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Speaker 1: The only thing I'm plugging is forgotten Seasons.

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Speaker 2: All right, welcome back today. We're really excited. We got

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Speaker 2: a guy who isn't on the usual podcast tour, but

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Speaker 2: he had an incredible fifteen year career. He's an All Star,

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Speaker 2: he's a two time champion, and just to do that,

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Speaker 2: I think has a really unique perspective on what the

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Speaker 2: NBA is and kind of his place in it. So

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Speaker 2: it's an honor. Welcome to the show, David West. Thank

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Speaker 2: you for joining us.

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Speaker 1: Thanks for having me d West. Before we even get started.

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Speaker 1: During your career, when playing in the NBA, we obviously

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Speaker 1: run into guys. We got tattoos. We got guys with

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Speaker 1: Mighty Mouse tattoos, we got guys with you know, Batman tattoos,

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Speaker 1: you know what I mean? Nick names from you on

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Speaker 1: the other hand, and I always knew that something was

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Speaker 1: going on with you is because you had the what

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Speaker 1: is it the Fibonacci sequence tattoo? Yeah, you know what

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Speaker 1: I mean? What was it? Before we even get started.

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Speaker 1: What was the significance of the Fibonacci sequence to you?

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Speaker 1: And why'd you decide to get a tattoo? Uh?

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Speaker 3: It? More so, it represents like the cycle of the

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Speaker 3: circle of life, and so there's always something that intrigued me.

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Speaker 3: It's one of a few different pieces of I guess

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Speaker 3: artwork like that, but more so just just it's emblematic

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Speaker 3: of the cycle of life that we're all on. And

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Speaker 3: I've got my kids initials up on it as well,

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Speaker 3: so it kind of ties it all together.

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Speaker 1: Like I said, I knew it was something that we're

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Speaker 1: already getting somewhere right off the battle. We knew it

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Speaker 1: was something different about the West off topic, but just

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Speaker 1: you know what I mean, the batman or you know,

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Speaker 1: a nickname or something like that. It was, it was

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Speaker 1: something some thought behind it. Your work ethic, d West Is.

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Speaker 1: I remember hearing stories or about how hard you worked

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Speaker 1: in the gym getting thousands of shots up, you know

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Speaker 1: what I mean, as as sometimes a day you obviously

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Speaker 1: went to hard Grave Military Academy and shout out you know,

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Speaker 1: Kevin Yeats was your coach there, correct, yeah, coach k yeah, yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: yeah yeah. Where does that work ethic come from? And

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Speaker 1: was it from hard Grave Military? Did it precede hard

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Speaker 1: Grave Military? You know, how where did you get that

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Speaker 1: you know work ethic to you know, really just go

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Speaker 1: how to how to go about your business.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, So I mean I just learned. You know, my

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Speaker 3: dad was a hardworking, you know, hard working man.

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Speaker 1: Uh.

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Speaker 3: You know, it was just a working class dude. So

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Speaker 3: we always always had the idea that you had to

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Speaker 3: work for whatever it is you were gonna you were

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Speaker 3: gonna get. Like my dad worked, had two three jobs sometimes,

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Speaker 3: you know. So I grew up, you know, kind of

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Speaker 3: just understanding that, you know, I had to work regardless

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Speaker 3: of what I was doing, whether I was going to

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Speaker 3: be a male man like my dad or going to

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Speaker 3: the military like my dad did. Either way, you know,

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Speaker 3: I was going to have to work. So I just

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Speaker 3: applied that the basketball. I've always been been a guy

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Speaker 3: that you never had all of the natural gifts, you

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Speaker 3: know what I'm saying. And I grew late, my body

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Speaker 3: developed late and all that stuff. So it was important

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Speaker 3: for me to just have an ethic about, you know,

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Speaker 3: sort of the way I went about my stuff every

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Speaker 3: single day. Uh. And I always look like I said,

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Speaker 3: I always just kind of knew, like you can't nothing's

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Speaker 3: going to be given to you.

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Speaker 4: You're always going to have to earn it. And then

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Speaker 4: you know what the reality.

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Speaker 3: Is, the higher up you go, you realize like a

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Speaker 3: lot of guys are just depending on their talent, depending

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Speaker 3: on their gifts, and they aren't really hard workers. It's

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Speaker 3: just blessed, you know, with you know, physical skills and

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Speaker 3: so uh. Particularly once I got the military school, I

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Speaker 3: realized like, that's how I was going to pass guys,

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Speaker 3: That's how I was going to outlast guys. Was not

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Speaker 3: you know, having to depend on my work ethic more

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Speaker 3: so than just some you know, the ability to jump

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Speaker 3: high or run fast or be you know, just be

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Speaker 3: physically dominant over people.

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Speaker 2: So getting into it, I think for this episode, your

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Speaker 2: entire career is so interesting. I think you you wanted

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Speaker 2: every stop. You were part of some really significant teams,

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Speaker 2: but specifically your your history in New Orleans. You're the

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Speaker 2: first player draft to do that franchise when they're in

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Speaker 2: New Orleans, and I would say that you probably were

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Speaker 2: there for the lowest points in franchise history and also

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Speaker 2: some of the highest points. And it happens pretty quickly,

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Speaker 2: so starting in the two thousand and three draft. Obviously,

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Speaker 2: everybody knows that draft class is one of the best ever.

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Speaker 2: Lebron James Carmelo, d Wade, Chris Bosh, but you're also

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Speaker 2: in that crop. I read that when you were going

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Speaker 2: through your draft process and draft workouts, most of the

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Speaker 2: things that you were hearing were kind of like questions

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Speaker 2: from teams like how tall you actually are, what position

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Speaker 2: you actually are?

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Speaker 4: And when you got.

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Speaker 2: To New Orleans, that was the only team that kind

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Speaker 2: of recognized who you were as a as a prospect.

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Speaker 2: You had an amazing college career at Xavier. But talk

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Speaker 2: to us a little bit about that two thousand and

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Speaker 2: three draft class experience. I think that you're probably the

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Speaker 2: forgotten member of that loaded draft class. But walk us

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Speaker 2: through your draft process and your introduction to New Orleans

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Speaker 2: in two thousand and three.

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Speaker 3: I will tell you, Mane, it was a difficult process

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Speaker 3: because I was a guy that I.

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Speaker 4: Was completely underrecruited and over look right.

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Speaker 3: I finished up high school, I left New Jersey, didn't

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Speaker 3: play varsity New Jersey, so I played freshman basketball and

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Speaker 3: JV basketball as a as a as a sophomore, and

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Speaker 3: then my family moved to North Carolina because my grandparents

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Speaker 3: were getting older and during the last few years of

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Speaker 3: their life. So when I got to North Carolina, I

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Speaker 3: kind of, you know, I was on this weird gros

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Speaker 3: spurt man. I was about six foot right at six

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Speaker 3: foot at the end of my freshman year. Started my

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Speaker 3: sophomore year, I was six four. Started my junior year,

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Speaker 3: I was like six six sixty seven. So I had

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Speaker 3: this you know, this crazy grow spurt man where I

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Speaker 3: just shot up about six or seven inches over the

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Speaker 3: course of two seasons. Uh So, when I got to

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Speaker 3: North Carolina, I was just you know, just looking forward

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Speaker 3: to playing and starting over.

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Speaker 4: But I wasn't getting recruited.

