Bobby Phills
1969-2000
God Bless

Good person, good player
The former came naturally to Bobby Phills. But he had to work hard to make himself into the latter
BY TERRY PLUTO
Beacon Journal sports columnist
There was a time when Bobby Phills wanted to be a veterinarian.
He liked small animals. He liked relieving their pain. He liked the fact that animals instinctively knew what kind of person you were, they didn't judge you by your looks, your clothes, your paycheck.
Phills looked at people the same way, and that's why he'll be missed.
``The story about Bobby Phills is there are no stories,'' said Cavs broadcaster Joe Tait.
Tait and Phills were together from 1991-97, when Phills went from the 12th man on a 10-day contract to the Cavs' starting shooting guard.
What Tait meant was Phills never shoved an official, kicked a cameraman or spat on a fan. He never even talked trash. He never demanded to be traded. He didn't pout when he was yanked from the starting lineup. He didn't lash out when lesser teammates were being paid far more money.
``He was the consummate straight arrow,'' said Tait. ``Every NBA player should be like Bobby Phills.''
Not because he was averaging 13 points a game while coming off the bench for Charlotte this season. Nor because he was a rugged defender, the kind of guy who put his body right next to yours, skin-on-skin, bone-on-bone, yet never made any moves that would be considered cheap or dirty.
It's because the passing of Phills means there's one less NBA player who cares more about the game than himself. It's one less player who respects his coach and fits in with his teammates, one less guy who knows what it means to wait his turn.
``I was crushed when I heard Bobby died,'' said Tait. ``Completely crushed. I saw it on the little newsbreaking line that crawls across your screen on one station, then I turned to another to make sure.''
Then Tait paused, as a Phills story came to mind.
``I do the (WNBA) Rockers games on the radio,'' he said. ``Bobby would often come to the games. He brought his kids. He just enjoyed the games, and always said hello.''
Tait paused again, thinking about the car wreck that claimed Phills' life yesterday morning. He thought about Phills coming to the Cavs in the spring of 1991. Former Cavs player personnel director Gary Fitzsimmons spotted Phills playing in Sioux Falls, S.D., banished to the Continental Basketball Association after having been cut by Milwaukee.
``Bobby made it in this league on hard work, and it's a worse place without him,'' said Tait.
More than hoops
That's because there's so much more to Phills than basketball.
Not only did he set a lot of scoring records at Southern University, but he also dreamed of being a veterinarian. He earned a degree in animal science. His father was the head of Southern's Agriculture Department.
Education was gold. Education was power. Education was not to be squandered.
From his family, Phills was told about the South of ``WHITES ONLY'' signs on bathroom doors, the South where there were places that a black man couldn't even buy a hamburger at a greasy diner because of the color of his skin.
He also learned about not making excuses, not hanging his head. He heard about pulling yourself up by your bootstraps, and about doing what was right.
To many, these sound like vacant words that no longer apply to modern America. To Phills, they were his blood, they caused his heart to beat and carried him into the NBA.
So when Phills was only the 45th player picked in the 1991 NBA draft, he didn't complain. When he was cut by the Bucks, he was disappointed, but not defeated. When he was told that the one place he could play pro basketball was South Dakota -- in December! -- he packed his bags and averaged 23 points.
Perfect practices
With the Cavs, the 6-foot-5 Phills was behind the likes of guards Craig Ehlo, Gerald Wilkins and John Battle. His practices were his games, Coach Lenny Wilkens would tell him. Hearing that, most players nod, then sit at the end of the bench and sulk, a towel over their head.
Phills sat straight and watched. He took mental notes. He told himself what he'd do when the time came, even though he rarely took off those warmups in his first two seasons.
But in 1993-94, his third year with the Cavs, Phills became a starter, a gritty, viable player. He was never a star, but he also never took a lazy step. He was not a natural shooter, but made himself into a 3-point threat. He went from making only 1-of-12 shots from behind the arc in 1993-94, to close to a 40 percent shooter on 3-pointers for the rest of his career.
That happened thanks to long hours of shooting alone in empty gyms during the summer. Just as the muscles of his 220-pound chiseled body glistened under the NBA lights thanks to relentless workouts in the weight room.
Phills left the Cavs in the summer of 1997, cashing in on a long-term free agent deal worth $25 million. He spent the last two-plus seasons in Charlotte, sometimes starting, sometimes coming off the bench.
In either role, he was effective. Not sensational. Not eye-popping. Just solid. A real pro. The kind of player who is seldom celebrated in this glitzy age.
Off the court, he was married with two children. He took that as he did everything else -- seriously. So what kind of guy was Phills?
A fan from Akron sent a fax to The Jim Rome Show saying he once saw Phills in a bar. He was talking with the fans, just like one of the guys, only he was drinking milk!
Joe Tait thought about that Bobby Phills as he walked through the lobby of the Portland hotel where the Cavs were staying yesterday. Tait was with Bobby Sura, one of the few Cavs left who played with Phills.
``Sura was shattered,'' said Tait. ``He said he couldn't believe it happened.''
Tait nodded at those words.
``Then Bobby told me that it makes you realize there is something more important than basketball,'' said Tait.
Sure does.
But then again, Bobby Phills always knew that.

