end that we had with 86? But 86 is nestled in the middle of the NBA Renaissance, right? Like obviously, we'll get to all the cocaine. Everybody knows that we're here because of the cocaine.

But the early 80s coming out of the ABA and the perception that this was this cocaine league and everything else that was around it, the bird magic thing. Also, with a dollop of the Sixers being as good as they were in that time, everything is looking good for the NBA in the early 1980s. You had everything you wanted. And believe me, there's a, there are a lot of places to go.

But when you get to the 86 draft, there's a couple of other things to remember. Number one, and it's fascinating today from a 2026 standpoint, which is why I'm bringing this up, is that you're only two years removed from the draft being 10 rounds. It was 10 rounds in 1984. They move the draft down to seven rounds. Can you still imagine seven rounds of an NBA? There's only 12 guys. the roster. Well, it allows for a lot of people to say, well, you know, I got drafted. I got drafted.

Exactly. And it was interesting looking at that because that was, to me, that was the high point. I mean, I was, you know, graduating from high school that year. And I was all the way into the, you know, basketball was the center of the universe. And you're a very good friend, Ralph Samson, had just been deposed by the Boston Celtics in the finals. I was just trying to protect my family from Jerry C. Sting. I had a knife. Exactly. And also, let us not forget that you come out of that year, and there was an anger toward everybody in the NBA when you're talking about the rich getting richer.

I mean, it was a fantastic half decade. The Celtics were back. The Lakers are back. The Sixers are back. and the Celtics and the Sixers get one and two in the draft. And, you know, one of the questions that people had been asking before that at that time was the Lakers win the championship and they get James Worthy. Like, so it was this rich getting richer thing.

And 86 was just a reload. It was like, so the Celtics are either going to get, you know, lend bias or, you know, they were going to get somebody good. And so for my orientation of it. of that draft at, you know, in real time at that time. This was just, this was going to be more of the same. You know, this was going to be moving into the next half decade or the next decade of like sort of these, this big three dominance. One, you know, one rival had the top pick. The other one had the other pick. The New, the Lakers had just lost to Houston inexplicably. So you knew they were

going to come back. And it just looked very, very top heavy. And instead, that draft turned, you know, it took how shall we say history took a turn yeah no it's actually i hadn't really thought about this until you said it but it is kind of wild that in 79 the good already good lakers got magic johnson that's right right in 1980 the already good celtics so let's run already good say it again celtics were terrible well no but but 79 80 they won 60 something games they won 61 games yes but right right so i'm saying but in 1980 they are good now oh yeah and And they get Kevin McHale and Robert Parrish. Right?

That's right. You get to 80. You get to 82. The already good Lakers get James Worthy. Right. Even if you get to 84 and think about it in the context of the Rockets where the Rockets were not good, but you just got Ralph Samson generational prospect from one draft and you get the next generational prospect coming to you in 84. Like teams were stacking up. Can you imagine social media in 1986 when you go, when you're the Houston Rockets and you go back to back?

number one picks. And then you start the draft lottery for the first year in 1985. And, G, the number one market in the country gets Patrick Ewan. I mean, people want to talk about gambling conspiracies now. I'm like, y'all ain't even hiding this about who you want to be good. But what's so funny about that is, if I'm not mistaken, it was Red Arborback who pulled the envelopes. Yeah. And if there's anything we don't think Red Arborback is doing, is throwing a freebie to the next.

That's right. However, it's the NBA. So there's always something for you to think or so. That's right. And also, and let's not forget that year, that was the very year that the Knicks tried to poach the Celtics. They tried to sign Kevin McHale to an offer sheet. And so, you know, they were, they were a year removed from playing the Celtics in the second round, the Great Bernard King series when Cedric Maxwell said, we're going to stop the bitch, right? You know, that he has scored his last 40 points. I mean, it was. it was a very, very top heavy time. And you can tell if you're thinking about it from a conspiracy standpoint. Yeah, Bird and Magic have brought this game back. We are no longer on tape delay. People like us. Like, Madison Avenue likes us.

This is lucky. Let's take advantage of it right now. Well, like, how breakneck was the turn? And I asked that because, like, 1979, 1980, they were still on tape delay when Magic put up the... They were on tape delay in 82. Right. Like, it just, like, it's so... because it feels, at least from a distance, like magic show,

magic and birds showed up and then boom, immediately everything was there. No, it took until 84. 84 was the first one. 84 is the Super Bowl 10 of the NBA finals, where it was like, oh, we are now something else, right? That Dallas Cowboys, Pittsburgh Steelers Super Bowl changed what the Super Bowl was. It's like, oh, this, no more high school marching bands anymore, right? We are something else. And that 84 finals, because it was Boston, because it was,

LA because it was magic, because it was burnt, all the perfect storm had aligned. And also, you know, and Michael was coming. And everybody knew Michael was on his way, even though nobody knew how good he was actually going to be at that time. But after that 84 finals, they all recognized that like, we got something special. And when you think about it from a PTSD standpoint, right, you can feel all of that time period today. You can feel it, you know, in terms of flagrant files when they're looking at the monitor and everything, you know, when you're looking at, you know, when you look at the malice at the palace, when you look at everything, they're like 80, we ain't, we're not going back, right? We're not going back. We're not going back.