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Speaker 3: You know, my grades weren't great, but the talent I thought,

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Speaker 3: you know, especially from my perspective, always felt like I

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Speaker 3: was good enough. But then you know, I got I

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Speaker 3: got blessed with a with a great coach down here,

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Speaker 3: Coach Eddie Gray. He kind of you know, put his

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Speaker 3: foot in my behind and just made me really chase

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Speaker 3: this thing seriously, you know, discussing it with my parents,

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Speaker 3: who decided like it was the best thing to go

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Speaker 3: to military school for a year to get that discipline. Uh,

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Speaker 3: you know, play against junior colleges, play against you know,

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Speaker 3: we played against every military academy that the JV teams

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Speaker 3: were the military academy. So that was a really that

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Speaker 3: was a hardened up year for me in terms of

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Speaker 3: just you know, playing against grown men and older guys.

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Speaker 3: But I got better and I got tougher, but again

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Speaker 3: I was still kind of under recruited, so I'll never

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Speaker 3: forget it. I was a little down on myself and

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Speaker 3: we went to this tournament in Maryland. It's called the

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Speaker 3: Charlie Weber. This was when you could still play AAU

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Speaker 3: in the fall. So go to the Charlie Weber and

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Speaker 3: there's this coach. You know, I'm on the far far

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Speaker 3: court and there are a bunch of different guys in

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Speaker 3: their high level guys who were like on the first

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Speaker 3: few courts, and my game was all on the back court.

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Speaker 3: And I remember walking past all these coaches. Nobody was

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Speaker 3: down at my game. And then, you know, I was

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Speaker 3: having a really good game and I saw this guy

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Speaker 3: with these glasses and he poked his head around the curtain,

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Speaker 3: and you know, I was like, okay, just keep playing,

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Speaker 3: d I'm telling myself, keep playing. So I was playing

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Speaker 3: well enough that he took a chair and he sat

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Speaker 3: splitting the curtain. So he was recruiting somebody on it

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Speaker 3: to his right, but he was kind of watching me

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Speaker 3: on this court to his left, and I didn't know

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Speaker 3: who he was, didn't know anything about, you know, where

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Speaker 3: programming was from. But after the game, he walks up

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Speaker 3: to me and he goes, hey, listen, I don't have

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Speaker 3: the power to make this official, he said, but I'm

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Speaker 3: almost certain, you know, we want to offer you a scholarship.

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Speaker 3: And I'm like, okay, what school are you from? Me

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Speaker 3: He's like, I'm from Xavier and I had literally never

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Speaker 3: heard of the school before. And that was coach Jeff

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Speaker 3: Battle and so Coach B started it and he's like, listen,

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Speaker 3: my head coach is gonna come see you as soon

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Speaker 3: as he has a moment. You know, they were obviously

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Speaker 3: getting ready for the season. So I would say maybe

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Speaker 3: about December, coach Prossers showed up. We were playing a

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Speaker 3: fork Union and coach showed up, saw me play.

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Speaker 1: One time live. I'll never get it.

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Speaker 3: After the game, he walked from the top row the

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Speaker 3: bleachers down the bleachers straight to me and offered me

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Speaker 3: a scholarship. That was like the first time, Yeah, that

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Speaker 3: was one of the first times I felt like, oh wow,

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Speaker 3: this you know, like it was validated, you know, like

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Speaker 3: so from there, man, I just kind of went on

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Speaker 3: about my business. I dibbled and dabbled with, you know,

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Speaker 3: looking at some other schools, but nobody really wanted me

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Speaker 3: as much as Xavier wanted me. So had a career there,

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Speaker 3: which I'm super proud of. But you know, when it

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Speaker 3: got to the draft process, because I had flirted with

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Speaker 3: coming out a couple of years, so I was getting

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Speaker 3: some noted, some notoriety after my sophomore year and then

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Speaker 3: after my junior year is a little something. So when

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Speaker 3: I decided to come back from my senior year, I'm like,

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Speaker 3: all right, well the only the only next stop is

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Speaker 3: the NBA.

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Speaker 1: Right, You've been done in college.

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Speaker 3: So ironically, though, as a draft process started, you know,

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Speaker 3: I started to hear things like, well, he only played

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Speaker 3: that well because he was in a smaller conference. So

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Speaker 3: I'm like, well, damn, y'all were just saying fucking four

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Speaker 3: years ago, I wasn't good enough to go to y'all conferences,

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Speaker 3: So you know, how can I you know, I was.

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Speaker 4: I was just stuck in that mix, you know what

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Speaker 4: I'm saying.

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Speaker 3: Like, So I didn't pay it any mind, but you know,

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Speaker 3: there were just all these questions about my size. I

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Speaker 3: remember I met the late Mail Daniels. He was with

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Speaker 3: the Pacers, and he came to one of my last

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Speaker 3: games in college and he walked up to me at

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Speaker 3: the right at the locker room door and he goes, dann,

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Speaker 3: you ain't no damn six six?

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Speaker 1: Who the else?

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Speaker 3: And I said, who told you? I was six six?

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Speaker 3: It's like, man, that's what everybody thinks. That's why you know,

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Speaker 3: everybody's like not high on you. And I'm like, nah, man,

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Speaker 3: I don't know you know where all that's coming from.

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Speaker 3: So it was just all of these different questions. You

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Speaker 3: know what position I played, and I'm like, dude, I

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Speaker 3: played you know, I played power forward my whole college career.

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Speaker 3: There were similar guys you know, to me who were

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Speaker 3: power forward. So I never understood the questions. And then

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Speaker 3: so I was, you know, I was, I'll admit, man,

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Speaker 3: I was. I was down throughout most of the recruiting

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Speaker 3: process because I definitely felt like I was higher, I

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Speaker 3: was a better player, and to a man, I was

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Speaker 3: like literally, I was like, man, I'm probably the fifth

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Speaker 3: or sixth best prospecting this draft, just you.

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Speaker 1: Know, and you were straight up.

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Speaker 3: So it just it just was one of those things.

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Speaker 3: When I got to New Orleans. I was tired of hearing.

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Speaker 3: I just was going down there with a clean slate

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Speaker 3: and I'll never get it by Bass who's passed. He

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Speaker 3: came up to me, he said, you know, my first

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Speaker 3: draft pick was David Robinson and he said my last draft,

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Speaker 3: my last draft pick is going to be David West.

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Speaker 3: And I said really, and he goes yeah, and he said,

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Speaker 3: if you're at eighteen, I'm drafting you. And I said, well,

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Speaker 3: I haven't even worked out yet, you know, because I'm

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Speaker 3: I had been to Seattle, I had been to I've

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Speaker 3: been all literally just about every team. When Jay Williams

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Speaker 3: got hurt, the Bulls brought me in because they didn't

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Speaker 3: know where they were going to go with their pick.

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Speaker 3: So I worked out from just about everybody. The only

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Speaker 3: people I didn't work out were like the top three teams,

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Speaker 3: but everybody below that, I mean I did eighteen to twenty.

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Speaker 1: Oh those things is brutal too, them things. It's hard

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Speaker 1: on you, boy. They're bringing the bringing all the fours

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Speaker 1: and five. Sometimes it be a lot of you, Sometimes

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Speaker 1: it be three groups of three, sometimes it be eight.

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Speaker 1: And these are the best candidates at the fours and

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Speaker 1: five at every little scout then until you get to

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Speaker 1: you get to, you get to and they battered at him.

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Speaker 1: The pre workout drafts is brutal. Boy, Yeah, staying in hotels,

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Speaker 1: you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, I'm sorry. I

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Speaker 1: just I just was flashing I remembering those No, I mean,

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Speaker 1: so I went through that process. I just went through

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Speaker 1: that process like it's whatever.

