Basketball Period: Tough defenders
Walter Fraser was born in Houston, A world-famous space city home to the Johnson Space Center, located 40 kilometers southeast of downtown. The $1.5 billion complex has one of NASA's largest R&D facilities and brings together the nation's finest high-tech professionals in science and engineering. Houston's aviation community includes more than 150 companies engaged in aircraft or spacecraft manufacturing, space research and technology. As one of the most developed cities in the United States, basketball is also an indispensable competitive sport in this city. Fraser, who has been very athletically talented since childhood, has been exposed to basketball very early, when he was a child, he walked all day on the street with a basketball, he went in and out of houston's major open-air basketball courts, usually he faced opponents who were taller than him, but Fraser this guy was born with a spirit of disbelief, and years of playing against players who were a few years older also honed his body to the greatest extent.
When he first entered Atlanta High School, he became the leader of the basketball team. His defense was so aggressive that his opponents were very jealous of his defense for quite some time, because it would hurt him. At the time of his high school graduation, he accepted a basketball scholarship from the University of Illinois, despite the fact that some universities offered him a more generous football scholarship.
At the University of Illinois, Fraser grew into the best backcourt defender in the country, and the defenders who flaunted their power in college basketball would be frustrated whenever they encountered Fraser's defense, and his offensive skills were more and more matured by the polishing of college basketball coaches. Fraser, who excelled on both ends of the board, earned nearly every name for state basketball honors, and he led the University of Illinois to the first team to win the National Invitational League Championship. In his senior year, Fraser was named to the All-American Team and was drafted by the Knicks in the 5th place in the first round of the 1967 draft.
New York Knicks period: "The Great Thief" Fraser
Fraser's initial NBA career was not a success, averaging just 9.0 points per game in his rookie season of 1967-68. But he showed his versatility, and he still had 4.2 rebounds and 4.1 assists. And in the first year he had some problems with free throws, his free throw shooting percentage was only 65.5%, and although his shooting performance was not good enough, he was selected to the rookie team with his overall performance.
In his second season, he made rapid progress, making him into the Defensive Team of the Season for his tough defense, averaging 17.5 points, 6.2 rebounds and 7.9 assists per game, becoming the team's top assist and number four scorer, and in the playoffs, they reached the Eastern Conference Finals, but they lost to the Celtics.
In the 1969-70 season, the in-form Knicks ushered in a wave of brutal 18 consecutive wins, which set a record of NBA winning streaks at the time, and they eventually played a 60-22 record in the regular season. Fraser averaged 20.9 points and 8.2 assists per game that season. Such performances helped Fraser be named to the All-Star starting lineup and was named to the All-Season Team at the end of the season. They beat the Bullets and Bucks unstoppable in the playoffs, and in the Finals they beat the Los Angeles Lakers 4-3 to win that year's championship.
In later memoirs, Fraser also considered the 1970 NBA championship to be the pinnacle of his career. "I feel like I'm full of energy on the pitch and I always want to find my teammates who are empty. But I was often excused that night, and there was no doubt that the NBA championship in the 69-70 season was the pinnacle of my career. Every day I think back to that team. ”
By 1970–71, Fraser had replaced Reid as the team's top scorer, averaging 21.7 points, 6.8 rebounds and 6.7 assists per game. Even in the league as a whole, the 21.7 points per game figure can rank 14th in the league. They still finished at the top of the Atlantic Division in the regular season, despite losing eight more games than the previous year, but lost the game by two points in the Eastern Conference semifinals.
At the beginning of the 1971-72 season, the addition of Earl Monroe relieved Fraser of pressure on the offensive end to a certain extent, and in this year he averaged a career-high 23.2 points per game, which made him once again a backcourt player on the first team of the season, and in the playoffs they eliminated bullets and Celtics all the way to meet the Lakers in the Finals, but they lost this Finals.
Perhaps this Finals stimulated the New York Knicks, in the following 1972-73 season, the Knicks achieved a regular season record of 57 wins and 25 losses, the first two rounds were the same as the previous year, the Knicks easily eliminated the Bullets and Celtics, but they met the Lakers again in the Finals. In contrast to the 1971-72 season, the Knicks lost the first game, followed by four consecutive wins to win the second championship in the team's history. Fraser also used his playoff average of 22 points, 7.3 rebounds and 6.2 assists per game to become the best player on the team.
After this championship, the New York Knicks also gradually began to decline, in the 1973-74 season, the Knicks record was 49-33, and Fraser's average of 20.5 points and 6.7 rebounds per game helped him to be named to the season's Best Team First Team and All-Star Starting Lineup again. In the playoffs, they were eliminated by the Celtics in the Eastern Conference Finals.
In the 1974-75 season, perhaps even Fraser did not think that this was his last playoff, and the Knicks were eliminated in the first round of the playoffs that year, and Fraser also used the data of averaging 23.7 points, 6.7 rebounds and 7.0 assists per game to draw a perfect song for his playoff performance. However, it is worth mentioning that he was successfully elected as the All-Star MVP when he participated in his sixth NBA All-Star Game. Fraser was selected to the NBA First Team at the end of the regular season, the fourth and final time.
The 1976–77 season was the last season of Frasernicks' career, and his average points per game had dropped to 17.4 points per game, and as he grew older, he became increasingly weak on the field, missing the playoffs for the second consecutive year.
Knighthood: Bleak old age
On the eve of the 1977–78 season, Fraser was traded to the Cavaliers, and with the glory of the Knicks' all-time scoring champion (14617), assists (4791), and appearances (759 games, 28995 minutes), Fraser ended his illustrious Knicks career.
After arriving at the Cavaliers, Fraser's career took a sharp turn for the worse, and after averaging 16.2 points in 51 games in 1977-78, he began to suffer from foot injuries in the next two seasons. He played only 15 games for the Cavaliers for the next two seasons, and after playing only three games for the team in the 1979-80 season, the Cavaliers chose to cut him, and Fraser ended his laudable career.
He was inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in 1987 and was named to the NBA's 50th Anniversary Top 50 Superstars in 1996.