Memories of Michael Ray
- Jake C
- Nov 11
- 9 min read
Updated: Dec 9
Cover photo: Michael Ray Richardson with the New York Knicks. Photo credit: Dan Raphael, Getty Images.
The following is a tribute to Michael Ray Richardson, who passed away on Nov. 11, 2025 at age 70 from complications due to prostate cancer.
Written by Jake Carapella, 11/11/25
Talent was next level. Game was so sweet.
Michael Ray Richardson was as dynamic as point guards came in the 1980s, ahead of his time at 6 feet, 5 inches tall with primal instincts for the ball and a flashy offensive style you would only see across the country in one Earvin “Magic” Johnson. Richardson’s crowning team achievement came in 1984, when along with New Jersey Net backcourt mate (and dear friend) Otis Birdsong, Richardson and the Nets upset the defending champion Philadelphia 76ers three games to two in the first-round of the 1984 playoffs. The best team achievement of Richardson’s eight-year NBA career. His individual accomplishments are a laundry list.
3-time All Big Sky at the University of Montana
Sweet 16 in freshman year of 1974-75
14.8 points, 7.0 assists, 5.5 rebounds in 556 NBA games (8 seasons)
4-time All-Star
2-time All-Defensive 1st team
3-time NBA steals leader (3.2 in 79-80, 2.8 in 82-83, 3.0 in 84-85)
Led the NBA in assists (10.1) and steals (3.2) in 1979-80; became the third NBA player to accomplish feat (after Slick Watts and Don Buse)
1985 NBA Comeback Player of the Year - 20.1 points, 8.2 assists, 5.6 rebounds, 3.0 steals
Ranks first all-time in New York Knicks’ history in steals (265) for single season and second all-time in Knicks’ history in assists (832) for single season
Ranks second all-time in Knicks’ history in assists per game (10.1) and first in steals per game (3.2) for single season; also has second and third highest steals averages for single Knicks’ season
Ranks first all-time in Nets’ history in steals per game (2.7) and first all-time in Knicks’ history in steals per game (2.6)
21 career triple-doubles (tied for 21st all-time)
Played in Europe from 1988-2002
2-time Italian Cup Winner
French Federation Cup winner in 1998
FIBA European Cup Winners' Cup champion in 1990
FIBA European Cup Winners' Cup Finals top scorer in 1990
1995 LNB Pro A champion
Italian Cup winner in 1989 and 1990
LBA steals leader in 1989
LBA All-Star 1988–1990
LBA All-Star Game MVP 1988, 1993
ULEB All-Star 1993, 1994
1992 Croatian Cup winner
1988 CBA champion with Albany Patroons
As a coach, Michael Ray led the Patroons from 2004-07, the Lawton-Fort Sill Cavalry (Oklahoma) from 2007-11, and the London (Ontario) Lightning from 2011-2014. Michael Ray coached the Cavalry to two CBA championships in 2008 and 2009, and was the PBL (Premier Basketball League) Coach of the Year in 2010. With the Lightning, he was the 2012 and 2013 NBL Canada Coach of the Year. In both seasons, he led the team to NBL Canada championships. His teams went 28-8 and 33-7 in those two seasons.
A lot of people know the surface story of Michael Ray Richardson. What came of Michael Ray’s abrupt NBA exit was the true redemption story. He released an autobiography, Banned, in September of 2024 that chronicled such a wonderful recovery. Forewords in the book are by his friends Nancy Lieberman and George Gervin. Michael Ray was the ultimate redemption. A soul eventually found, and a life well lived.
I first met Michael Ray on a rainy day in the fall of 2012. I was 22 years old, and he had been named the head coach of the London Lightning, the flagship team in a new pro league, National Basketball League of Canada, in 2011. Still in college, I wanted to immerse myself in professional sports. This was my first foray. I had heard of Michael Ray. Great player who was banned and all that. All of the generic, general stuff that people think of when they hear his name.
