Posted on 06/19/2010 2:02:29 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
Manute Bol, who became a basketball sensation in the 1980s as a skeletally thin shot-blocking giant with the Washington Bullets and other professional teams, and who devoted his post-basketball life to improving the lot of his fellow natives of Sudan, died June 19 at the University of Virginia Medical Center in Charlottesville. He was 47.
His cousin George Bol said Mr. Bol had internal bleeding and other complications from Stevens-Johnson syndrome, a rare skin disease that he contracted from a medication he received in Africa.
Mr. Bol, one of the two tallest players in NBA history, was also one of its most exotic and endearing -- and surely the only one to have killed a lion with a spear. His unusual journey to basketball stardom began in southern Sudan, where he was a cattle-herding member of the Dinka tribe and never touched a basketball until his late teens. After catching the eye of an American coach working in Sudan, Mr. Bol made his way to the United States without knowing a word of English.
When the Bullets drafted him in the second round in 1985, he was measured at 7 feet, 6¾ inches in his bare feet -- usually rounded up to 7-feet-7 -- and he weighed a mere 190 pounds. Mr. Bol had limited basketball skills, but with a fingertip-to-fingertip wingspan of 8 feet, 6 inches, he proved to be unusually adept at one aspect of the game: blocking opponents' shots. Standing flat-footed, he could extend his hand above the rim of the basket 10 feet off the floor.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Don Nelson, who later coached Mr. Bol with the Golden State Warriors, said simply, "He's the most amazing shot-blocker I've ever seen."
I’m sad. From all accounts, he tried to help his people back in Sudan. So sorry that this happened to him.
Spud was the more amazing of those two
Man those legs are like stilts!
I linked my earlier thread to this one
Kansas bookmark.
Sorry to hear this. Manute spent some time out here with the Warriors. Seemed like a good guy, and 47 is so young.
The only time University of Bridgeport basketball games were televised in Connecticut was when he played.
"Most NBA players go broke on cars and gambling. Manute Bol went broke building hospitals."
R.I.P., big man.
IIRC, no one knew when he was born, for sure.
His age was a best guess.
I met him a couple times. Nice man.
Thank you for posting this. Although I am an avid NBA fan,I did not know of Mr. Bol. I really just got into NBA the past decade.
Going to the article I am touched with so many different things..
47.. is much too young but in those years he did a lot of good for a lot of people & seemed to have fun along the way.
I know a lot of 70 year olds who cannot say that.
He realized his good fortune and did good works. Our current crop of athletes could learn something from him.
He had to have made a good deal of $$$ in his career...so what in God’s name was he doing getting medical care and/or taking medications made in Africa?
Probably got the meds when he was younger and they destroyed “something?”
Too tall Bol. Often, great height comes with some metabolic baggage. Seemed like a nice man.
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