Former Sonic Art Harris, who we briefly profiled many years ago, would have been 68 years old today. Sadly, he passed away in 2007.
Harris is largely unknown to Sonic fans who only watched the team in the 1970s or later, but he had an interesting life. In our very short biography of him, you learned that he came from a tough background in Los Angeles, matriculated to Stanford where he became a standout in the Pac-8, then made his way to Seattle, where he was named to the NBA's All-Rookie Team after averaging 12 points per game.
The remainder of his professional basketball career was brief, and, like many of his teammates of that era, it is extremely difficult to find information about him.
Since we posted that story, though, I did manage to find two contemporary articles about Harris from his time in Palo Alto. The first is from The Stanford Daily of January 12, 1968, and explores his transition from Watts to the Bay Area, as well as the difficulty he faced in guarding (then) Lew Alcindor.
The second is an even better article, also from the The Stanford Daily, from May of 1968, and is a recognition of his being named the Stanford Athlete of the Year.
Both are worth a read.
