Julius Erving
Julius Winfield "Dr. J" Erving II is an American former professional basketball player. He helped legitimize the American Basketball Association, and was the best-known player in the league when it merged into the National Basketball Association after the 1975–1976 season.
Erving won three championships, four Most Valuable Player awards and three scoring titles with the ABA's Virginia Squires and New York Nets and the NBA's Philadelphia 76ers. During his 16 seasons as a player, none of his teams ever missed the postseason. He is the ninth-highest scorer in ABA/NBA history with 30,026 points. He was well known for slam dunking from the free-throw line in Slam Dunk Contests and was the only player voted Most Valuable Player in both the ABA and the NBA. The basketball slang of being posterized was first coined to describe his moves. In 1980, Erving was honored as one of the league's greatest players of all time by being named to the NBA 35th Anniversary Team. In 1993, Erving was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame. In 1994, Erving was named by Sports Illustrated as one of the 40 most important athletes of all time. In 2004, he was inducted into the Nassau County Sports Hall of Fame. In both 1996 and 2021, Erving was again honored as one of the league's greatest players of all time by being named to the NBA's 50th and 75th anniversary teams, respectively.
Many consider him one of the most talented players in the history of the NBA; he is widely acknowledged as one of the game's best dunkers. While Connie Hawkins, "Jumping" Johnny Green, Elgin Baylor, Jim Pollard and Gus Johnson performed spectacular dunks before Erving's time, Erving brought the practice into the mainstream. His signature was the slam dunk, since incorporated into the vernacular and basic skill set of the game in the same manner as the crossover dribble and the no look pass. Before Erving, dunking was a practice most commonly used by the big men, usually standing close to the hoop, to show their brutal strength which was seen as style over substance, even unsportsmanlike, by many purists of the game; however, the way Erving utilized the dunk more as a high-percentage shot made at the end of maneuvers generally starting well away from the basket and not necessarily a show of force helped to make the shot an acceptable tactic, especially in trying to avoid a blocked shot. Although the slam dunk is still widely used as a show of power, a method of intimidation and a way to fire up a team and spectators, Erving demonstrated that there can be great artistry and grace in slamming the ball into the hoop, particularly after a launch several feet from that target.
Early life
Erving was born February 22, 1950, in East Meadow, on Long Island, and raised from the age of 13 in Roosevelt, New York. Prior to that, he lived in nearby Hempstead. He attended Roosevelt High School and played for its basketball team. He received the nickname "Doctor" or "Dr. J" from a high school friend named Leon Saunders. He explains: "I started calling 'the professor' and he started calling me 'the doctor'. So it was just between us...we were buddies, we had our nicknames and we would roll with the nicknames. ... And that's where it came from."Erving recalled that "later on, in the Rucker Park league in Harlem, when people started calling me 'Black Moses' and 'Houdini', I told them if they wanted to call me anything, call me 'Doctor'". Over time, the nickname evolved into "Dr. Julius" and finally "Dr. J." Erving was first called "Dr. J" by his friend and future teammate on the Nets and Squires, Willie Sojourner.
College career and Team USA
Erving enrolled at the University of Massachusetts Amherst in 1968. In two varsity college basketball seasons, he averaged 26.3 points and 20.2 rebounds per game, becoming one of only six players to average more than 20 points and 20 rebounds per game in NCAA Men's Basketball. In 1968, the NCAA adopted a rule that prohibited dunking. Thus, Erving's dunking was only seen and known to teammates at practice.Fifteen years later, Erving fulfilled a promise he had made to his mother by earning a bachelor's degree in creative leadership and administration from the school through the University Without Walls program. Erving also holds an honorary doctorate from UMass. In September 2021, Massachusetts honored Erving by unveiling a statue outside the Mullins Center on the university's campus.
In the year 1970, Erving also played for the United States Olympic Development Team as an aim to qualify for the Olympic team in the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, Germany. Erving, wearing the jersey number six, played power forward and was recruited to be the team's top rebounder. He ended up being the top vote-getter for Most Valuable Player or MVP, a top scorer for Team USA, and successfully competed against adult professional players from the Soviet Union, Finland, and other European countries alongside teammates Bob Nash and Paul Westphal. It was around this time Erving started hearing talks among his teammates of the American Basketball Association and its novel goal to recruit undergraduates as a plan to compete with the National Basketball Association. After a meeting with ABA general manager Johnny "Red" Kerr and future coach Al Bianchi, he then decided to inform his mother that he will join the ABA in late 1971 while staying in a hotel in Philadelphia talking with a double agent named Steve Arnold. This became a subject of litigation for Erving's NBA rights to play for the Atlanta Hawks in the next year.