You know, we're talking dress codes and everything else. That 84 season was the one where you were like, we have finally become the league that we thought we could be. And this goes back to 1947, 1946, because, you know, I mean, the NBA was far behind baseball and football and sometimes hockey. The league was going through labor wars in the 70s, you know, battling with the ABA. And then we were, we were going. We're going through labor wars in the 70s, you know, battling with the ABA. And then we were, and then we were, when the ABA comes in, there was this other group of people who were like, yeah, but, you know, you can take all that streetball shit. We don't need that. You know, the game was too black. And then, you know, you start adding the drugs and stuff to it as well. And, you know, there had been, and it's wild to talk about it now, but there had been serious talk in my childhood. You know, and go call Bob Ryan.

I'll tell you all about this, you know. But there was serious talk all the way up and through high school, you know, is the NBA going to survive. You know, like this was like this league's not going to make it. And we've never seen a league fold. Right. I mean, so that's where, I mean, it's, it's unthinkable today to think that the league is going to fold.

I mean, you barely have teams moving anymore. Like back then, you know, Buffalo moved to San Diego and then they moved to Los Angeles to be the Clippers. You know, Kansas City had already moved out to Sacramento. So you had a whole bunch of sort of franchise instability as well. So that period was, you know, like people talk about, oh, they talk about ratings now. But back then they were talking about this league might not make it at all. Right.

Think about how down bad you got to be to be like, we're going to move to Sacramento. That's where we're going. That's where we're going. Yeah, we're going to, we're going to, we'll show you. We'll move to Sacramento. We're going to hitch our wagons and go even farther west, young man. That's right. That's right.

And then on top of that, you know, you look at some of the other franchises. And it just didn't seem like there was a great, I mean, even at the time, your greatest player, pre-magic, who's Kareem, by far. And nobody liked him. Right. You know, and a lot of reasons was because he was too black, but also he was aloof. And he's in Los Angeles. Right. Which is now the something that we would say,

oh, of course you're going to Los Angeles. Didn't matter. You know? Right. And so in 84, it's interesting also because, I mean, the finals really kind of gave them everything they wanted in the sense that the white man did come out on top. Right?

Like whatever, whatever battle of morals and principles that you had at that point, the white, not into the white man come out on top. The white man came out on top and the flashy black dude self-destructed. I can't imagine. there was anything better for business for the NBA, than that seven games of that series ending in that very particular way.

In that very particular city. Yes. Which is really why we have all this, you know, it's fascinating to me how we talk about these cities and we talk about these teams. And then they fulfill the prophecy. You know, and that's part of kind of why we attach ourselves to sports so much because it's like,

it does represent us. It's like this guy all kind of coincidence in some ways, but maybe not, right? But then again, maybe not. And I remember that very well. I mean, I tell people this all the time. I was in the Celtic City doc on HBO. That's my

favorite year. You know, as a 10th grader who was a huge Celtics fan, because they had no business win in that series. I remember watching that game one. Watch the first quarter of game one of the NBA finals in 1984. I think the Lakers were up 32 to 12. And the way that they were, and you have to

remember too, and this is wild, but you have to remember too, because this is a pre-cable. We never saw anybody else unless it was a Sunday, you know, CBS game, right? So I never, I saw the Lakers, what, twice that year, maybe a few times, you know, in the, you know, the Sunday game against, you know, when they were running up on San Antonio or killing Seattle or somebody. But to see magic run the floor in real time. I was like, there's no possible way we're going to beat these guys. I mean, this is, they're unbeatable. Right? I mean, they're that

good. And then of course, Byrd hits three to end the third quarter and suddenly you got a good game. They still lose the game, 115, 109. But you're looking at them and then Gerald Henderson makes the stealing game too. You're like, they should have got, they should have got swept. Then they lose the third game, 137 to 104.

They got killed that whole series. And then Larry Bird is like, all right, one of y'all punks need to take somebody out and then you get the current rampant's clothesline and then that whole series changed and now all of a sudden you know it was like it you know it was a lot like game three of the 2003 american league championship series you know once you start thinking roger clemens might throw the fastball at your forehead yeah a little more timid going to the basket and the whole thing changed right yeah you might not want to dive out over the plate anymore

and then that changed everything and then that was when pat riley said no rebound down no ring and then you get that thing and the bad boys come and then everybody knows the rest of the history and what's really funny about that bull sorry I know we're supposed to talk about the draft it was really funny about that moment was that today everybody likes to have all kinds and nostalgia for remember when the NBA when men were men back in the 80s when they bullshit at that time that was one of the dirtiest plays and and mcale didn't even that was a common foul yep that was a common foul and and and And that play made me have to rethink.

It was like, oh, wait a minute. I remember telling Isaiah this too. And I was like, oh, we were the bad guys. You were a son of bad boys. The Celtics started all this shit, right? Oops. Right? And it's fascinating because at that time,

because they were riding so high, Nothing happened. No. I mean, McCale should have been suspended, right? The whole series changes. I mean, Robert Parrish beat up Bill Lambert and I think he only got a tech.

Got a technical foul, you know? But like once again, there's a lot of nostalgia for that time period, but in that moment, nobody quite knew what had been created. Right. Now, we get to 86. This is after each the Lakers and the Celtics

get another championship and the Celtics had an argument at that time that they just tried it out the best team in the history of the NBA. Right. Like the 86 Celtics are of legendary status up there, right? Like it's the 72 Lakers. It's the 67 Sixers. For the 83 Sixers too. Yeah.

