Sen. Bradley’s Race in New Jersey Looks Like Another Easy Slam-Dunk

For a long time, he feared he’d be known as “Sen. Bill Bradley, former New York Knick” for the rest of his life.

The image of a man “wearing short pants in drafty arenas” didn’t seem to enhance the credibility sought by New Jersey’s young senator when he arrived here in 1978.

So the Rhodes scholar with a great baseline jumpshot deliberately shunned the key.

“Dollar Bill”--a nickname he earned from his pro teammates because of his frugal handling of his affairs--set out to apply his sense of discipline to mastery of parliamentary procedure. He built support for tax reform, forging alliances until Congress overhauled the tax system in 1986.

He fought for the Superfund cleanup bill, child nutrition programs, more Medicaid money for poor mothers and children, all the while plunging himself into details of foreign policy, Third World debt and international trade.

“The important thing is to get things done,” he says.

Twelve years after what he calls his divorce from basketball, Bradley returns alone in the summers to a court near his mountain home in Denville, N.J., to relax with his famous five-spot warmups--”but not the jumpers, you understand,” he says good-humoredly.

“The heart is willing, but the knees aren’t,” the former Knicks forward laments.

About all he puts them through in Washington these days are sessions shooting hoops with his 13-year-old daughter, Theresa Anne. Aides say the daughter he devotedly drops at school each morning and cares for four days a week shows signs of catching up with her father’s legendary technique.

Playing with her has helped him put basketball back into perspective after several years in which he believed he could only be taken seriously on Capitol Hill by pushing his NBA career firmly into the past.

“Now I look back and I can think more easily about it; the fact of the matter is that I like the game,” says Bradley.

The senator picks his 6-foot-5 frame up from his office chair during an interview over coffee to point out reminders of what he’s mastered in his 46 years: a golden gavel for presiding 100 hours in his first Senate session and photographs from his 1970 and 1973 NBA championship victories with the New York Knicks.

He takes equal pride in the gavel and the shot of him wrapped in a bearhug around Willis Reed, triumphant after the Knicks’ 1973 championship.

Sports metaphors occasionally punctuate his conversation.

“In basketball and in politics, the only score that counts is the one at the final buzzer,” he says when asked about Republican predictions that his opponent will do well to capture 38% of the November vote.

Bradley also says he’ll serve out another six-year Senate term to the buzzer, despite recurring speculation that he will seek the presidency.

His supporters take his word at face value.

“I believe that in his heart and his head, he believes he is going to serve out his full term,” says Harold Hodes, once chief of staff to former New Jersey Gov. Brendan T. Byrne. But, he adds, “between 1991 and 1992 a lot of things can happen.”

Would waiting until 1996 hurt him? Are supporters pressuring him to run?

“It’s a very funny thing,” Bradley responds. “I assume that’s what people talk about sometimes, but that’s not what they talk about with me. I think people respect my sense of service. They know that if they mention anything to me about that, that I will say: ‘Look, my interest is New Jersey.’ ”

Still, Bradley-watching has become a pastime within both parties.

Roger Stone, a Republican consultant who helped elect Ronald Reagan, says Bradley is conservative enough and independent enough to appeal to GOP voters.

“Our party could nominate a Bill Bradley,” Stone says. “If you look at his votes on Contra aid, defense issues, the MX missile, the B-1 bomber, he looks at issues one by one.”

And, looking at Bradley’s command of 64% of the vote in his last reelection bid, Stone adds: “A lot of Republicans obviously voted for him in 1984.”

Bradley’s fair-tax policies have appealed to even some of the most conservative voices.

“He’s not one of those Democrats who has never met a tax hike he doesn’t like,” says Howard Phillips, chairman of the Conservative Caucus.

The most common negative that people on both sides say about Bradley is he lacks charisma. The word comes up again and again, along with references to improvements in his once sleep-inducing speeches.

“I think there isn’t any Bradley charisma. But it’s obvious that he cares about people. It’s obvious he listens,” Stone says. “On a one-on-one basis, he’s easy to like.”

Christine Todd Whitman, the GOP candidate who hopes to unseat him in November, has criticized Bradley for endorsing proposed campaign-spending reform legislation when his own campaign kitty is way above the $5.5-million limit that would apply in New Jersey.

For his part, Bradley bemoans being forced to spend so much to buy television time in the expensive New York and Philadelphia media markets because New Jersey has none of its own.

“You end up being collectors for television,” he says.

But he says he needs to raise the money to fend off any possible negative GOP campaign. The cautious nature is part of Bradley’s style.

For the last two years he also has been playing in national political circles, Hodes notes. He has spent countless hours jetting to podiums around the country on behalf of campaigning colleagues.

“Remember the early endorsement of Michael Dukakis, at a very critical time for Dukakis; the decision to back Ron Brown for Democratic National Committee chairman. New Jersey was a swing seat for Brown and Bradley endorsed him,” Hodes says.

And at the same time, Bradley has quietly been learning about issues outside New Jersey. For example, although New Jersey has a strong agriculture industry, the senator made several visits to a South Dakota wheat farm to study another region’s farm problems.

“I went back over time,” Bradley says. “I have to physically experience things; it’s not enough for me to read the book.”