Bell paying dividends

sportsaholic · 12-22-2006, 08:12 PM

Bell paying dividends

Paul Coro
The Arizona Republic
Dec. 22, 2006 12:00 AM
The formula for the usual NBA standout is to be coddled as a teenage prodigy, own a blue-chip recruiting label, achieve stardom at a major college and become a first-round draft pick with the corresponding fat, guaranteed contract.

Suns guard Raja Bell had none of that. With every fork in his basketball road, Bell could have veered and wound up lost. Instead, he kept slamming the accelerator and didn't let up, even as he arrived as a prominent NBA figure in Phoenix.

"When I came out of college, I could've never dreamed that I'd be on a team as good as the Suns and get to play the role I play," Bell said.

That meant going undrafted out of Florida International. That meant starting out in the United States Basketball League doing his Florida team's laundry, carrying a Continental Basketball Association team's bags in Yakima, Wash., and eating at Denny's with his International Basketball League teammates in Sioux Falls, S.D., when the first NBA call came.

"It's been a blessing to be able to watch him take the small steps to his dream," Bell's wife, Cindy, said. "He's been able to appreciate every little thing and not take anything for granted. It keeps him very grounded with people, kids and every situation."

Before last season - his first with Phoenix - vaulted Bell into national notoriety with a career-best season, a playoff clothesline on Kobe Bryant and the pivotal shot of the Suns-Clippers series, Bell had to get off the bench in Yakima in 1999.

He was only there because a friend of Yakima coach Paul Woolpert scouted for Atlanta, where Bell was cut after one preseason game, and convinced him to draft Bell among a fourth round of no-names in the CBA draft.

"A lot of people in the CBA had never heard of him," Woolpert said. "The one constant is Raja. He knew he belonged in the NBA. There was no question in his mind. He had that sheer determination."

Dominoes fell right

Fortunately, James Cotton could not take the CBA grind and quit, leaving Bell as the team's only shooting guard. Even after he broke into the NBA with Philadelphia, Bell was out again in 2002. He was playing in Spain a year after he went from being a 10-day-contract Sixer to guarding Bryant in the 2001 NBA Finals.

"I wondered if I'd ever play in the NBA again," Bell said.

Fortunately, Suns center Pat Burke had left their Spanish team, Tau Ceramica, two weeks before Bell told their coach he wanted to leave. Normally, fringe players don't ask out of lucrative European deals and teams don't let them walk. Burke's absence put them in need of an American big man. Bell was let go and he hitched with Dallas when Greg Buckner's departure left Dallas in need of a stopper.

Fortunately, the Mavericks had a point guard named Steve Nash who wound up placing the call that convinced Bell to sign with Phoenix in 2005.

Who's fortunate now? Bell or Phoenix, which landed Bell with a midnight call that came before scheduled meetings with four other teams in Miami.

"Raja is really the heart and soul of our team," Suns coach Mike D'Antoni said. "He's a little nutty but we all are. His best attribute is his heart."

Bell's price, $24 million over five years, is arguably a bargain.

"For me to be where I've come from and have coaches coming to talk to me and my wife (Cindy) about their team was unbelievable," he said. "I did better than I ever thought I'd do. I'm slightly a victim of timing. But my existence in this league is the product of good timing. So if I'm going to take the good, I take everything else. I caught a lot of breaks to get here."

Bell bought a lakeside house for his parents - Roger (a University of Miami associate athletic director) and Denise (a teacher) slept on a sofa bed while Raja and his sister, Tombi, shared the Miami apartment's bedroom when they first moved from the U.S. Virgin Islands.

"To be able to give back to them is what I was in it for," Bell said.

This place, where Taco Bell gives him endorsements and ESPN.com carries his journal, never was certain. Only his passion for the game was and had been since he was a kid drawing lines in the street to run sprints or playing in "strength shoes" carrying extra weight.

That love is why he drove from Miami to Boca Raton to make enough in the USBL to cover his gas.

"It was just, 'Give me a uniform, a ball and a floor,' and I was good to go," Bell said.

That is how it was in Philadelphia. Jumaine Jones, Bell's teammate with the Sixers and now in Phoenix, said, "He's the same guy. He did the same things. Most people talk about how much better he got but, to me, he just got the opportunity."

That is how it was in Dallas. Then-Mavericks coach Don Nelson said, "I misread Raja Bell. I liked him very much but I saw him as a defender and a utility kind of guy. I just didn't think he'd ever develop the shooting touch he has now. Give him all the credit. He has made himself a player and a wonderful player. We always knew he was tough and could guard and run."

That is how it was in Utah. Jazz teammate Jarron Collins said, "He brings a lot of energy and tremendous passion to the court. At times, he shows a fire that results in people getting put in headlocks. Fans respect that. As a teammate, you respect someone that has that fire. He won't back down from anyone or any challenge."

Now, everyone knows. He is a respected defender, one of the league's more accomplished three-point shooters and tougher than tank armor. Since the playoffs, fans nationwide tilt their heads or squint their eyes in recognition of a celebrity in public.

He accepts the status among his fans warmly but longs to remain "normal." He is still the guy who eats at a pancake house with Cindy on game days and prefers going to a movie or staying at his central Phoenix house with his wife, who is expecting their first child, a son, in May after two years of marriage and a 10-year relationship that began when he transferred to Florida International. Cindy jokes now that he taught her to have patience.

Now, she returns the favor when his competitive fire is inextinguishable.

"I try my best to give him that calm in the middle of the storm," she said. "It doesn't always work but as long as I'm there."

Link to artical
http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/sports/articles/1222bell1222.html

Very good story!