Like this is the level of basketball that we're talking about here. They went 40 and 1 at home. A lot of white boys, man. It was just kind of hard to avoid that reality. But they wouldn't. They went not here doing no favors. Why you got to hit me where it hurts? Yeah, man.

But hey, man, it wasn't like no white boys out there because somebody was doing them a favor. Actually, they were doing them a favor. Why? Because everybody knew, right? I mean, everybody knows Boston and in Boston. You couldn't, even if the Celtics won, like, if they won 80 games, if that bench was not populated with white players,

the team would have fans were like, nah. Yeah. You think Greg Kite was doing there. Yeah, yeah. Now those guys doing somebody a favor. But like, Mikhail, Byrd, Danny Aang, even if you got a healthy Bill Walton, like, Red was clearly like,

if I think the white boy got something in them, I got it at least give him a chance. Yeah, we will get. I got it at least see. Look, let's put it this way. Okay, just, you know, so, you know, so your feedback is not inundated with, why do you guys always have to play the race card?

right? The NBA at that time was 80% black. There were 14 players on a roster. The Celtics had 10 white players. That's really mathematically hard to do. You're like, you know, it's hard to do. And everybody knew, but everybody knew at that time that there were three cities that really, really knew that they were going to cater to white players. Boston, Utah, and Phoenix. Those were the cities where the ownership knew that they had a racial dynamic that they had to factor into their roster construction. Right. And it's also, you know, not a coincidence as well that when the Celtics had hit rock bottom, you know, during 78, 79, it was also the years where they had the highest concentration of black players in their history at that time, you know, and they've still refer to those years as the Sydney Wicks

Curtis Roe years. Bob Akadu was on one of those teams. That was the, that was the, that was the, that was the Ed Witson to the Yankees of the NBA, as I recall. Like, hey, hey, Randy Johnson to the Yankees. Hey, this just ain't going to work. This isn't going to work, right? Exactly. And so, you know, at that time, you're really looking at, you know, you are, you do believe, if you're the NBA, you're on top of the world. And that's why that 86 draft is so important because it brought some things back to reality, but it also sounded the alarms for the NBA in terms of we know underneath everything, underneath the bird magic commercials, underneath all the rise and the ratings and everything else, we know that we cannot do anything that reminds people

that of the idea that having black players or having majority black workforce is a negative. Yeah. And so we get to this 86th draft with the Celtics coming off this season. And the Celtics have the number two pick in the draft. I don't remember. What trade got them that pick?

Do you remember? Of course I remember. The trade that got them that pick was Gerald Henderson who stole the ball in game two against James Worthy. He had a contract dispute, and they traded him to Seattle for Seattle's number one pick. Yes. Which turned out to be the one pick, which ended up being Len bias. Yeah, which turned out to be the number two pick because this is also the lottery of flat odds,

one envelope for everybody. Cleveland has the number one pick. In one day, the Sixers got rid of Moses Malone and the number one pick. Don't remember exactly what the circumstances were on both, but they were in a position where, like, maybe we could take one more swing at this, and they were like, yeah, or maybe we won't, right? Maybe we'll just go about this in a different way. So Cleveland's sitting at number one. The Celtics are at number two. And the best thing that ever happened to the Cleveland Cavaliers at that point was that there was a very clear

paradigm in that era that said that if there is an excellent seven-footer and in this case, one who played four years of college basketball, was only 20 years old and played for Dean Smith, that is going to be the number one overall pick in the draft. And so they took Brad Doherty who wore number 43 because that was Richard Petty's number, which is something that I don't think

ever happened in the NBA before or was ever going to happen in the NBA again. And Brad Doherty was a very good basketball player. If Brad Doherty doesn't get hurt, Brad Doherty probably winds up in the Hall of Fame by the end. He was not in the Ewing, Elijah Juan Robinson tier of player, but he was a multiple time all-star in the Cleveland teams that he played on were very, very good, and he was a square. There is no other way to put this

about Brad Doherty. He is a square. He wound up running NASCAR teams. He was one of Duncan before Duncan. Yeah, yeah, but it like, Tim Duncan's more quiet. Yeah, Duncan was quiet and kind of had this like really snappy sense of humor. Yes. If you like get around to it, right? Like Tim Duncan has dreadlocks right Now, Brad Doherty does not. He was just a big old goofy boy from Black Mountain, North Carolina, had the biggest accent of anybody in the league. And everything else about this draft pretty much was about chaos. The Cavs took the biggest square in the draft,

and that's why they actually got something out of their pick. Well, and it's also a reminder that even 40 years later, the Philadelphia 76s cannot get a top three pick right. right i mean they had the number they had the number one pick yeah right and if you go back and hop on

YouTube and look at the at the draft lottery that day um red our back is clapping his hands when he didn't get the number one pick like i got you i know something you don't know i got you right which was of course you know just more gamesmanship but it was just red

being red but the 76ers end up trading that pick they ended with roy hinson from Rutgers. Yep. And I think that, can you imagine Charles Barkley and Dr.

Jay with two years left and Brad Doherty? Philly's probably a pretty good team for the next couple of years. Barclay Doherty front line is pretty damn good. Yeah. And instead they trade Moses for Jeff Ruland.

Say that again. He traded Moses Malone for Jeff Ruland. A still pretty good Moses Malone. Yeah. And a pretty decent. I mean, Jeff Rulin at that time was a decent player. Yes.