Death of Phills hits Cavaliers hard
By LANDON HALL Associated Press Writer
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) -- The death of Charlotte Hornets player Bobby Phills made it a difficult day for his former team, the Cleveland Cavaliers.
The Cavs were stunned to hear about the car crash that killed Phills, who spent his first six NBA seasons in Cleveland.
"Bobby's one of the best people you could be around, and he really tried to help others out," said Bob Sura, a teammate of Phills' during the 1995-96 and 1996-97 seasons. "It's a tough day for people who were close to him. He was such a good guy.
"It's so unexpected. We just feel bad for his family and his kids who have to grow up without having him around."
In some ways, it was a bittersweet days for the team, which had its spirits lifted by the birth of teammate Danny Ferry's third child earlier Wednesday.
"At least we had some good news," said Cavs' media relations director Bob Price.
Tiffany Ferry gave birth to an 8-pound, 1-ounce girl, Sophia Bryn. She and her husband have two other daughters.
Ferry, who is on the injured list with a strained left calf, remained in Cleveland and will join the team sometime during its seven-game road trip.
Even with that happy event, the Cavs' locker room was somber, although Sura and Ferry are the only team members who played with Phills, who signed with Charlotte as a free agent following the 1996-97 season.
Sura said it was tough for the Cavaliers to focus on basketball.
"It's a tough night for me, having been one of the only guys to have been around him when he was here," he said. "It just makes you realize that basketball is such a small part of what life is about."
First-year coach Randy Wittman, who played against Phills as a member of the Indiana Pacers earlier this decade, said Phills was an uncommonly good person.
"Let's forget what Bobby Phills was as a basketball player. It's what he was as a man and the good things that he brought," Wittman said. "I think anybody that has ever associated or touched by Bobby considered him a friend, a guy that would give the shirt off his back for you. It's tragic that his life was cut short.
"As I told our team today after hearing the news, it's time to take a step back and realize how precious life is, and that we don't live it on our terms. At any time, you just never know when your time comes."

