We’re all accustomed to tragedy. Turn on the news, and it’s everywhere — betrayal, genocide, famine. We know that tragedy can occur at any moment, and we live our lives wary of it occurring. Tragedy is normal, background noise, because it often seems a long way off — just headlines on the news, until it makes its way into our own lives.
Tragedy can destroy the values and ideals comprising the foundation of our sense of self. We can believe in control and free will, yet fate can override our conscious efforts. We can believe in love and loyalty, yet betrayal can tear it apart in an instant. All these ideals, these totems to our sense of self, can be ripped apart by tragedy.
This is the story of tragedy ripping apart the ideals of merit and control, the ideals that tell us hard work leads to success. This is the story of a tragedy in which a man rose from nothing to the highest heights based on hard work alone and yet was still left empty-handed. It’s the story of his rise and his fall, and how he built himself up again. It’s the story of Brandon Roy.
“[Brandon] Roy, 365 days, seven days a week. Roy has no weaknesses in his game,” said Kobe Bryant when asked about the toughest player he had to guard in the Western Conference.
Brandon Roy’s early years were the classic example of a come-up story. He was raised in a small West Seattle duplex with three siblings. His father a drove a bus for the Seattle Metro, and his mother worked in a school cafeteria. Like many, Roy took to the game of basketball from a young age. He participated in AAU tournaments and other basketball leagues in Seattle. At one point, Jason Terry — prior to becoming an NBA champion — sponsored his AAU team in middle school.
In 1998, Roy enrolled in Garfield High School. The Metro League school was known for its basketball prowess, and up until Roy stepped on campus, Garfield won 11 state basketball championships. But they had never seen a player quite like Brandon Roy though.
Initially, Roy was buried under elite Garfield squads, but as the years progressed, he earned a varsity spot. Roy broke out in 2001, his junior season, averaging 18.7 points and 5.5 rebounds per game. In his senior year, Roy averaged 22.3 points and 10.4 boards per game, leading Garfield to the state 4A tournament. In his final game, in the loser’s bracket of the 4A tournament, he led Garfield to a 71-70 victory over Snohomish, scoring a personal best of 38 points. He averaged 24.5 points per game in the tournament, scoring 18 or more points in all four tournament games, making the Class 4A all-tournament first team and guiding Garfield to a fourth-place finish in the tournament. Roy became one of the most decorated players in Seattle high school basketball history, being named the KingCo Conference Most Valuable Player not once but twice and finishing as a finalist for the McDonald’s High School All-America Team.
During his time in the Metro League, Roy played with and against several future basketball stars. Roy and fellow Garfield Bulldog Will Conroy would go on to play at the University of Washington together — where they were joined by Nate Robinson, who had just spent four years playing against the Bulldogs for state champion Ranier Beach High School alongside Rodrick and Lodrick Stewart, who both went on to play at USC. Perhaps most notably, Roy had the opportunity to be mentored by the aforementioned Jason Terry and NBA star and Seattle native Jamal Crawford, who “took [Roy] under his wing.”
It’s not often you see such a talent – Roy’s senior year at Garfield put him on the national radar. Scout.com had him as the No. 6 shooting guard and the 36th best overall recruit in the nation. As a senior in 2002 — a time with a very different collegiate and NBA landscape than we see today — elite basketball prospects had two options: commit to and attend college (the option for most players) or declare for the NBA draft.
Roy had committed to the University of Washington to play basketball under head coach Bob Bender. However, after a disappointing 2002 season for the Huskies, Bob Bender was fired. College athletes often commit to schools to play for a specific coach, not for the university. So with Bender gone, Roy’s college basketball future became uncertain.
To complicate things further, Roy suffered from a learning disability throughout high school, and his SAT scores didn’t fit the NCAA’s requirements for participation in college basketball. With test scores looming over his head, Roy didn’t know if he would even be allowed to play college hoops.
Still, the young athlete wasn’t ready for the NBA. Roy was an excellent, four-star prospect in high school. But even still, he wasn’t projected to be in the upper echelon of college basketball players, let alone professional NBA players.
Given Bender’s dismissal, Roy initially put his name into the 2002 NBA draft before ultimately deciding on the college path.
In a 2010 interview with ESPN RISE, Roy shared the realization that he wasn’t “prepared mentally or physically to play in the NBA.” After a meeting with the Huskies’ new head coach Lorenzo Romar, Roy felt confident in the University of Washington basketball program. Not only that, Roy also earned extra time on the SAT due to his learning disability, which he hoped would help him earn a score that would grant him NCAA eligibility. Things were looking up.
