R.I.P. Kevin DiCicco, Air Bud creator

Kevin DiCicco has died. Best known as the creator of the “Air Bud” character, DiCicco died of advanced chronic obstructive pulmonary disease in San Diego, TMZ confirmed through his brother. He was 63. 

DiCicco found Air Bud, a stray golden retriever, while staying at his grandfather’s cabin near Yosemite in 1989. Buddy walked out of the woods hungry and disheveled, and DiCicco took him home. Realizing his dog’s special ball-handling talents while playing catch, DiCicco began teaching the dog to bounce a basketball into a regulation-sized hoop. Months later, on August 21, 1990, Buddy sank his first basket. “He’s a three-sport cross-trained dog,” DiCicco told The L.A. Times in 1992. “Bud knows hockey, Bud knows baseball, but Bud knows basketball best of all.”

After convincing a few NBA teams to allow Bud to shoot hoops during halftime, DiCicco and Bud began attracting national attention. One thing led to another, with DiCicco leveraging a local TV spot into CNN coverage. Around the time that Bud was invited to be the mascot of the Illinois state fair, DiCicco began writing a screenplay called Mascot, about an NBA team that enlists the help of a hoop-shooting good boy. DiCicco and Bud’s profile continued to rise throughout the early ’90s, landing spots on America’s Funniest Home Videos and The Late Show With David Letterman‘s “Stupid Pet Tricks.” In 1995, Bud was cast as Comet for a few episodes of Full House.