But that deal was like, what are you doing? I mean, they believe, Philly had believed. And once again, and this is why it's so fascinating when everybody likes to talk about sports as meritocracy and this and that. Philly's another one of those cities where it's like, okay, we don't have to have a white boy in here. but it might help. I mean, they saw the, you know, Julius was done. He had two years left, 86, he was done by 87, and he retired. But it was Barclay City.

You know, that was my first year in Philly. I went to college and now at Temple. And that, there was no other team that I could think of. And I hadn't been anywhere. I hadn't been anywhere. But no team said black part of our city like the 76ers. You know, like the Julius Irving 76ers were an experience. You know what I mean?

And then to follow up that experience with Barclay. I mean, and then the very next year, I mean, two years later, right, you got Chuck D. putting Barclay in his lyrics. Like everybody. I'll throw it down your throat like Barclay. I mean, that was like the experience. And so, you know, on the one hand, Moses was never as great as he had been previously. But on the other, you traded Moses Malone for Jeff Ruland. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you did that. You did that.

By the way, you could have replaced them, but you didn't do that, right? Like, that's how it shook out. But shout out to you, Cleveland Cavaliers. They wound up, they didn't have the first pick in the second round. The Mavericks did, but the Mavericks made that pick for them and they made a trade. They got probably the two biggest squares you could get in that draft, Brad Doherty and Mark Price, and I believe both of their numbers are hanging in the rafts. Sometimes what you need is a square.

Because after that, buddy, everything gets a little bit wonky. We'll talk about that, including land bias coming up next. The biggest stage in world soccer is here and every goal changes everything. And now, Fanduil is giving you a reason to root for every single one. Introducing every goal pays. Bet on a match and get bonus bets for every goal scored in that match. That's right. More goals means more bonus bets and all you have to do is turn on your token.

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Call 1-8778-8-Hope-N-Y. Text, Hope N-Y, New York. Call 1-877-7-7-867, Louisiana. All right, we are back with Howard Bryant talking about the 1986 NBA draft. It's almost cliche to talk about what happened with Lynn Baez. It is well-worn territory, but I'll say it again. My daddy was adamant well into the 21st century. If the Celtics had taken Lynn Baist, they would still be kicking butt to this date.

Like, the Lynn-Buy's clips of him at Maryland, that's a dude that looks like he came from the future. That's right. He's a man. I mean, I still say two things on this. It'll be very quick about it. Number one, the first time I interviewed LeBron James was in Boston, back when the NBA Summer League was in Boston before they went to Vegas. And I remember looking at LeBron James, he was, and I just remember staring and like, you know,

when you're an average size human, looking at basketball players is a humbling experience. And I'm looking at him going, no way, is he 18 years old? It's just no way, is he 18 years old? And that's how people looked at Len bias. There were a couple of guys who would come later or in that same range. Like Walter Berry, people looked at him like the way they looked at bias. That men against boys thing. J.R. Reed as well, I remember at that same time, a few years later back in the 90s,

they looked at him same thing that men against boys, you know, and obviously Zion a little bit later. But Len Baez was one of the first guys where you were like, wow, right? I mean. And at that time as well. let's also not forget that Jordan had just scored 63 points in a playoff game. Yeah. You know, so the whole thing, when people were talking about bias, they were comparing him in a lot of ways to his ACC rival, who had just scored 63 points in a playoff game. It was like, we got, now, we got our guy now, right?

So I was, I just graduated high school. I was working produce, unloading vegetables at Star Market, otherwise known as Star Market, if you're not from Boston, the supermarket. And I got a phone call. We didn't have cell phones back then over the intercom phone call for Howard Bryant. I'm like at the supermarket, right? And it's my boy, my best friend calls me and he's crying. He's dead. He's dead. He's dead. I'm like, who's dead? I was talking about his brother. I was like, what, who, what, what? Len Pius. you know i mean it was like still don't have any words for that for that very remember remember it like it was yesterday and and then all the stuff that came later it was just staggering you know

sports illicit a death of a dream and the whole thing and it's like it's it all it all went sideways i mean in a very very tragic tragic way but also um that draft was, you know, you realize that that wasn't, you know, only the tragedy of the draft. It was just the beginning. Right, right. And look, the thing with Lynn, well, he could hoop. Like, it was not just simply this spectacular athlete while that was also a part of it. He also had game.

Like, Michael Jordan's last year in college is 1984. Lim Baez was the 1984 ACCC tournament MVP. He's an ACC player of the year the next two years. he was the clips of watching Lynn Byest that game at the Dean Dome, basically when it wasn't the first game at the Dean Dome, but it was the first year where he makes that, makes that, makes that, makes that bucket steals the pass and reverse dunks it. And it was like he just levitated off the ground to go do this. It's like what was happening here. And he was going to play for the Celtics who already have literally the best front line in the history of the NBA.

And what was wild about that too, Bo was that, you know what was exciting to me about that was that, and once again, you talk about the style of the day, you're still only 10 years removed from the ABA NBA-N-B-A merger. And the stereotypes and the racism that comes with that, which those dudes played streetball, we play basketball the right way, that Dr. Jack, Portland, you know, we pass the ball, you know, all of it, we play the game the right way. You know, the Celtics were extremely proud of the fact that they had never had, um, an NBA scoring champ. Why? Because we share the ball.

