Kermit Washington

On May 25, 2016, Washington was indicted for embezzling roughly $500,000 meant for children in Africa. On December 4, 2017, he pled guilty to three counts: one of aggravated identity theft, and two of making a false statement in a tax return. Washington used the charity to launder money he received as kickbacks. Washington, as a regional representative for the National Basketball Players Association, referred NBA players to San Diego attorney Ronald Mix, who then made donations to the charity, but were actually illegal referral payments. Washington then withdrew this money for personal spending. Washington failed to report this money as income on his tax return. In July 2018, he was sentenced to six years in federal prison for charity fraud.

During the summer between his senior year of high school and his freshman year of college, Washington grew four inches. He began weight training, and ran the steps in his seven-story dormitory building wearing a weighted vest to improve endurance. Washington became more extroverted in college, so much so that he later said his life could be separated into two parts—his pre-college life and his life after college. He has frequently described his college years as "the happiest time in my life." He began dating his future wife Pat when he was a freshman. They met after she noticed him accidentally scoring four consecutive points for the opposing team in a freshman basketball game. She pursued him even though he often remained silent when she spent time with him. A lot of the emergence of Washington's personality is credited to Pat, who encouraged him to be more outgoing and overcome his low self-esteem. Washington spent a lot of his free time practicing in the gym. He played playground basketball in the summer, and was on several Urban League teams. He averaged 19.4 points and 22.3 rebounds on his freshman team at American. Pat helped him with his grades—despite the fact that he had done well his senior year of high school he was still far behind; he did not even know what a paragraph was when he entered college or how to write a report.

Newell had Washington watch tapes of Paul Silas, who was a rebounding forward for the Boston Celtics, and convinced him to have more confidence in his offensive game. He reworked Washington's game from the ground up, and in so doing established a name for himself as a tremendous coach of big men—he would later conduct a yearly "Big Man Camp" in Hawaii which was attended by hundreds of NBA players.

In the early 2010s, Washington lived in the Washington, D.C. area, where he was employed as a regional representative of the National Basketball Players Association.

Since retiring, Washington has run restaurants and is a founder and operator of a number of charitable organizations. He ran a restaurant in the Portland metropolitan area with former Trail Blazer Kevin Duckworth, called "Le Slam." The restaurant closed in 2001. He has also served in a coaching role with Stanford University, and worked at Pete Newell's "Big Man Camp" for 15 years. In 1995, he founded The 6th Man Foundation, otherwise known as Project Contact Africa. In August 1994, Washington accompanied a team of doctors and nurses on a humanitarian mission to Goma, Zaire, working in a refugee camp for people fleeing the Rwandan Civil War. "It was a sad, sad sight", Washington later recalled, "a sight I'll never forget."

Washington also claimed that American University cut off contact with him after he punched Tomjanovich. However, when he tried to become athletic director of American in 1995, the school offered to hire him as assistant to the athletic director, since Washington had no front office experience. When confronted about this Washington stated: "I didn't see why I couldn't be the AD so they could use my name out front and then have someone with more experience be my assistant." John Feinstein and others have suggested that the most lasting damage caused by the fight between Washington and Tomjanovich has been to Washington's self-image, and his supposed refusal to accept responsibility for his actions in that fight. Pat later said it went deeper than that, as when she met him in college:

Washington shared time at the Trail Blazers power forward spot with Maurice Lucas at first, but after Lucas' trade to the New Jersey Nets, he became the full-time starter. He played three seasons in Portland, during which he earned a spot in the 1980 NBA All-Star Game, after some of the top players sat out due to injury. During that All-Star weekend, which was held in Landover, Maryland, nearby American U. held a halftime ceremony in which they retired Washington's number. He was named a team captain for the following season. In his post-punch career, numerous players, coaches, and officials noted that he became less aggressive on the court out of fear of getting into another fight; something he never did. Washington started experiencing pain in his back and knees during the 1980–81 season. The pain became unbearable during the 1981–82 season, and he retired in January 1982 after missing all but 20 games. In 1987, after more than five years out of the league, he tried to make a comeback with the Warriors, but lasted only eight games on the roster (playing in six of them) before being cut.

Kunnert signed with Boston before the 1978–79 season even though Washington was on the team because the Celtics offered him the most money. There remained a mostly quiet discord between the two as Washington felt Kunnert never properly acknowledged his role in the fight.

In November 1978, San Diego played in Houston. Tomjanovich scored 26 points and collected 11 rebounds while Washington had six and two. Before the game, the Clippers coach, Gene Shue, had suggested to the Rockets coach, Tom Nissalke, that the players shake hands at center court prior to tipoff. Tomjanovich rejected the idea.

