Trivia 11/30/09

This NBA player had his number retired by this team after playing only 4 years for them. They are the only NBA team he ever played for. Although he was a member of a Championship team with them, he averaged only 9.5 PPG in his 4 year career with them. Name him?

beat

Geesh no quesses.

OK couple of hints, his number was 13!

and he played with a pretty good redhead.

beat

Dave Twardzik

Sam

Did the hints give it away?

beat

Yup.

Redheads.

First I thought you were harking back to your Syracuse days and were referring to Red Kerr. Nope.

So next I went to the one championship team Walton played on and just perused the roster. You can click on each player's name and get his stats; and Twardzik played four years in the NBA (all with Portland) with a 9.5 average. (I believe he also played four years in the ABA.)

Finally, on the same stats page, Basketball Reference shows all the uniform number worn by each player, displayed with team colors.

#13. Slam dunk! I never even bothered to try to determine why a player averaging less than double figures would have his number retired after four years.

Sam

Sam

When I was looking around for a question I sort of ran into that too about how a player with only 4 years on a team and a 9.5 PPG average managed to get his number retired. Perhaps they just wanted #13 off the books for goodluck reasons.

In looking at Portlands retired numbers I was surprised just how many they have.

[edit] Retired numbers
1 – Larry Weinberg, Owner, 1970–88
13 – Dave Twardzik, G, 1976–80
14 – Lionel Hollins, G, 1975–80
15 – Larry Steele, G, 1971–80
20 – Maurice Lucas, F, 1976–80, 1987–88
22 – Clyde Drexler, G, 1983–95
30 – Bob Gross, F, 1975–82
30 – Terry Porter, G, 1985–95
32 – Bill Walton, C, 1974–79
36 – Lloyd Neal, F/C, 1972–79
45 – Geoff Petrie, G/F, 1970–76
77 – Jack Ramsay, Head Coach, 1976–86

beat

Beat,

I looked for info on the retirement of Twardzik's number and found only the following. It was so short that I didn't even bother with the link.

"Dave Twardzik,
for instance, fails any objective test for having one’s number retired.
But he played a key role on a beloved title team (the 1977 Blazers) and
has stuck around the NBA in high-ranking personnel jobs since his
playing career ended."

Sam