Sam Bowie

Samuel Paul "Sam" Bowie (born March 17, 1961) is a retired American basketball player. A national sensation in high school and outstanding collegian, Bowie's professional promise was undermined by repeated injury. In spite of the setbacks, the 7'1" and 235 lb center played ten seasons in the NBA.

Projected as a solid first rounder in the 1984 NBA Draft, Bowie was chosen by the Portland Trail Blazers as the second selection, ahead of future Hall of Famer Michael Jordan, due to Portland already having drafted Clyde Drexler just a year before.

High school and college

Bowie's #31 jersey was retired by the University of Kentucky. This banner in Rupp Arena honors him.

As a player at Lebanon High School, Bowie was heavily recruited. He averaged over 28 points and 18 rebounds per game, and was a McDonald's All-American and Parade All-American. As a junior, he led his team to the state finals, where they lost by a point to Schenley High School of Pittsburgh. He was named National Player of the Year over another heavily recruited center, Virginia high-schooler Ralph Sampson. However, in a hyped game at the Capital Classic, called "Battle of the Giants" Bowie was outplayed by Sampson. Bowie also participated in the Dapper Dan and Derby Festival Classic.

As a freshman during the 1979–80 season at the University of Kentucky, Bowie averaged twelve points and eight rebounds per game.^[1] At the end of that season, Bowie was picked for the United States Olympic men's basketball team, which eventually boycotted the Moscow Olympics. Bowie's sophomore season saw him average 17.5 points and nine rebounds per game. At the end of the season, he was named a third-team NCAA Basketball All-American by the Associated Press. Also in 1981, he set, and now shares, the Kentucky record for most blocked shots in a game, with nine.^[2] However, Bowie began seeing the first signs of the injury trouble that would plague the remainder of his basketball career.^[3]

In the third-to-last game of his sophomore season against Vanderbilt, Bowie went up for a dunk but came down off balance. He landed with most of his weight on his left leg, saying that he felt pain but initially trying to play through it. Kentucky performed well enough during the season and qualified for the NCAA tournament as the #2 seed in the Mideast Region, earning themselves a first round bye. In the Wildcats' first game of the tournament, against #7 seed Alabama-Birmingham, the injury finally caught up with Bowie and he played his worst game of the season, fouling out in the second half as Kentucky was eliminated by UAB 69-62. In the offseason, the extent of Bowie's injury was revealed, and he was told he had a stress fracture in his left tibia and would miss the 1981-82 season. Due to his recovery not going the way that Kentucky desired, Bowie sat out the 1982-83 season as well.^[4] He returned in time for the 1983–84 season, where he averaged 10.5 points and nine rebounds per game while being named to the second-team All-American squad. During his senior season, his heroics in a game against rival Louisville earned him a spot on the cover of Sports Illustrated. Bowie, along with fellow "Twin Tower" Melvin Turpin (as the Kentucky front court duo was called), led Kentucky to the SEC championship, a top three national ranking, and a 26-4 season record. The Wildcats advanced to the Final Four in Seattle that year, where they faced off against Patrick Ewing and Georgetown. Although Kentucky led at the half, Georgetown took over in the second half and handily defeated the Wildcats, ending Bowie's college career with no NCAA championship.^[5]

NBA career

The Houston Rockets selected Houston center Hakeem Olajuwon with the first pick in the 1984 NBA draft, having won a coin toss with the Portland Trail Blazers for the pick. The Indiana Pacers actually finished with one of the two worst records in the league that year along with the Rockets, but had traded the pick in 1981 to the Blazers for center Tom Owens. Olajuwon had been the Blazers' first choice, but with him now off the board and the team still desiring a center, Portland made Bowie the second choice in the draft.^[6] Drafting third, the Chicago Bulls chose North Carolina shooting guard Michael Jordan. Jordan is now widely considered the greatest basketball player of all time.^[7]

At the time, the pick appeared to make some sense from the Blazers' perspective; they'd been looking for help in the post since franchise player Bill Walton suffered the first of several foot injuries that would eventually end his career. In fact, shortly before the draft, the NBA fined the Blazers $250,000 (equivalent of $560,000 in 2013) for improper contact with Olajuwon and Patrick Ewing. Additionally, Portland had drafted a shooting guard, Olajuwon's Houston teammate Clyde Drexler, a year earlier. With Drexler and Jim Paxson on the roster at the time, the Trail Blazers had no room for another shooting guard.^[8] Nonetheless, in 2005, ESPN, citing Bowie's injury-laden college career, named the Blazers' choice of Bowie as the worst draft pick in North American professional sports history.^[9] In 2005, Sports Illustrated listed Bowie as the biggest draft bust in NBA history, arguing that teams should draft for talent and not need.^[10]

During his rookie season, Bowie played in 76 games and averaged 10 points and 8.6 rebounds per game, earning a spot on the NBA All-Rookie Team.^[11] However, he broke his left leg in 1985, and then broke his right leg in 1986—injuries unheard of in the NBA. Due to the broken right leg, he missed all but five games in the 1986–87 season. During the 1987–88 preseason, he fractured his right tibia while walking around in a pregame shootaround and was lost for the season.^[4] All told, due to his leg troubles he only played 63 games (out of a possible 328) during his last four seasons in Portland.

On June 24, 1989, Bowie, who had averaged 10.5 points per game with the Trail Blazers, was traded, along with a draft pick, to the New Jersey Nets in exchange for Buck Williams. Bowie's four seasons in New Jersey were his healthiest and most successful; he averaged 12.8 points and 8.2 rebounds per game and never missed more than 20 games in a season. His best season was his first with the Nets where he averaged a double-double with 14.7 points and 10.1 rebounds per game. Bowie also hit a career high in points per game in 1991–92 with 15.0, and played a career high 79 games in 1992-93 averaging 9.1 points per game and seven rebounds. After the 1992–93 season, Bowie was involved in a trade that resulted in Benoit Benjamin being sent to New Jersey in exchange for Bowie, who joined the Los Angeles Lakers. However, Bowie's injury problems resurfaced and his action in two seasons with Los Angeles was limited; he only played in 92 games and started 17. Bowie retired from professional basketball in 1995 to become involved in harness racing, although Jerry West, the team's general manager, wanted him to stick around for a few years after that.^[12]

Over his career, Bowie averaged 10.9 points, 7.5 rebounds and 1.78 blocks per game.^[12] He hit 45.2% of his attempted field goals (2,127 made of 4,702 attempted), and 30.2% of his three-point shots (32 made of 106 attempted).^[13]

Post-retirement

After his retirement from basketball, Bowie returned to Lexington, Kentucky, where he has said most local residents remember him fondly for his success in college, rather than focusing on his unrealized potential in the NBA. As noted above, Bowie is involved in harness racing, both owning and training horses that run at The Red Mile in Lexington.

In 2012, Bowie was featured in an ESPN SEC Storied documentary, "Going Big."^[14] In it, he admitted hiding the extent of his leg troubles from the Blazers. For instance, he said that when a doctor tapped his left tibia with a mallet, he claimed not to feel anything when he was actually in noticeable pain.^[4]

References

External links

• Sam Bowie - The Fateful Pick @ bigbluehistory.net
• NBA stats @ basketball-reference.com
• Draft Busts @ SI.com