Good Night, Sweet Prince

Bill Walton hath retired.

Quite the shame, really. He was certainly missed last year as he struggled with back pain.

Some people hate on Bill Walton, which I just don't get. As far as color-commenting went, he was hilarious. He was also kind of the anti-Van Gundy in that he might disparage the same people for the same reasons, but without the fast-talking eastern pentameter. Walton was a sage of the court, the original roundball flower child.

Given to hyperbole, absolutes and favoritism, it was plenty of fun to listen to all the different ways that he could come up with to say that someone was good at basketball. A few of my favorites:
-"Andrei Kirilenko is the best 3-on-1 fast break player in the NBA."
-"Charlie Ward is the best in-bounds passer in the history of basketball."
-“John Stockton is one of the true marvels, not just of basketball, or in America, but in the history of Western Civilization!”

The same could be said about him saying bad things about people as well. For instance, I apparently have seen "the two worst shots in the proud history of the Houston Rockets." Thanks, Cuttino Mobley!

His announcing during any international contest was fantastic, as he would just open up the wikipedia page of any given country and start spouting off GDP statistics, or the interesting topography of Argentina, for instance.

He loved Rock n' Roll and Basketball, in that order. Luke Walton once said that his earliest memory is Jerry Garcia running naked around his dad's backyard teepee. That teepee must have been a muhfuckin party.

As the final eulogy of the greatest sports announcer in the history of television, I will say three resounding renditions of, "Todd MacCullough throw it down throw it down," and "Amare Stoudemire! Winner of the genetic lottery!"

As much as I like hip hop Van Gundy, I'm going to miss Bill Walton.