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Speaker 3: So by the time I got to New Orleans, you know,

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Speaker 3: it was like, Okay, my agent was like, well, David,

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Speaker 3: you got to work out for the Lakers because they're

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Speaker 3: twenty two. And so I started working out for some

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Speaker 3: of the lower because I like, in my mind my

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Speaker 3: draft stock was slipping and I didn't even know why.

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Speaker 3: And then again no disrespect to anybody, but none of

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Speaker 3: them guys they had front.

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Speaker 4: Of me was better, Like they just weren't better players.

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Speaker 3: Even when we would have you know, in the workouts,

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Speaker 3: uh you know, we get we'd have like the just

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Speaker 3: different environments where we were always in even the summer

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Speaker 3: before my senior year in college, I was always proving

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Speaker 3: that I was better than the crop.

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Speaker 1: Of guys that they had in front of me.

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Speaker 3: So when I got to New Orleans, it was like

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Speaker 3: they barely even let me work out. Like I remember,

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Speaker 3: I was out there with another guy, like two or

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Speaker 3: three other guys, and you know, mister Bass was like, nah,

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Speaker 3: you just go through the warm up and I'm sitting

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Speaker 3: on the side talking to the That's.

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Speaker 1: Another that's one of the other better feelings, that's outside

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Speaker 1: of the coach was coming down from giving you the scholarship.

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Speaker 1: The other one as well, come from upstairs and be

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Speaker 1: like and nah, he just stretched, let him put on

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Speaker 1: the gears, do a little stretch. You hiding waiting his measurements,

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Speaker 1: and then we're gonna get on out of here.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, right exactly.

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Speaker 1: He made me.

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Speaker 3: I mean the only thing literally, I was barely on

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Speaker 3: the court for like ten minutes. I won't I stretch,

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Speaker 3: went through some measurements, and then when the other guys

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Speaker 3: were getting ready to like go through the real workout,

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Speaker 3: you know, he goes, hey, man, just he said take

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Speaker 3: the ball and take a dribble. I was about three

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Speaker 3: steps outside of the three point line. He's like, I

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Speaker 3: want you to bounce the ball, pick it up and

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Speaker 3: dunk it. And I was like all right. So you

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Speaker 3: know he was he was always he liked my hands.

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Speaker 3: He said, man, you got these big hands. He loved,

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Speaker 3: He just loved physically what I was. So one bounce,

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Speaker 3: dunked it and then I sat down for an hour

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Speaker 3: and a half and so I remember after that workout,

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Speaker 3: he told me, he was like, you know you're gonna

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Speaker 3: be here in New Orleans. He was like, we've talked

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Speaker 3: to the other teams for whatever reason, they don't see

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Speaker 3: what we see. We're not going to try to convince

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Speaker 3: them to see it. We're hoping that you that you

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Speaker 3: you're here for us at eighteen. So I knew I

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Speaker 3: was going to New Orleans. You know, I knew that

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Speaker 3: they had. They had literally said there was nobody ever

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Speaker 3: gonna draft over me at eighteen, and they felt like

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Speaker 3: they were getting a steal soul.

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Speaker 2: Before you get to this question, did do you guys

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Speaker 2: know why the Hornets moved from Charlotte to New Orleans.

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Speaker 3: I've heard a lot of other than I know they

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Speaker 3: didn't have a lot of fans support.

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Speaker 1: But they did.

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Speaker 2: But if you remember, like ten years before, Charlotte was

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Speaker 2: like Larr Johnson. They were like the most popping thing.

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Speaker 2: But the owner George Shinn, who ended up selling the

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Speaker 2: team to David Stern in the NBA, they like foreclosed it.

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Speaker 2: He was part of some crazy ass scandals, like it's

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Speaker 2: like a sex kidnapping scandal. He was with a cheerleader

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Speaker 2: and they basically said, you know, Charlotte as the city

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Speaker 2: was like, yo, we don't want any part of you anymore.

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Speaker 1: So just the quickest side.

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Speaker 2: I don't know if it leaked down to the players

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Speaker 2: at all, but that's why the that's why you're drafted

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Speaker 2: by the New Orleans.

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Speaker 1: Hornets and not the Charlotte Hornets. Sorry to Jolawi, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: no clue. I forgot what I was going to ask him, now,

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Speaker 1: Dylan after that bomb, after that bomb, So yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I remember George and having some issues at the owner

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Speaker 1: that I heard like he was being cheap with like

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Speaker 1: some gatorays, Like I was hearing like players that only

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Speaker 1: have like two or three.

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Speaker 3: No, it was now, we definitely, I mean, we definitely

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Speaker 3: had an experience down there, you know, because you know,

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Speaker 3: again New Orleans was like it was like a new

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Speaker 3: city for the NBA. We didn't have like one of

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Speaker 3: these ultra rich owners and leadership, so you know a

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Speaker 3: lot of stuff was budgeted. I'm sure you might have

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Speaker 3: talked to BDD definitely.

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Speaker 1: He was one of the ones talking me about the gatorads, like,

337
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Speaker 1: you know, you can't take two or three gatorads back there.

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Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah yeah yeah.

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Speaker 3: So, I mean it was a different experience, like great city,

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Speaker 3: and you know, the fans really embraced us. But you know,

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Speaker 3: I was happy to be drafted down there because you know,

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Speaker 3: it was a place that I knew, believed in.

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Speaker 1: I did some homework d West before Dylan sent me

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Speaker 1: a couple of articles and it talked about your experience,

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Speaker 1: you know, in the locker room as a free thinker

346
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Speaker 1: and in the NBA. You know what I mean, how

347
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Speaker 1: you felt almost out of place, you know what I mean,

348
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Speaker 1: for reading and you know what I mean, and then

349
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Speaker 1: being upright, you know what I mean, and you know,

350
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Speaker 1: standing on standing on yours that's what you would you know,

351
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Speaker 1: That's what from Afar, That's what I almost always admire

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Speaker 1: about admired about you because I had a similar instance

353
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Speaker 1: when I came into the NBA, Like and a lot

354
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Speaker 1: of the stuff that you read in this article, those

355
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Speaker 1: were the type of stuff. That's the type of stuff

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Speaker 1: that I was reading, you know what I mean. If

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Speaker 1: from Donald Goins to you know, what I mean something,

358
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Speaker 1: You know what I mean about some self awakening to

359
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Speaker 1: the Wall Street Journal, You know what I mean, whatever

360
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Speaker 1: it was, you know what I mean, I'd be doing

361
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Speaker 1: that on the plane, you know what I mean, in

362
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Speaker 1: the locker instead of shooting dice and shit. Then but

363
00:16:43,280 --> 00:16:44,920
Speaker 1: then I might, you know what I mean, take part

364
00:16:44,920 --> 00:16:46,560
Speaker 1: in the dice game too, you know what I mean.

365
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Speaker 1: If I decided so that always didn't sit well with

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Speaker 1: some of the coaches, players, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. On the team.

367
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Speaker 1: Can you talk to me a little bit about the

368
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Speaker 1: dynamics about feeling kind of foreign and the locker room

369
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Speaker 1: doing your rookie years or did you have good vets

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Speaker 1: and were accepted.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, so I guess you know when I when I

372
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Speaker 3: got dressed, I got going to New Orleans. I went

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Speaker 3: to the oldest team in them here. So those guys

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Speaker 3: were they were done, I mean in terms of just

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Speaker 3: like the whole rookie hazing, and I mean I was

376
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Speaker 3: hearing stories from like what Shack and them were doing

377
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Speaker 3: to the rookies in l A. And I'm like, oh, yeah, nah,

378
00:17:21,000 --> 00:17:22,960
Speaker 3: I might have had to go upside somebody head with

379
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Speaker 3: a baseball back if I was if somebody tried and

380
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Speaker 3: that stuff for me. So, you know, I had guys

381
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Speaker 3: like PJ, Steve Smith, Stacey Augman, George Lynch, Daryl Longstrong,

382
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Speaker 3: David Wesley, Sean Rooks.