We're not selfish. We don't want an NBA scoring champ. All of our guys are fundamentally sound, which was code for, you know, you can have all the flashy black guys and we'll beat them, you know, with our white intellect, right? That was the thing underneath it. And one of the reasons why we in the black community love the Celtics so much was because we felt we had to protect Jojo White and Cedric Maxwell and Robert Parrott. from that bullshit, right? Because that's what you were living with.

But then we were going to get an athlete. Yes. The Celtics, we were going to get, you know, brothers were like, we can actually be Celtics fans, like, out loud now. We're going to get an athlete. We're going to get somebody who actually, like, leaves the floor. Yeah. Well, the other thing about Red Arlbeck, you have to remember,

he had the teams with all the white boys in the 80s, but he had the teams with all the black dudes in the six. he was a valuable man when it came to these things. He wasn't going to be the guy. Like this wasn't like late aughts Mike Chashefsky where you're like, dude, you don't even want that guy? Are you serious? No, no, no, no.

Red Rhaen back's looking at Lian bias and hell, Shoshchew probably would too. Well, he tried to get Ralph Sampson, which I used to laugh at. Yeah, come on down. Right here. We got a place for you, buddy. You may have to come off the bench for a year or two, but we got something. Although we do know that 50-50 or even close, He was taking a white boy.

Yeah. He took Michael Smith over Kobe Bryant. Michaels, that was a different draft, right? Was it your jane? No, no, he took Michael Smith over, I think, was it Eddie Jones. Eddie Jones. Eddie Jones. Eddie Jones.

Eddie Jones. He took Eric Montross. He did take Eric Montross. You know. But I felt like he took Eric Montross very similar to how Eric Montross wilds up at Carolina. Because one thing good in D. Smith, we're doing. Hey, we also have to have a couple of white guys on this team. and it helps if they're seven feet tall.

Exactly. That's right. But we, we, the bias, I mean, look, bias dying obviously literally changed the world, right? And it's sad because the legacy of Lynn Baez wind up getting a lot of black people throwing in jail. Not like it was Lynn Baist's fault, not like it was his idea. But that was the end result.

The death of Lynn Byers became an excuse for a lot of people to do a lot of things that they probably wanted to do already and was one of the first cases that I could think of and it's the same thing going on with this Matthew Perry case and it's something that really kind of gets

on my nerves a little bit which is whenever a famous person, Philisimore-Hawford, whenever a famous person dies and using drugs, you got to go find somebody to blame. Who sold you these drugs and we're going to put them in jail?

Yeah, or some other junkie to go do that or like Tyler Skaggs, the thing with the angels. And I'm like, I understand what you're doing here. But come on, man. Are you serious? Are you serious? And also, let's not forget that the piece of that, too, when it came to the drugs with bias, was also the selling that Three Strikes and the War on Drugs and all this stuff, that we're doing it for you. And that you in the black community, you're asking for this. We're doing this as a benefit. We're not doing this as a punishment. We're doing it to protect your kids. Right. And you did anything but protect.

our kids. Like all of that stuff, you destroyed our kids and their kids. Right. So, but that is all happening. And when you think about that draft, I mean, like I said, we focus on bias, but number two pick bias dies of a drug overdose. Number three, Chris Washburn. Yep. Cocaine suspension. Number six, William Bedford. Yep. Drug suspension. He's in a championship team with the Pistons. Yep. Number seven, Roy Tarpley,

banned from the NBA. Yeah, and he was cold. And I was going to say, and Roy Tarp. We don't talk about, everyone's like, oh,

well, the Dallas Mavericks didn't get to the NBA finals until, you know, 2006. Those mid-80s Dallas Mavericks teams were right there

with the Lakers. They were pretty damn close. I mean, Derek Harper dribbling out the ball. They had a shot, man. And Roy Tarpley, Roy Tarpley was the center.

When he was on that team, when he was playing, they were great. 13. Pearl Washington. Ban from the NBA drugs. 22. Scott Skiles played a bunch of years, coached the whole thing. But he had a cocaine thing in college. He did.

Scott Schuyles is, that guy is a story. He's his own documentary. Yeah. Scott Skiles is like, Jason, like there's a Jason Williams element to Scott Sciles, but Jason Williams, Jason Williams didn't get in nearly as much trouble. No. And Scott Sciles did.

Jason Williams just smoking dope, but not like dope, dope, just like weed. That's just weed. Six of the first 22 picks, five of the first 13 picks in that draft were associated or suspended, banned from the league or died because of drugs. Yeah. And the NBA starts doing things. And the NBA starts doing things. And also, let's also not forget that Chris Washburn is in Golden State.

And Golden State is having its own problems because they had, you know, the nickname, because there were so many drugs going through there, they used to refer to Oakland as Oakland. And, you know, Bernard King had his drug issues when he was over at Golden State. And so, you know, then he goes to the Knicks, obviously. But, and, you know, becomes the great Hall of Famer that he is. But at that time, you know, the Warriors had a reputation of being, you know, a place where drugs were running rampant. And also, let's not forget, 1986, while that's going on, you're a year removed from the Kansas City, Pittsburgh drug trials and baseball. And so the 80s, it just, I feel like going back and like watching Wall Street.

or something, right? You know, or watching robocop, where drugs are like everywhere. Right. In the 80s. Hold on. Two years ahead of the Edmonton Oilers cocaine scan. That's right.

Then the Oilers, too. That's right. Ask me, who went to jail for that? Who went to jail for that? Grant Fuhr. That's right. The black guy. The black goalie.

