As the highest temple of basketball in the world, every talented player hopes to enter the NBA and then make a name for himself in this league. Looking at the 74-year history of the NBA, we can find that there are many players who originally thought that they were the beginning, but they were unexpectedly peaked, but there are still a considerable number of players, who were originally extremely talented and powerful, but did not even have the opportunity to play in the NBA, and Len Baias is the most typical existence.
Who is Len-Baias? Presumably few people know about him, except for old fans, Baias was the eye-catching show of the 1986 draft, and the team that selected him was the Boston Celtics.
How strong is the legendary Len-Baias, who rivals Jordan?
Coach K, the legendary American coach who has read countless people, once said that the two strongest players in the history of the ACC league, one is Jordan, and the other is Baias. Even better than Jordan, Baias was named ACC Player of the Year in 1985 and 1986 before running for the NBA.
Compared with Jordan at the same time, Baias is indeed more energetic in terms of talent visible to the naked eye, 2 meters 03 is taller than Jordan, accurate jump shot, very high shooting point, compared to Jordan who has not yet practiced the back stunt at that time, Baias is more delicate.
From the performance of the two at that time, Jordan's breakthrough was the strongest, the shooting was relatively weak, while Baias's breakthrough was relatively weak, and the shooting was stronger than Jordan at that time. Because the strengths and weaknesses of the two are just opposite, there has been a saying that year, "God created two of the strongest basketball specimens, one is Michael Jordan, the other is Len Byas, Jordan was given the strongest breakthrough ability by God, and Byas was given a stronger shooting." ”
Byas is in opposition to Jordan
In college, Jordan's North Carolina fought once with Maryland led by Baias, and although this battle ended with North Carolina winning, everyone knows that North Carolina is not only Jordan's strong point, but Maryland only has Baias.
Although he lost the game, but Baias's personal performance did not lose, the whole game, Baias scored 24 points, no worse than Jordan's 24 points and 12 rebounds, and because of Byas's excellent performance, Jordan directly expressed his admiration for Baias in an interview after the game.
Jordan: "I've never seen such a good player, Len is simply so good, you know we have 4 stars in North Carolina and Maryland is his team alone. ”
It was Len Baias who shot the shot and Jordan who was the defender
In terms of personal data, Baias averaged 23 points, 7 rebounds and 1 assist per game in his senior year, shooting 54.4% from the field, and Jordan averaged 19.6 points, 5.3 rebounds and 2.1 assists per game in his final year, shooting 55.1% from the field.
Baias's talent is not worse than Jordan's, if anyone can beat and beat Jordan, then this person can only be Len Baias, and even there is a possibility that There is Byjas, maybe Michael Jordan will not achieve the name of "basketball god". However, it is such a being, less than 50 hours after the end of the draft, because of the sudden convulsion due to a large amount of drugs in the university dormitory, unconscious, ineffective rescue, and finally died!
The unexpected death of Len-Baias was a huge loss for the Celtics and the NBA
As early as two years before the start of the 1986 draft, the Celtics began to investigate Byas, and finally the Celtics fans strongly recommended Byias to the team, and then Cardinal Auerbach, who built the Celtics, also looked at Baias, "I want him, don't think about it!" He can control the ball, he can score, it's perfectly for our needs. When it comes to Byas, the Green Army helmsman, who is accustomed to seeing strong winds and waves, is also like a child, unable to suppress the excitement and enthusiasm.
Despite looking at Baias, the reality is that the Celtics' signing position is not enough to select Byas, for this reason, Auerbach did not hesitate to use all his connections and means in the NBA to get the list of the year, before the start of the 86 draft, it is no secret that the Celtics want to choose Baias, and finally the Celtics also chose him as they wished.
Speaking of this, all the officials will have a question, if Byas is so bullish, why is he not a champion? The signing of that year was in the hands of the Cleveland Cavaliers, and in terms of the preference for the player at that time, more teams preferred to choose a big center to serve as the cornerstone of the team, rather than a guard, and at that time, in addition to Len-Baias, there was another favorite, he was brad Doherty, a tall and skilled big center, and the Cavaliers chose him with the title at that time, which is the same as why Jordan was not selected as a champion in 84.
Brad Doherty
It is worth mentioning that when it was officially announced that the Celtics selected Len Baias with the eye of the list, an ESPN commentator boldly predicted: "The Celtics' second eight-game winning streak is coming"!
With Baias, maybe the Celtics won't do it again for eight consecutive titles, but they will definitely do it to continue to dominate the NBA, at least not to let the Celtics do nothing in the 90s after that. One key issue is that when the decision was made to choose Baias in 1986, the Celtics had just won the championship under the leadership of Larry Bird, Kevin McHale and Robert Parrish, and if a Baias were added to this lineup structure, the Celtics would be very powerful.
With Bird and others, there is no need to worry too much about The survival of Baias in the NBA, with his talent, strength, and after the teaching of Bird and others, he will once again be a superstar player. Unfortunately, Auerbach's deliberately chosen Bird successor for the Celtics eventually died young.
After hearing the news of Baias's accidental death, Auerbach turned white overnight, and later Auerbach said directly about Baias: "If Lun did not leave us, I think the late 80s and 90s should have ruled the whole league, that would not have made the Bad Boy Army in Detroit so arrogant, and there could not be any bull dynasty, in short, God is unfair to us, but it is possible that God will let him leave us for the development of the whole alliance." ”
The loss of Len Baias at least set the Celtics back a decade, and it is true that after Bird retired, the Celtics did nothing throughout the nineties, and after entering the 21st century, even with Pierce, the team continued to be depressed for 7 years, until the Big Three team teamed up to enter the league championship again.
Len-Baias is not an addict
It is said that Baias was not an addict, at least not in the mind of the coaches who coached him, and even before he died of cocaine smoking, Baias did not drink.
Baias Celtic no. 30 jersey and university no. 34 jersey
On June 18, 1986, local time in the United States, Baias returned to the University of Maryland after participating in the draft, and in his dormitory, Baias and his classmates and friends held a three-hour party, at this party, Baias, who was excited about his future, began to inhale cocaine into his mouth again and again, according to the recollection of one of Baias's roommates, Baias inhaled cocaine nearly 10 times, and even loaded half a cup several times.
Already excited, even more excited after taking cocaine, Baias passed away at 6:30 a.m. on June 19.
Achieving greatness is not only about talent, but more importantly about self-discipline and restraint. Also with the top talent, Michael Jordan can "become a god" in the NBA, relying on self-discipline and restraint, the rookie season Jordan once met his teammates in the hotel to take drugs, but he refused to join it, and also hated it. From this point of view, it can also be seen that even if Baias is not inferior to Jordan in talent and strength, it is difficult for him to reach the level that Jordan has reached.
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