Family Circle restaurant was the name of the breakfast establishment, in London, Ontario, where we met and discussed what I’d be doing with the team. I remember being a bit nervous as we had breakfast. I’d never been in the presence of NBA guys before, let alone of a guy who was a top player in the NBA at one point - “For a time, Michael was the best guard in the NBA next to Michael (Jordan),” longtime columnist Peter Vecsey told me once. Michael Ray and Vecsey remained close as the years progressed.
I remember bringing up Earl Monroe to Michael Ray. Monroe played his final two seasons with him in New York. I also mentioned to Michael Ray (something he already knew, of course) that Isiah Thomas had said that Sugar was the only player that he was scared to play against. I remember us going over what my duties would be for the Lightning - posting lineups in the media room and taking down stats during the game on game nights, and doing team stat sheets and scouting reports of opponents. I remember the General Manager of the team suggesting to Michael Ray that he get a Twitter account to engage with fans.
“I don’t know anything about this Tweeter s***,” was Michael Ray’s reply. Hilarious. He eventually did get an account.
When I walked into the player-coach-staff building entrance for our first game (London’s best event venue, then called Budweiser Gardens, was where Lightning games were held; upwards of 7,000 fans packed the arena on game nights in the Michael Ray era) there was just a big open space in front of me. Didn’t know where the locker room was.
“Hey, Coach”, I bellowed as I saw him ahead of me. “Where do I go?”
“Follow me, buddy,” said Michael Ray, suit draped over his shoulder.
I get to the locker room and there is a bin with water bottles. I grab one after asking if I could take one. “Make yourself at home, buddy,” he said.
Speaking of suits, Michael Ray’s were clean. He outdressed his coaching counterparts. Snake-skin shoes. He was expressive on the sidelines. Arguing calls. Imploring his players.
“You’re a bum! You’re a bum!”, he said to opposing players on many occasions. “Oh! Do him! Do him!,” he would command his players.
All part of the competitive fire.
I sat two seats away from Michael Ray on the bench so that I could relay stuff to him. How many fouls a player had, etc. One of the assistant coaches sat between us. At the end of the games, Michael Ray would give me his clipboard to carry back to the locker room. Rookie duties.
Michael Ray and I talked about the game of basketball on quite a few occasions. One time before a game, we were just talking of old stuff, his former teammates and all that. He recalled the sad story of Marvin “The Human Eraser” Webster. The two were teammates on the Knicks from 1978-1982. Webster’s son at age 19 passed away from a heart attack. Webster himself passed away in 2009 at age 56 from coronary artery disease. We talked about his former Net teammate, center Mike Gminkski, who at the time did NCAA color commentary on CBS. “G-Man”, Michael Ray called him. He talked about his experience in the CBA, winning the title in 1988 with the Patroons under head coach Bill Musselman. After victories, Michael Ray and his teammates, namely future NBA head coaches Rick Carlisle, Scott Brooks, and Sidney Lowe, would crack open beers to celebrate. One time in the locker room before one of our games, I mentioned to him that I had watched the 1984 Christmas Day game between his Nets and the Knicks. It had aired on NBA TV Canada a few days prior to one of our games. The contest is known for Bernard King’s 60 points. But the Nets won by a final score of 120-114. Michael Ray’s stat line was 36 points, 5 rebounds, 4 assists, and 4 steals.
“I let ‘em have it that day,” he recalled to me.
My core funny memory of Michael Ray. One night before a game, probably an hour before tip-off, I had mentioned that one of the forwards on our opposing team that night, the Windsor (Ontario, across the Detroit River) Express, reminded me of Joakim Noah, who at the time was the Chicago Bulls’ All-Star center.
“Jake, I used to have a lot of respect for your basketball knowledge until you compared Noah to that mother******.” I laughed. Assistant coaches laughed. I texted one of Michael Ray’s Oklahoma and London players this morning. He remembers it. Funny stuff.