Death of Phills leaves team stunned, saddened
By LEONARD LAYE
Sports Editor
The pair of baby shoes was hanging from the door to Bobby Phills' locker.
Leslie Jones was already struggling to hold back tears. Seeing the shoes, belonging to Phills' baby daughter, Kerstie, made that impossible.
"That did it. I couldn't handle that," said Jones.
Phills died late Wednesday morning in a three-car traffic accident on West Tyvola Road, near the Charlotte Coliseum. He and other Hornets players had just left the arena after a brief shootaround, a light workout that precedes each NBA game. Police said Phills was traveling at "a high rate of speed."
Jones, a senior assistant to Hornets coaches and players, cleaned out Phills' locker, gathering items for Phills' wife, Kendall.
The Hornets postponed Wednesday night's scheduled home game against the Chicago Bulls. At the Hornets' Fort Mill training center, Jones and Susan Buff, the team's executive assistant, were peppered all afternoon with telephone calls as news of the tragedy spread around the league. They came from opposing coaches, general managers, trainers and players including such former Hornets and Phills teammates as J.R. Reid and Chuck Person.
At the Hornets' Hive Drive business offices, Cathy Montgomery juggled one phone call after another, many of them from fans expressing sympathy. Team chaplains Luke Witte and Charles Mack gathered with employees at mid-afternoon for a brief prayer service.
Local radio stations got calls from people who admired Phills and, in many cases, had had personal contact with him during his 2½ seasons as a Hornet.
It was apparent that Phills, 30, had touched a lot of lives in and around Charlotte and the NBA. He was in his ninth NBA season. But it was more than basketball that endeared Phills to his friends, his fans and the team.
In an era of me-first attitudes in professional sports Phills was, by all descriptions, the antithesis. On the court he played as hard as any coach could ask. Away from the game he was genuine, a man who appreciated the simple things and knew life was about much more than basketball - he had a bachelor's degree in Animal Science from Southern University in Baton Rouge, La., and had often said he could have been happy as a veterinarian.
He was down to earth and easy to talk to, whether with fans, kids or the media. He loved a good laugh.
"He was just the kind of person who you could talk to about anything," Jones said. "He was my buddy."
He was the rare type of player who had pride in his game but who always made the team the priority.
This season he relinquished his role as a starter once coach Paul Silas determined the Hornets would function best with a big starting lineup. Phills, a 6-5 guard/forward with a powerful build, accepted his new responsibility and immediately began working with the younger players who would fill out the team's second unit.
"You have to have an ego to play this game," he said recently. "But the most important thing to me is winning games. I'll do whatever I need to do to help us do that."
He will no doubt always be remembered by Silas for his tireless work late last season as the Hornets closed with a flourish, narrowly missing the playoffs but helping secure the coaching job on full time for Silas.
Phills played his first two seasons in Charlotte under coach Dave Cowens.
"I don't understand why things like this happen," said Cowens, who called the Hornets Wednesday afternoon immediately after learning of the accident from a friend. "And to people like Bobby Phills.
"I don't think there's a selfish bone in his body. He's just a guy who, well, nothing was handed to him. He worked for everything. He listens. He's intelligent. He doesn't come in with any baggage.
"He was just one of those rare guys who came in pure, in the way he played basketball and the way he lived his life. Selfishness is what kills team sports, and he didn't have any of it."
Phills' death stunned the city. Its impact on the team was immediate: several players, leaving the Coliseum shootaround at the same time, drove upon the scene of the accident on their way home. Others got the word on cellular phones and turned around to go back to the scene.
All of them eventually got there, then lingered for at least an hour.
They stood alone or in small clusters, talking quietly, watching as police and firemen assisted the two people injured in other cars and then went about their investigation of the accident.
Minutes after the accident Wesley called trainer Terry Kofler at the Coliseum. Kofler alerted Silas and assistant coach Jerry Eaves, and the three rushed to the site. Hornets owner George Shinn, driving toward his office and not knowing what had happened, stopped when he saw Silas on the side of the road. Basketball vice president Bob Bass rushed up from Fort Mill and was visibly shaken.
It was Bass, working with the NBA, who made the decision to postpone Wednesday's game. It has not yet been rescheduled, and the Hornets don't know at this point how, if at all, the rest of their schedule will be affected. Phills' funeral arrangements were incomplete Wednesday night.
"He was just so special," Bass said. "He touched all of us and we'll always miss him. I'm just in shock."
A few hundred yards away from the spot where Bass spoke and police officers worked to get the road reopened to traffic before rush hour, an electronic message board was still flashing: "Game tonight. Lane changes will be used."
But there would be no game. Bobby Phills was gone. "He was just one of those rare guys who came in pure, in the way he played basketball and the way he lived his life. Selfishness is what kills team sports, and he didn't have any of it."

Sometimes praise is worthy, even when late
When a man or woman of some celebrity dies, we tend to glorify them. We glorify them when they are entitled and we glorify them when they aren't. We glorify them with such regularity that the process becomes automatic, the kind words less credible. This is a shame because some celebrities - and Charlotte Hornet Bobby Phills is one of them - deserve the praise.
In the 12 seasons I've been around the Hornets, I can think of only three players who were unaffected by their success. Don't blame the Hornets; most of us would be affected, too. The adulation and the money and the opportunity to be a member of one of the most exclusive societies in sports will turn the head of almost any young man. Phills, like former Hornets Hersey Hawkins and Vlade Divac, seemed oblivious.
Although he made about $3.5 million a season, he didn't need the league. He didn't derive his identity from what he did.
He was grounded, with both feet in the real world. He had a wife, Kendall, who attended almost every home game with their children, 3-year-old Bobby Ray and 1-year-old Kerstie.
He had a degree in animal science.
He had an ego so undersized that he volunteered to give up his starting position, one of only 145 in the NBA, so Anthony Mason and Derrick Coleman could start.
He was a locker room leader, a man who commanded respect.
With a body almost as carved as his cheekbones, he only looked regal.
The end of Phills' life was incongruous with the way he lived. He left the shootaround at Charlotte Coliseum Wednesday in his black Porsche and drove east on Tyvola Road, at a good deal of speed. Near him was David Wesley, his teammate and good friend, whose Porsche also was fast and sleek.
Maybe they accelerated in tandem. Maybe Phills pushed his accelerator and Wesley responded, or maybe Wesley went first. People who make their living with their reflexes tend to believe in them.
On this day, a January afternoon that felt like spring, Phills' reflexes or his automobile might have let him down. His judgment certainly did, costing him his life and endangering the lives of others.
Charlotte is going to remember where it was when it learned about the tragedy. I was on I-85, on the other end of town, when the telephone call came. I didn't quite believe it.
I turned around, drove down Tyvola Road, saw the police cars blocking traffic, the helicopters from the television stations hovering and then the crumpled black Porsche and then, sadly, Kendall Phills and Phills' teammates.
As we drive Charlotte's streets today, perhaps more slowly than we did before, we'll have more time to think. If you want to think about something that says a lot about Phills, think about this.
The Hornets are in New York this season for a Dec. 20 game against the Knicks, and Phills asks a Hornets staff member about the Statue of Liberty. The staff member is from New York City, and Phills wants details about the Statue of Liberty, the best way to get there, how long the lines are.
Players often ask staffers for tickets or advice, but nobody had ever asked the staff member about the Statue of Liberty. NBA trips are quick hits. To sightsee, effort - and a willingness to go off by yourself - is required.
Phills said he didn't want to merely pass through the league, he wanted to take time to appreciate the cities in which he played. He said he was going to try to visit a landmark in every town.
I know that some of what I'm writing, and what others are saying and writing, make Phills sound like Gandhi in high tops. But as classy as everybody says he is, that's how classy he was.
I wish I had glorified while he was still alive.