Ain't nobody ever circled the wagons to be like, yeah, but not him. Not him. No. Now that guy, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Everybody was like, hey, maybe me. Him? Absolutely not.

But hey, the cocaine 80s were wild. And then this draft, even the guys who weren't cocaine cases, it didn't go right for anybody. It feels like. Doherty wound up having the bad back. He's back into his career. Ron Harper tore up his knee. John Hot Plate Williams couldn't stop eating.

Dale Curry, you know, at a fairly, he had a decent career, right? He's the one who played forever. You know who played the most games out of anybody in this draft, by the way? Rodman. Johnny Newman. Jenny Newman, yes. Johnny Newman, yes. Johnny Newman, yes, Johnny Newman played the most games.

Del Curry also plays 16 games. Like, Rod Harper pulled it together and played 15 years. But again, we had a knee injury situation. There were all kinds of guys that just washed out. Walter Berry didn't become that guy. I remember, that's not possible. Oh, sorry, I'm looking at the wrong draft. You're right.

Yeah, Walter Berry didn't get there. Buck Johnson, not a great pick by you. Buck Johnson, Alabama, right? Yeah, yeah, not a great pick by you, Houston Rockets coming off of that year. Arvita some bonus is in that draft, but hey, he only plays, gets over here for seven years. And even then, by the time he got here, he had the knee problems. The guy that wound up having the best career in this draft turned out to be Dennis Rodman. and it is wild.

We didn't know it at the time, but looking back on it at the end, in the cocaine draft, the last man standing was Dennis Rodman. It's crazy. And what's really sort of wild about it just in terms of irony and when you're looking at all of these,

you go back and just look at the numbers, there are just so many moments where everything changes. But that's what history. he does, right, where everything changes. And Dallas is such a good example of that because I remember, you know, knowing how different, there were like three guys that you remember outstandingly that when they were on, the future changed. One was Michael Ray Richardson, drugs. One was Roy Tarpley, another one, right? It was like, oh, suddenly their teams are totally different teams when

when he's playing. You know, and then the drugs just sort of change everything. And obviously, you know, biases the third. Like the what ifs and how things would have just completely shifted. Yeah. Like I say, should have took a square.

The guy from that draft with the most win shares for his career in the end, Jeff Hortesek. Could I have Mark Price. Johnny, Nate McMillan, square. Where's about it? You also had Chuck Persson, who was just a lot of fun. A lot of fun. You know who surprised me in that draft? Because I was, once again, we talk about,

you know, the blackness of the 80s and all those teams because, of course, I was a Georgetown guy at that time. David Wingate got 15 years. David Wingate did get 15 years. He got 15 years. And like, one thing that people do not talk anywhere nearly enough about is that this is still a job. Yeah. Right? He got 15 years on the job. That's a goal watch. Right. I mean, and that's, that is some real talk right there in terms of also just being a professional. Like Johnny Newman, 16 years?

Yep. In the league? Keep coming to work. And people tell you, what's the average salary? I mean, I'm sorry, the average salary. What's the average, you know, service time in the league? Is it, you know, three years, average career length, three years? You got 16?

16. By the way, another square you might have won to take, Johnny Dawkins. Oh, yeah, one of my favorites. Yeah, Johnny, boy, if you ever meet a black. And he was a great player until his knee, you know, tore up his knee with Philly. Yeah, and if you ever hear about a black man rooting for Duke of a certain age, you're like, why would you do such a thing, that Johnny Dawkins thing? Johnny Dawkins happened before all the other stuff did.

So that's my reason. Duke was one of my favorite teams. Duke, because they had the black back hood of Dawkins Amaker. Yeah, but you got over that shit, right? Very quickly. Okay. Hey, hey, hey, hey, you've said enough. I mean, come on.

I know, I know. That hurt me right there. I know, but you know, right? Like, I just had for the audience. I did that for the audience. I did that for the people. I needed to make sure that they knew that I wouldn't allow a double agent to sneak in here. Drozhen Petrovich was in this draft too.

I noticed that. There's so much in there. Yeah, if you weren't here, boy, that Drozzo Petrovich was a motherfucker boy. Good. Gracious, he was good. And all. The Euroguards, like them Slavic guards are just Eastern Europeans, him and the OGs. Saruna's Martialonis. I was going to say, open 13. They came over here with a game that looked

familiar. We're like, oh, y'all out here, hoop it. Yeah. And Marcialonis, who's, you know, he had them thighs and calves like a soccer player like them. And Eurostep. And he was, he played a lot like Genobley before Genobey, but he was more muscular. He's a bigger guy. It's true. I mean, it's, it is, once again, really fascinating watching all of those players, Because once again, that was my sweet spot where that was the moment where the Big East was as popular as the NBA in our, you know, neck of the woods. Yeah. And so, you know, I remember. And also, you know, let's not forget the, you know, the white stiff player because there was Ewing, but there were all these other guys that everybody thought, you know, the John Concax and the Larry Christoiacs and the Greg drylings and all these dudes, right?

And it's like, WS, Big White Stiff. It's an archetype that has largely been eliminated, kind of sadly. They made things more fun. They made more. Well, you know, once again, you know, they like to blame us, but they're actually cannibalizing each other because the European players came in, opened up the space, and then the big white guy in the middle who, hey, man, I was always guaranteed a job. Where, what you mean?

There's no room for me anymore. The game shifts. It did. Who else we got here? Kenny Skywalker, 1989. Kenny Skywalker, Kentucky. Kentucky, you know, one of the guys in the chef, I was actually thinking about this because I was laughing when I went through this. Obviously, Len Byest accepted.