The fall of 2002. At 18 years old, many young adults look for a job or begin higher education at a university. Not Roy, though. He was “sitting at home on the couch,” waiting for his SAT score to come in. He couldn’t play basketball until he was academically eligible.
Roy wasn’t one to remain idle, however. His old AAU coach got him a job at the Seattle docks. In an interview, Roy said he was “like a janitor” — cleaning restrooms, taking out trash, or spraying down shipping containers. While his Husky teammates were practicing for the upcoming season on the court, Brandon was hard at work, waiting for those scores.
After a painstaking wait, the scores finally came in. And to Roy’s relief, he had done it. Though it was already the middle of the Huskies’ season, Roy could now suit up and get on the court. He was declared eligible by the NCAA on January 16th, 2003.
Ascent. It’s the key to every hero’s journey, often making up the bulk of a story. We love a good ascent. Why? Because we love having a destination in mind.
Many want their lives to be a story, where everything is pre-planned and prewritten, where life is simply a training ground for a looming climax. Foror most of us, that’s not the case: life is too complex. Yet for Brandon Roy? It’s strangely accurate. His story falls neatly into the camps of exposition, rising action, climax, and resolution. His life seems to follow a script—each step upward, a chapter perfectly placed. And if fate were writing the script, his time at UW was the rising action — the ascent.
The Ascent
“Excellence is a habit, not an act.” – Aristotle
At UW, Roy quickly showed his potential as a freshman, starting in the Huskies’ final two games, averaging 13.8 points and 5.5 rebounds throughout the final four games.
Roy’s rise came at a much-needed time for the University of Washington. Between the years 1988 and Roy’s truncated freshman season in 2003, Washington Men’s Basketball had a mere four winning seasons. Their last period of sustained success was in the 1980s. It was up to Brandon Roy and head coach, Lorenzo Romar, to build a winning culture at the university.
And, in short order, a winning culture they built indeed. In 2004, Roy’s second collegiate season (and his first full campaign), the sophomore started all 31 games for Washington. Roy averaged 12.9 points per game, paced his team with five rebounds a game, and racked up 102 assists and 37 steals. He even scored a career high 30 points in 29 minutes in a game against UCLA that February. Roy was named to the National Basketball Writers Association All-District team and notched honorable mention All-Pac-10 honors.
Thanks in part to Roy, the Huskies went 19-12, breaking their spell of losing seasons. Washington finished second in the Pac-10 Conference and made its first NCAA tournament since 1999. During that 2004 season, Brandon Roy received a Pac-10 Player of the Week award after leading UW to a sweep of Arizona. The last time the Huskies swept Arizona? January 1984, six months before Brandon was born.
Roy’s 2005 junior season got off to a rocky start: he tore his right meniscus three games in, taking him out for a month of Washington’s campaign. He bounced back quickly, though: Roy finished the season with 26 games played, averaged 12.8 points per game and 5.0 boards per game, and posted two double-doubles. The Huskies went 29-6 that season and won their first-ever Pac-10 Conference Tournament championship, earning a No. 1 seed in the NCAA tournament. Washington made it to the Sweet 16.
After a dominant junior season, Roy planned to enter the NBA draft. However, he changed his mind when he found out that his teammate Nate Robinson and top Husky recruit Martell Webster both intended to enter the draft. Roy realized he had an opportunity to elevate his draft stock with another stellar year at UW.
And guess what? He capitalized upon it.
His senior year, Roy averaged 20.2 points per game and guided Washington to a 26-7 season and a second consecutive Sweet Sixteen appearance. Roy was an All-American, named Pac-10 Player of the Year, and was a finalist for nearly every major collegiate award. He left Washington as the best player in Husky basketball history.
Following graduation, entering the NBA draft was a no-brainer; Roy was an elite draft prospect. NBA draft scout Aran Smith described him as a “no-nonsense 2-guard with excellent all-around skills.” The young player possessed excellent shooting skills, and a no-fear play style.
Despite his grocery list of achievements, draft scouts had some reservations about Roy. Some worried he was a “jack of all trades, but a master of none.” While 6’6″ was an average height for a shooting guard, Roy had a shorter wingspan and wasn’t considered to have the overpowering athleticism to compensate. He also had two arthroscopic knee surgeries in college, leading to concerns about his ability to stay healthy as he moved up the ranks.
