John Crawford, known as “Big Man” at KU, was one of my childhood heroes who was one of the greatest shot blockers in school history. Since blocks were officially recorded in the 1970s, Crawford finished his career ranked No. 1 all time at KU in blocks with 155 (now No. 8). He led KU in blocks his sophomore, junior and senior seasons, while leading Kansas in field goal percentage as a sophomore and junior.
A great jumper, John never saw a blocked shot he didn’t like.
Crawford, a Kansas City native, was part of a heralded recruiting class by Ted Owens in 1977, which also included McDonald’s All-American Darnell Valentine, Wilmore Fowler and Booty Neal. Crawford played just nine games his freshman season before being declared academically ineligible. However, he rebounded from adversity and averaged a career-high 9.2 points per game his sophomore season while shooting a career-best 52.1 percent from the field. Crawford, an impressive shooter from 15 to 17 feet, shot over 50 percent from the floor each season and finished with a 51.4 career field goal percentage.
The skinny 6-7, 178-pound forward also completed his career scoring 791 points for a career 8.1 points per game average with a career 4.8 rebounds per game.
I have a family connection to John. He knew both of my parents since he earned his master’s degree in social welfare at KU, where my dad was a social welfare professor for 34 years and my mom was a field liaison. John worked with my Mom at Heart of America Family and Children’s Service in the 1990s. My Mom talked fondly of John and told me of John speaking of his great experience playing overseas in Finland in 1983, where he was enlightened to see the lack of poverty.
When I interviewed John for a Where Are They Now? story for Jayhawk Insider in 1999, he told me his social conscience grew from his experience living in Finland. I’ll never forget our interview at Starbucks in Westport. John was sitting in the coffee shop as I walked in. He told me he saw me walking to the store, and after we greeted each other hello, he asked me or said something to the effect that I didn’t go into social welfare like my parents. My sister is also a longtime social worker, and has been the director of a community mental health center in Boston for many years. I smiled when John said that, and told him I chose a different path of becoming a writer.
I brought press clippings to our interview from John’s career and a box score of KU’s Sweet 16 loss to Wichita State in the 1981 NCAA Tournament.
“Oh my goodness, look at that,” he said. “I had five rebounds. Antoine (Carr), he had nine rebounds. ... I think one of the things that got me later on in life is I was astounded that I played with some of the best and held my own. Like Antoine Carr, Cliff Levingston, Alton Lister, Sam Perkins, Magic Johnson. I jumped with the best of them and I think I shot with the best of them.”
Indeed, he did. But more than his basketball accomplishments, John learned invaluable life lessons from his KU experience from great mentors like KU assistant coach Lafayette Norwood. John, who grew up in the inner city, spoke of how Norwood helped expose him to a new way of thinking about life.
“It got me to the point where I was able to see that everybody did not live in urban housing,” Crawford said. “He (Norwood) made you think as a young man. A lot of things he told me when I was a young 19, 20-year-old rebellious kid have stuck with me today as being a 40-year-old man, especially a black man growing up in the city.”
I reveled in hearing John talking about Norwood and his experiences of expanding his horizons and how he was helping young people now as a social worker for Full Employment Council, the largest non-profit agency in Kansas City which helps place inner city youth with jobs and career employment. John was now teaching kids what Norwood taught him about exploring a whole new world outside the inner city these kids had known all their lives.
I also delighted in how John told me he pretended to be his hero Kareem Abdul-Jabbar growing up, practicing his hook shot all day and night on the playground and how his Mom proudly raised him and his siblings as a single parent and always made sure, despite not much money, that they had nice clothes and dress shoes while keeping an “immaculate” house.
It was a very memorable interview, especially how I felt a connection with John since he knew my parents.
Here, he spoke about his childhood growing up in Kansas City, his hoop dreams, and his recruitment. I also included the Where Are They Now? story I wrote on John in 1999 for Jayhawk Insider. I’m forever grateful for John for his kindness and time he gave me that wonderful afternoon 20 years ago in Kansas City.
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“I first started playing basketball, I think really being interested in it, about 8 years old. I remember just playing on the playground. That’s all I did, was play on the playground. I’ll never forget as a kid, we would all get together, just play outside till about 11-12 at night. Those stories of Mom used to call us in, ‘Ok, in a minute.’ She had to actually just threaten to get us inside the house sometimes. We‘d play. I remember, at one time, I was thin as a rail. ... But the thing about it, is, we would play, and I’ll never forget, the only thing I had at that time, I could shoot pretty good, but I had a hook shot I used to throw from everyplace. When I got in trouble, I threw this hook shot. Didn’t know where it came from, I just threw it. Half hook, quarter hook, three quarters, it didn’t matter. I just threw that hook shot, and that’s the best shot I ever had.
