Re: Lorenzen Wright Found Dead
Man this sucks. RIP...
Man this sucks. RIP...
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Re: Lorenzen Wright Found Dead
damn man RIPEricmaynor3.com
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Re: Lorenzen Wright Found Dead
Sad. R.I.P.
When I first heard the news I was thinking suicide. But, this sounds really crazy now. He was shot 12 times? Nuts.
I remember watching him when he played at Memphis.
Last edited by LingeringRegime; 07-29-2010, 08:24 AM.Comment
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Re: Lorenzen Wright Found Dead
Lorenzen Wright had some very solid seasons in Memphis and Atlanta. He was 34 years old and had 6 children. Every article I read has something different on the details of his death. However he passed away, it's certainly tragic.
R.I.P. Lorenzen Wright
http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/column...=Wright-100729
The NBA world is so warped, the values so skewed, that sometimes the simplest acts can seem extraordinary. That was the case when Lorenzen Wright offered to drive his friend and colleague around.
But it was that small measure of grace, far from the normal image of the self-centered professional athlete, that popped into Johnny Doyle's mind when he heard that Wright was found dead Wednesday. Doyle was the Clippers' strength and conditioning coach when Wright first played in the NBA near the end of the 1990s, and Doyle was the beneficiary of Wright's "good guy" persona you heard mentioned so often Wednesday. When Doyle wrecked his car, it was Wright who spent a week driving him to practice or wherever else he needed to go. Wright had a Chevy Tahoe, which he was particularly fond of because its red paint matched the color of his college fraternity, Kappa Alpha Psi.
After Wright left the Clippers to sign a free-agent contract with the Atlanta Hawks, he'd still drive Doyle around whenever the Clippers came to Atlanta. They'd go to Wright's house or out to dinner. Wherever they wound up Wright usually had family members with him.
"He loved his family," Doyle said. "He loved his dad and his brother. They came out [to Los Angeles] with him. I remember how much he loved his family. They were always around."
Wright would expand the family base by raising six children of his own. A seventh died at a young age. One might think that losing a child would have been enough sadness for a family that had already had to deal with the bullet that left Wright's father paralyzed. Now more bullets have reportedly ended Lorenzen's life at age 34.
An exceptional amount of misfortune for someone whom Doyle considered an exceptional man, one he formed a closer bond with than most of the players he worked with in his time he spent with the Clippers from 1993-2005. They had recently reconnected on Facebook, and from his brief messages Wright still seemed to be the same happy-go-lucky person Doyle remembered.
And now more adversity has come to the group with which Doyle formed some of his fondest memories. An impossible-to-believe percentage of the saddest NBA-related stories of recent years have sprung from the roster of the 1996-97 Clippers.
Malik Sealy was 30 when he was killed by a drunk driver while returning from Kevin Garnett's birthday party in the early morning hours of May 20, 2000.
Kevin Duckworth died of a heart attack at age 44 on Aug. 25, 2008.
Rodney Rogers was paralyzed from the shoulders down in a Nov. 28, 2008, dirt-bike accident.
Dwayne Schintzius fought leukemia and needed a bone-marrow transplant to fight his way back to become cancer-free, according to this recent report.
And now Wright is gone.
When Wright signed his big contract with the Hawks, which immediately doubled his annual salary, I remember people wondering whether he really deserved the money coming off a season in which he averaged 6.6 points and 7.5 rebounds per game. Those who knew him -- whether they were longtime friends from his hometown of Memphis or people who had come into his life more recently, such as Doyle -- were happy for Wright, glad to see a good person rewarded. The money in the NBA, just as the standards by which Wright's good deeds seemed to stand out, is all relative. Does anyone really deserve multiple millions of dollars to play basketball?
Now the question is turned around, with a tragic twist involving a life ended by multiple gunshots, leaving us to wonder all over again: What could he possibly have done to deserve this?
Rather than post the sordid speculations or get into the details of what the end of life was for former Hawk and 13-year NBA vet Lorenzen Wright, I wanted to share about how I remember the guy called "Wren".
Star-divide
The only man who was more fired up about losing than I was.....and I am a nut-job who once removed myself the arena after slamming and breaking a Diet Coke plastic bottle, spraying many a patron, after a first quarter beating at the hands of the visiting Spurs in 2000. Yet, Wren was said to have caused more than his share of ruckus after a loss and according to Stan Kasten, put me to shame.
I initially remember Wren as not quite being the player we thought he would be after Pete Babcock traded (2) first round picks to the Clippers and signed him to a 7/42 deal prior to the 1999-2000 season. He was supposed to be part of the tear-down/rebuild project that featured Jason Terry and Dion Glover, but that plan for success never materialized.
But what we did get was a guy that could knock down a short base-line jumper, rebounded well on the defensive glass, and would get so intense after a loss that teammates would scatter when Wren would go knocking down chairs and other items in the lockerroom, post-game.