Collectively, however, those concerns were minor. No one passes on a 6’6″ shooting guard with a proven track record of success. Roy was the sixth overall pick in the 2006 NBA draft, drafted by the Minnesota Timberwolves and then immediately traded to the Portland Trail Blazers on draft night.
We can contextualize Roy’s brief stardom with Bill Walton. Like Roy, Walton was a college star who bloomed early on in his career with Portland, reaching even higher heights than Brandon Roy, winning a title and a finals MVP award in 1977. But like Roy, Walton’s career was doomed by injuries.
Brandon Roy was like the Parousia of Bill Walton, his second coming. The people of Portland were his Israelites, jaded by the unfulfilling years of Clyde Drexler and the “jail-blazers” era, waiting ready for Roy to take them to the promised land. And for a brief, beautiful period, Roy was more than they could have ever asked for.
If a Portland hoops fan was born in 1960 and their son in 1990, both would have witnessed a messiah — one saw Walton, the other saw Roy. Two shooting stars, burning bright, burning fast — too fast.
The Messiah
“For unto us a child is born… and the government shall be upon his shoulder.” – Isaiah 9:6
While Roy was rising, the Portland Trail Blazers were undergoing a rough patch in their franchise’s history. Portland was a storied organization – the Blazers won the title with Bill Walton in 1977 and made two NBA finals with Clyde Drexler in the late 80s and early 90s. In the early 2000s, the “jail blazers”, known for their on-court prowess and their off-court antics, made two Western Conference finals.
By 2006, however, the Blazers had fallen on difficult times, struggling with performance and public perception (this was partly due to the “jail-blazers” tendencies to find themselves in “jail”). This losing spell culminated in a 21-61 record in 2006, the worst record in the NBA that season.
Luckily, they managed to acquire Roy, who would soon lead them out of hard times and guide them to their first title in thirty years.
Roy quickly established himself as a star. In 2006-07, his rookie season, Brandon averaged 16.8 points a game along with four rebounds and four assists. He was the Western Conference rookie of the month in January, February, and March of 2007. Roy only played in 57 out of 82 possible games, but was so dominant on the court that he won NBA Rookie of the Year (nowadays, he wouldn’t have played in enough games to be eligible for the award).
Despite his promise, the Blazers still struggled, finishing the 2006-07 season with a 32-50 record. This was a blessing in disguise, however, as they won the 2007 draft lottery, selecting promising center Greg Oden out of Ohio State (drafting him one spot ahead of a certain lanky small forward from Texas).
Portland now possessed a young core brimming with potential between Roy, Oden, and promising rookie LaMarcus Aldridge. According to a Bleacher Report article, “Most people would agree that this up-and-coming ball club [the Blazers] could win a championship or two in the near future”.
Roy future was looking bright; he made his first all-star team in 2008 and was averaging 19.1 points a game. In 2009, Roy averaged a career-high 22.6 points per contest to go with 5.8 assists and 4.7 boards per game. On December 18th, 2008, Roy scored 52 points in a nationally televised game against the Phoenix Suns. Blazers fans chanted “MVP” late in the game (they were onto something). Roy finished ninth in NBA-MVP voting and made the all-league second team, a huge honor for a third-year player.
The Blazers were improving, too, finishing 54-28 in 2009, placing them in a three-way tie for the No.2 seed in the Western Conference. The most direct cause of this improvement was Roy’s all-star presence, and Portland knew it. Going into the 2010 season, he was rewarded with the max contract: a five-year 85-million-dollar deal that would keep him with the team through 2014.
Roy proved himself worthy of his contract in 2010, averaging 21 points a game, making his third all-star team, and his second all-NBA team. He had bloomed, ready to lead his team to contention year after year, on a Hall of Fame career trajectory.
Unfortunately for Blazers fans, things would fall apart as quickly as they came together.
The ancient Greeks loved their tragedies. They understood the ways in which tragedy can affect our sense of self. Antigone buried her brother, the morally right thing to do, and was killed for it. Medea sacrificed everything for Jason, valuing love and loyalty over anything else, and yet he left her.
In the tragedy of Oedipus, a man tries to avoid a prophecy, but in his efforts to avoid it, ends up doing exactly what it foretold. Like man before him and man after, Oedipus attempted to circumvent destiny yet succumbed to it in the end.
Brandon Roy’s story really is a tragedy. The working-class kid from Seattle’s Central District, rising through the ranks through hard work and hard work alone, finds his dreams shattered by fate.