Professional career
Virginia Squires (1971–1973)
Although NBA rules at the time did not allow teams to draft players who were fewer than four years removed from high school, the ABA instituted a “hardship” rule that would allow players to leave college early. Erving took advantage of the rule change and left Massachusetts after his junior year to sign a four-year contract worth $500,000 spread over seven years with the Virginia Squires. However, the Squires were forced to forfeit their first round pick in the 1972 ABA draft in order for the ABA to allow this move on their end, later being one of four ABA teams to relinquish their first round draft pick rights during that year's draft period.Erving quickly established himself as a force and gained a reputation for hard and ruthless dunking. He scored 27.3 points per game as a rookie, was selected to the All-ABA Second Team, made the ABA All-Rookie Team, led the ABA in offensive rebounds and finished second to Artis Gilmore for the ABA Rookie of the Year Award. He led the Squires into the Eastern Division Finals, where they lost to the Rick Barry-led New York Nets in seven games. The Nets went to the finals, losing to the star-studded Indiana Pacers team.
ABA–NBA contract dispute
Under NBA rules, he became eligible for the 1972 NBA draft and the Milwaukee Bucks picked him in the first round, a move that would have brought him together with Oscar Robertson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Prior to the draft, he signed a contract with the Atlanta Hawks worth more than $1 million with a $250,000 bonus. The signing with the Hawks came after a dispute with the Squires where he demanded a renegotiation of the terms. He discovered that his agent at the time, Steve Arnold, was employed by the Squires and convinced him to sign a below-market contract.This created a dispute among three teams in two leagues. The Bucks asserted their rights to Erving via the draft, while the Squires went to court to force him to honor his contract. He joined Pete Maravich at the Hawks' training camp, as they prepared for the upcoming season. He played two exhibition games with the Hawks until NBA Commissioner J. Walter Kennedy ruled that the Bucks owned Erving's rights via the draft. Kennedy fined the Hawks $25,000 per game in violation of his ruling. Atlanta appealed Kennedy's decision to the league owners, who also supported the Bucks’ position. While waiting for the owners’ decision, Erving played in one more preseason game, earning the Hawks another fine. Erving enjoyed his brief time with Atlanta and he would later duplicate with George Gervin his after-practice playing with Maravich.
On October 2, Judge Edward Neaher issued an injunction that prohibited him from playing for any team other than the Squires. The judge then sent the case to arbitration because of an arbitration clause in Erving's contract with Virginia. He agreed to report to the Squires while his appeal of the injunction made its way through the court.
Back in the ABA, his game flourished and he achieved a career-best 31.9 points per game in the 1972–1973 season. The following year, the cash-strapped Squires sold his contract to the New York Nets.
New York Nets (1973–1976)
The Squires, like most ABA teams, were on rather shaky financial ground. The cash-strapped team sent Erving to the Nets in a complex deal that kept him in the ABA. Erving signed an eight-year deal worth a reported $350,000 per year. The Squires received $750,000, George Carter and the rights to Kermit Washington for Erving and Willie Sojourner. The Nets also sent $425,000 to the Hawks to reimburse the team for its legal fees, fines and the bonus paid to Erving. Finally, Atlanta would receive draft compensation should a merger of the league result in a common draft.Erving went on to lead the Nets to their first ABA title in 1973–1974, defeating the Utah Stars. Erving established himself as the most important player in the ABA. His spectacular play established the Nets as one of the better teams in the ABA and brought fans and credibility to the league.
The end of the 1975–76 ABA season finally brought the ABA–NBA merger. The Nets and Nuggets had applied for admission to the NBA before the season, in anticipation of the eventual merger that had first been proposed by the two leagues in 1970 but which was delayed for various reasons, including the Oscar Robertson free agency suit. The Erving-led Nets defeated the Denver Nuggets in the ABA's final championship. In the postseason, Erving averaged 34.7 points and was named Most Valuable Player of the playoffs. That season, he finished in the top 10 in the ABA in points per game, rebounds per game, assists per game, steals per game, blocks per game, free throw percentage, free throws made, free throws attempted, three-point field goal percentage and three-point field goals made. This is the only season in the ABA or the NBA where such a feat was accomplished.