When we weren't losing games, and in 1999-2001, that wasn't too often, Wren was smiling, chatty, his outgoing personality obvious. At Dominique's retirement dinner, I asked Wren how it was to play against Lenny Wilkens, who had been hired by Raptors. Lenny, you see, was not anxious in the least about playing the man Babcock acquired, so when Wren was playing considerably more under new coach Lon Kruger, I knew Wren couldn't wait to play the Raptors.
Wren, who had a subpar shooting night but still turned in a double-double, said he reveled in the Hawks winning 78-72 and said he let out a big "Staaaaaaaan Albeck!" in the coach's direction. Albeck, who followed Lenny from Atlanta to Toronto, had also been less than eager to play the young forward.
I'll also always remember him leaving the Philips Arena floor after one of those many losses, face stern with anger and disappointment, removing his jersey and putting it in my stomach as if I were Jamal Anderson. That jersey hangs in my closet still, with pride, because Wren was fun and cared about winning and losing, character items that fans want in a young player. No, he was never worth the loot that Pete paid for him, but I always felt he gave everything he had and cared about the outcome.
He was soon gone to the Grizzlies for Shareef Abdur-Rahim and while I wasn't around for Wren's second tour through Atlanta, I wish I had been. I would have liked to share/laugh about a couple of those stories from his earlier years and thank him for the jersey and for caring during some pretty rotten times.
Because that's how I remember him. A Hawk. #42. Rest in peace.Comment
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Re: Lorenzen Wright Found Dead
Wow shot 12 times?! and yeah the ex wife seems involved in this somehow in some of the info i've read about this.
R.I.P.Member of the Official OS Bills Backers Club
"Baseball is the most important thing that doesn't matter at all" - Robert B. ParkerComment
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Re: Lorenzen Wright Found Dead
It's very sad and I obviously echo the sentiments of others here in feeling bad for the family. It's sad when any life ends like this, and even more sad to think that the cycle of violence just continues...Comment
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Re: Lorenzen Wright Found Dead
Prayers out to his Family, let them find some Peace.
GT: IIx PaCmAN xII
Rams/Mizzou/Cards
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Re: Lorenzen Wright Found Dead
If he was shot 12 times then robbery was clearly not the motive. Smells like a crime of passion to me.Comment
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Re: Lorenzen Wright Found Dead
A 911 call comes, the dispatcher supposedly heard multiple gunshots, a guy screaming and nothing happens?Comment
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Re: Lorenzen Wright Found Dead
Tweet from Bill Simmons:
Isn't that insane?RIP Lorenzen Wright. 4 '96 Clippers passed away (Sealy, Wright, B. Williams, Duckworth) + a 5th is a quadraplegic (R. Rogers). Dumbfounding.Originally posted by G PericoComment
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Re: Lorenzen Wright Found Dead
That was in JA adande's article.
I am moving to Memphis soon and this is sad for a city that has fought the crime stigma for years.
Wright was a bust as a player but he appeared to be a good dude. Otherwise you don't get this kind of press for a 8ppg former NBA player.Comment
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Re: Lorenzen Wright Found Dead
Apparently the ex wife has been taken into custody. Hopefully they'll use the information my dad and other neighbors know and use it to put that woman away.
I found out today that she gets $16,000 a month in child support. InsaneOriginally posted by CardsFan27What I'm Currently Listening ToComment
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Re: Lorenzen Wright Found Dead
My dad (Coleman) was on the news tonight.
MEMPHIS,TN – Homicide detectives spent their Sunday afternoon in Sherra Wright’s Collierville home collecting evidence. They spent an hour in the backyard which doesn’t come as a surprise to neighbors Tim Coleman and Ruth Ann Carnes who saw heavy smoke coming from the fire pit the day Lorenzen went missing. They say that’s because Sherra Wright started a fire in the backyard, and they thought it was unusual for Wright to light a fire on one of the hottest nights of the year.
Coleman says that’s not the only bizarre behavior he’s noticed over the weeks. While on the phone in her front yard he heard Sherra Wright on the phone. “I just heard her talking to somebody about needing her money. I don’t know anymore than that. I really try not to listen to it but when she’s screaming it’s hard not to hear stuff.”
Neighbors like Ruth Ann Coleman say former Grizzlies and Tigers Player Lorenzen Wright lived for his children. “He was a big tweeter and he talked about his kids all the time.”
It’s been four days since Lorenzen Wright’s body was discovered in a field. He was reported missing by his mother July 22, 2010. He was last seen by his ex-wife July 18, 2010. Sherra Wright has been questioned by Memphis Police, so far no one has been charged in connection with Lorenzen Wright’s deathOriginally posted by CardsFan27What I'm Currently Listening ToComment
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