“Growing up in K.C., it was one of those things where I just played for fun. I never thought I was going to go to college. My plan was to do something in high school. I didn’t know what. I was going to go into the Army or what have you. I played basketball in high school, scored a lot of points, purely just for fun. I never thought of anything. I very seldom watched basketball on TV. I would watch the big games, but I was so busy outside playing. I had role models. I think Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was my biggest role model when I came up, because even though he was 7-foot he was skinny and slim, and I used to try to exemplify that hook shot. I never could quite get it like that. I figured, if he could do it, I could do it. I was 6-7, and he was 7-1. But anyway, in terms of Kansas City, I’ll never forget, all my friends played basketball. All of them. We played on the playground. Like I said, I never thought I was going to go to college. Didn’t have any idea of what college was about. I came out of high school with the attitude that you know, basketball players were given everything. That’s the only concept I had of college basketball. When you went to college, you played basketball. You did nothing but play basketball.
“Oh my goodness, I was recruited by over 200 schools. I can’t name them all. Schools like Notre Dame I know did not recruit me. UCLA did not recruit me. I can probably name the schools that did not recruit me. But overall, all the Big Eight schools. I got recruited by schools, not really East Coast, by that time, East Coast was keeping kids that were on the East Coast. Schools from the SWC recruited me, the Missouri Valley Conference was recruiting me. The Big Sky Conference. One of the things I had to do was narrow things down. Like for instance, my coach told me. He was very, very good. He eliminated junior colleges. He said, ‘John, you’re not going to go to junior college. Get your grade point average up so we don’t have to deal with that.’ So that’s what I did. I still have the letters in my Mom’s house. One of the big schools at the time that recruited me was Tulsa, the University of Tulsa. I think the coach Jim King, that used to play for the Chicago Bulls, was head coach at the time. He was the coach for Tulsa back in like 1975, ‘76. It was interesting. I took like two visits. Some schools that I care not to mention, I got some freebies. They kind of bring you down in the summertime when you go to camp; it wasn’t a visit, but you got your camp paid for, stuff like that. I didn’t go to a lot of camps. I didn’t like the whole idea of being far from home because growing up, my mother was a custodial parent. My Mom, she raised me. I just couldn’t see myself leaving home. I was scared to leave home. So I thought Lawrence was far away, because I had never been outside the metropolitan area.
“Most kids during my time growing up, and a lot of kids today, that’s one thing they don’t experience. They do not experience outside their urban areas. They’re not exposed to that, so that’s their world, and to go outside their world, it’s scary. It’s real scary. I Iived on Independence Avenue, just north of here (Westport). On the bus, that’s a 20-minute (drive) to this part of town. I didn’t come down on bus. I didn’t come to the Plaza until I played for KU, when we played in the Christmas tournament. That was my world as a kid, living in an urban core, but I never visited the Plaza. It's ironic. You find a lot of kids today that still have not come down to the Plaza. Most of it’s because that’s their world down there. They don’t have the transportation to get around like I did. My world was going to the community center and playing basketball every day, and going to school. That was it. It’s just interesting. It’s interesting to think back on where I’ve been.
“We were OK (growing up). We were fine as kids, but as a single parent home, we weren’t well off like a lot of people. In some cases, a lot of people where I grew up thought we were well off because my Mom kept a very clean house, immaculate. She kept very clean furniture. It was immaculate. People thought we were well off, and we dressed. We wore dress shoes to school. People didn’t understand why because my feet were so big. When we bought a pair of men’s shoes, I had to wear them out before I bought another pair of shoes. I didn’t wear tennis shoes, only when I played basketball.”
By David Garfield
John Crawford began playing basketball as a skinny 8-year-old kid on the playgrounds in Kansas City, Mo. He pretended to be Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and practiced his hook shot all night or until his mom would “actually have to threaten to get us inside.” It was here on the playground, community center, and school where Crawford spent the better part of his childhood.
“That was my world,” he said.
Crawford had never really been outside his metropolitan, urban area until he graduated from high school in 1977 and received a basketball scholarship to Kansas University. He credits his college experience and instrumental mentors such as KU assistant coach Lafayette Norwood for exposing him to a new way of life.
“It got me to the point where I was able to see that everybody did not live in urban housing,” Crawford said this recent afternoon at a coffee shop in Westport (just a 20-minute bus ride from where he grew up).
“He (Norwood) made you think as a young man. A lot of things he told me when I was a young 19, 20-year-old rebellious kid have stuck with me today as being a 40-year-old man, especially a black man growing up in the city.”
