Speaker 1: This is kJ Live with Chris Johnson. Allen and Chris
Speaker 1: is having conversations with influencers in the sports world and
Speaker 1: entertainment industrain. Now here's Chris Johnson. You're now tuned in
Speaker 1: to kJ Lott today's guests on the show. Has been
Speaker 1: considered one of the foremost authorities in basketball player development.
Speaker 1: He's worked with over four thousand, five hundred clients around
Speaker 1: the globe, including international Olympic, w n B, A college,
Speaker 1: high school, and some MBA athletes. Dorian Lee and his
Speaker 1: training is rooted in an explosive movement, functional movement, quick release, shooting,
Speaker 1: seamless trasitional ball handled, exposed to play and exposed to finishing. Man,
Speaker 1: that sounds like a lot. Let's welcome in my man.
Speaker 1: Dorian Lee is in the building. What's up? Deeply, have
Speaker 1: been a long time bro. So it's good. Like I said,
Speaker 1: it's good seeing you and excited about just having that conversation.
Speaker 1: Man there like you. We've talked off line about the
Speaker 1: vibe even years ago. Uh, forward thinkers have this this
Speaker 1: way of connecting, and I knew you were a forward thinker.
Speaker 1: I knew you had some, uh some big things in store. Man.
Speaker 1: So I'm honored, man, I would have to do the
Speaker 1: do the bow down. I'm honored to be on the podcast,
Speaker 1: my bro. No, Man, I appreciate you for jumping on
Speaker 1: man and blessings you know have been bountiful for me
Speaker 1: and for you as well. Man. But I wanted to
Speaker 1: get you on the pod specifically because just to give
Speaker 1: all this a little bit of background, I met d
Speaker 1: Lee down in Atlanta around two thousand and five. I
Speaker 1: think we was at Running Shoot. So we was at
Speaker 1: Running Shooting and all my my who pends out there
Speaker 1: know exactly what Running Shoot is. It's over there, what
Speaker 1: East Point, Yeah, yeah it was. It was on Metropolitan Parkway, yeah,
Speaker 1: the Avenue. Yeah. What revitalized actually spearheaded the revitalization of
Speaker 1: that part of town because that town, part of the
Speaker 1: town was known for the strip clubs, for you know,
Speaker 1: the drug dealing and things of that nature. And it
Speaker 1: was amazed at how a basketball facility kind of changed
Speaker 1: all of that. Man. It was beautiful. Man. Running Shoot
Speaker 1: had about what six eight eight twelve courts, had a barbershop,
Speaker 1: you could eat, you can lift weights, and so during
Speaker 1: the course of during the course of my workouts, I
Speaker 1: think I was down there doing trying to try out
Speaker 1: for the Hawks or something. But I had met Dorian
Speaker 1: Lee in the gym and we start chopping it up
Speaker 1: and we'd be rebounding for each other. We'd be working
Speaker 1: out a little bit, but it would be a daily thing. Man.
Speaker 1: We kind of had this bond and camaraderie. Man, did
Speaker 1: I didn't see you again for nothing? Yeah, for another
Speaker 1: fifteen years. Man, we finally reconnected. But I wanted to
Speaker 1: get you on the show because man, I I love
Speaker 1: your story, I love your journey, and I love how
Speaker 1: you express your journey. Brother, I wanted to know how
Speaker 1: you got your start. Where are you from and how
Speaker 1: did you get your starting this basketball? So I'm deep South.
Speaker 1: I'm from Mobile, Alabama, football country. Viger High School where
Speaker 1: I attended was actual ESPN National champs in football. So
Speaker 1: it wasn't a basketball It's not a basketball part of
Speaker 1: the country, right. You know, we're Alabama and Auburn. No
Speaker 1: pro sports teams, uh, you know, major pro sports team.
Speaker 1: So you know we were kind of afterthoughts, you know,
Speaker 1: and then you talk about just a little bit to
Speaker 1: the left in Mississippi. You know, you got your literial greens,
Speaker 1: your mark mood abdu Raos and they were allowed to
Speaker 1: really play. We were more defensive oriented. You know, people
Speaker 1: like me were actually shun who let that ball fly?
Speaker 1: You know, we were shunned in a sense. So, uh,
Speaker 1: it was it was a funny uh placed the start
Speaker 1: in terms of your basketball journey, but um, you know
Speaker 1: that's where it started from me. I ended up you know,
Speaker 1: lant the city and scoring a second in the city
Speaker 1: and scoring behind Antonio Lange my senior year, and uh
Speaker 1: in high school. He went on to play at Duke
Speaker 1: to obviously grand Hill's roommate, you know during that time.
Speaker 1: So Tony has had an incredible college and professional career
Speaker 1: in terms of coaching, playing overseas, the whole now has
Speaker 1: done a phenomenal job. But I ended up going to Juko.
Speaker 1: I didn't have any offers coming out of high school,
Speaker 1: you know, not because of the game. I believe, even
Speaker 1: though I wasn't in my opinion when I looked back
Speaker 1: at I wasn't that good. I was athletic, I was
Speaker 1: you know, explosive, I could score, but I really just
Speaker 1: didn't have the true understanding of the game. But I
Speaker 1: had knee surgery to knee surgeries before I left high school.
Speaker 1: So people wanted me on crutches to the wait and
Speaker 1: then we'll try out and whatever. And I was like, no, man,
Speaker 1: I wanna, I wanna. I want to ink something and
Speaker 1: lo and behold. Uh. This was the funny stories of it.
Speaker 1: But the laughing stock junior college where we used to
Speaker 1: jone people that hey, man, you're gonna end up going
Speaker 1: to Bishop State, that's where you go. You ain't even
Speaker 1: good enough. Guess where your boy ended up. So we
Speaker 1: were jonah and man, it was one of the best
Speaker 1: things that ever happened. Led him in score. My first
Speaker 1: year fourteen and a half, second year nineteen and a
Speaker 1: half was an all star selection, had uh multiple Division
Speaker 1: one offers. Uh, it ended up coming down to a
Speaker 1: Division one, Division two, so I had Southeast Louisiana, had
Speaker 1: McNeese State, Western Carolina, but it came down to Western
Speaker 1: Carolina and North Florida, which is now Division one but
Speaker 1: was was D two at the time. And it was
Speaker 1: you know, when you talked about making those decisions, I was.
Speaker 1: I was in love at that time, so I wanted
Speaker 1: to be closer uh to my girlfriend. So I made
Speaker 1: a decision, a permanent decision on a temporary relationship. Uh.
Speaker 1: And I ended up going to North Florida over Western Carolina,
Speaker 1: and uh so that's that's kind of where I started, man.
Speaker 1: And you know, I played six d points in college,
Speaker 1: had had a decent career, got into my coach my
Speaker 1: senior year, went back to spring Hill College in a
Speaker 1: i A ranked number four in the country that year.
Speaker 1: We were loaded, had had a good college experience. Uh
Speaker 1: and then I was like, you know what, man, I
Speaker 1: I want to make my money doing something else. Man.
Speaker 1: And you know, it's it's weird because I already had
Speaker 1: a child. My oldest daughter is thirty one now, and
Speaker 1: she was she was small then, and I was like
Speaker 1: kind of almost like uh uh disenchanted with with basketball
Speaker 1: at that at that moment, you know, went over to
Speaker 1: Mexico for a tour, played well, but my heart really
Speaker 1: wasn't totally in it at that point. Man. So you know,
Speaker 1: I got back worked in Corporate America for some years,
Speaker 1: and I finally, man, just got to a point I
Speaker 1: was a pharmaceutical wrapped my last stint in corporate America,
Speaker 1: and that was supposed to be the cure all, end
Speaker 1: all job. And when I got it, I realized, Man,
Speaker 1: I don't want to work with anybody. Yeah, and it
Speaker 1: was it was different. So, man, I tell you I left.
Speaker 1: I have some real estate, already had seven properties I
Speaker 1: bought by the time I was twenty five, I got
Speaker 1: in with some business partners in the Network marketing company
Speaker 1: and I'm telling you that. I was like, dude, I'm
Speaker 1: getting out of court for America. And I literally left,
Speaker 1: and you know, the bottom fell out with the real estate.
