WOODS CROSS, UTAH — Extremely goal-driven from the time he was a seventh-grade student in Washington, D.C., Thurl Bailey built what he calls a "structure" through a string of achievements, culminating with a 16-year professional basketball career.
But, he said, that structure was without sure foundation until 1996, when he joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Brother Bailey, a 6-foot-11-inch Utah Jazz legend, spoke Sept. 26 at a fireside in the Church's Bountiful Regional Center, sponsored by the Woods Cross Utah, Woods Cross Utah East, Bountiful Utah Orchard, Bountiful Utah North Canyon, Bountiful Utah Val Verda and North Salt Lake stakes.
His wife, Cindy, a lifelong member of the Church whom he married in 1994, also spoke to the congregation. (The Baileys have two children ages 4 and 2.) Envoy, a trio of professional vocalists presented two selections, and Brother Bailey, who recently launched a career as a recording artist, sang "All the While," a song he co-wrote with James Marsden that tells of his searching for and finding truth.
Brother Bailey said he was a standout the day he entered kindergarten.
"I remember looking around at all these little people and asking my mom and dad, why is everybody so little?" he recalled. "And of course, parents being parents and wanting to be positive, they said, 'Son, you're special.' "
Nevertheless, it was a struggle, he said, and by seventh grade, to divert attention from his unusual height and lack of coordination (he was 6 feet 4 inches), he set an unusual goal to join and become president of all nine after-school clubs. This he achieved.
Then came time to try out for the school basketball team. Though he did not play sports at the time and, in fact, had never picked up a basketball, he decided to try out for the team.
"My first thought: I have to be captain of the team," he said. "I've got my nine clubs; I could be team captain."
But despite the fact that he was more than a foot taller than the other boys trying out, he did not make the cut. For the first time, he felt a sense of failure. He tried out the next year, again without success.
By the ninth grade, he was standing 6 feet 10 inches. He had worked on his game and learned some things from his father and brother. This time, his name appeared on the team list, although it was penciled in at the bottom.
"I knew I wouldn't play much," he said. "But this being my last year in junior high school, I was voted co-captain of the team, which is all I wanted anyway," he said.
"And it's amazing, because a lot of times when we accomplish something, when we give it our all, other positive things start to happen."
In this case, he started every game that year as the "jump-ball man." His height was a strategic advantage as the referee tossed the ball into the air for a jump ball.
With similar determination, he progressed from being junior varsity player in high school to being so good that by the time he graduated, more than 400 colleges were recruiting him with scholarship offers. His senior year at North Carolina State University in 1983, he helped lead his team to a national championship.
That year, he was selected in the NBA draft by the Utah Jazz on the seventh pick of the first round. He played eight years with the Jazz and then was traded to Minnesota, where he spent another three years. (Ultimately, he would return to play for Utah, where he spent last season.)
He met his wife, Cindy, through a basketball camp she was working. He recruited her to work his basketball camp, and their association grew to their marriage and subsequent sealing in the Swiss Temple.
But when they married, he was not a member of the Church, though he learned much about it from her and from Jazz teammates who were LDS, such as Fred Roberts, Andy Toolson and Pace Mannion.
"I knew he had the potential to become something great," she said in her talk. "As he started asking questions, I would answer them, but I never pressured him. I felt the best way to influence him was by example."
They went to Greece where he played basketball for a season, but it was not a positive experience for either of them. Thus, when his contract expired in Minnesota and he was offered the chance to play in Italy, neither of the Baileys was very keen on the idea of going abroad again.
But as Thurl lay in bed that night, he could not sleep and the idea of going to Italy would not leave him, even though it would be for less money and he would have to leave in two days. He told Cindy, "I don't know why, but I just feel we need to go."
Basketball camp in Italy afforded him time to get away occasionally and think. "There was a lake nearby, and I would go walk around the lake," he said. "It was the first time in a long time I had really had a chance to reflect on my life, who I was, what I had gone through."
He called Cindy one night and asked if she could find out the phone number of the LDS mission home in Milan. After he got the number, he called it and made an appointment for two elders to come to his home where he fixed them dinner. He agreed to hear the missionary lessons and amazed the elders with his knowledge of gospel principles.
One night, he asked them about a matter he had brought up with other LDS acquaintances but had never had resolved to his satisfaction. It pertained to why the priesthood was withheld from African-American men until 1978.
"I remember them starting to answer my question in their way," he said. "I'm sure it was a great answer, but for some reason it didn't really sink in as far as what I needed to know."
The missionaries returned on a later occasion. As Brother Bailey answered the door, he saw that a man was with them. It was J. Halvor Clegg, president of the Italy Milan Mission.
Brother Bailey reflected: "I've played against Kareem Abdul Jabar. I've played against Shaquile O'Neil (he fell on me once). I've played with Karl Malone and John Stockton and against them also. And do you know what? Until that day I had never felt intimidated. Not until I looked at this man. He reached out to shake my hand, and I knew at that moment this man had something important to say to me and I had better listen to him."
At a point in the discussion that evening, Brother Bailey politely dismissed the missionaries so he could speak privately with Pres. Clegg. He asked the mission president about the priesthood and African-Americans.
"He said, 'Thurl, it wasn't time.' He said those three simple words to me. And you know what? For the first time I felt something in me just open up. He said our Heavenly Father has a time and a place for everything. He said, 'You have to remember, we're all human, but I can guarantee you this Church and gospel are true.'
"At that moment, I knew why I'd come to Italy. I knew why I had gotten on that plane. I knew why I was up all night trying to figure out what in the world was going on. And I don't think it was just his answer so much. I think it was what his answer created inside me. I can't really describe it to you. But I know that the Spirit was strong in my home that night. I know that when that door opened, the Spirit was with this man and his missionaries."
That night, he called his wife, who by this time had joined him in Italy but had returned to the United States for her grandmother's funeral. As she relates the story, he greeted her softly then didn't say anything for a long time. Finally, she said to him, "You're getting baptized, aren't you?"
"I said, 'Yes,' and we cried and cried for a long time," Brother Bailey recounted, " a very expensive cry, I must say."
Brother Bailey said that all his life, extending back to kindergarten, a structure was being built. "Everything, president of the clubs, the basketball team, everything in my life was part of this structure. . . .
"But it wasn't until after my first daughter was born, not until that time in Italy, that I realized the structure didn't really have a strong foundation. . . . It took my flying over to Italy to realize that all of it didn't really mean anything: the money, the great NBA life, it didn't mean a thing, because the structure was wavering. It was unbalanced. . . . But I'm here to tell you tonight, I'm where I belong."
Brother Bailey said he does not know yet what Heavenly Father has in store for him. "I know it's a big responsibility. Somewhere, sometime, I know He's going to have something for me to do. . . . I don't know how to describe it, I just know that my Heavenly Father is blessing me. My life isn't perfect, . . . but the gospel is in my home; the priesthood is in my home."