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Speaker 1: I mean you have like you had, like jam there,

384
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Speaker 1: all the good guys of the NBA on one team.

385
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Speaker 1: That is completely ridiculous that you had. You could just

386
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Speaker 1: have two of those and be good between the guards

387
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Speaker 1: and the big guys, you know what I mean. That's

388
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Speaker 1: a whole team for the like the best. Yeah.

389
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Speaker 3: Yeah, So I got the game, honest, bro, Like like

390
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Speaker 3: you know, Stacey Augman was my vet, PJ.

391
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Speaker 1: Smitty.

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Speaker 4: They never they never steered me wrong.

393
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Speaker 3: Like it was literally from the day I got there,

394
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Speaker 3: it was like, young fella, you want to learn how

395
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Speaker 3: to play twelve to get in the standings joint twelve

396
00:18:07,280 --> 00:18:10,400
Speaker 3: fifteen seasons. We got you, and it was like do this,

397
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Speaker 3: do that, you know, and I just I just followed.

398
00:18:13,440 --> 00:18:16,920
Speaker 3: I was a copycat, like I you know, Stacey Augman

399
00:18:17,040 --> 00:18:18,960
Speaker 3: told me, don't sit up there by the coaches, man,

400
00:18:19,000 --> 00:18:21,199
Speaker 3: you know, when you're gonna play, sit down toward the

401
00:18:21,240 --> 00:18:22,640
Speaker 3: end of the bench so you can watch the game

402
00:18:22,720 --> 00:18:24,640
Speaker 3: and understand what's going on in the game, and learn

403
00:18:24,720 --> 00:18:27,520
Speaker 3: these rotations and these assignments, he said, because you sit

404
00:18:27,600 --> 00:18:29,200
Speaker 3: up there there the coaches, that's where all the gossiping

405
00:18:29,240 --> 00:18:29,520
Speaker 3: goes on.

406
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Speaker 4: And so I used to sit down at the end

407
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Speaker 4: of the bench.

408
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Speaker 1: And something as simple as that, something as simple as that,

409
00:18:35,800 --> 00:18:38,399
Speaker 1: something as simple as that's too much noise towards the

410
00:18:38,400 --> 00:18:40,639
Speaker 1: front of the batch. You got the little assistant on

411
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Speaker 1: the end whispering in your ear and halfway to right.

412
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Speaker 1: That's a free game.

413
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Speaker 3: Yeah, playing politics, and so Ice, you know, Ice was like, yo, man,

414
00:18:48,000 --> 00:18:49,800
Speaker 3: go sit down, sit down here with me, young fella.

415
00:18:49,880 --> 00:18:52,960
Speaker 3: You'll learn the game faster sitting down here. So and

416
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Speaker 3: I wasn't playing a whole lot. I was playing about

417
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Speaker 3: ten or eleven minutes a game as a rookie maybe,

418
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Speaker 3: so most of the night I was sitting there watching

419
00:18:59,480 --> 00:19:01,840
Speaker 3: until somebody got in foul trouble or it was, you know,

420
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Speaker 3: different type of matchup or something. So I never felt

421
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Speaker 3: really isolated in New Orleans, especially with that group, but

422
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Speaker 3: you know, it was it was just some of the

423
00:19:10,520 --> 00:19:13,359
Speaker 3: smallest stuff. As I started to get, you know, as

424
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Speaker 3: being a four year college.

425
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Speaker 4: Guy like I had learned, you know, a lot and

426
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Speaker 4: I had.

427
00:19:17,960 --> 00:19:20,080
Speaker 3: I was applying some of the methodologies that I had

428
00:19:20,160 --> 00:19:23,200
Speaker 3: learned in college to you know, my day to day life.

429
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Speaker 4: So I used to read.

430
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Speaker 3: I was always asking questions, trying to find out, you know,

431
00:19:27,560 --> 00:19:29,399
Speaker 3: what is what I you know, wanted to learn the

432
00:19:29,440 --> 00:19:32,199
Speaker 3: business of basketball before it even became a thing. I

433
00:19:32,240 --> 00:19:33,840
Speaker 3: was trying to figure out like wait a minute, man,

434
00:19:33,880 --> 00:19:36,200
Speaker 3: where you know, how do we get paid? How do

435
00:19:36,320 --> 00:19:38,479
Speaker 3: the you know, how does all of this work? So

436
00:19:39,480 --> 00:19:43,439
Speaker 3: my first couple of years was all about learning, you know,

437
00:19:43,520 --> 00:19:45,399
Speaker 3: trying to figure stuff out. And then it wasn't until

438
00:19:45,400 --> 00:19:48,000
Speaker 3: I got a little bit older, uh you know, year three,

439
00:19:48,040 --> 00:19:50,240
Speaker 3: year four, year five, that some of these younger guys

440
00:19:50,240 --> 00:19:51,080
Speaker 3: started to come in.

441
00:19:51,560 --> 00:19:52,840
Speaker 4: And that's when I realized, like.

442
00:19:52,840 --> 00:19:55,800
Speaker 3: Wait a minute, Like, hmm, I'm a little different from

443
00:19:55,920 --> 00:19:59,240
Speaker 3: because I can't have these conversations about you know, about

444
00:19:59,280 --> 00:20:03,840
Speaker 3: bitches drinking, and that just wasn't anything I could spend

445
00:20:03,840 --> 00:20:04,840
Speaker 3: a whole lot of time on.

446
00:20:04,920 --> 00:20:06,480
Speaker 4: So it would isolate me at times.

447
00:20:06,520 --> 00:20:08,200
Speaker 3: Right, I knew how to hang out and stay cool

448
00:20:08,200 --> 00:20:10,639
Speaker 3: with my guys, but you know, in terms of like

449
00:20:10,720 --> 00:20:13,240
Speaker 3: conversation and what I chose to do, Like I would

450
00:20:13,280 --> 00:20:15,680
Speaker 3: go to when we would land in certain cities. Man,

451
00:20:15,720 --> 00:20:19,960
Speaker 3: I'm finding the best bookstores. I'm going to the museum sometimes,

452
00:20:20,000 --> 00:20:21,960
Speaker 3: you know what I'm saying. I might go to you know,

453
00:20:22,040 --> 00:20:26,240
Speaker 3: catch a show, you whatever, Just doing stuff that wasn't

454
00:20:26,240 --> 00:20:28,879
Speaker 3: necessarily the typical get to the city, get drunk, let's.

455
00:20:28,720 --> 00:20:30,800
Speaker 1: Go to the club, you know, trying to get the

456
00:20:30,800 --> 00:20:33,320
Speaker 1: real culture the city, the real vibes. Those are where

457
00:20:33,359 --> 00:20:35,280
Speaker 1: the real vibes are, you know what I mean? And

458
00:20:35,359 --> 00:20:36,840
Speaker 1: now that I used to do a lot of the same.