Speaker 1: And so I was on a trip to New York
Speaker 1: and this this guy was sitting at my wedding. It
Speaker 1: was a wedding event we were at and sitting at
Speaker 1: my table was Jay Hernandez that played at Hofstra. He's
Speaker 1: an assistant coach now with Charlotte Horner and uh we
Speaker 1: were sitting talking man, and Jay was talking about Look man,
Speaker 1: you know, uh I hear I was talking about going
Speaker 1: back to play. This is around the time that I
Speaker 1: met you. A little bit before I met you two
Speaker 1: thousand and three, I went on another tour to Ostria
Speaker 1: professional tour and I was heading that. When I was
Speaker 1: talking to him about he was saying, like, why don't
Speaker 1: you come up and work out with me? And so
Speaker 1: I'm from Alabama work out. To me, I'm like, man,
Speaker 1: I live weights with you talk. You know. He was like, no,
Speaker 1: like player development, man, Listen, I had never even heard
Speaker 1: the term player development. Right. We we just didn't have
Speaker 1: either you had a dad who could do it, or
Speaker 1: you founded in the streets and you just made the
Speaker 1: best of it. And we just didn't have people who
Speaker 1: were putting people through drills and explaining the game. And
Speaker 1: I went up that week, uh took a long train
Speaker 1: ride countryside New York uh to get the Long Island.
Speaker 1: I mean it was about four inches of snow during
Speaker 1: this time, and you know, we got an island garden.
Speaker 1: You know, we got some work in and I learned
Speaker 1: more from an individual standpoint, how to frame stuff in
Speaker 1: one week that I had my entire basketball career, right.
Speaker 1: And so I went over to Austria. Killed it. I mean,
Speaker 1: average probably twenty nine for the tour. I mean, just
Speaker 1: had a phenomenal tour. Had offers from Lithuanian teams, from
Speaker 1: German teams, a couple of Austrian teams, um, but they
Speaker 1: fell through, and I just took it as a signment,
Speaker 1: you know what I need to bro I just need
Speaker 1: to do something else and and and I it was
Speaker 1: a weird kind of feeling because I had a big
Speaker 1: gap between corporate America when I went to Mexico to
Speaker 1: gap in corporate America and then back to Austria. Man,
Speaker 1: that was about a ten year eight nine year journey.
Speaker 1: So I was thirty one when I went to Austria.
Speaker 1: And so one of the issues was, you know his age,
Speaker 1: you know, yeah, he's he's he's really really good. But
Speaker 1: can we get a younger player for you know, less money?
Speaker 1: That that that thing. So I came back and I said,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm gonna set up shop and run and shoot.
Speaker 1: And you remember, I don't know that all the times
Speaker 1: you came. But it was such a jungle like meaning
Speaker 1: like a real jungle. So I started in that man,
Speaker 1: and I'm I'm telling you, bro, it was people will
Speaker 1: walk on the court while you're training. And yo, bro,
Speaker 1: you didn't give it. You didn't get permission to set
Speaker 1: up shop in our town. What's up with that? And that?
Speaker 1: And so so I had to deal with that and
Speaker 1: maintain professionalism. You know, I had the college shirts, I
Speaker 1: had the logo. I was the first to really kind
Speaker 1: of bring a level of of of professionalism to that
Speaker 1: inside a running shoot and from there, man, it really
Speaker 1: it grew. I I mean, and I was as super
Speaker 1: athletic then I was still three six tins. So I
Speaker 1: had a a flare for the presentation. And so it
Speaker 1: really drew a lot at that time, and then the
Speaker 1: rest became reputation. And I've grown throughout the years a lot.
Speaker 1: When I look back then, you you know, you realize
Speaker 1: how much you didn't know. And then as you move forward,
Speaker 1: she was like, man, you know what I've I've come
Speaker 1: a long way in the game. Man, I'll tell you what. Man,
Speaker 1: that's a You really really brought back a lot of
Speaker 1: memories when you mentioned running shoot in the jungle, because
Speaker 1: I remember, Man, I'm coming. I was at running Shoot.
Speaker 1: I come in the gym. You know, I'm nobody, and
Speaker 1: I won a national championship. I had done some stuff
Speaker 1: in U c L A pack ten, you know whatever.
Speaker 1: But I walked in the building. It's like they look
Speaker 1: at me up and you like, you know, who's this
Speaker 1: light scaring curly here, you know, with all that type
Speaker 1: of stuff. So then, but the thing I love of
Speaker 1: about Basketball D League is if you got a game,
Speaker 1: it automatically endears this respect no matter where you at
Speaker 1: in the world. So it dope better. So it felt
Speaker 1: like a jugger first, But after a couple of weeks,
Speaker 1: you know, on first name basis with everybody, it's all good.
Speaker 1: You're walking. We got, we got, we got, we got
Speaker 1: light skin, Yeah, we got, we got. Let's go, let's
Speaker 1: get it. Let's get it. And there's no greater feeling
Speaker 1: than that. The other thing I want to touch you
Speaker 1: on something you said at the outside, just talking about
Speaker 1: where you're from, where your roots are from that area Alabama, Mississippi.
Speaker 1: I remember when I was growing up. You mentioned Chris Jackson,
Speaker 1: the guys that it was a bunch of Mississippi dues.
Speaker 1: Also m Chris Jackson, a guy named Ford. You know,
Speaker 1: you know who Ronnie Henderson is, Okay, Jess Jesse Pate, Okay,
Speaker 1: Othella that whole so that whole crew. So I played
Speaker 1: with Ronnie Henderson. We flew Ronnie Henderson out from Mississippi,
Speaker 1: came out to l a bro and he played on
Speaker 1: our team. So I kind of got And I was
Speaker 1: sixteen years old, dumb bounce and one of the coolest
Speaker 1: cats of all time. I'll tell you what the brothers
Speaker 1: down from Alabama, Mississippi. Man, when you just a different
Speaker 1: type of person down there, saw a real cool, solid individuals,
Speaker 1: unbelievable sense of humor. But that I thought about that too,
Speaker 1: And the other thing I thought I wanted to ask
Speaker 1: you about all this. How serious in your mind was
Speaker 1: the NBA? Because because you kept it going? Man? And
Speaker 1: I know as for me, I always had the NBA.
Speaker 1: So I go to Tim Buck to to who, I
Speaker 1: go to Madagascar to who, because I say, hey, that's
Speaker 1: the job. Let's give me an opportunity. I put on
Speaker 1: my resume and say I played somewhere last year. I
Speaker 1: didn't you know, because it's you know? So so for you?
Speaker 1: How serious was the NBA in your mind? As as
Speaker 1: a goal? My brother? It was? It was No. I
Speaker 1: really didn't have a plan. B. And for for many people,
Speaker 1: if you go to my hometown, and I think most
Speaker 1: will a test. They everybody just felt because the way
Speaker 1: I loved it, that I would fill the gaps from
Speaker 1: a talent and an i Q standpoint, and it would
Speaker 1: just happen. And when I look back on that has
Speaker 1: so many opportunities. Man. But when you have such poor
Speaker 1: counsel and when I mean by poor counsel, that means
Speaker 1: bad counsel, means that they just people don't know right,
Speaker 1: Like like what I'm able to do now, Chris, when
Speaker 1: I can literally get on the phone and get you
Speaker 1: a job, whether it's an agent involved or not, or
Speaker 1: I can get you the right agent for your tear
Speaker 1: of player, I had no idea of that. I can't
Speaker 1: and worked out for an agent Atlanta ninety six loved me,
Speaker 1: told me, look, you signed with me. Now I'm gonna
Speaker 1: take you on these tours. Right, I'm gonna pay you
Speaker 1: about three hundred dollars a week, blah blah blah. And
Speaker 1: I'm sitting here like a dummy listeners to somebody who
Speaker 1: doesn't play, saying, oh you can make that at McDonald's.