We do everything right, work as hard as we can, and still succumb to fate. Tragedies like those of Oedipus and Roy make us wary of the inevitable. Tragedy scares us into appreciating what we have by teaching us what can be lost.
The Tragedy
“My knees were bone-on-bone.” – Brandon Roy
Cartilage. The porous, water-filled connective tissue that serves as a sort of biological shock absorber. Cartilage sits in our joints to prevent our bones from rubbing against each other. Cartilage is especially important for an athlete who are constantly moving and putting tremendous amounts of stress on their joints. For, say, a 6’6″ shooting guard in the NBA? That person couldn’t go without it.
Unfortunately for Brandon Roy, there was something wrong with the cartilage in his knees.
Brandon Roy faced knee problems throughout high school and college. In his junior season at Washington, Roy suffered a lateral meniscus tear in his right knee, taking him out for a month of the season (the meniscus is a kind of cartilage). He underwent two arthroscopic knee surgeries in college, leading some NBA teams to purportedly drop him from their draft boards.
Meniscus tears are usually treated with arthroscopic surgeries, a minimally invasive procedure that doctors use to diagnose and treat joint problems. An arthroscope (camera) is inserted into a joint through a small incision. The surgeon then looks at the joint through a screen and uses small incisions to remove or repair damaged tissue.
Arthroscopy helped Roy become a full-fledged superstar and the face of the NBA, but it was a short term solution. But repeated meniscus removal takes away cartilage in the knee, leading to reduced shock absorption. It’s a vicious cycle: you remove cartilage from the knee, leading to bone-on-bone contact that causes pain and damage, leading to further arthroscopic surgery and cartilage removal, leading to further pain and damage.
By the 2009-10 season (Roy’s fourth NBA season and his second all-NBA campaign), Roy started missing games because of knee pain. He played just 65 games that year as compared to the 78 he played in the 2008-09 season.
In April 2010, Roy tore his meniscus once again and underwent knee surgery. He (in)famously rushed himself back from the injury, returning just eight days later against Phoenix in game four of a playoff series to lead the Blazers to a win. Fans cried and teammates were in awe, but no one seemed to understand the severity of the situation. Rushing himself back from his meniscus tear was the final nail in the coffin for his NBA career.
Roy wasn’t the same player in the 2010-11 season. In late 2010, in a last-ditch attempt to save his career, Roy underwent microfracture surgery, in which surgeons drill tiny holes into the bones beneath damaged cartilage. This leads to the release of stem cells, which in turn form scar tissue that simulates cartilage. It’s a last resort for many high-impact athletes but it didn’t work for Brandon Roy.
After sitting out the 2011-12 season, Roy attempted to make an NBA comeback. Because the Blazers had used an amnesty clause on him, he couldn’t return to Portland. He signed with the Timberwolves but played in just five games before his knees gave out for good.
In December 2011, Roy retired from the NBA.
Brandon Roy’s career was tragically fleeting but still impressive. Roy was a three-time all-star and made two all-NBA teams, and earning a healthy 96 million dollars over his playing career from the NBA alone.
Still, his fall was as quick as his rise. In a near instant, Roy went from superstar to unemployed.
Would things have been different now, fifteen years later? In today’s NBA, there’s a huge load management culture that ensures players sit out games to rest for the postseason, think Kawhi Leonard or Joel Embiid. During Roy’s career, in the late 2000s, there was no such culture. Roy routinely played a minimum of 38 minutes a night.
There are also new experimental methods to deal with cartilage degeneration in which STEM cells are produced outside of the body and implanted back into the knee. Kobe Bryant famously had a PRP injection in his knees. Roy tried something similar, but only after the damage was done, so it had little effect.
There’s a chance Roy would have played a little longer with load management and new medical methods, but with how aggressive his playstyle was, it’s unlikely we’d see a 15-year career, even now.
Ah, yes. It can’t be a complete story without a happy ending to wrap it all up. Sure, the ancient Greeks loved their tragedies, but we’re conditioned to want, need, and even expect the happy ending. The fulfilling conclusion.
Brandon Roy picked up the pieces, building a successful high school coaching career, bringing his time full circle back to his high school alma mater. Really, there should be a movie about this guy.
Some may not consider Roy’s tale to have this so-called “happy ending”. Roy touched the sun, reaching heights most can only dream of, until his wings of cartilage fell off. Sure, he put himself back together, but not to the level he once was.
But it is a happy ending. He found himself a purpose to live out. He found a way to instill the lessons he learned upon up-and-coming youth, the lessons of fame and tragedy. Isn’t happiness all that matters in the end?
