This Day in Cavs History: Cleveland sends Mark Price’s No. 25 to the rafters

The Cavs beat the Bucks on Nov. 13, 1999. I’m guessing even some of the 18,640 people at Gund Arena that night would have to look up the score.

They remember halftime just fine.

That’s when the Cavs raised Mark Price’s No. 25 to the rafters. He was the sixth player in franchise history to get the honor, joining Austin Carr, Bingo Smith, Nate Thurmond and two guys who’d caught a whole lot of his passes, Larry Nance and Brad Daugherty.

Joe Tait emceed the ceremony. You can probably hear him saying it now: “There will never be another Cleveland Cavalier to wear No. 25.”

The Cavs gave Price a piece of the floor from the old Richfield Coliseum. “I always wanted to give my all on the court for you,” he told the crowd. A moment later, he put it even more simply. “I loved playing here.”

And here’s something I couldn’t have envisioned in 1999: I’d get to call Mark Price a friend, and I’m proud that I can. He’s had me on the Mark Price For 3 podcast about a dozen times. Host Aaron Conrad tells me that’s more than any other guest. I think he’s even being serious. Of course, in 1999, he’d have had to explain to both of us what a podcast was.

My favorite thing about watching Price was seeing what he’d do when two defenders came after him. One dribble between them and suddenly Daugherty had the ball headed to the rim. Next trip, Price might pull up for three before the defense got set. In those days, you had to be awfully good for a coach to live with that shot. Price was.

Of course, it helped that Price could go to All-Star Weekend and win the 3-Point Shootout two years in a row. He did it in 1993 and ’94. He made four All-Star teams and four All-NBA teams, and in 1988-89 he joined Larry Bird as the only player at the time with a 50-40-90 season. He shot 90.6 percent from the line as a Cav, still the franchise record. His 90.4 percent across all 12 NBA seasons ranks third all-time. 

The Cavs got him in a draft-night trade after the Mavericks took him in the second round. That worked out OK. Wayne Embry, the GM who made that deal, spoke at the ceremony. So did Bobby Cremins, Price’s coach at Georgia Tech.

The score, by the way, was 117-112. Shawn Kemp and rookie Andre Miller were Cavs by then. Ray Allen and Glenn Robinson were Bucks. There was a whole second half to play, and I’d bet plenty of people spent a lot of it looking up at No. 25.