459
00:20:36,920 --> 00:20:38,639
Speaker 1: If it wasn't shopping, you know what I mean. It

460
00:20:38,680 --> 00:20:42,080
Speaker 1: was like a local bookstore, record store, little mom and

461
00:20:42,160 --> 00:20:43,879
Speaker 1: pop stops, you know what I mean, where you can

462
00:20:44,000 --> 00:20:46,639
Speaker 1: actually get the feeling this city. That's interesting. I did

463
00:20:46,720 --> 00:20:48,280
Speaker 1: it a lot. I think, go ahead.

464
00:20:48,560 --> 00:20:51,119
Speaker 2: I feel like it's it's not too different than like

465
00:20:51,200 --> 00:20:53,240
Speaker 2: high school or anything like. You do you do you

466
00:20:53,320 --> 00:20:55,000
Speaker 2: notice a lot of players in the NBA kind of

467
00:20:55,000 --> 00:20:57,160
Speaker 2: fall victim to like trying to be somebody that they're

468
00:20:57,160 --> 00:21:00,199
Speaker 2: not just to because they're not like people might be

469
00:21:00,200 --> 00:21:02,719
Speaker 2: looking at you funny or talking. But it takes kind

470
00:21:02,760 --> 00:21:05,479
Speaker 2: of a strong willed person to just be themselves and

471
00:21:05,560 --> 00:21:07,840
Speaker 2: not care about what anybody else is saying them do

472
00:21:07,880 --> 00:21:10,240
Speaker 2: you see oftentimes in the NBA people kind of going

473
00:21:10,240 --> 00:21:13,159
Speaker 2: into situations and just kind of merging in with the

474
00:21:13,160 --> 00:21:15,840
Speaker 2: group just so they can quote unquote fit in and

475
00:21:15,920 --> 00:21:17,159
Speaker 2: be somebody that they're really not.

476
00:21:18,320 --> 00:21:21,359
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean it's hard, you know, especially for guys

477
00:21:21,359 --> 00:21:23,679
Speaker 3: who had to do that. And I think, you know,

478
00:21:23,680 --> 00:21:25,760
Speaker 3: when I was coming through, like we were like we

479
00:21:25,760 --> 00:21:29,440
Speaker 3: were legit enemies with other guys, Like we weren't friends.

480
00:21:29,480 --> 00:21:32,520
Speaker 3: Like I didn't grow up being friends with the guys

481
00:21:32,520 --> 00:21:35,600
Speaker 3: I was competing against, right, Like I wasn't friends with

482
00:21:35,720 --> 00:21:38,919
Speaker 3: Jamiir Nelson in college, you know, And so when I

483
00:21:38,960 --> 00:21:41,680
Speaker 3: was competing trying to beat Jamiir every year in college,

484
00:21:41,760 --> 00:21:45,600
Speaker 3: and so it wasn't like now or even you know

485
00:21:45,960 --> 00:21:48,840
Speaker 3: a few years before I got got out of the NBA,

486
00:21:48,960 --> 00:21:51,160
Speaker 3: a lot of these guys are friends and they're friends

487
00:21:51,240 --> 00:21:55,119
Speaker 3: from childhood, and so the competitiveness is not there. But

488
00:21:55,160 --> 00:21:57,720
Speaker 3: then also it's like the idea that I've got to

489
00:21:57,760 --> 00:21:59,960
Speaker 3: relate to this dude in a different kind of way

490
00:22:00,560 --> 00:22:02,320
Speaker 3: and connect with them in a different kind of way.

491
00:22:02,359 --> 00:22:07,240
Speaker 3: That isn't again that that isn't what most of us

492
00:22:07,240 --> 00:22:09,119
Speaker 3: were used to in terms of like, nah, we're not

493
00:22:09,160 --> 00:22:11,159
Speaker 3: shaking hands after the game. We're not hugging and all

494
00:22:11,160 --> 00:22:13,200
Speaker 3: this other stuff that goes on after the games. Now,

495
00:22:13,200 --> 00:22:15,560
Speaker 3: like just a regular season game, we weren't. We weren't

496
00:22:15,600 --> 00:22:17,879
Speaker 3: doing that. We weren't brought up that way. So I

497
00:22:17,920 --> 00:22:21,320
Speaker 3: think a lot of guys are just being themselves because

498
00:22:21,359 --> 00:22:24,000
Speaker 3: they've always kind of had the buddy buddy relationship, like

499
00:22:24,359 --> 00:22:26,000
Speaker 3: you know, I'm gonna go out here and not play

500
00:22:26,080 --> 00:22:27,280
Speaker 3: defense against you.

501
00:22:27,280 --> 00:22:29,880
Speaker 4: You not playing defense against me, will both look good.

502
00:22:30,080 --> 00:22:32,160
Speaker 3: And so you know, you see a lot of guys

503
00:22:32,160 --> 00:22:34,560
Speaker 3: who just conform, right, So they come in the league

504
00:22:34,560 --> 00:22:36,239
Speaker 3: and they're like, Okay, everybody else is doing it, I'm

505
00:22:36,240 --> 00:22:36,760
Speaker 3: gonna do it.

506
00:22:37,720 --> 00:22:37,879
Speaker 1: You know.

507
00:22:37,920 --> 00:22:40,359
Speaker 3: When I came in the NBA, it was the it

508
00:22:40,480 --> 00:22:44,240
Speaker 3: was like the big car era, so and with sayds everywhere,

509
00:22:44,600 --> 00:22:47,160
Speaker 3: you know, just I mean it was big, big cars.

510
00:22:47,240 --> 00:22:49,000
Speaker 4: And I remember like PJ.

511
00:22:49,359 --> 00:22:51,879
Speaker 3: PJ pulled up in this navigator and PJ had this

512
00:22:51,960 --> 00:22:53,080
Speaker 3: crack through as navigator.

513
00:22:53,119 --> 00:22:54,359
Speaker 4: I'm going what you're.

514
00:22:54,240 --> 00:22:57,320
Speaker 3: Going man like, like Wes, it gets me here? And

515
00:22:57,359 --> 00:23:00,800
Speaker 3: I was like, nah, I respect it. You know, just

516
00:23:01,280 --> 00:23:03,960
Speaker 3: again I was some of that stuff.

517
00:23:04,160 --> 00:23:04,400
Speaker 1: Again.

518
00:23:04,440 --> 00:23:06,800
Speaker 3: It's it's some of the guys fall victim to it

519
00:23:06,840 --> 00:23:09,880
Speaker 3: because they're in environments where they don't have the veteran leadership,

520
00:23:09,920 --> 00:23:12,280
Speaker 3: they don't have guys to like tell them or set

521
00:23:12,440 --> 00:23:15,760
Speaker 3: you know, set an example for them. And yeah, you

522
00:23:15,800 --> 00:23:17,840
Speaker 3: do have guys like I saw guys in New Orleans, right.

523
00:23:17,840 --> 00:23:20,120
Speaker 3: They come in and they're completely clueless about what they

524
00:23:20,160 --> 00:23:23,080
Speaker 3: have to do to make the team. They're completely you know,

525
00:23:23,200 --> 00:23:26,000
Speaker 3: they're what they think about themselves and what role they

526
00:23:26,040 --> 00:23:29,600
Speaker 3: should be playing on the team. Uh, is completely in

527
00:23:29,760 --> 00:23:32,560
Speaker 3: left field versus what you know, the team is looking for,

528
00:23:33,000 --> 00:23:35,560
Speaker 3: looking for from them and looking for what they can

529
00:23:35,600 --> 00:23:37,320
Speaker 3: do or bring to the team. These guys that come

530
00:23:37,359 --> 00:23:39,200
Speaker 3: in and be like, man, I'm competing with Chris Paul.