Speaker 1: Why are you did? But it's it's it's it's not
Speaker 1: saying it's not the same. It's not the same. It's
Speaker 1: not the same. And I said, now I gotta pay
Speaker 1: this Cardinal, I got the baby, and nobody would say,
Speaker 1: d you trust me? You got this talent. You got
Speaker 1: the talent to play a long time right every time
Speaker 1: I walked and running, shoot right. And if anybody says
Speaker 1: it says it's not true. It's lyne. People always ask me, man,
Speaker 1: so so so where did you play last year? Where
Speaker 1: where are you coming from? What? Right? Because that's the
Speaker 1: type of work I used to put in, And so
Speaker 1: it's it's the talent was there, but the advice, man,
Speaker 1: it is that counsel is so utterly important man for
Speaker 1: young folks to really be able to to seek expert
Speaker 1: counsel versus you know, and I'm gonna say this, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna say this, think about this from a from a
Speaker 1: you know, because of the leagues you've played in that
Speaker 1: this is not the same as all other businesses. Right,
Speaker 1: So people will tell you, oh, they offered you four thousand, Uh, Chris, see,
Speaker 1: you're worth more than that. See, that's something you do
Speaker 1: as a as an I T. Consultant. You can't do
Speaker 1: that in basketball because you gotta know maybe that's the
Speaker 1: market that year that year, not your value, but the
Speaker 1: market that year that year, right, And so four this
Speaker 1: year might really have been nine last year, and then
Speaker 1: next year that four might be twelve based on the
Speaker 1: economy and certain markets that the global economy a lot
Speaker 1: of things. But again, without that expert council, bro, it's
Speaker 1: just you that's not gonna get it. And but you
Speaker 1: made a really great point about being able to direct
Speaker 1: a player to the right agent for his level, because
Speaker 1: a lot of times cast get with agents that are
Speaker 1: too big for him and then they become an afterthought.
Speaker 1: But then if you get an agent that specializes in
Speaker 1: getting guys like yourself, your particular, whatever your skill set is,
Speaker 1: whatever you get it. Maybe you undersize an undersized four.
Speaker 1: And my guy has been able to get Cats jobs
Speaker 1: in Australia, Australia or whatever because the team likes these
Speaker 1: type of guys because that coach is on that type
Speaker 1: of system. You feel me and so and so. That
Speaker 1: to me is one of the most important parts about
Speaker 1: just today's basketball culture, Dorian, is having surrounding yourself with
Speaker 1: the right people. You know. I bring folks on uh
Speaker 1: NBA guy x NBA guys, and that's what they tended
Speaker 1: to to kind of lean and talk about because I
Speaker 1: asked them the question of you if you can tell
Speaker 1: yourself you can talk to a sixteen year old say,
Speaker 1: I had de Reil right on and he was like,
Speaker 1: you know, I'll tell you know, he tell hisself just
Speaker 1: to listen to the right people. And just to stay
Speaker 1: locked into the right stuff. And I feel like I
Speaker 1: feel like a voice like yours, d Lee and the
Speaker 1: way you lead by example as well. You're somebody, uh
Speaker 1: that I feel like it's it's easy to follow, it
Speaker 1: is easy, it's easy to listen to a brother like you,
Speaker 1: is easy to trust someone like yourself. Now you can't
Speaker 1: trust everybody, okay, but you can't, you know. I feel
Speaker 1: like you're somebody that you know, folks can kind of
Speaker 1: listen to. But man, I want to talk about some
Speaker 1: high level basketball stuff because that's that's one of the
Speaker 1: major reasons I got you on this show, bro, because
Speaker 1: I love the way that your perspective and the way
Speaker 1: you think about things. So my first question for you
Speaker 1: on that level is the old school versus new school thing.
Speaker 1: So my thing has always been about the old school
Speaker 1: was the style of play in the context, so the
Speaker 1: rules of the game, and whether or not an old
Speaker 1: school guy could would have a hard time playing today.
Speaker 1: It kind of started with Charles Oakley saying that stuff
Speaker 1: about Janice and Joannice being a role player. You're taking
Speaker 1: your honest today and putting them in the eighties. He'd
Speaker 1: be a role player. What is your opinion on comments
Speaker 1: like that? And what is just your overwhelming thought about
Speaker 1: taking new school guys who have grown up playing without physicality,
Speaker 1: without our level of physicality, and putting them back into
Speaker 1: old school. How would they do? So? So I'm I'm
Speaker 1: gonna say this. I'm gonna say that we got two
Speaker 1: things that we have to do to frame this correctly.
Speaker 1: Uh Number One, we always talk about when a game
Speaker 1: would be played right. So if we're talking about bringing
Speaker 1: someone back to the eighties and nineties seventies, we also
Speaker 1: have to erase YouTube, television contracts, specialized training, blah blah blah.
Speaker 1: Now let's see where they are. If we talk about
Speaker 1: moving Oscar Robinson up, now, we got to talk about
Speaker 1: specialized training, YouTube, synergy, being able to watch all of
Speaker 1: this stuff. The number of AU games now we're moving
Speaker 1: them forward. So what I know for a fact is
Speaker 1: that true greatness is transcendent. Some greatness is situational, it's timing.
Speaker 1: But true greatness Pete Pistol, Pete would have had everything
Speaker 1: that Nash had ten years later because the style would
Speaker 1: have adapted. See when we talk about pre uh and
Speaker 1: one pre and one post and one, you can see
Speaker 1: the shift in the style of handling. Right, it was
Speaker 1: more outside of the frame of the body, where back
Speaker 1: in the day it was taught to be tight, keep
Speaker 1: it tight, you know everything, Like you watch kJ Kevin Johnson. Man,
Speaker 1: Kevin Johnson used to be on top of it. His
Speaker 1: back was art because leaned over the ball so much.
Speaker 1: But it was like quick kids. But Kevin Johnson in
Speaker 1: space now with the style of play bro, that's a
Speaker 1: that's an all star guard with his with his with
Speaker 1: his athleticism, all start in you see what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: So that for for me, we have to talk about that.
Speaker 1: So how would they have fair? It is players that
Speaker 1: would have transcended all levels, and it is some players
Speaker 1: today that would have figured it out based on what
Speaker 1: they're built like. So for me, Lebron is a it's
Speaker 1: a big hot topic, right. I think Lebron when we
Speaker 1: started talking goat, we we enter another way of we
Speaker 1: enter another level of critique. Right, So we can't critique
Speaker 1: him like an average player. He's in the goat conversation,
Speaker 1: So how does he stack up against other goats? Right?
Speaker 1: So when you look at Lebron from a mental toughness standpoint, right,
Speaker 1: I don't know, would he have been much different than
Speaker 1: Karl Malone in same career, in same statistics numbers out
Speaker 1: the roof, it was was arguably one of the best
Speaker 1: of his positions, but when it got down to the
Speaker 1: to the to the nuts and bolts, he struggled in situation.
Speaker 1: So worst case scenario, Lebron is Carl Malone? Right, that
Speaker 1: that that in my opinion, right, move move MJ to
Speaker 1: this era, right, because I'm gonna keep going back and forth.
Speaker 1: So now we we got Lebron back to there, and
Speaker 1: let's move m J up. But MJ with the same
Speaker 1: pedigree upbringing brothers whooping on him. Uh, you know all
Speaker 1: of those situations and joined in space with six four
Speaker 1: at the RAM, six six at the RAM, six eight
Speaker 1: at the RAM. I just I just think it's it's
Speaker 1: ungodly the type of numbers with the level of competitiveness
Speaker 1: right with his with if he kept the same unset, now,
Speaker 1: no one convinced him to take games off. You know, uh,
Speaker 1: what do you call it? Not time management but management?
Speaker 1: Old management, all of those terms that you know, the
Speaker 1: man played eighty two games nine times. You know, Stockton
Speaker 1: played eighty two games like twelve times, ten like crazy.
Speaker 1: So those are those are factors to right and just
Speaker 1: the basic science. So at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: I believe what I said the other day on the
Speaker 1: post that got me lamb based in him. And it
Speaker 1: was so short because I like doing reals. You know,
Speaker 1: the algorithms, the reels get greater views what happens. So
Speaker 1: so it is a science behind it. But I had
Speaker 1: to cut some pieces off. So when I made the
Speaker 1: National Wrestling Basketball Association coming, they were like, that would
Speaker 1: make sense. People used to wrestle more and File back
Speaker 1: in the day. I was talking about entertainment. So it's
Speaker 1: the matchups, it's you know, it's whole Coogan versus the
Speaker 1: Rock and you know, and they pounded on each other.