Phills appreciated his role
As starter or reserve, Hornet's goal was helping team win
By RICK BONNELL
Bobby Phills understood his blessings.
He had a beautiful wife, two children he adored and millions in the bank. He was secure enough in his status to give up a starting spot with the Charlotte Hornets because he thought it would improve the team.
"I'm very secure with myself,'' Phills said Dec. 28, in what might have been his last extended interview before dying in a car crash Wednesday. "I have a great family. I was raised by a great family. I have the American dream.''
Most athletes aren't so content. They complain about money and minutes and respect.
Phills grew beyond that. Eight seasons into his NBA career, he didn't need constant reminders of how good he was. So he originally suggested moving to the bench, allowing forwards Anthony Mason and Derrick Coleman to start.
Asked to explain that choice, Phills said he never defined his self-worth by athletics or the luxuries sports provided. He graduated with honors from Southern in Baton Rouge, La., and planned to attend veterinary school. He never expected to make it in the NBA, so he didn't build his life around basketball.
"A lot of people get caught up in those things - defining themselves by what they drive or what they're wearing,'' Phills said. "Way before I thought I could do this, I expected to work 9-5 as a veterinarian. I know what I have up here mentally. I don't need to be a basketball player to be a success in life.
"It's a sad thing how many athletes get lost after their careers are over because that is their only niche. They don't know how to live their lives without a basketball in their hands.''
Phills was surprised he made it at all. His goal was to last one season, then two so he would qualify for an NBA pension. He was nearly cut several times by the Cleveland Cavaliers before establishing himself as a starter in 1994. The Hornets signed him to a $32 million contract in 1997, and were thrilled with what he delivered as a player and leader.
Phills set the Hornets' agenda. He was easily the most respected player in Charlotte's locker room.
"He has control of this team,'' swingman Ricky Davis said recently. "Bobby might be the most powerful player on this roster. Bobby's really big-hearted. He takes (leadership) real seriously.''
That helps explain the remarkable step he took in the preseason, lobbying coach Paul Silas to move him to the bench. Phills felt neither Mason nor Coleman could handle playing as a reserve. Phills knew he could, so he urged Silas to play him as sixth man.
Silas initially declined the offer, then reconsidered when the Hornets started the season 5-4. Phills not only accepted the move, he thrived on it, taking charge of four young players off the bench.
Silas said that kind of selflessness is all but extinct in the NBA.
"Whether we win or lose, that paycheck is going to be there. So it has to be something deeper driving him,'' Silas said last month. "He has that will to win, and I'm not talking about some of the time, I'm talking about all of the time.
"In practice, he never wants to lose. A guy like that is invaluable. When I decided to put him down, to have him come off the bench, there were no complaints. Just `Whatever you want, whatever is good for the team.' "He's totally unselfish, and yet he makes big shots whenever you need them. He'll get rebounds, he'll penetrate to the hoop, he'll make big free throws.
"Without Bobby, we wouldn't be a real good team, I don't think.''
Most athletes say winning is what matters. Most athletes are fibbing. Phills wasn't. He seemed genuinely unconcerned with statistics so long as the team succeeded.
"That's what makes it so fun to play with him,'' close friend David Wesley said last month. "There are not a lot of people like that in the NBA - guys not looking at stats or worrying about who's starting and who's not.
"He says, `When you win, everybody's important.'"
Phills' wife, Kendall, wasn't as quick to accept the change.
"Finally I told my wife, `Babe, there aren't any awards for starters.' "Phills said. "Now I can shoot for Sixth Man.


In last night's game, Cavs guard Bob Sura honored Phills by writing "No. 13, May God bless" on the back of his shoes.

Multi-Media
Bob Sura talks about his old teammate and friend Bobby Phills.