531
00:23:39,200 --> 00:23:42,480
Speaker 3: I'm like, oh, no, you're not. You're trying to get it.

532
00:23:43,000 --> 00:23:45,280
Speaker 3: You're trying to earn a thirteen spot on this team, man,

533
00:23:45,359 --> 00:23:47,560
Speaker 3: and be on the team and start making the name

534
00:23:47,600 --> 00:23:50,200
Speaker 3: for yourself. But you know, a lot again, when the

535
00:23:50,240 --> 00:23:52,880
Speaker 3: guys don't have that sense of don't have a good

536
00:23:53,560 --> 00:23:55,680
Speaker 3: background in terms of what they are and who they are,

537
00:23:55,720 --> 00:23:58,119
Speaker 3: they've always tried to fit in instead of just having

538
00:23:58,119 --> 00:24:02,480
Speaker 3: an identity that they believe in or completely confident in

539
00:24:02,560 --> 00:24:04,760
Speaker 3: what they are inside. You know, you get guys who

540
00:24:04,840 --> 00:24:06,840
Speaker 3: come to the league and yeah, they conform, they do

541
00:24:06,880 --> 00:24:10,320
Speaker 3: what everybody else is doing, you know, and it just

542
00:24:10,400 --> 00:24:12,600
Speaker 3: kind of one of those monkeys see monkey do type

543
00:24:12,600 --> 00:24:14,040
Speaker 3: of details, types of dude.

544
00:24:14,359 --> 00:24:16,920
Speaker 1: And the fairness it comes in waves too, you know

545
00:24:16,920 --> 00:24:19,439
Speaker 1: what I mean. Sometimes you have a confidence to be yourself,

546
00:24:19,480 --> 00:24:21,320
Speaker 1: then you get it put in a situation where you

547
00:24:21,400 --> 00:24:24,359
Speaker 1: might well have to conform. Then you might government somewhere

548
00:24:24,359 --> 00:24:26,680
Speaker 1: and they might give you opportunity to be yourself again.

549
00:24:26,800 --> 00:24:30,840
Speaker 1: But you've been jabbling in between conforming and being yourself,

550
00:24:30,880 --> 00:24:32,760
Speaker 1: and now in this next stop you kind of off,

551
00:24:33,240 --> 00:24:34,960
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, And then it's like a

552
00:24:34,960 --> 00:24:37,160
Speaker 1: fifty to fifty at that point. Then it's really about

553
00:24:37,160 --> 00:24:39,520
Speaker 1: your environment. If you don't have no good veterans or

554
00:24:39,520 --> 00:24:42,560
Speaker 1: a good coach. At the same time, it's like, you know,

555
00:24:42,600 --> 00:24:44,879
Speaker 1: I mean, going to allow you to just nose your

556
00:24:44,920 --> 00:24:48,600
Speaker 1: teetering a little bit, then that changes your whole experience too.

557
00:24:48,880 --> 00:24:51,400
Speaker 4: Yeah, SMI Smithy told me once, he said, he said,

558
00:24:51,480 --> 00:24:52,600
Speaker 4: is it more important to be?

559
00:24:53,400 --> 00:24:53,520
Speaker 1: Uh?

560
00:24:53,760 --> 00:24:55,840
Speaker 3: He said? Is in your career? Is it more important

561
00:24:55,840 --> 00:24:58,000
Speaker 3: for you to be what you want to be or

562
00:24:58,080 --> 00:25:00,920
Speaker 3: be what this team needs you to be? You know

563
00:25:00,960 --> 00:25:05,159
Speaker 3: what I mean like if if you do or if

564
00:25:05,200 --> 00:25:06,919
Speaker 3: you are what the team needs you to be, you're

565
00:25:06,920 --> 00:25:09,560
Speaker 3: gonna get paid, you're gonna have a job, you're gonna

566
00:25:09,560 --> 00:25:12,840
Speaker 3: be But if you trying to be what you want

567
00:25:12,880 --> 00:25:17,480
Speaker 3: to be, Hey, man, you and you're not Kobe Lebron,

568
00:25:17,680 --> 00:25:20,200
Speaker 3: Mike or you know, KG is somebody like that, then

569
00:25:21,400 --> 00:25:23,960
Speaker 3: you're gonna find a harder, harder pet.

570
00:25:25,280 --> 00:25:27,720
Speaker 2: It's an interesting dynamic between that, and then you could

571
00:25:27,760 --> 00:25:30,359
Speaker 2: probably make the argument for guys that only made it

572
00:25:30,400 --> 00:25:33,960
Speaker 2: because they thought of themselves, like the irrational confidence guys.

573
00:25:34,000 --> 00:25:37,800
Speaker 3: Sometimes it works, Sure, you're right, I mean, because I mean,

574
00:25:37,880 --> 00:25:40,600
Speaker 3: we all have to get there. Yeah, because at some

575
00:25:40,600 --> 00:25:43,600
Speaker 3: point you have to have irrational confidence to compete against

576
00:25:43,640 --> 00:25:46,159
Speaker 3: some of these guys. But I think it's more so

577
00:25:46,440 --> 00:25:49,919
Speaker 3: like it has to be believable, and it has to

578
00:25:50,040 --> 00:25:52,399
Speaker 3: it has to make sense, especially if you say it

579
00:25:52,400 --> 00:25:55,680
Speaker 3: out loud. I used to say about when when guys

580
00:25:55,720 --> 00:25:58,439
Speaker 3: would come into camp and think they're competing against CP, right,

581
00:25:58,480 --> 00:25:58,840
Speaker 3: it's like.

582
00:26:00,840 --> 00:26:01,320
Speaker 4: You're missing it.

583
00:26:01,440 --> 00:26:05,640
Speaker 1: You can't shoot a cannon from a canoe right at

584
00:26:05,680 --> 00:26:06,440
Speaker 1: the end of the day.

585
00:26:08,320 --> 00:26:10,920
Speaker 2: So your first two years, your rookie year, you guys

586
00:26:10,960 --> 00:26:14,399
Speaker 2: go to the playoffs, like you said, you're observing a

587
00:26:14,400 --> 00:26:16,800
Speaker 2: lot from the bench, but that's an amazing seven game

588
00:26:16,840 --> 00:26:19,720
Speaker 2: first round series. Baron Davis kind of in his last

589
00:26:19,880 --> 00:26:23,120
Speaker 2: rat for the Hornets, going toe to toe with Dwayne Wade,

590
00:26:23,160 --> 00:26:25,439
Speaker 2: your fellow two thousand and three draft member, what are

591
00:26:25,480 --> 00:26:29,159
Speaker 2: your biggest memories of that series? Seeing bad and d

592
00:26:29,280 --> 00:26:30,359
Speaker 2: Wade go back and forth.

593
00:26:30,920 --> 00:26:34,280
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, I'll tell you this if I'm almost positive

594
00:26:34,480 --> 00:26:39,159
Speaker 3: that we played the Heat four times in the regular season,

595
00:26:39,280 --> 00:26:43,000
Speaker 3: seven times in the playoffs, and twice in the preseason.

596
00:26:43,119 --> 00:26:43,439
Speaker 1: Damn.

597
00:26:43,480 --> 00:26:47,159
Speaker 3: So we had played each other an unreasonable amount of

598
00:26:47,200 --> 00:26:50,960
Speaker 3: times that year, so we were super familiar with each other.

599
00:26:52,400 --> 00:26:54,480
Speaker 3: And you know that was again, it was one of

600
00:26:54,520 --> 00:26:58,280
Speaker 3: those things where we knew we had a chance to

601
00:26:58,280 --> 00:27:00,320
Speaker 3: beat up beat them, they had a chance to beat us.

