The Oregonian / 1996
Kevin Duckworth leading a Special Olympics basketball clinic in Beaverton in 1996.
The Trail Blazers and The Oregonian sports page (here and here) have sites paying tribute to Kevin Duckworth. Here’s our editorial remembering the big man.

Kevin Duckworth, 1964-2008

Anybody who lived in Portland in May 1990 remembers the surge of elation that followed the emergence of a 300-pound man from the Trail Blazers’ locker room.

It was Game 7 of a playoff series against the formidable San Antonio Spurs. The Blazers had managed to reach the final game without their big man, Kevin Duckworth, who had broken a bone in his hand three weeks earlier and hadn’t played since.

The doctors told him he couldn’t play for three more days. But he came to the arena vowing to talk his way onto the floor. When Duckworth trotted out, the fans in the Memorial Coliseum erupted. “I’ve never heard the fans sound so loud,” he said.

The Blazers won in overtime. It was the start of a terrific run for Duckworth, Jerome Kersey, Terry Porter, Buck Williams, Clyde Drexler and the rest — a run that led to the construction of the Rose Garden and a permanent expectation that the team would play deep into the postseason.

But Duckworth, who died of apparent heart failure Monday on the Oregon coast, where he was to host a free clinic, was more than a valuable basketball player. He was a big, sensitive man who happened to have a sweet, short jumper.

He avoided scandal and spoke warmly of his friends and teammates. He was gracious with fans, who were saddened when he was traded away. But he never really left. He made Oregon his home and spent a lot of time in his wood shop or on the water, pulling fish from Northwest streams and lakes. Home won’t be the same without him. 

http://blazers.blogs.oregonlive.com/default.asp?item=165976