Basketball Culture
Why the Trail Blazers Retired #30: Bob Gross
Bob Gross was Portland's defensive secret weapon in 1977 — the player who held Julius Erving in check and helped deliver the only championship in franchise history.
5 min
Career Journey
Julius Erving invented the athletic language of modern basketball. Before him, the game was played below the rim by players who used footwork and positioning to create scoring opportunities. Dr. J introduced above-the-rim decision-making — the shift in plane mid-flight, the baseline undercut, the reverse layup from a position where gravity had already taken everything else — that became the vocabulary for every highlight-reel play that followed, from Jordan to LeBron to the next generation of wings.
Erving's career in the ABA produced three MVP awards and two championships with the New York Nets before the league's merger with the NBA in 1976. His ABA statistics — averaging 28.7 points per game over four seasons while winning the scoring title five consecutive years — reflected a player who was dominant in a league that, while underrated by the mainstream press, featured genuine professional talent. His 1981 NBA MVP with Philadelphia completed a cross-league résumé that gave him legitimate claim to the most decorated peak of any forward between Russell's era and Jordan's.
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Bob Gross was Portland's defensive secret weapon in 1977 — the player who held Julius Erving in check and helped deliver the only championship in franchise history.
Philadelphia 76ers
Philadelphia 76ers
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Virginia Squires
1972-1973
New York Nets
1973-1976
Philadelphia 76ers
1976-1987
His 1980 baseline left-handed layup over Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in the NBA Finals — moving from the right side of the basket, floating to the left, curling under the backboard, and laying the ball in with his right hand — is among the most discussed individual plays in basketball history, not because it was the most athletically extreme thing he did, but because it was done at maximum Finals pressure by a player who had already established that he could do anything.
Erving attended Massachusetts before beginning his professional career in 1972. He was 21 years old when he made his professional debut and did not slow down for the next 15 years.
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