The Portland Trail Blazers traded not one but two players for the Los Angeles Clippers superstar center and philanthropist, Marcus Camby in a multi-million dollar deal, ESPN.com reported Tuesday.
The Blazers — who beat the Clippers 109-87 in Tuesday night’s game — traded guard Steve Blake and forward Travis Outlaw for the 35-year-old Camby, whose contract with the Clippers was about to expire.
The Blazers are sending $1.5 million to the Clippers in the trade and will ante-up $2 million in incentives Camby will earn this season, sources told ESPN.com’s Ric Bucher. With the Blazers’ Greg Oden and Joel Pryzbilla out for the season with injuries, Camby — one of the league’s top rebounders who won the NBA Defensive Player of the Year Award for the 2006-07 season — will be a huge help to his new team.
Judging from how much he has helped the communities in which he’s played, he will be an asset to the Blazers in other ways, as well. “It’s always important to give back to the community,” Camby told Denver’s CBS affiliate in 2007.
And how. Over the years, the 6’11″ basketball star has consistently taken time out of his busy schedule to help children all over the country. In 1996, he formed the Cambyland Foundation, which works with schools and communities to help children and now has branches in Hartford, Conn., New York City, and Denver, Colo.
When he played for the Denver Nuggets, he bought and distributed Thanksgiving meals to families in need; played Santa and took underprivileged children on shopping sprees in a chauffeur-driven limo, no less, during his “Cambyland Christmas” program so they could buy gifts for their families; gave $30,000 in college scholarships to Denver students and bought tickets to every home game for less fortunate families.
In Los Angeles, he read to schoolchildren as part of the Clippers “Read to Achieve” program and hit the links for the Clippers’ Annual Celebrity Golf Classic.
His efforts didn’t go unnoticed. In 1999, The Dime Savings Bank of New York named him the then-New York Knick a “Hometown Hero” for his charitable works, donating $50,000 to his foundation. New York Magazine hailed him as its “Athlete of the Year” for his work on — and off the court that same year. In 2005, he was awarded the NBA Community Assist Award as the most committed NBA player in his community.
In March, even though he was no longer with the Nuggets, he returned to Denver to open the Cambyland Teen Center at the William E. Cope Branch of the Boys and Girls Clubs of Metro Denver.
“Even though I’m no longer playing in Denver, it was important to me to follow through on the commitment I made to develop this center,” said Camby at the time. “The Denver community was great to me and my family during my six years there and it’s very rewarding to be able to give something back. I’m very excited that the project is complete and we can provide a safe place where kids can go to learn and form lasting friendships.”
Camby donated $20,000 for the club to renovate an unfinished room for kids 13 to 18 years old. The Cambyland Teen Center features six computer workstations, a DJ station, a theater with a flat screen television, several board games and books — which teens frequent more than ever now, John Arigoni, CEO/President of The Boys and Girls Club of Metro Denver tells Tonic.
“Everyone in Denver misses him,” says Arigoni. “He always took time to visit with the kids and talk with them and tell them how important education is and to do well in school. He really understood where a lot of the kids were coming from, since he himself didn’t grow up with a silver spoon in his mouth. He was a great role model. He’s a good guy — with a big heart. We wish him the best.”
And now that Camby is heading to Portland? “We have a Boys and Girls Club there and hope he plugs into them, there, too!”
Photo by Eric Molina via Wikimedia Commons.