But who's the one guy in that draft in the first round who did not play a game in the NBA? Huh. I do not know. Oh, the jerry-curled fighting Irish Kenny Barlow. Oh. You know what's so funny? I was mixing him up with Kenny Norman. I was so confused when I saw the gap and was like,

I don't understand why there's a gap for, I remember Kenny Norman, but you're right, Kitty Barlow. Kenny Barlow, Notre Dame. And people, we used to make fun, right, because, you know, I didn't like Notre Dame, didn't, you know, Notre Dame basketball was never much to me about anything. but they, you know, we used to make fun of the Jerry-Crelled Afro brothers over there. They had Kenny Barlow and then they had David Rivers.

They did have David Rivers. You know, who we used to make fun of because of the Nintendo game punchout. We used to call him Kid Quick. Oh, wow. Now, this draft was all over the place. It was another Russian, Sasha Volkov, they played for the Hawks for a couple years. Because we were getting confused with Nikolai Volkov from the WWF. No, no, no, completely different situation.

We were about that size of Volokov life, but it never happened. I mentioned it quickly before. Chuck Person got to be wishing he could play today. Oh, no doubt. First of all, so great things about Chuck Conner, about Chuck Person, excuse me. The Rifleman. His nickname was the Rifleman because his middle name was Connors because he was actually named after the rifleman.

And then became a guy that just shot a bunch of three pointers and then, suffered an ignominious end to his coaching career as he went down as none of the head coaches went down during that last little coach's scandal back when you could get in trouble for paying people to play basketball. And hilariously too

Chuck Connors his mother did name him after the rifleman after Chuck Connors and on top of that he also was a Boston Seltin. He was. He was. He was. Chuck Connors. I mean, he called on Chuck Connors. Chuck Person and Reggie Miller on the same team, but you make it 2019.

They, man, they might be the greatest show on Earth. And that team was one of the great villains because that was Byrds last year when he hit his head in the court in the playoffs. Chuck Person was hitting from everywhere. He was one of the great villains, and he reveled in that too, but he could play. That Indiana team is interesting as well because they weren't championship level, but you knew when you played them, you were going to get into some stuff. Right, right. By the way, another great square.

Nate McMillan, future head coach. Another one. He got his jersey, so square he got his jersey retired by the Sondis. That is its own program. Squares in the Rafters by Bomani Jones. Nick Collison, Mr. Thunder. Another one, right? Yeah, where they just, hey, man, they just liked you.

They just liked you. Avery Johnson. And, no, it's a good one. No, the difference is at least, Avery Johnson won a championship. Yes. With the Spurs. These other guys were just there.

For a long time. Yeah, right. Not all stars. No, no, no. Just people. And I'm all for that. There is something to be said for sticking around. Yeah.

And again, in this draft, hey, man, survive. That should be, that would be the documentary series, surviving the 86 draft. That's right. Anybody that was in it, and you managed to make a crowd of it. Shout out to you, John, Sally. Surviving the 1986 draft and getting yourself like four championships out of the deal. And I just go back and look at that 86 draft. And another guy there who is on one of my,

there are two of them in there on my list. I didn't buy into one of them. But I always still do talk about the list of your greatest misses, right? Who were the guys that you were convinced were easily going to be great players and never turned into great players? And two of them are on that list. One was Walter Berry. Yeah.

You know, everybody thought he was 6, 8, 220, he was just going to just roll. left-handed as well, never really was a great player. And the other one that everybody thought was going to be a good player, I didn't think it was a great player, but people talked about him back then was Billy Thompson and Louisville. Yeah. And Billy Thompson went to the Lakers and it was like, oh, man, the Richard just got richer.

And won a title with them. Man, this, it's, when you just see all the names, Kevin Duckworth. Yep. He's in this draft. Kevin Dougworth is the worst thing. Good enough to be your center, but certainly to be a liability of one form or another in the end.

because he was just a little bit too chubby. Like, he was, he was an interesting version of, he was a big man who didn't play like a tall man. That's right. He played small. He provided no presence. And he was a jump shooter. He wasn't quick enough. It just wasn't quick enough to, to be that presence.

And fade away jumper, what else could he do? Now, were you not a guy who bought into Pearl Washington? Because these New York is talking about Pearl Washington. Like, he was a ghost. I am in the Pearl Washington all the way, camp in Washington. while you were talking, I was thinking about this, that it's so, so, so, so, such a big part of this was how important the Big East was. Like, we got to see them dudes all the time.

I mean, they were actually rivaling the NB. I don't know if it was that way in terms of ratings, but I know it as you said, who do you watch? People would have been like Celtics, Lakers, Georgetown, right? Syracuse. Anyway, Pearl Washington, I remember, because I was big basketball. basketball junkie back on I used to read all those street and Smith trade mags and basketball digest and all of them. And they were, I remember the scouts would talk about how Pearl Washington

could play in the NBA. And what was funny about it was, was when he got to the NBA, when you saw him against other NBA players, you were like, you're kind of short and fat. And can't shoot. He had a flat jump shot, kind of leaned in. But at that time, that was an example of when you could be an East Coast point guard and drive the hoop and just play East Coast basketball. You didn't have to have a Jay from way outside. All you to do was take dude number one off the dribbled and go, you know, and everybody talked about Pearl Washington. Pearl Washington. Pearl Washington is a legend, man. And Pearl Washington is one of those guys where you realized, at least for me, who's going to become a reporter and become a journalist, was realizing how many tools you actually