Speaker 1: But then after the thing, all the blood was fake,
Speaker 1: all of it. It's more of a show now than
Speaker 1: it was. And when Adam Silver came out a few
Speaker 1: years ago, Chris and said that this is an entertainment
Speaker 1: league and we have to evaluate what helps the entertainment value.
Speaker 1: When he actually uttered throse words from his mouth, I
Speaker 1: knew that the game had officially changed. Stern never said entertainment.
Speaker 1: He continued to call it the Sports League, the Sports
Speaker 1: industry once we went to entertainment. Chris that it changed.
Speaker 1: So old school players better players, new school players more skilled,
Speaker 1: but don't know necessarily how to deploy deploy that skill
Speaker 1: in game situation. Fox Sports Radio has the best sports
Speaker 1: talk lineup in the nation. Catch all of our shows
Speaker 1: at Fox sports Radio dot com and within the I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio app search f s R to listen live.
Speaker 1: I can respect that, look, I can respect that that
Speaker 1: explanation about it. Uh, my feeling is something along the
Speaker 1: lines of that. I didn't go as deep as you did,
Speaker 1: which was a great point about thinking about all the
Speaker 1: video that a player could watch, you know what I'm saying,
Speaker 1: if they came, if they came from this area, going back,
Speaker 1: et cetera. So, no, that's a great point. Was something
Speaker 1: I was wondering when you mentioned when you say the
Speaker 1: entertainment value. I think we saw something the other day
Speaker 1: that kind of, you know, captures that mood amongst the
Speaker 1: NBA current day NBA fan and Marcus Smart Celtics Warriors.
Speaker 1: Marcus Smart dies for a loose ball steph Curry doesn't dive,
Speaker 1: stands up, looks at it. Smart get lollygagging, lolligagging Marcus
Speaker 1: Smart first to the floor, secures the basketball, and then
Speaker 1: you had just a ton of just backlash. Was good. Look,
Speaker 1: nobody wants Steph Curry to get hurt. Nobody wants anybody
Speaker 1: to get hurt. But also we don't want playing hard
Speaker 1: to be taken out of the game. We've seen it
Speaker 1: with the NFL where they've made some rule changes and
Speaker 1: I don't know if it's better for the league or not,
Speaker 1: but it's just not the same NFL. You have people
Speaker 1: talking about they need to take out diving for loose
Speaker 1: balls from the game. They said that that needs to
Speaker 1: be taken out d league. What are your thoughts on that? Man?
Speaker 1: And just as far as this, it goes back into
Speaker 1: this entertainment aspect, let's preserve our stars. One more thing
Speaker 1: on that. I felt like, if that will see the
Speaker 1: Osman or somebody else diving, uh, that was Steph Curry
Speaker 1: in that position. Nobody would have cared. No one would
Speaker 1: have cared. What are your thoughts on that? Bro? I
Speaker 1: think you first of all, I don't even have to
Speaker 1: I don't even have to say anything. You You you
Speaker 1: literally put it the way it where it was now.
Speaker 1: Hate occurs when you call stuff the way you see it,
Speaker 1: Steph was a lolly gag. Didn't make a really strong effort.
Speaker 1: Second thing, part of athleticism is understanding, uh, your your
Speaker 1: body and space. I consience when somebody is kind of
Speaker 1: about to undercut me. I left my legs. Some of
Speaker 1: that has to do Chris. We're not playing hard. How
Speaker 1: many times did m J get hurt? How many times
Speaker 1: did a lot of our players in the in the
Speaker 1: old NBA get hurt? And they were playing way more games,
Speaker 1: so much more load. But they also knew when and where.
Speaker 1: They knew if they were gonna go for a ball,
Speaker 1: they were gonna go for it. If they weren't gonna
Speaker 1: go for it, they weren't gonna go for it. Smart
Speaker 1: was playing hard, I thought, and I love and the
Speaker 1: thing I hate is I love current, I love of
Speaker 1: Steph with Kerr, Kerr, you ain't got no right. I
Speaker 1: know that looks good for media that you're taking up
Speaker 1: for your guy. Marcus. Smart did the right thing. Reputation wise,
Speaker 1: Marcus has gotten into some stuff. Now. They should have
Speaker 1: been talking about the kick on the other end when
Speaker 1: he tried to block that. That was something I can't
Speaker 1: defend that. If you want to talk about what that
Speaker 1: you and you almost kick the dude in the face.
Speaker 1: That's the one we ought to be talking about. We
Speaker 1: talked about something that was just a what's a basketball play?
Speaker 1: I have an issue with that part of the game
Speaker 1: right now. The basic tenant of basketball, the basic tenant
Speaker 1: of sport, it's competition. It's competing. Three point doesn't make
Speaker 1: the game change. Uh, you know, ease of movement rules
Speaker 1: don't make the game change. Dumping into the post back
Speaker 1: in the day, that was, and what makes the game different?
Speaker 1: What makes the game different now? It's that players don't compete.
Speaker 1: They play hard sometimes now playing hard and competing on
Speaker 1: the same thing. Russell Westbrook has always played hard, he
Speaker 1: hasn't always competed competition. So playing playing hardest energy expenditure,
Speaker 1: I hook a I hook electrode to your neck and
Speaker 1: your heart rate at your eight thousand, you know your
Speaker 1: your muscle output, force output is at twenty million. All
Speaker 1: of that is great, But was I tactically using it
Speaker 1: to win? Was I coming up with ways strategically to
Speaker 1: beat my defender with with with the i Q and
Speaker 1: physicality versus just raw physicality. That's playing hard with no
Speaker 1: aim rhyme reason for what you're doing. So that's the
Speaker 1: difference between playing hard and competing. And that's what's missing
Speaker 1: in my opinion in today's game. And maybe I just
Speaker 1: I I hear they excuse, Chris, and you tell me
Speaker 1: what you think about this. I hear the excuse, the
Speaker 1: excuses they play au together or whatever. Right. I got
Speaker 1: some of my boys who whoo and and they all
Speaker 1: listen to this. You that serve some time, and and
Speaker 1: you know, uh and and in some nice uh government
Speaker 1: housing for a second. Right. And when we were growing
Speaker 1: up together, these were my best friends I'm talking about.
Speaker 1: We would we we would fight together, we would go together,
Speaker 1: we walked to the gym. But guess what we would
Speaker 1: also do. We would fight each other. So even though
Speaker 1: we were that close the game of basketball, we wanted
Speaker 1: to win against each other, probably even more than some stranger,
Speaker 1: because that's who I'm gonna hear it from the most.
Speaker 1: But now it's more like this. You know, you see
Speaker 1: Lebron dunk on on Kevin Love and they whole bromance
Speaker 1: off of a dunk. I believe some of this. Look,
Speaker 1: look I look, we're gonna people gonna be like y'all
Speaker 1: have some old focus, But I cannot believe some of
Speaker 1: the stuff I see happen on the basketball floor nowadays
Speaker 1: in the NBA, Like that move that k Love when
Speaker 1: he ran over to bron and did the head look
Speaker 1: a headlock move. I was just like, damn, this is
Speaker 1: really a new league. And it goes to your point, man,
Speaker 1: when someone says something is more about entertainment, that means
Speaker 1: that we should not take the competition side of things
Speaker 1: as serious, and that to me, that takes away from everything.
Speaker 1: Do you think that this generation is less competitive? I
Speaker 1: like the AE thing, but here's something else that I'm
Speaker 1: just gonna throw out there, because you know how these
Speaker 1: kids they grow up, they playing video They're playing video
Speaker 1: games against each other all day. So it's like, if
Speaker 1: you're not competitive, are you using all your competitive juices
Speaker 1: for call of duty and for mad and so you
Speaker 1: So when you get on the court, it's like, not
Speaker 1: forget you. I don't see you when you get back
Speaker 1: to the house on the c D. This one on
Speaker 1: one it's not really what matters because we didn't we
Speaker 1: didn't have all that to hang our head. We had
Speaker 1: the one on one matchup that we were like, yeah,
Speaker 1: let's think, let's think about it. That's a beautiful point.
Speaker 1: Think about it in its totality. So you and I
Speaker 1: we haven't really seen each other in about almost twenty years,
Speaker 1: but at eighteen years, right, and if we follow each
Speaker 1: other online or we're friends on Facebook, we feel like
Speaker 1: we've we we've been in front of each other that much.
