Saying goodbye: A friend remembers

The smile. I'll remember the smile.

Gary Wortman and I were reading the box scores in USA Today and eating breakfast in a hotel coffee shop in Wilmington, N.C., when this broad smile crossed Gary's face.

It was the kind of smile a parent gets when he sees his son's straight-A report card.

"Check Nate's line," Gary said.

The box score showed Nate McMillan, then a young Sonic point guard who was struggling to learn this most difficult position, had dealt 22 assists in a win over the Los Angeles Clippers.

Wortman, a Sonic scout at the time, was as happy as if he'd dished those assists himself.

He had lobbied the Sonics to draft McMillan in the second round in 1986. He saw intelligence, athleticism and leadership qualities in McMillan that most NBA scouts didn't see.

But on this morning in February 1987, Gary wasn't happy for himself. He wasn't happy because Nate McMillan was making him look good. He was happy for Nate, because he knew how hard it was for a young kid to come into the NBA and play point guard.

He was happy because he considered McMillan a friend, and Gary always seemed happier with his friends' successes than they did.

Gary Wortman, 59, a friend of mine, somebody who made my life better because I knew him, died last week from brain cancer.

"Whenever I talked with him, he always knew how I was doing," McMillan, now a Sonic assistant coach, said this week. "He knew my stats. He knew if I was doing well, or if I needed to do some things."

Gary took almost a fatherly interest in McMillan. He knew Coach Bernie Bickerstaff's tough-love approach was hard on McMillan. He saw the crisis of confidence that McMillan was facing.

Surreptitiously, selflessly, Wortman worked with McMillan. When he was on the road scouting, he would call the Sonic point guard with elaborate scouting reports on the night's opposing point guards.

McMillan didn't ask for the phone calls. Bickerstaff didn't know about them. This was between Nate and Gary. Nobody else had to know.

"He knew I was a young guy coming in here with all these veterans," McMillan said. "And he always kept me up to date. He was there for support, moral support. He was never negative. He was always positive.

"He would call me all the time, no matter where we were, and let me know the tendencies of the guys I was going up against. And no one knew he was doing that. It was something that he just did.

"It wasn't Bernie Bickerstaff telling him to do it. It was him understanding that I was young, playing a major role and I needed some support."

In a league full of egos, full of coaches and scouts who think they developed the next great system or discovered the next great talent, Gary Wortman practically was ego-free.

He was in the business because he loved it. He wanted to make players better, but he didn't want to read about how he did it.

"That story about Nate is a great example of how Gary operated," said Pete Babcock, Atlanta Hawk general manager and one of Gary's best friends. "He wasn't looking for recognition, or attention or fanfare. He did things because he wanted to help.

"He didn't expect a lot of pats on the back. He didn't care if people told him what a great job he did. It's just how he did things."

Wortman played for Les Habegger at Seattle Pacific and coached at Kentridge High School before joining the Sonics.

This would have been his ninth season as director of scouting with the Hawks. For eight years before that he was a scout and assistant coach for the Sonics.

He was one of the lucky guys in this league, a guy who was doing exactly what he wanted to do. He was somebody who had an unquenchable passion for the game, but also had an ability to step away from it and enjoy his family and friends.

We got to be good friends, hanging out at Green Lake. We would run around the lake and talk hoops, or talk about the latest nonfiction book he was reading.

I remember him telling me about the new guy in the Sonic office, President Bob Whitsitt. "The guy really knows basketball," Gary told me.

Gary always had a healthy skepticism about sportswriters, and it took me more than a year to convince him to let me tag along on a scouting trip.

We got snowbound in Syracuse and fogbound in Wilmington, but we always made it to the next game on the next night, and we had a blast.

This is the kind of friend he is:

During our trip, I mentioned that I hope to, someday, write a novel.

"You're going to need a better computer," he said, pointing to my jalopy of a Radio Shack.

When we got back to Seattle, without my knowledge, he started shopping for computers. He became friendly with a computer salesman, eventually put a computer on layaway, dragged me to the store and made me buy it.

"Now write your novel," he said.

If or when I do, it will be dedicated to him.

Gary was the kind of guy you wanted to make proud. Whether you were a player, a coach, or a sportswriter, you wanted him to like what you did.

"How do you explain love?" said Habegger, a former Sonic assistant coach and general manager who first brought Gary into the Sonic scouting crew. "I mean, why do we get into coaching? We want to help to develop young men and influence young men. . . .

"He was very, very influential in my life. He was such a caring guy. A hard-nosed player. I really loved him. He contributed greatly to my life. I look at these clippings now that say Gary Wortman is dead and I think it's not possible. I grieve. I really grieve."

Gary was an excellent judge of talent. He convinced Habegger to pick Xavier McDaniel over Detlef Schrempf and it was obvious, at the time, the Sonics needed McDaniel more.

He was especially good at finding players late in the draft. He argued for McMillan.

He helped engineer a draft-day trade with Chicago that brought Shammond Williams to Atlanta with the 34th pick. "We made a big mistake cutting him," Babcock said.

And he found Atlanta forward Chris Crawford with the 51st pick of the 1997 draft.

"Gary paid attention to detail and had a good feel for talent," said Toronto Coach Lenny Wilkens, who was with Wortman in Seattle and Atlanta. "He was a very upbeat guy. Hope always sprung eternal with him."

He pushed for the trade that brought Dikembe Mutombo to Atlanta from Denver. And he fought for the trade with Miami that got the Hawks Steve Smith and Grant Long for Kevin Willis. He knew the game. The Hawks averaged 49 wins in Wortman's first six seasons.

"He was so easy to be around," Babcock said. "He would always be very honest with you about his opinion. With so many guys there's some sense of a hidden agenda. It's like there's something else they're trying to achieve.

"There never was that sense with Gary. If I didn't agree with him, he was never afraid to stand his ground and make his case. Normally he was right. We never did anything basketball-wise, as an organization, without Gary's input."

Gary was a good basketball man, but he was a better person. When my wife was diagnosed with a brain tumor in 1991, he was one of the first people to call me.

That's not an easy call to make, but on a day when I was feeling lousy, he lifted my spirits.

"You knew he was sincere when he asked you how you were doing," McMillan said. "You could look him in the face and tell that he was really concerned. He wasn't just blowing smoke.

"He was just an honest guy, a good guy who everybody respected. He was just a good guy and it seems like things like this happen too often to the best guys."

When a friend dies, there always are so many regrets on so many levels.

I don't think Gary knew how much his enthusiasm rubbed off on me. I don't think he knew how much his kind words helped my writing.

I'm not sure I've met anyone else in sports who was as generous with his spirit as Gary was.

Nate McMillan, who is a lot like Gary Wortman, is right.

Gary was a good guy in every way. And I wish I could have told him that, one last time.