had to have to be an NBA player. You know what I mean? Like that gap between college player, Naismith level player, NBA player, NBA great, like huge gap in that last step. And Pearl was one of them guys because when he got to the NBA when he was with the Nets, I was like, that's Pearl? Everybody was better than Pearl Washington because he was quick, but he wasn't fast. And then they used to, you know, all that NBA, it was, and also, let's also not forget the New York of it all. Yeah. Now, the last thing I wrap with, and this is an interesting thing because we often think about this draft, obviously, in terms of the cocaine and the reputational damage, but it's also worth noting, David Robinson is the number one pick in 87, but if you

go through those drafts, 88, 98, 89, 90, even 91, because Larry Johnson's back wound up given out until you get to between david robinson and shekel o'neill the draft wasn't yielding that many great players now like this is not the only draft that you go back and you went back to look at at and we're like huh that didn't turn out the way that we thought so like 87 you wind up with like reggie miller becomes a hall of famer after robinson but danny manning didn't work out his number one pick nervous and service purpose it's number one pick at 89 derrick coleman all time unreal talent it didn't happen you know you get guys like matumbo in 19 or whatever, but 92, you get Shaq and you get Alonzo morning.

Like that draft felt like a little more. But this was actually an interesting period of time where the NBA was not really getting the guys out of college to keep the thing afloat. As it had been, we're like in 1982 where the top three picks, I contend that if you would put any of those three guys, which were worthy Terry Cummins and Dominique Wilkins, put each of them on each other's teams and the end results maybe are very similar. That's right. You know what I mean? But it was still, like, Terry Cummins gets forgotten, but that was three really good players, right?

Mark Aguil. Terry Cairns was a great player. Yes. Yeah. He was a, like the big forward with a small forward game. Like he and Dominique Wilkins were kind of pioneering. And James Worthy, like three guys, big forward, small forward games. 81, you had Aguire and Isaiah Thomas at the top of the draft.

The draft was putting dudes out there. And then for whatever reason, we wound up with the lull. And that lull kind of starts here. because even with Robinson, you had to wait for two years because he went on to both. Because he's service, exactly, his commitment. And also one of the other pieces of that that is happening at the same time in real time

is by the time you get to 88, you win the bronze in the Olympics. Yep. And everything shifts in the other direction, right? Everything goes, and now all of a sudden you get to the dream team and by the time you get there, now we start, we're starting to think. about alternative sources of talent. Now it's becoming an international game.

And before we go, the last thing I do want to say about this is that we did not mention the other Hall of Famer in that draft, which is Sabonis. Sabonis, yeah, we got to know quickly. Very quickly. Sabonis was the Vladimir Trechiak of basketball. It was like if he could come over here, like the great goalie for the USSR.

If he played in the NHL, Sabonis was killing dudes internationally. Sabonis was supposed to be, you know, Kareem and Walton combined, but he was behind the Iron Curtain. And one of these days, we're going to get to see Subonis. And he got drafted,

and he didn't, he didn't show up, obviously, until what, 92? 95. 95. So he got drafted nine years before he made his NBA debut. And was still a really good player. He just wasn't the same.

He wasn't subonus. He was heavier. He was, you know, but go back and look at Subbonus. in the 80s playing international for the USSR. But that's the thing about the 88 loss, which as I recall was only like by a couple of buckets. David Robinson got off the boat.

Yeah, David Robinson got off the boat. Had to go guard some bonus, man. And Sabonis put some work. Bonus put some work on you. That team was like David Robinson, Dan Marley, Danny Manning, which I remember like. Herssey Hawkins was on that.

team. Yeah, man. It just... Well, because the coach, John Thompson, didn't put enough offense on that team and people didn't like Big John anyway and they were like, we're going to pay you back for this, John. Yeah. Bronze? We're going to pay you back for this, John. Boy, we over, don't nobody overreact like when America loses basketball game. Get ready at 2028 when Victor come knocked down the buildings in LA. I don't know what they're going to do to the basketball program. So, like, something going to have to change. Some, some promises were, made promises will be kept. That's right. It'll be like the white salesman in boogie nights talking to Don Cheedle.

What kind of brother are you? He's interesting. They're talking, you know, black men losing a gold? Yes. What kind of brother? In America, in Los Angeles? What kind of brothers are you? It's going to be tough. We got to keep Chet off that team, boy. That's all I know. Check, unfortunately, as you already talked about it, don't put Chet in front of Vector. Just go watch some bullfighting or something shit like that, right? Put their little red thing

right in front of him. Little Toro. You're done. Oh, man. Hey, man. Hey, Wemby. Chet's in the corner. Chet just rolled up.

Wee, we. I got this. Howard Bryant. Check it out. Here we go again. Kings and Paul. It's still available. where all fine books are sold. My brother, I appreciate you. All fun, man. All right. Ladies and gentlemen,

thanks so much for joining us here on The Right Time. We do this four days a week. Ryan Brumley handled everything behind the scenes. Thank you, sir. Hit the voicemail line 3-2-3-9-6-7-67. Remember, follow the right time. Subscribe, like, rate us, review us, give us five stars. You only give us four stars. I'm inclined to believe you are a hater and we'll talk to you guys in a couple of days. Take it easy.