Clifford Rozier's death is a sad reminder of what might have been

Tim Sullivan | Courier Journal

Denny Crum was too weak to work, but he was too strong-willed to entrust game strategy to his subordinates.

Recovering from the intestinal flu in Jewish Hospital on the night of Jan. 14, 1993, the University of Louisville’s head basketball coach relayed his instructions by telephone to the Cardinals bench.

When Clifford Rozier produced two early dunks against Virginia Commonwealth on a play called “swing-em,” Crum ordered assistant Jerry Jones to stop running it.

“Denny thought you save plays that you know will work until the end of the game,” Jones said. “I’d have run it every time. Cliff could have had 50.”

Rozier sank his first eight shots from the field that night, and he might have challenged Wes Unseld’s single-game school record of 45 points if not for Crum’s conservatism. When Rozier’s troubled life ended Friday following cardiac arrest at the age of 45, memories of the player he was were inextricably intertwined with nagging thoughts on what he might have been.

Earlier coverage: Former Louisville basketball star Clifford Rozier dies

A first-team All-American at Louisville and a first-round draft choice of the Golden State Warriors, Rozier was quick, intuitive and 6-foot-11. He would average double-figures in scoring and rebounding in both of his seasons at U of L, but he subsequently suffered from drug abuse and hallucinations and was waived by his third NBA team less than a month into his fourth NBA season.

“If you ask me if he got the most out of his talent at the professional level, I’d say no,” Jones said. “He could have gotten more out of his talent in college. If you were there all the time with him, he’s good. (But) If you think he’s going to do it on his own, it’s not going to happen.

“Probably, the game came too easy. When it comes too easy, you think, ‘I can turn it on when I have to.’ Sometimes big guys are like that. They think they can turn it on and off. In the pros, it doesn’t work like that.”

Rozier performed at a high level at U of L despite recurring issues with alcohol. Matt Brown, then a student manager, recalls Rozier arriving for a Saturday practice in a taxi he had taken from Lexington, claiming he was “too drunk to drive.” Brown remembers Rozier, during a 1994 NCAA Tournament trip to California, proposing a post-bedcheck clubbing expedition to roommate Doug Calhoun.

“You’re an All-American. I’m a walk-on,” Calhoun replied. “I’ll be on the first plane back. You’ll still be playing.”

Tales of Rozier’s undergraduate nightlife might seem more amusing now if not for his fortune-blowing descent into drug abuse and homelessness. A recovering crack addict, heavily medicated for schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, Rozier recounted hearing voices urging him to jump off buildings and into traffic in a 2010 interview.

“I started seeing snakes everywhere,” Rozier told the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. “They were all around me. They would say, ‘I bet you won’t run out in front of that car. Don’t worry about it. God will save you.’ And I’m like, ‘Why do I have to run out in front of a car because you said God will save me?’ And I’m just having questions and battles with this person on ways to kill me.”

See also: Who is the best player to wear each number for Louisville basketball?

At the time, Rozier was living in a halfway house in Bradenton, Florida, having squandered more than $3.5 million in NBA salary.

“Ain’t nobody heard from me in almost 10 years,” he told reporter Chris Anderson. “I don’t go nowhere. I keep to myself. I want to stay here.”

Darrell Walker, who coached Rozier with the Toronto Raptors during the 1996-97 season, came to realize that problems he once attributed to anger management “went a little deeper than that.”

“At times, he could get angry real fast, get angry with teammates,” said Walker, now the head coach at Arkansas-Little Rock. “When his mind was right, he was kind of a fun guy to be around. He was very aggressive, and I liked that.

“At that time, nobody knew that he probably had some issues. Nobody had diagnosed (mental illness) early in his career, and that’s unfortunate.”

Tragic, it turns out.

Tim Sullivan: 502-582-4650, tsullivan@courier-journal.com; Twitter: @TimSullivan714. Support strong local journalism by subscribing today: www.courier-journal.com/tims