Speaker 1: So it's a virtual world that distorts like the real world.
Speaker 1: So what you're saying is is holly plausible and probable,
Speaker 1: holly plau probable that a lot of that is in
Speaker 1: the virtual world. So, and it's also a safer world
Speaker 1: because there's no real embarrassment. It's nobody's spectating. It's more
Speaker 1: embarrassment in a in a in a in an open
Speaker 1: warm So maybe part of that social media going viral,
Speaker 1: people stay away from moments that could put them in
Speaker 1: unfavorable light. That's why I respect those that don't mind
Speaker 1: getting dropped and hot right back up and defend. I'm
Speaker 1: always applotting that dude who didn't care about going viral
Speaker 1: or playing a little cool defense. And I don't really
Speaker 1: want you know what I'm saying, I ain't gonna get
Speaker 1: hurt type defense, but I think a lot of that.
Speaker 1: It's some truth in that, bro I think a lot
Speaker 1: of that competitive nature is being eaten up in other ways.
Speaker 1: So what do you where do you think Curry rinks
Speaker 1: as far as all time and not just guards. I
Speaker 1: get killed for this, I get killed for this. I think, Um,
Speaker 1: you have to delineate certain things in basketball, and any
Speaker 1: time you delineate timelines with the player, like I said,
Speaker 1: pre Ai post a right, you know, pre Jordan, post
Speaker 1: Jordan's pre magic, post magic when you talk about you know, uh,
Speaker 1: pre steph post step right. And then we we got
Speaker 1: a lot of people who, oh, man, you know other players,
Speaker 1: other teams were doing it, you know, Donnie Nelson was
Speaker 1: doing it, but it was also a frowned upon type
Speaker 1: of play at the time. He really has revolutionized the
Speaker 1: fact that skill. It's now about for the first time
Speaker 1: in years, it's about the trump athleticism in a in
Speaker 1: an NBA. Athleticism has always trumped skilled to a certain extent,
Speaker 1: because we've seen highly skilled players that have to spend
Speaker 1: years in Europe because they weren't the prototypical They weren't
Speaker 1: six six two guards. You remember, you remember when it
Speaker 1: was six six two guards you know it was then
Speaker 1: it was you know, Magic came and everybody's a copycat leader.
Speaker 1: Everybody was nine one. Then they got back to the
Speaker 1: small guards that the folks like Damien was was hurting,
Speaker 1: you know, hurting. Jordan's a c l S when he
Speaker 1: was crossing and hidden. So it's just it's always a
Speaker 1: copycat league. Man. But you know, I I think Steph
Speaker 1: is and this is a tough He's a top five
Speaker 1: impact player in the league history. But it's not five
Speaker 1: players that I would say, Okay, I need a shot
Speaker 1: or I need for one game where I would pick
Speaker 1: him over. But he's top five in terms of impact
Speaker 1: on the game. Ever you think Steph would have been
Speaker 1: And I'm gonna get back to that particular question as
Speaker 1: far as impacts, I have something about Mark Jackson I
Speaker 1: wanted to add, But do you think Steph would have
Speaker 1: been just as effective in the era of the armbar,
Speaker 1: in the era of to say, the Jordan rules where
Speaker 1: they say the Pistons had the Steph rules and you know,
Speaker 1: guys were clotheslining you, and then they had they had
Speaker 1: to do with your mental fortitude as a man. Now
Speaker 1: it's beyond basketball. That's where the league, and and this
Speaker 1: is where I feel like it gets discounted. And I
Speaker 1: don't want to sound like we were just a bunch
Speaker 1: of brutes running around like savages trying to chop people's
Speaker 1: heads off. But there was a part to the game
Speaker 1: when we were playing where physicality was definitely something that
Speaker 1: you had to take into account because it messed with
Speaker 1: your game. Yeah, so to talk to me, talk to
Speaker 1: me about Steph in particular, let me tell you about
Speaker 1: his particular makeup, his mentality. I think he would have
Speaker 1: first of all, his scoring. He would have been a
Speaker 1: eighteen nineteen point of game potentially a guy he still
Speaker 1: shot the ball well. Uh. I think he would have
Speaker 1: because he does have the mental fortitude. I think he
Speaker 1: would have adapted to that style of play. Uh. I
Speaker 1: think he's sneaky tough. Now I don't think. I don't
Speaker 1: know if his body would have with with with stood
Speaker 1: the pounding. So what you would have as a guy
Speaker 1: who in that era would have shown, Okay, this kid
Speaker 1: is tough, is a can play. But he had been
Speaker 1: a Brandon Roy in an earlier era because he would
Speaker 1: only shown a couple of years of it and probably
Speaker 1: would have been on the injury would have been injury prone,
Speaker 1: just based on the way he's He's constructed right, the
Speaker 1: style that he plays because he has to get a lot.
Speaker 1: You gotta remember, at his size, he has to get
Speaker 1: a lot to do a lot to get a lot.
Speaker 1: So so he can score thirty eight, but man, if
Speaker 1: you break it down, that meant thirty eight points. He
Speaker 1: probably came out no live maybe sixty screens over the
Speaker 1: course of a game, whether they're on ball off ball.
Speaker 1: He took probably sixty two seventy dribbles in the game.
Speaker 1: So imagine that load every night, and remember that that
Speaker 1: wasn't the style of play. Then he couldn't beat the
Speaker 1: ball that much. Even when you see Isaiah b B
Speaker 1: b B bed it wasn't as it wasn't the as
Speaker 1: many dribbles and as much times. It's different. Man, So
Speaker 1: I think Steph I might be one of the few
Speaker 1: that thinks Steph would have been Okay, I don't. He's
Speaker 1: not dominant in that area. He's mak good. Here's what
Speaker 1: I'm gonna say about about how those guys. So as
Speaker 1: much as I say, you know they would struggle, I
Speaker 1: feel like they would struggle. But then there's also this
Speaker 1: thing and talking to a lot of basketball people, there's
Speaker 1: also this thing about adaptation d League. You know as
Speaker 1: well as I do as a ball player, when you
Speaker 1: go into a situation that's a little bit above your
Speaker 1: pay grade, if you will, after a day or two,
Speaker 1: after a day or two, you figure it out and
Speaker 1: then you just start feeling like this is nothing and
Speaker 1: and wait a minute, everything slowed down. And I know
Speaker 1: you've had those moments. I've had those moments and it's
Speaker 1: been against NBA guys. So I feel like Steph is
Speaker 1: the kind of guy and a lot of these guys
Speaker 1: from this era, they'll go back into that time. They'll
Speaker 1: get beat up, maybe the first week of practice, but
Speaker 1: I feel like they're gonna because they're ball players at
Speaker 1: the end of the day, and they're ball players, they're
Speaker 1: gonna adapt to just and I feel like that they
Speaker 1: man and with that skill set like a Jannis and
Speaker 1: that back then or step even Steph and let's say
Speaker 1: he cuts down the combos from the nine to the
Speaker 1: five and sometimes the three. You know, yeah, I think
Speaker 1: he might be aff I think here, but I think
Speaker 1: you ball. I think he is the only issue, the
Speaker 1: only issue he would have in that era. One of
Speaker 1: the things that I hung my hat on and I
Speaker 1: still do. I teach you all about players, every one
Speaker 1: of them. I don't care if day five, eight, five, nine,
Speaker 1: six seven. Can all shoot over the top like we are,
Speaker 1: shoot over the top experts like y'all don't care what
Speaker 1: length in front of us. We can get the shot off.
Speaker 1: Steph can't shoot like that. Kyrie, on the other hand,
Speaker 1: has the ability. So Karie needs very little space Steph.
Speaker 1: Steph can't go over. He has to go around. He
Speaker 1: has to get you to go back. He has to
Speaker 1: create that type of separation. Kyrie plays with people, but
Speaker 1: Carrie needs literally one or two dribbles just a little bit,
Speaker 1: and he his shot release allows him to get those shots,
Speaker 1: those shots all. So I think Carrie would, Kyrie would. Man,
Speaker 1: he's the transcendent any level, any era type. Do I
Speaker 1: think he's the most skilled player in basketball history, the
Speaker 1: most as far as the most skilled ever? You think so? No,
Speaker 1: I'm asking you, I'm asking you. Do you think you
Speaker 1: think so? Man? I haven't seen I haven't seen a guy.
