“Things hit rock bottom when Coach (Frank) Layden, who was also our general manager at the time, got a call from our team owner, Sam Battistone," 1982 fourth-round pick Mark Eaton remembers in his book, The Four Commitments of a Winning Team. “He told Layden the team needed a million dollars in order to make payroll on Monday, and he wondered if Layden had any ideas to come up with the money.”
It turned out that Layden had one: trade the player who had just been drafted No. 3 overall, trade a future nine-time All-Star and first-ballot NBA Hall-of-Famer, trade a future NBA scoring champion and two-time dunk contest winner.