One day at a practice, I was talking to one of our veterans, Rodney Buford, a sharpshooter from Creighton University who in 1999 was a 2nd-round draft pick of the Miami Heat. Rodney had played on the 2000-01 Philadelphia 76ers and the 2003-04 Sacramento Kings. We were talking about Peja Stojavokic, and how automatic the European star was from anywhere on the floor. On cue came the subject of Game 7 of the 2004 Western Conference Semifinal. The Minnesota Timberwolves hosted the Kings in that game and won, 83-80. Rodney had gotten minutes in the game, 16 minutes, and he and I were talking about that. As we talked, Michael Ray, a few steps ahead of us in the hall and within earshot, chimes in to Rodney, “Too bad you didn’t do nothing with ‘em.”
That was Michael Ray. Quick witted, always with a joke and a smile and a memorable laugh.
Michael Ray was big time, especially for London, Ontario. This was a guy who was drafted two slots ahead of Larry Bird. A guy who was a triple-double machine. A stealth stealer of the basketball. A two-way guy before the term “two-way” became en vogue. One of his close friends, John Zelbst, a lawyer from Lawton, Okla., flew in to see our game one night. At the team’s shootaround, we spoke about how big Michael Ray was, how big he was for this city.
“Made a million dollars overseas,” Richardson’s friend and attorney Zelbst told me at the time. “He was huge.” (In news releases in the past day, Zelbst said that he believes Michael Ray is the best player not in the Naismith Hall of Fame).
Michael Ray was surely beloved as a Knick, and his Nets’ 3-2 series knockoff of the defending champion 76ers in 1984 is one of the great upsets in league history. In the clincher, Richardson put up 24 points, 6 rebounds, 6 assists, and 6 steals.
He was beloved in Italy, too, and France. He played internationally until the age of 46. His son, Amir, age 23 and born in France, is a midfielder for Serie A’s Fiorentina and is a member of the Moroccan national team. One of his daughters is a doctor in the New York area, one son a firefighter in New Jersey.
People didn’t know Michael Ray when he got to London. It is a hockey city, with the Ontario Hockey League’s Knights reigning as ruler. But fans came to love him. He attracted fans as a draw in the form of a former NBA star that the city had never seen. Personable with the fans, taking time with youngsters. And good to a young guy like me who was just cutting his teeth.
Michael Ray’s life was one of sweet redemption. Apropos that his nickname was Sugar. He had beaten all of the probabilities and odds that said that he would not amount to much upon his banishment from the NBA. He went overseas and was a dominant player, playing until 2002, displaying an insatiable zest for the game. Coaching for a decade-plus thereafter, his love for basketball was clear. He also worked during the 2000s as an ambassador for the Denver Nuggets. Richardson, born in Lubbock, Texas, was a graduate of Denver’s Manual High School, whom he led to a state title in 1972.
I last spoke at length with Michael Ray nine years ago, while I was working on an assignment, though we had texted in recent years. We also spoke briefly in 2021 and 2022. At the time, he was thinking about getting back into coaching for another year. His friend and former Albany teammate, Derrick Rowland, is the current head coach of the Patroons and Michael Ray wanted the head job with a team in Newfoundland, Canada. I reached out to teams and leagues on his behalf. We never got another opportunity to speak or see each other, though I messaged him on his birthday this year. Sad.
When Michael Ray and I spoke in 2016, he granted me an hour or so of his time and went through his upbringing and how he came to love the game. In his retirement from coaching, he and Birdsong ran free youth camps, Ball Stars Youth Camps, for underserved communities in New Jersey, the Orlando area, Colorado, Texas, West Palm Beach and Palm Beach Gardens. Richardson also substitute taught in Lawton.
Asked by Vecsey today if he had read Richardson’s book, Birdsong said, “I don’t have to. I lived it.” With Michael Ray every step. A true friend.
Banned, is a terrific read. This is a man who went toe-to-toe with addiction and won. A great guy, a funny guy, a self-deprecating soul who overcame all odds to live a prosperous and successful life.
Condolences to his kids, wife, and his extended family and friends.
Rest In Peace, Michael Ray! Thank you for everything.
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