Speaker 1: So when I say skilled, art, I have to think
Speaker 1: about I like the size. So if you're six ten
Speaker 1: with the handle that. That's a high value skill if
Speaker 1: you're that size and you're able to not not only handle,
Speaker 1: another part of skill is finishing, and you're able to
Speaker 1: finish like Kyrie without hops. You see, he does not
Speaker 1: get off the ground on some of these finishes. He
Speaker 1: has these things. You know you're right. You know you're
Speaker 1: right because I've seen I've seen him do the little
Speaker 1: a couple of times. But deally, but I'm not sure
Speaker 1: I've seen somebody finish in touch such tight spaces or
Speaker 1: get through as many as tight spaces is he's able
Speaker 1: to get through and then recover. But but I don't know.
Speaker 1: I think let me say this, I think we we
Speaker 1: are watching it now at the moment. Yeah, I really do,
Speaker 1: because because I've seen Nash do some stuff, man like
Speaker 1: even the passes in tight areas. Yeah, that's a skill. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I doesn't have now when we talked about on the
Speaker 1: ball offensive skill. All right. The question is, and this
Speaker 1: is what I posed on this long thread about that, right,
Speaker 1: what is aesthetically pleasing doesn't mean that it's functionally better.
Speaker 1: Better is situational? Right, So I used the analogy of
Speaker 1: having a car, so you gotta you know, I'm oh,
Speaker 1: I gotta nineteen seventy one Mercedes. You got a two right,
Speaker 1: we're heading the mobile my hometown. I take the shortest route,
Speaker 1: driving seventy miles power. You take the longest route driving
Speaker 1: fifty five. Who gets there first? Right? So it's it's
Speaker 1: not now one gets there and probably more comfort bluetooth
Speaker 1: stereo bowls. But the ultimate thing is I'm using it
Speaker 1: today to get to a destination. So if it's a
Speaker 1: guy who can only dribble with one hand, only right
Speaker 1: and can never be forced off of his line, can
Speaker 1: go to any spot he wants, can finish every time,
Speaker 1: even if it's only on the right side, because he
Speaker 1: can get to the right anytime he wants. Is he
Speaker 1: not more? Isn't he not as equally skilled as a
Speaker 1: as a kyrie? Even though it doesn't You said, what
Speaker 1: he can't do is left? Does he need to his right?
Speaker 1: Is his left? Because he can't be stopped? So I
Speaker 1: keep I keep thinking alone, I keep thinking along these lines. Now.
Speaker 1: The last one too, is isn't skilled? Also about proficiency
Speaker 1: with efficiency? So you and I work a job. You're
Speaker 1: the new guy. You just coming off Warden business school.
Speaker 1: You got all the technical knowledge this this, you're smarter,
Speaker 1: you know the new ways to do it. And we
Speaker 1: both start a task and I've been there so long,
Speaker 1: I know the shortcuts. I get done with the task
Speaker 1: in twenty minutes. You do more technically sound, beautiful business
Speaker 1: theory type stuff, but it takes you ten hours to
Speaker 1: accomplish your task. Who is the most skilled now in
Speaker 1: to the coming to the public? Man, just's do way
Speaker 1: more smart, way smarter than the old head. But the
Speaker 1: old head gets it done. So I know that's a
Speaker 1: long roundabout way, but it's it's how we frame better
Speaker 1: and better better, what is better? Fox Sports Radio has
Speaker 1: the best sports talk lineup in the nation. Catch all
Speaker 1: of our shows at Fox Sports Radio dot com and
Speaker 1: within the I Heart Radio app. Search f s R
Speaker 1: to listen live. Now listen if we want to talk
Speaker 1: about what's the most the most beautiful games ever? Jordan's
Speaker 1: carry period, Jordan's game is the I show it to
Speaker 1: my kids and it's just like what and like no
Speaker 1: one has no one has done the finishes he's done.
Speaker 1: Where does Kobe stand in beauty of game and sheer
Speaker 1: beauty d league? Because I'm an athlete, he's a little
Speaker 1: bit behind. Uh, m J. But m J was just
Speaker 1: a better athlete that so it's tears in this. So
Speaker 1: you've got world class, excellent, above average good. This is
Speaker 1: how good can elevate to above average in the rights around,
Speaker 1: above average can elevate to excellent in the right setting.
Speaker 1: Excellent can can venture into world class at moments. But
Speaker 1: world class every shot, every second, every cut, every jump,
Speaker 1: every lady is world class. So Kobe was an excellent athlete,
Speaker 1: excellent and ventured. We saw some of the dunks in place.
Speaker 1: He ventured in the world class, but he didn't have
Speaker 1: world class every single jab, every single way, m J.
Speaker 1: I'm just every single thing he did was a world
Speaker 1: class athletic type. It's it's just a difference in his athleticism.
Speaker 1: And then we've ever seen facts, no question, He's let
Speaker 1: me ask you this, Does it seem like they are
Speaker 1: less traveling and carrying valuations in today's NBA that they
Speaker 1: were in the past. And if if it does, is
Speaker 1: that a matter of guys that are actually better at
Speaker 1: handling the rock or is this a situation where the
Speaker 1: rests or have loosened up this sort of I was
Speaker 1: on the phone with one of my good friends, the
Speaker 1: NBA reff yesterday, man, and we're you know, I was
Speaker 1: joining him because, uh, you know, I was at a
Speaker 1: game the other night. A good friend of mine from
Speaker 1: France came here loves Dominique, so I introduced him to Dominique.
Speaker 1: We got the jersey signed. It was always was a
Speaker 1: really big deal for him because he's always his favorite player.
Speaker 1: And my boy Sean was calling the game, so I'm
Speaker 1: I'm heckling yet, and so we were just laughing on
Speaker 1: the phone about no one's and I've said just a
Speaker 1: hundred times, like you go back in any of my
Speaker 1: posts and workley, I said, no one's read the rule book.
Speaker 1: I've argued with NBA guys that I've played, stop telling
Speaker 1: me where to travel. You never read the rule book?
Speaker 1: And oh man, I played too. I said, ask my question,
Speaker 1: have you read the rule book? It doesn't matter. I
Speaker 1: know you act like you don't even want to play.
Speaker 1: Have you read the rule book? No, you have it.
Speaker 1: So what happens is people started to stretch certain things
Speaker 1: that let me, let me help you out with violations.
Speaker 1: If it's not specified in the rule book, it is
Speaker 1: not a violation, no matter how boofy it looks for
Speaker 1: it looks if it's not specified. That's why we keep
Speaker 1: thinking black and white. It's black and white. But it's
Speaker 1: actually great, not just great, but it's that you can
Speaker 1: paint it. It's it's like it's like a law. How
Speaker 1: many times in law when you go to the courtroom
Speaker 1: you've seen a Johnny Cochrane paying a picture of black
Speaker 1: and white. Picture black and white that convinced somebody, Man
Speaker 1: the glove, don't you kill blood? Don't fit bro, ain't
Speaker 1: no way he killed yourselves. Bro Listen, we we just
Speaker 1: a soul caught up into ecstatically. It's how things look.
Speaker 1: And I'm telling you, man, i'll say something so simple.
Speaker 1: So I did a long I'm gonna send it to
Speaker 1: you after this, you know I'm gonna send it to you.
Speaker 1: But I did a long thing on travel violations, right,
Speaker 1: and I took you back to James Naate Smith. When
Speaker 1: he first started, he had thirteen original rules. Originally you
Speaker 1: it was nine on nine on half the size of
Speaker 1: an NBA court. Now you could only take first You
Speaker 1: couldn't take a dribble, you had to pass it. But
Speaker 1: then he added one dribble and you couldn't shoot off
Speaker 1: the one dribble. It was only to get a better
Speaker 1: passing angle. Yeah, so he realized over time these were arbitrary.
Speaker 1: This was not the ten commandments from Mount sign Out
Speaker 1: that came down. This is a dude in a in
Speaker 1: a in a class trying to come up with something
Speaker 1: that's gonna have his kids entertained during the winter months.
Speaker 1: Do you do you know why the goal is ten
Speaker 1: feet because the balcony at the y m c as
Speaker 1: ten feet. That's where they hung the peach basket. It
Speaker 1: was no science, like based on height it should be eleven.
Speaker 1: It was no science. It was arbitrary. Right, So what
Speaker 1: I'm telling people when you start talking about being a
Speaker 1: purist in the rule, they need to do it the
Speaker 1: way the rules were set up. Now, Bro, you don't
Speaker 1: want to go back to on a half of court.
Speaker 1: We're taking wondering how bad with the game? Right? So,
Speaker 1: folks realized. I realized that if I bounced the ball
Speaker 1: out and it's I don't I take my hands off,
Speaker 1: how does that counting towards the dribble and I catch
Speaker 1: back up to it. But what if I do the
Speaker 1: same bounce out and instead of letting it completely go,
Speaker 1: let it ride in my hand and spin. It's centripical force. Right.
Speaker 1: This is science to this. When we talk, I talk principles.
Speaker 1: So don't tell me that I'm can. I'm guiding it,
Speaker 1: but I haven't controlled it. Right, I'm guiding, but that
Speaker 1: people can say all the same, you're you're you know,
Speaker 1: that's semantics, but it's a difference between gathered. So so
Speaker 1: think about this from a travel standpot, tuck it to
Speaker 1: the body, put both hands on it, get my hands
Speaker 1: under it, right, or pumme it. Those are the only
Speaker 1: way that a ball can't return to the floor legally.
Speaker 1: If I'm not doing any of those things, then that
Speaker 1: balls live and I can take eight thousand steps between it.
Speaker 1: I can take eight thousand steps, let it hanged in,
Speaker 1: pick it up after the eight thousands steps and take
Speaker 1: two more. It's it's all about the way we frame it.
Speaker 1: And I was getting lamb based it back in the day.
Speaker 1: People would come over, Man, you're teaching a bunch of bs,
Speaker 1: and I mean really use that bullshit, like say it
Speaker 1: that boy, and you're teaching these kids all this stuff,
Speaker 1: and I was like, man, I just knew, like, why
Speaker 1: why isn't this legal? Why would this be you know,
Speaker 1: my hands still on top of the ball, I can
Speaker 1: skip into a shot, So why can't I skip and
Speaker 1: then pick it up and do a jump stop and
Speaker 1: lay it up? Right? Yeah? No, absolutely, the way you've
Speaker 1: where you're talking about the game. But it's always fascinating
Speaker 1: me because it's like when you would just be like
Speaker 1: sitting here. I remember watching you just trying to work
Speaker 1: on stuff and like counting stuff out like you would
Speaker 1: be I'll be watching you over in the cut, like
Speaker 1: what is it over there doing? But she was like,
Speaker 1: you know, you'd be counting your steps, doing your one twos,
Speaker 1: and you're real scientific about it. Man. I guess a
Speaker 1: lot of us, a lot of ball players don't read
Speaker 1: the rule book. I think I think that should be
Speaker 1: at an early age one of the first things that
Speaker 1: we give the youth is the actual rule book and test.
Speaker 1: Why wouldn't you though? Because and nobody does. But that's
Speaker 1: the that's the wild part is nobody does. You're one
Speaker 1: of the first people that I talked to you about
Speaker 1: basketball that that talks about what's in the actual rule book.
Speaker 1: Because we feel like we have such a grasp of
Speaker 1: all basketball rules because we've played it so much and this,
Speaker 1: and that you've been through so many situations when in
Speaker 1: fact you really don't. You almost don't really know remember
Speaker 1: where you got it from. You got it when you started.
Speaker 1: You started at a lower level of Y M C,
Speaker 1: A red ball whatever. As someone said, oh, that's a
Speaker 1: travel and you were like, okay, you never question used
Speaker 1: the authority, authority validate that you framed everything from that
Speaker 1: day for yeah, And like I was always like, so
Speaker 1: the new moves that kind of came on and gotten
Speaker 1: popular the last decade or so, from the euro to
Speaker 1: the side step you know, that little sidestep jumper everybody
Speaker 1: does instead of the straight pull up. I used to
Speaker 1: think that those were traveling or I used to have
Speaker 1: issue with those, but that I started to understand and
Speaker 1: I looked actually looked it up. You know. I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: wait a minute, that's not you can actually do this.
Speaker 1: So I think that you're doing that is an excellent thing.
Speaker 1: I wanted to flip back though, to steph and Clay
Speaker 1: and ask and ask you and ask you kind of
Speaker 1: a just uh, I have a theory, right, So they
Speaker 1: say Stephane Clay changed the game as far as threes
Speaker 1: because their ability to shoot knocked down the high level
Speaker 1: efficiency proficiency. I say Mark Jackson changed the game because
Speaker 1: he allowed those two to do so and not get
Speaker 1: pulled out the game. D League, can you can you
Speaker 1: comment on and just help this next generation understand that
Speaker 1: there was a time when you couldn't shoot that stuff.
Speaker 1: Bro I was just talking to a friend said the
Speaker 1: same thing. Man, he says, it's ridiculous how far they pull.
Speaker 1: It's cool he can make the shot, but he missed
Speaker 1: one of him here be coming out. So you gotta
Speaker 1: think about me like I averaged twenty nineteen and a
Speaker 1: half in Juico my second year, had a high game
Speaker 1: of forty three, high game in the state that year,
Speaker 1: and it was it was you just gotta be hot
Speaker 1: that night because anything else that you do that a
Speaker 1: coach doesn't like, he's gonna make. Let me let me
Speaker 1: tell I'm gonna tell you this is a this is
Speaker 1: a true story, right. We had and I was real
Speaker 1: big about performance then man and and my gear. So
Speaker 1: my my coach rests Soul entered into a contract with
Speaker 1: a six. This was the first year they made basketball
Speaker 1: shoes and they looked not only looked like wrestling shoes,
Speaker 1: they had hard rubber bottoms. Our court. Our court was
Speaker 1: a rubber floor and juco So it was like literally
Speaker 1: it was I'm not joking. It was no grip. So
Speaker 1: I got another player of black Nikes and I warm right,
Speaker 1: and I got a white pair of pumps, uh David Robinsons,
Speaker 1: and I wore him in the game. And I went
Speaker 1: through it, and I remember average nineteen and a half
Speaker 1: of the season, but had about eleven game stretch where
Speaker 1: I averaged only about ten points a game because he
Speaker 1: was benching me because I wore different shoes colors, right,
Speaker 1: But I had the grip, and and he never asked
Speaker 1: us like what feels good for you? But does this work?
Speaker 1: How does this work? When I went to North Florida,
Speaker 1: we had Ky Swiss and guess what I had on
Speaker 1: about in the middle of the season, George's I had
Speaker 1: some Jay's Olympic additions when I played with the rest
Speaker 1: of the way. So again, coaches didn't really take into
Speaker 1: consideration what the player needed, wanted, what made them more confident.
Speaker 1: Because ultimately, what we're getting to, Chris, and what you're
Speaker 1: asking is is everybody And it pisces me off because
Speaker 1: how many folks Dennis Scott was shooting that deep at
Speaker 1: joy A detect. You know, I remember he was in
Speaker 1: Cameron indoor and and de Scott was shooting from twenty
Speaker 1: six Twitter and I was like, nowhere close to the line,
Speaker 1: and and and it's imagine he did a little bit
Speaker 1: in the league. But imagine Bobby Crimmins which let him
Speaker 1: shoot that. But just imagine you just being encouraged all
Speaker 1: the time. Man, it stretches the defense. It makes them
Speaker 1: have to come out further, and you got more space,
Speaker 1: like the concept what the world to live in? You said,
Speaker 1: But I agree. I look, I will, I will go ahead,
Speaker 1: and I will say all right, I can see Mark
Speaker 1: Jackson changed the game by allowing them to do it.
Speaker 1: Was amazing at the time when Mark Jackson came out
Speaker 1: and said that this was perhaps the greatest shooting backcourt
Speaker 1: would be a history. It's amazing to see all the
Speaker 1: people that really looked at him like he was stupid.
Speaker 1: You know they you know how they do, you know
Speaker 1: how they do how? He said it too. He didn't
Speaker 1: say no, not potentially, No, they are the best shooting
Speaker 1: at court that this game has ever seen. And to
Speaker 1: be so spot on, but never to really receive the credit.