After a year in San Diego, Washington was traded again. Levin decided to acquire Portland center Bill Walton even though Walton had missed the entire 1978–79 season due to broken bones in his foot. Since the Blazers and Clippers could not agree on compensation, the commissioner's office made the final decision, sending Washington, Kunnert, and Randy Smith to Portland in exchange for Walton. This became the second time Washington and Kunnert were part of the same trade.

On December 9, 1977, during an NBA game between the Lakers and the Houston Rockets, a scuffle broke out between several players at midcourt.

On December 27, 1977, just two weeks after the incident, Washington was traded to the Boston Celtics. Red Auerbach, Boston's general manager lived in the Washington, D.C. area, and had been a longtime fan of Washington's. His wife, Pat, stayed behind as the couple had two young children, and Washington would be staying in a hotel. While he waited for his reinstatement, which he thought would not occur until the next season, he became depressed and fell out of shape. He pulled himself together, and began running up and down the flights of stairs of the 29-story hotel.

A big defensive forward, Washington was known for his ability to gather rebounds. He averaged 9.2 points and 8.3 rebounds per game in ten National Basketball Association (NBA) seasons and played in the All-Star Game once. Washington was drafted by the Los Angeles Lakers with the fifth overall pick in the 1973 NBA draft. He played sparingly his first three seasons, and sought the help of retired basketball coach Pete Newell before his fourth season. Under Newell's tutelage, Washington's game rapidly improved and he became a starter for several teams. He played for the Lakers, Boston Celtics, San Diego Clippers, Portland Trail Blazers and Golden State Warriors.

Washington was drafted fifth overall by the Los Angeles Lakers in the 1973 NBA draft. A week before the team began training camp, Pat and Kermit were married. They invited neither of their families; they just drove together to LA's city hall for the ceremony. He had a difficult time making the transition from college center to NBA power forward. Washington also had played in a primarily zone defense system in college and was not versed in man-to-man defense, which is more common in the NBA. He arrived on a team which had legend Jerry West, who was in the waning stages of a career that would result in him becoming the silhouette seen on the NBA's logo. Washington admits that he was terrified of West, and felt anxiety every time he made a mistake in front of him. Though healthy, he played in only 45 games and averaged 8.9 minutes a game his rookie season. He hurt his back that year but kept quiet about it, fearing he would be "labeled soft." The injury would bother him the rest of his career. He continued to struggle in his second season, and discovered that finding individual coaching in the professional game at that time was difficult. Between the rigorous schedule, and the coaches assuming players already knew how to play for the most part when they entered the league, no one, including head coach Bill Sharman, was willing to work with him on a one-on-one basis.

He averaged 18.6 points on 46.8 percent shooting and 20.5 rebounds in his first year of varsity basketball. He still played a somewhat unaggressive or "soft" brand of basketball, and it was hurting his chances of being drafted by a professional team. Between his sophomore and junior years he began lifting weights with Trey Coleman, a former football player from the University of Nebraska who was studying as an undergrad at American. Coleman encouraged him to be more aggressive on the court, and Washington told him that it was not in his nature. Coleman admonished him, telling him he could not afford to be "cool" on the court given his talent level if he wanted to join the pro ranks. Washington was named an academic All-American his junior year. He averaged 21.0 points on 54.4 percent shooting and an NCAA-leading 19.8 rebounds in his junior season. He was drafted after his junior season by the New York Nets of the American Basketball Association (ABA) and offered a four-year contract for $100,000 a year, which astonished him. He decided to stay at American with coach Young for his senior season because he felt he owed the school which had given him a chance when he was coming out of a difficult period in high school. He was offered an invite to try for the 1972 Olympic basketball team after the season, but did not make the squad.

On-court fights had been all too common in the 1970s, often including bench-clearing brawls. In the season opener, when Abdul-Jabbar punched Benson, no suspension had been levied. However, Washington's punch resulted in the league enacting strict penalties for on-court fights. Former NBA commissioner David Stern, then the NBA's chief counsel, later said that the incident made NBA officials realize that "you couldn't allow men that big and that strong to go around throwing punches at each other." Currently, any player who throws a punch at another player—even if he misses—is automatically ejected from the game, and suspended for at least his team's next game. The league added a third referee to its game crew after the season; this referee would have trailed the play and could have called a foul when Washington grabbed Kunnert's shorts, thereby potentially stopping the play and preventing the melee that succeeded it.

Kermit Alan Washington (born September 17, 1951) is an American former professional basketball player. Washington is best remembered for punching opposing player Rudy Tomjanovich during an on-court fight in 1977. His punch nearly killed Tomjanovich, and resulted in severe medical problems. However, Tomjanovich made a full recovery and ultimately made the All-Star team two years later.