602
00:27:00,320 --> 00:27:03,160
Speaker 3: We knew it was gonna come down to whichever team

603
00:27:03,280 --> 00:27:05,920
Speaker 3: kind of could put together the best four or five

604
00:27:06,000 --> 00:27:08,320
Speaker 3: six minutes in the in a decisive game.

605
00:27:09,400 --> 00:27:10,200
Speaker 4: And that's when you know.

606
00:27:10,200 --> 00:27:12,280
Speaker 3: D Wade really had I mean, he had a lot,

607
00:27:13,000 --> 00:27:15,320
Speaker 3: a lot of confidence. He was in a situation where

608
00:27:15,320 --> 00:27:18,520
Speaker 3: they were get you know, basically looking for him to

609
00:27:18,560 --> 00:27:20,080
Speaker 3: be the guy, and he had and he had some

610
00:27:20,119 --> 00:27:22,400
Speaker 3: moments in that in that playoff series. But we had

611
00:27:22,400 --> 00:27:26,560
Speaker 3: played each other so many times that that season because

612
00:27:26,560 --> 00:27:29,000
Speaker 3: we were still in the East. Yeah, New Orlands, so

613
00:27:29,119 --> 00:27:32,920
Speaker 3: we were you know, uh, we knew exactly who they were.

614
00:27:32,960 --> 00:27:35,159
Speaker 3: They knew who we were. Uh, they just had a

615
00:27:35,160 --> 00:27:36,800
Speaker 3: little bit more than we had. But that was a

616
00:27:36,840 --> 00:27:38,840
Speaker 3: great you know for me, it was a great experience

617
00:27:38,840 --> 00:27:41,639
Speaker 3: because I got to see these these older guys compete.

618
00:27:42,560 --> 00:27:45,720
Speaker 3: I got to see them sort of that that step

619
00:27:45,760 --> 00:27:47,639
Speaker 3: that you have to take as the season winds down,

620
00:27:47,720 --> 00:27:47,920
Speaker 3: you need.

621
00:27:47,920 --> 00:27:49,959
Speaker 1: To go to the playoffs. I was thinking about that.

622
00:27:50,040 --> 00:27:50,880
Speaker 1: You got to see.

623
00:27:50,640 --> 00:27:56,520
Speaker 3: That that right, being able to see them do that. Uh,

624
00:27:56,560 --> 00:28:00,159
Speaker 3: you know, we probably would have finished that year. Uh uh,

625
00:28:00,640 --> 00:28:03,480
Speaker 3: probably in the top three had mash Burn not gotten hurt.

626
00:28:03,520 --> 00:28:06,679
Speaker 4: You know, we didn't have small mass Burn most of

627
00:28:06,720 --> 00:28:07,280
Speaker 4: that season.

628
00:28:07,440 --> 00:28:10,600
Speaker 3: Yeah, because he was dealing with that that needed ultimately

629
00:28:10,680 --> 00:28:13,199
Speaker 3: you know, ended his career. But you know, if we

630
00:28:13,320 --> 00:28:16,600
Speaker 3: have mass you know, we probably get through that, get

631
00:28:16,640 --> 00:28:19,680
Speaker 3: through that, get through that series with no problem.

632
00:28:20,000 --> 00:28:22,240
Speaker 1: He was showing signs trying to fight through that kneel.

633
00:28:22,280 --> 00:28:24,159
Speaker 1: I thought he was gonna come back for a minute too.

634
00:28:24,640 --> 00:28:28,639
Speaker 1: That's a micro fraction, Yeah, yeah, for a minute. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,

635
00:28:28,680 --> 00:28:30,959
Speaker 1: he tried. He retired right after that.

636
00:28:31,000 --> 00:28:33,080
Speaker 2: I think he was he was, he was an all star,

637
00:28:33,400 --> 00:28:34,879
Speaker 2: he was everything, like twenty points a game, and then

638
00:28:34,880 --> 00:28:35,760
Speaker 2: he retired, like.

639
00:28:38,240 --> 00:28:40,479
Speaker 1: I felt like he did, and he looked like Mash.

640
00:28:40,600 --> 00:28:42,960
Speaker 1: But it probably took him, took him. He probably went

641
00:28:42,960 --> 00:28:44,960
Speaker 1: to hell him back to get there. He probably was like,

642
00:28:45,000 --> 00:28:48,280
Speaker 1: I'm cool because you know his brain. Yeah, he wasn't.

643
00:28:48,280 --> 00:28:50,920
Speaker 3: He never got he never he was never healthy that

644
00:28:50,960 --> 00:28:53,360
Speaker 3: whole year, and even when he came back, it was

645
00:28:53,440 --> 00:28:56,400
Speaker 3: like him trying to test it and it was it

646
00:28:56,440 --> 00:28:58,719
Speaker 3: was just he couldn't do it. And then I remember

647
00:28:58,720 --> 00:29:04,080
Speaker 3: that following that following summer, we were checking in trying

648
00:29:04,080 --> 00:29:06,160
Speaker 3: to see what he was going to do, and he's like,

649
00:29:06,240 --> 00:29:09,520
Speaker 3: d West, I can't even walk around Disneyland without this thing,

650
00:29:10,320 --> 00:29:11,960
Speaker 3: you know, this thing messing because he had taken his

651
00:29:12,000 --> 00:29:14,200
Speaker 3: daughter somewhere, so he was like, you know, we knew

652
00:29:14,240 --> 00:29:17,120
Speaker 3: he was, he was done, but that that impacted that

653
00:29:17,240 --> 00:29:20,160
Speaker 3: year too, because if we had Mashed, I mean it's

654
00:29:20,200 --> 00:29:22,720
Speaker 3: probably a different outcome of that series and that whole season.

655
00:29:23,560 --> 00:29:25,560
Speaker 2: We didn't even mentioned Mash in the in the list

656
00:29:25,600 --> 00:29:28,480
Speaker 2: of super vets. He's like a damn near billionaire. Now

657
00:29:28,520 --> 00:29:32,520
Speaker 2: he's got all the franchising. He's a junior bridgeman.

658
00:29:35,280 --> 00:29:40,959
Speaker 1: Yeah, lurky king real estate mash doing it all. I mean,

659
00:29:40,960 --> 00:29:42,400
Speaker 1: he was a hell of a player to come on.

660
00:29:42,680 --> 00:29:46,479
Speaker 1: One of the yeah, one of the forgotten ones. Lucky yeah,

661
00:29:46,920 --> 00:29:49,840
Speaker 1: oh yeah, even in college. She was a bucket in college.

662
00:29:49,840 --> 00:29:53,320
Speaker 1: He's one of my favorite players. Watching him in Kentucky. Yeah,

663
00:29:53,360 --> 00:29:56,680
Speaker 1: after your rookie, after your rookie year, Tim Floyd got fired,

664
00:29:56,880 --> 00:29:58,600
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. There's been I don't know

665
00:29:58,640 --> 00:30:01,000
Speaker 1: how you like Tim Tim Floyd as a coach. But

666
00:30:01,680 --> 00:30:04,320
Speaker 1: Byron Scott comes in, Oh, g B. Scott comes in.

667
00:30:04,360 --> 00:30:07,239
Speaker 1: And I heard some stories about Scott and you know,

668
00:30:07,360 --> 00:30:09,320
Speaker 1: some of the regiment and the things he used to

669
00:30:09,400 --> 00:30:14,360
Speaker 1: do in training camp and and and practices and and

670
00:30:14,360 --> 00:30:16,720
Speaker 1: and other things of that sort. Did you like that?

