Utah Jazz: Earl Watson pours his heart back into basketball

Jazz » Watson reaches out to young players from his hometown.

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"I thought, ‘This dude is crazy,’ " Watson said. "Who runs track in the Midwest?"

Someone who wanted out.

By high school, Watson understood. Greene had track. Watson had basketball. Amateur Athletic Union turned into the Kansas City 76ers. The Watson-era 76ers were stacked. One of the "best travel teams ever assembled," he said. The club that guided Randle to Los Angeles made Watson a Bruin.

"No matter what was going on in my school or my neighborhood or around my house, when I got into the game, nothing else mattered," Watson said.

He added: "That’s how I fell in love with basketball. It saved my life."

The believer

Watson doesn’t just love basketball. He believes in it. Heart and soul, body and mind.

Spend enough time around Watson, and the John Wooden stories pour out. Hubie Brown speeches. Jerry West reflections. Proud mentions of names such as Jerry Sloan and Kevin O’Connor.

The 76ers carried Watson to UCLA. Then Wooden showed him the way.

Initially, Los Angeles was dreamland to Watson. He lived in a small garage with close friend and teammate Baron Davis. Watson took the backseat while the future New York Knicks point guard drove on dates, smiling while Davis’ girlfriend wondered about the third wheel with a Midwestern accent.

But Watson started to see light. He’d walk to Wooden’s condominium and ask the guru about the game. Wooden would talk only about real life. Family, friends, day-to-day events. By the time Wooden was done speaking, though, Watson learned more than he’d ever known about everything from a full-court press to the difference between a winner and a true champion.

Brown was his next guide. Wise and gracious as an ESPN analyst, Brown was pure fire when he coached Memphis. He’d yell and scream and push and teach, ultimately uniting players and turning the 2003-04 Grizzlies into a playoff team.

Watson swears by Brown. And when the then-71-year-old stepped down just 12 games into the 2004-05 season, Watson remembers nothing but tears.

"He’s going to give you his heart on a daily basis," Brown said.

The guide

Watson’s heart was ripped out in 2004. Seventeen-year-old Eric Vargas was killed in a hit-and-run accident in Kansas City. Vargas had been adopted by Watson’s family, and the Jazz guard calls Vargas his "little brother."

Having survived and moved on from Crimedotte, Watson vowed to give back.

"It inspired me even more to stay connected to younger people," Watson said. "Because in a unique way, I feel like I’m connected to him still."

Watson didn’t just set up another foundation or write a check, though. He helped take over the 76ers. With the Kansas City travel team, Watson touched Randle’s life, Jamal Branch’s life — a St. John’s point guard coached by Steve Lavin, who led the Bruins when Watson was at UCLA — and many others.

When the NBA locked its doors in 2011, Watson took the next step in his career. The player became a coach.

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