Bill Walton

William Theodore Walton III (November 5, 1952 – May 27, 2024) was an American basketball player and television sportscaster who played collegiately for the UCLA Bruins and professionally in the National Basketball Association for the Portland Trail Blazers, the San Diego and Los Angeles Clippers, and the Boston Celtics. The 6-foot-11-inch center rose to prominence in the early 1970s as the starting center for coach John Wooden at UCLA, where he won three consecutive national college player of the year awards from 1972 to 1974 and led the Bruins to NCAA championships in 1972 and 1973 and an 88-game winning streak. Selected as the first overall pick in the 1974 NBA draft, Walton led the Portland Trail Blazers to the franchise's first and only NBA championship in 1977, earning the NBA Finals Most Valuable Player Award. The following season he was named the 1978 NBA Most Valuable Player. His professional career was significantly hampered by foot injuries that required numerous surgeries; he underwent 37 orthopedic surgeries over the course of his lifetime. Walton is a member of both the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame and the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame.