Former NBA Player Luther Wright Talks About "A Perfect Fit" and an Imperfect Past

Luther Wright was a Seton Hall basketball standout in 1993 when he was chosen as a first-round draft pick for the Utah Jazz.

His goal, he says, was to make it to the NBA. Once he got there, he didn't have much of a plan for what to do next.

Standing at a hulking 7 ft. 2 inches, Wright, a Jersey City native, played for the team for one year before drugs, ADD and bipolar disorder and a lack of focus got him cut from the team and hospitalized.

From there, Wright got caught up in a spiral of addiction and homelessness. It bottomed out when he found himself laid out in an emergency room, on drugs, with an infection in his size-22 foot that cost him two toes, ending his ability to move as he once did as a star athlete.

Now 41, Wright has written a book about his experiences, "A Perfect Fit."

He proudly lives clean and sober without the drugs - legal and not - that once waged war inside his body.

On Thursday, he came before a group of kids and teens in the For KEEPS program, run by Saint Peter's University Hospital, to share the story of his demons and how he overcame them.

For KEEPS is a program that provides therapy and treatment for young people between the ages of 5-17 who live with emotional and/or behavioral problems.

It is run out of the hospital's How Lane clinic.

Wright said his fall from the spotlight was well-documented in the news.

"The stories they were writing about me, you'd think I was this crazy bad person," he said.

Since beating his addiction, Wright says he has written a book, gotten married, and focused himself on his love of music: guitar, DJ-ing, and singing.

A student in the crowd asked Wright if he would do it all over again.

"I wouldn't change anything because I've grown through the experience," he said.

Wright said that people come up to him now to share their own stories, and tell them he's inspired them. People are happy to see him.

"I didn't die from my addiction...it made me stronger," he said.