The Builder
“Really the thing that brought me to coaching was I missed basketball. I still wanted to be around it.” – Brandon Roy
Roy needed a homecoming, a reset after a tumultuous NBA career. He returned to his hometown of Seattle, looking to coach ahead of the 2016-17 basketball season. But where would he coach? Enter Lorenzo Romar.
Lorenzo Romar had been the head basketball coach at the University of Washington since 2002, Brandon Roy’s freshman season. He was initially successful, making a few NCAA tournaments in his early years with the team. But by 2016, Romar’s teams had fallen off. While the Huskies finished with winning records, they continually missed March Madness, with the 2016 season being their fifth consecutive year without a tournament appearance.
It was clear a change was long overdue. So why was Romar kept on so long? The answer was Michael Porter Jr., the nation’s top basketball recruit. Romar was best friends with Porter Sr. (Michael Porter Jr.’s father). The top brass at Washington kept Romar on as head coach because of his connection to the Porter family. To secure Michael Porter Jr.’s commitment to the Huskies, Romar hired Porter Sr. as an assistant coach for the Huskies, making him the highest-paid Washington assistant.
Before Michael Porter Jr could play for the Huskies, though, he had to finish high school. Porter’s family moved to Seattle, living in the area near Nathan Hale High School, ahead of the 2016-17 basketball season. This lined up perfectly with Brandon Roy’s coaching timeline, and Roy agreed to be Nathan Hale’s head basketball coach for the 2016-17 basketball season.
Nathan Hale wasn’t very good – they finished their previous campaign with a 3-18 record. Even with Michael Porter Jr.’s incoming talent, the “Raiders” still couldn’t compete with historic metro league schools like Garfield and Rainier Beach. But Brandon Roy’s presence drew in a ridiculous seven transfers, including three future NBA players: Michael Porter Jr., Jontay Porter, and freshman Marjon Beauchamp.
Nathan Hale went from the worst team in the Metro League to the best high school basketball team in the nation. The Raiders were undefeated, with a perfect 29-0 record. They beat Oak Hill Academy, a national powerhouse on par with IMG and Montverde Academy, and Sierra Canyon, which rostered multiple future NBA players. Nathan Hale blew through local teams, with the season culminating in a 68-51 win over Rainier Beach to secure the 3A state title.
The Raiders became the greatest team in Metro League history – not just in basketball, but in any Metro league sport. Nathan Hale wasn’t a “tier below team” like most public schools that randomly stack elite talent; they were better than national powerhouses like Montverde and IMG in 2017. This was Brandon Roy’s master class. While he was practically handed Michael Porter Jr., he was able to add future NBA players and D1 talent to the team to turned it into an all-time basketball squad.
After the 2017 season, Michael Porter Jr. left for college (not to Washington, though, because Lorenzo Romar was fired after a disastrous 2017 campaign). Roy decided to go full circle, leaving Nathan Hale for his alma mater in Garfield High School.
At Garfield, Roy continued his coaching dominance. He led the Bulldogs to state titles in 2018, 2020, and 2023, making them a routine powerhouse. He stepped down twice as head coach due to personal issues, but is currently the active head coach at Garfield.
In a 2020 interview with Sports Illustrated, Roy said he had no intention to leave Garfield, emphasizing that he wants to build something at the school.
Brandon Roy is one of the best coaches in high school basketball history – in eight years, he’s won four state basketball titles at two different high schools. He rebuilt Nathan Hale into a powerhouse and continued his alma mater’s dominance of the Seattle circuit. Coaching gave Roy what his knees couldn’t: a second chance at basketball greatness, not through his own shot, but through the players he shaped.
Some things are just too good to be true. You see a beautiful cake in the window, then you take a bite and find it to be fondant-covered cardboard. You eagerly await the toy in the cereal box, only to find tiny plastic disappointment. Your favorite TV show gets a new season, and it’s awful.
Brandon Roy was a fever dream. Ascension to the highest level, before it all came crashing down. It’s the mark of a true tragedy. He would be haunted by health issues but tantalized us with his promise. He made us believe – the perfect low-maintenance star, no antics, no nothing. While his greatness at the highest level was fleeting, Brandon Roy made us believe.
Yet the Buddha said: “Don’t dwell in the past, don’t dream of the future.” Tragically, Roy wasn’t built to last — but in the moment, he was everything. Brandon Roy gave us beautiful seasons of basketball and taught us the meaning of the moment. He taught us how to live. And for that, we may never appreciate him enough.