Speaker 1: I feel like I'm always used my platform to shout
Speaker 1: out Mark Jackson because he he's responsible for something that
Speaker 1: truly changed the generation of basketball and now we see
Speaker 1: a totally different NBA because of it. Let me let
Speaker 1: me get your advantage. You know, I know you got
Speaker 1: a lot of stuff to do today. I wanted to
Speaker 1: get one more thought from you because I love your
Speaker 1: point of viewing perspective. What are your thoughts on just
Speaker 1: all the denigration of Lebron James despite what we would
Speaker 1: look at as as an unbelievable phenomenal career. What would
Speaker 1: you Why do you think there's just so much negativity
Speaker 1: and denigration. I think one of the main reasons, man,
Speaker 1: and and and uh is he You know, Lebron has
Speaker 1: shown front running tendencies, and I think it bothers people
Speaker 1: that you know, you stockpile you now, now hold on,
Speaker 1: let's frame it a little different. You say, he's received
Speaker 1: a lot of criticism, but he's also received more excuses
Speaker 1: than any other start in history, Like, oh, man, his
Speaker 1: team's bad, but they used to always put up every season,
Speaker 1: they would put up a directive with all of the
Speaker 1: faces of the team that he's about to start the
Speaker 1: season with who's beating this roster? We run into the chip.
Speaker 1: By mid season, all these bums, none of them can play.
Speaker 1: He ain't got no help, right, that's front running. So
Speaker 1: what Barkley got in trouble was about. It was like,
Speaker 1: let's match him up Kevin Love, Clay Thompson, Carrie Steph,
Speaker 1: Tristan Draymond, Lebron KD I like our chances right right right,
Speaker 1: That's what he was saying, and he got he got
Speaker 1: again land based and for saying that, and that's when
Speaker 1: Lebron came back. I ain't throw people through a play
Speaker 1: glass window and I come up drunk, and nothing to
Speaker 1: do with with with basketball, Lebron was. I mean, Berkeley
Speaker 1: was speaking strictly basketball. So the hate he receives it
Speaker 1: is equal to the excuses that he's been allowed to receive.
Speaker 1: And I've never really seen it. Everybody else Kobe got criticized,
Speaker 1: ball hog and this and that. But for whatever reason,
Speaker 1: Lebron has positioned himself, especially with the off court stuff,
Speaker 1: he's positioned himself where he's almost where you can't criticize.
Speaker 1: He came from Akron, he didn't have this and he
Speaker 1: donated this much and and so did Jordan. Jordan donated
Speaker 1: more money than anybody in NBA history, and this documented,
Speaker 1: you can go look it up. And so he's never
Speaker 1: gonna get it because he didn't broadcast. So now we're saying,
Speaker 1: because you didn't broadcast it, you're not good. You you
Speaker 1: didn't do enough, So you should have broadcasted if you
Speaker 1: do in it. But then if you have broadcasting it,
Speaker 1: then then you were trying to broadcast. You can't you win.
Speaker 1: So what I want Lebron to do sometimes what you
Speaker 1: chase elude you. Lebron will go down as the single
Speaker 1: greatest career in NBA history. He had the greatest career,
Speaker 1: but he wasn't the greatest player. He wasn't even the
Speaker 1: best player. He's It's just it. It's a lot of
Speaker 1: other hip hop artists better than Tupac. But Tupac is
Speaker 1: the greatest m C now. But not because of skill,
Speaker 1: not because because of impact on the game. I don't
Speaker 1: know even in his own era, did he impacted more
Speaker 1: than steps. We just talked about steps. So that Lebron
Speaker 1: change the way it's playing or what did he change
Speaker 1: the business of it? I think I think Lebron is
Speaker 1: effect on the game is more on the business side
Speaker 1: of the things about NBA player powerment, being able to tank,
Speaker 1: call your own shots, become a GM, build your own
Speaker 1: roster for trade force, free agency, that side of things,
Speaker 1: being involved in tons of different business vatures that you know,
Speaker 1: you're a part owner of the Aren't going Liverpool soccer
Speaker 1: team in the Boston Red Side. Let me ask you this.
Speaker 1: Let me ask you this, Chris, last question didn't improve
Speaker 1: the game. And I want you to think about it.
Speaker 1: The the effects of squeezing the middleman out of the NBA.
Speaker 1: So the middle class of the NBA, and I'll just
Speaker 1: throw names in that to give you idea. Uh, he's
Speaker 1: a special exception, but Udonis Haslem's the Lasts Stevenson, the
Speaker 1: Matt Barns, the Isaiah Thomas. They're not the superstar, but
Speaker 1: not a rookie. So it's this middle tier that's absent now.
Speaker 1: So what we have is a thirty seven and a
Speaker 1: thirty seven year old Chris Paul Lebron looking like they
Speaker 1: are improving, not maintaining, but improving because the i Q
Speaker 1: the level of the rest of the league, not physically
Speaker 1: but mentally emotionally. So your vet your vet is a
Speaker 1: I'm a nineteen year old on my VET twenty one.
Speaker 1: What is he gonna What is he gonna teach me
Speaker 1: about professionalism? Everybody didn't have the luxury of having a
Speaker 1: U Dona's hasslm on the team. Right, it's different U
Speaker 1: dinas hassles one point of game is different than the
Speaker 1: rookies one point of game. He brings so much more
Speaker 1: to the table. Right. Patrick Beverley's impact is being seen
Speaker 1: on Minnesota's team. Right, that's a middle guy. But it's
Speaker 1: not a lot of those anymore because they they if
Speaker 1: I'm gonna pay for four points a game, I gotta
Speaker 1: pay my top tier forty million. So this is the
Speaker 1: thing for the greats to get more money. It squeezed
Speaker 1: out the middle class that's up the NBA, and I
Speaker 1: don't think there it's not gonna reverse itself anytime soon.
Speaker 1: I think this is a trend that's gonna continue. I
Speaker 1: think the league is gonna all it's gonna continue to
Speaker 1: try to get younger and younger as much as they
Speaker 1: possibly can. I mean this whole thing with social media,
Speaker 1: this whole NBA social media, it's almost their one. So
Speaker 1: now it becomes so everything now is designed and strategized
Speaker 1: with social media in mind. I mean, I mean nearly everything.
Speaker 1: And so why why wouldn't you focus on a younger
Speaker 1: generation and a younger demographic so that you can bring
Speaker 1: in younger fans and fans that aren't your typical old
Speaker 1: old head you know, sports fan. I think that person
Speaker 1: is becoming less of a priority. As far as who
Speaker 1: the NBA. That's point. Not only is the middle class out,
Speaker 1: but so it's the old the middle class. Man. I'm
Speaker 1: not said that's a different that's a different perspective, bro,
Speaker 1: that's a different perspective, man. But I tell you, man,
Speaker 1: I pray because us the game we actually love and
Speaker 1: if I can just I don't care all the other things.
Speaker 1: If the quality of play from an i Q standpoint,
Speaker 1: it is maintained and the competitive nature is maintained, they
Speaker 1: can kick, they can do extra point field goals as
Speaker 1: a four point play, and I wouldn't be upset about
Speaker 1: it as long as we still compete and as long
Speaker 1: as the the i Q is there, the strategy and
Speaker 1: not just this the laying everybody running to the three
Speaker 1: point line, kicking it out, lay up at the ram,
Speaker 1: kicking it out no post of we we still gotta
Speaker 1: balance the game. So Dorian, Man, I appreciate you joining
Speaker 1: the show today. Brother, I cannot wait to have you
Speaker 1: back on again now. Man, I love it though. We gotta,
Speaker 1: we gotta, and we gotta do this bag because I
Speaker 1: love again. I love the way you think. And I
Speaker 1: ain't just I ain't hyping it up. I just love
Speaker 1: the way when I can talk without it being attacked
Speaker 1: as hate or whatever. No, let's let's let's have the discussion.
Speaker 1: It's just a way we can look at stuff differently.
Speaker 1: And you just made me five different topics look at
Speaker 1: stuff differently. So I definitely appreciate you. Bro. Yes, their
Speaker 1: opening minds, ladies and gentlemen, Dorian Lee, but I appreciate
Speaker 1: you Bett