Crawford is now using his background and teachings to make a difference and impact the lives of today’s youth. After graduating from KU in 1981 and playing basketball in Finland for one season, Crawford has devoted his life to social services and working with at-risk children.
He was employed as a parole officer for the state of Kansas in the early 1990s when he yearned to do “something more” and create greater change in society. Thus, Crawford enrolled in the School of Social Welfare at KU. Crawford, who received his master’s degree in 1992, said he has finally found his niche after a “long stepping career.” He is currently the executive manager of youth programs for the Full Employment Council (largest non-profit agency in Kansas City), where he helps place inner city youth with jobs and career employment.
“Hopefully, they can see the value of going to work and not staying out here on the streets," Crawford said.
Crawford approaches his professional career with the same amount of zest as he did playing at KU.
“I was given a gift,” he said. “In every aspect of my life, I use basketball,” he said. “It’s just like chess, you have options. ...When times get intense, I intensify. I know when to play defense. Without that background as related to sports, I’d be lost.”
Crawford was rarely lost on the basketball court at Kansas. He had a solid four-year career, and led KU in blocked shots for three seasons (1979-81). As he looks over old game programs and newspaper clippings this afternoon, Crawford smiles and reflects back to yesteryear.
“Oh my goodness, look at that,” he said pointing to the KU-Wichita State box score (NCAA Sweet 16 loss in 1981). “I had five rebounds. Antoine (Carr), he had nine rebounds. ... I think one of the things that got me later on in life is I was astounded that I played with some of the best and held my own. Like Antoine Carr, Cliff Levingston, Alton Lister, Sam Perkins, Magic Johnson. I jumped with the best of them and I think I shot with the best of them.”
Of course, his teammates at Kansas like Darnell Valentine and Tony Guy were pretty good players themselves. Crawford has especially fond memories of the close-knit team in 1981. Kansas was 14-2 that season before losing the next three games. Crawford, whose minutes had been reduced after starting the first six games of the year, admits he was frustrated. He decided to sit down and have a “man-to-man” talk with Coach Ted Owens.
I said, ‘Coach, I don’t want to start. I just want to play more. I think I can be more effective than Victor (Mitchell). He’s a good player coach, but we can only do one thing with him — play zone defense and walk the ball up the floor. ... If you give me the same minutes that you give Victor Mitchell, I’ll give you twice as many rebounds as I get now and twice as many points.’”
The season then turned around. Owens respected Crawford so much that he not only gave the senior additional minutes, but started him the last eight games of the season (KU won seven in a row before losing to Wichita State in the Sweet 16 on March 20, 1981).
A few months later in June, Crawford was selected as a seventh-round draft choice by the Philadelphia 76ers. He was released in veterans camp and declined a lucrative offer to play in Europe because he “wanted to be at home with my child (Jon, who was born in December, 1981).”
“That was the right thing for me to do,” Crawford said.
Crawford eventually went overseas to Finland and pursued his basketball dream in 1983. Enlightened to see another culture with no poverty or drug problem, his social conscience grew, as well as his commitment to help young people.
Sixteen years later, Crawford is now inspiring the next generation of heroes to achieve greatness and experience a whole new “world” than he did as a child. He said he’s at peace living and working back home in Kansas City.
“I’m not going to get rich being a social worker,” he said. “But I’m going to have a decent way of life. And if I figure I do a good job, I’ll live well. I love what I do.”
A Closer Look at John Crawford:
Years at KU: 1977-1981
Career Notables: Crawford led KU in blocked shots from 1979-81. Ranks No. 4 all time (155) in that category...Led KU in field goal percentage in 1979 and 1980.
Education: 1981, B.G.S. Communications. 1992, M.S.W. (School of Social Welfare)
Family: Crawford has two sons— Jon, 17; Derrick, 15.
Since Leaving KU: Crawford played one season in Finland in 1983 before returning to the states and working at the YCAT (Youth Center at Topeka) from 1984-1988. He then became a parole officer for the state of Kansas. Crawford, who received his master’s degree in social work from KU in 1992, worked for Heart of America Family and Children’s Services (1995-98). In January 1999, he was hired at the Full Employment Council.
Currently: Crawford is managing executive of youth programs for the Full Employment Council in Kansas City, Mo.
Hobbies :Jazz music and fishing
Favorite KU Memories: Bonding as a team during preseason conditioning in 1981 and having a “man to man” talk with Coach Ted Owens late in the year about receiving more playing time.
On the Jayhawks Today: “I think KU is going to go far this year. ...Ever since I first met him (Roy Williams), I liked his attitude. He instills values in his kids from top to bottom, and I think his coaches exemplify that, too.”
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