What Ever Happened to the NBA’s Brian Willams, aka Bison Dele?

The history of professional sports is not without its own batch of terrifying, unsolved mysteries, and tops among them might be the disappearance of former NBA center Bison Dele, who played most of his career as Brian Williams. Dele disappeared while sailing in the South Pacific Ocean along with his girlfriend, Serena Karlan, and boat captain Bertrand Saldo in 2002. 

Williams was a well-known, well-respected player during his NBA career — never a star but a bona fide role player who won an NBA championship alongside Michael Jordan on the Chicago Bulls in 1997. 

We wanted to take a look at the life and mysterious disappearance of Bison Dele and explore the fascination with it that still continues 20 years later.

Bison Dele was born as Brian Williams on April 9, 1969, in Fresno, California — Easter Sunday — and was the second son to Patricia Phillips and Geno Williams, who was a professional singer and performed with The Platters in the 1970s. Dele was raised with his older brother, Kevin Williams. 

At 6-foot-11, Dele was a high school basketball star in two different states, first at Bishop Gorman High School in Las Vegas as a junior and then at Santa Monica Catholic High School in Santa Monica, California, where he averaged 17.3 points, 12.7 rebounds, 2.1 assists, 2.5 steals and 9.1 rebounds as a senior. 

Dele signed with the University of Maryland but came to campus in the wake of the death of Len Bias and left soon after, transferring back to the West Coast and the University of Arizona. 

Dele blossomed at the University of Arizona under legendary head coach Lute Olson, where he averaged 12.4 points, 6.8 rebounds and 1.2 blocks over two seasons and was an All-Pac-10 selection as a senior in 1991.

Someone as big and as skilled as Dele was bound to have NBA teams welcome him with open arms. Not surprisingly, he was selected by the Orlando Magic as the No. 10 overall pick in the 1991 NBA Draft. 

Dele’s NBA career was marked by his constant movement between teams — and his productivity. 

He played two seasons for the Orlando Magic and two seasons for the Denver Nuggets before playing one season for the Los Angeles Clippers in 1995-96, where he averaged career highs of 15.8 points and 7.6 rebounds. A contract dispute forced him to miss most of the 1996-97 season before he was signed by the Chicago Bulls and became a key backup player on the way to the franchise winning its fifth NBA championship. 

His short time with the Chicago Bulls made Bison Dele a hot commodity as an NBA free agent, and he took a big-money offer with the Detroit Pistons — a whopping, seven-year, $45 million contract. 

Dele wasn’t without problems during his career. He was diagnosed with clinical depression and attempted suicide in 1992, but treatment and therapy helped keep his mental health issues in check. Still, teammates reported several disturbing incidents, including one time on a team flight where Dele insinuated he was going to pull the emergency door on the plane mid-flight. 

Dele changed his name from Brian Williams before the 1998-99 season and retired before the start of the 1999-2000 season at 30 years old, still in his prime and with five years and $36.45 million left on his contract.