He was a Crystal City’s banker son. Crystal City is a small place in the middle of Missouri, not far from St. Louis. He had a lot of aspirations since in the early stages of life. Bill Bradley studied a lot and was very good at it, he was open to every kind a culture, and he was curious and ambitious. Bill Bradley wanted to become the U.S. president. He failed in this regard: his run was stopped at the primary of his Democratic Party in 2000. But he was the state of New Jersey Senator for three terms, so it’s safe to say he was a very successful politician. And before he was a great athlete. Bill Bradley went to Princeton, Ivy League, and had a terrific college career. He brought Princeton to the NCAA Final Four scoring 40 points in the quarterfinals, then scored 58 points in the consolation game. He also won the Olympic gold medal at Tokyo in 1964 and when he finished his four-year career was selected in the first round of the NBA draft by the New York Knicks. A perfect story.
And still he had different ideas. He wanted to study; he wanted to be perfect and moved to Oxford, making the Knicks wait two years for him.
When he returned to the States, he won two NBA titles, his jersey number 24 was retired and his career went straight to the Hall of Fame. His political career started very soon later but before… before he was in Milano. In 1965 Simmenthal chased a great European dream to validate its place in the history. The great Cesare Rubini had a terrific idea and proposed to Bradley a contract: he’d have studied and lived in London, then hopped on a plane and reunited with his teammates in time to play in the Champions’ Cup. Bradley, contacted by Sandro Gamba, accepted. He played one year in Milano. The ones lucky enough to watch him still talk about him as you talk about a legend. The practice sessions, the seriousness, the smartness, the passes, how he moved without the ball, theoutside shooting. Bradley brought Olimpia to the European title alone? It’d very superficial to say that. Olimpia had a lot of great champions, it had Pieri, Vianello, Thoren, was a formidable team but Bradley was the glue that held the team together. He gave Simmenthal whatever Simmenthal needed, points (37 against Giessen, 27 against Real Madrid in the crucial game that allowed Milano to go to the Final Four), leadership, defense. On April 1st, 1966, in the Bologna’s final game against Slavia Prague, Milano became European Champions. And Bradley took a place in the European basketball history.
He was born on July 28th in 1943, he has written also seven non-fictional books, the last one in 2012. He played in the NBA only for the New York Knicks
