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Looking forany autographRick Adelman
One collector is trying to find a single signature from every man who ever played for the Jazz — all 370 of them, from the 1974 New Orleans team to today. For many of them, this page is the only one on the internet. Here is Rick Adelman: what he did on the floor, a few things most people never knew, and every card that carries his name. If you own something he signed — or you know who might — there is a note at the foot of this page.
Before the Hall of Fame coaching career there was a guard from Loyola of Los Angeles — a seventh-round pick in 1968 who became an original Portland Trail Blazer and closed out his playing days in 1975 after stops with Chicago, the New Orleans Jazz, and Kansas City-Omaha.
The bench is where he made history: 1,042 wins across 23 NBA seasons, tenth-most at the time of his death, with two Finals trips in Portland, the great Sacramento teams of the early 2000s, and a 22-game winning streak in Houston in 2008. Inducted into the Naismith Hall of Fame in 2021, Adelman died on June 1, 2026, fifteen days short of his 80th birthday.
HOW HE CAME & WENTChicago traded him to New Orleans for John Block on November 11, 1974, and three months later he went to Kansas City with Ollie Johnson for Nate Williams.
- Full name
- Richard Leonard Adelman
- New Orleans Jazz tenure
- 1974–75
- Position
- Guard
- Born
- 1946, Lynwood, California
- Died
- 2026
- Height
- 6′1″ (185 cm)
- Weight
- 176 lb (80 kg)
- College
- Loyola Marymount
- Drafted
- 1968, 7th round, San Diego
A card. A photo. A program. A page from an old autograph book. Anything he put his name on.
You do not need to know what it is. Take a photo with your phone and send it to me. I will tell you what you have, for free, whether or not anything comes of it. I pay the postage both ways. I answer every message myself, usually the same day.
With the Jazz
RICK ADELMAN · 1974–75 · PER GAME| SEASON | TEAM | G | MPG | PPG | RPG | APG | SPG | BPG | FG% | 3P% | FT% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1974–75 | NOJ | 28 | 21.9 | 6.3 | 2.0 | 2.5 | 1.7 | 0.2 | .421 | — | .695 |
| JAZZ TOTAL | 1 SEASON | 28 | 21.9 | 6.2 | 2.0 | 2.5 | 1.7 | 0.2 | .421 | — | .695 |
Season by season, regular season, with this franchise only. More info: Basketball-Reference ↗ · Wikipedia ↗
Did you know
RICK ADELMAN · 7 NOTES- Played for the franchise in its very first season, 1974–75.
- His son David followed him into the profession and now runs an NBA bench of his own — coaching is the family business.
- Before his NBA coaching fame he spent six seasons at Chemeketa Community College in Salem, Oregon.
- In 1992 he published The Long, Hot Winter, a 223-page insider account of a season with Clyde Drexler's Trail Blazers.
- He was married to Mary Kay for 56 years and they raised six children together.
- A seventh-round pick at 79th overall, the 6-foot-1 guard was claimed by Portland in the 1970 expansion draft.
- During the 2011 lockout Erik Spoelstra filled three-quarters of a notebook over a four-hour lunch learning the Adelman corner offense from his son R.J.