671
00:30:16,880 --> 00:30:19,160
Speaker 1: I know you're coming from hard grade d Wes, you

672
00:30:19,160 --> 00:30:19,640
Speaker 1: know what I mean.

673
00:30:19,760 --> 00:30:22,760
Speaker 4: And coach he played for Scott longer I played for.

674
00:30:24,400 --> 00:30:26,280
Speaker 1: I knew. I was like, I think what we were

675
00:30:26,360 --> 00:30:29,040
Speaker 1: talking about, appreciate. I was like, I was like, man,

676
00:30:29,080 --> 00:30:31,240
Speaker 1: I think West like that ship though.

677
00:30:31,320 --> 00:30:35,040
Speaker 3: Man, Yeah, yeah, rock with coach, Rock with coach you

678
00:30:35,080 --> 00:30:37,520
Speaker 3: know it was uh with with with with with coach

679
00:30:37,600 --> 00:30:38,080
Speaker 3: Floyd Man.

680
00:30:38,120 --> 00:30:39,560
Speaker 4: You know, it was a tough situation.

681
00:30:39,240 --> 00:30:42,760
Speaker 3: Because he's coming in this kind of any college energy

682
00:30:42,880 --> 00:30:46,560
Speaker 3: coach and like I'm like, I knew it was an

683
00:30:46,600 --> 00:30:49,440
Speaker 3: issue because he was just up against a locker room

684
00:30:49,440 --> 00:30:51,000
Speaker 3: that just had way more bad A minute.

685
00:30:51,560 --> 00:30:53,360
Speaker 1: Was he trying to bring the tryangle in there? He

686
00:30:53,520 --> 00:30:54,160
Speaker 1: let that go by.

687
00:30:54,520 --> 00:30:58,120
Speaker 3: No, it just was that, you know, you you're you're

688
00:30:58,160 --> 00:31:01,120
Speaker 3: coming to the oldest team in the n with their college,

689
00:31:02,040 --> 00:31:05,840
Speaker 3: with the college enthusiastic I'm like, yeah, that ain't Yeah,

690
00:31:06,080 --> 00:31:08,520
Speaker 3: that ain't gonna work. And the guys just never they

691
00:31:08,640 --> 00:31:11,000
Speaker 3: never because they knew it all. Like you're trying to

692
00:31:11,000 --> 00:31:14,000
Speaker 3: show Stacey all how to close out and no, man,

693
00:31:14,160 --> 00:31:17,680
Speaker 3: it's more so like, you know, how do you like

694
00:31:17,760 --> 00:31:19,320
Speaker 3: to do? Like I learned this right, Like when you

695
00:31:19,440 --> 00:31:22,600
Speaker 3: got guys like that who basically mastered this stuff. So

696
00:31:22,640 --> 00:31:25,240
Speaker 3: it's more so, here's what here's the scheme we want

697
00:31:25,280 --> 00:31:27,959
Speaker 3: to try to introduce. What do you think about it? Stacey? Like,

698
00:31:28,000 --> 00:31:29,400
Speaker 3: what do you think about it? Smithy?

699
00:31:29,680 --> 00:31:31,720
Speaker 4: Like that's the way that group should have been coached.

700
00:31:31,720 --> 00:31:36,479
Speaker 3: PJ Wait not yeah, not coming in trying to this

701
00:31:36,560 --> 00:31:38,080
Speaker 3: is what we're gonna do this is how we're gonna

702
00:31:38,120 --> 00:31:41,000
Speaker 3: do it. Like now, ge Lynch played for Dean Smith,

703
00:31:41,560 --> 00:31:43,840
Speaker 3: you know what I mean, he was under I think

704
00:31:43,880 --> 00:31:46,600
Speaker 3: he went he was with the Philly the seventy seventy

705
00:31:46,600 --> 00:31:48,440
Speaker 3: six is when Iverson took him to the finals.

706
00:31:48,800 --> 00:31:51,120
Speaker 4: So you know, he's got like Larry Brown Dean Smith

707
00:31:51,120 --> 00:31:51,920
Speaker 4: in his background.

708
00:31:52,000 --> 00:31:55,800
Speaker 1: Like come on, Steve Smith played for a legendary college

709
00:31:55,840 --> 00:31:57,520
Speaker 1: coach and some legendary coaches too.

710
00:31:57,680 --> 00:32:00,120
Speaker 3: Yeah, he's at Michigan State. I mean they are mean,

711
00:32:00,160 --> 00:32:02,040
Speaker 3: all these guys had immense basketball.

712
00:32:02,120 --> 00:32:02,239
Speaker 4: Oh.

713
00:32:02,280 --> 00:32:04,560
Speaker 3: Bryce Drew was on that team as well, right, so

714
00:32:05,120 --> 00:32:07,760
Speaker 3: Bryce was like a little coach then, you know.

715
00:32:09,240 --> 00:32:11,200
Speaker 4: So it was just a lot. So it was a

716
00:32:11,240 --> 00:32:12,960
Speaker 4: lot for Tim. I've always said it was.

717
00:32:12,880 --> 00:32:16,480
Speaker 3: Just that environment was tough for him, especially coming after,

718
00:32:16,680 --> 00:32:18,760
Speaker 3: you know, his time in Chicago. So when we got

719
00:32:18,760 --> 00:32:21,720
Speaker 3: be Scott, uh, Scott was clear with them old dudes.

720
00:32:21,760 --> 00:32:23,600
Speaker 3: He was like, y'all, you know it's over for y'all,

721
00:32:23,720 --> 00:32:26,800
Speaker 3: Like we're gonna transition this thing. We're gonna go younger. Yeah,

722
00:32:26,840 --> 00:32:29,360
Speaker 3: like I'm about to run the gym. I'm about to move,

723
00:32:29,440 --> 00:32:32,360
Speaker 3: y'all about to I'm coming here. We're gonna break some

724
00:32:32,440 --> 00:32:34,960
Speaker 3: of y'all the ones who can stay okay, cool, We'll

725
00:32:34,960 --> 00:32:35,760
Speaker 3: see what you got.

726
00:32:36,280 --> 00:32:36,520
Speaker 1: Yeah.

727
00:32:37,000 --> 00:32:37,200
Speaker 3: Yeah.

728
00:32:37,480 --> 00:32:39,560
Speaker 4: And he wasn't like harsh with it.

729
00:32:39,480 --> 00:32:41,840
Speaker 3: It was more so like, we've got to rebuild this team,

730
00:32:42,160 --> 00:32:44,720
Speaker 3: and we're gonna rebuild it in a way with with

731
00:32:44,720 --> 00:32:47,640
Speaker 3: with a style that's faster and more up tempo because

732
00:32:47,880 --> 00:32:50,680
Speaker 3: we were moving to the Western Conference, which was all

733
00:32:50,720 --> 00:32:52,080
Speaker 3: about scoring.

734
00:32:51,680 --> 00:32:55,200
Speaker 1: And that's a tough move. Yeah, about a tough love.

735
00:32:55,680 --> 00:32:58,200
Speaker 3: So we so, you know, he had to come in

736
00:32:58,280 --> 00:33:01,440
Speaker 3: and you know, we started, you know, trading away guys,

737
00:33:01,560 --> 00:33:05,400
Speaker 3: and you know, we just sort of admitted that that

738
00:33:05,520 --> 00:33:08,760
Speaker 3: year was going to be a rebuilding year. You know,

739
00:33:08,800 --> 00:33:11,360
Speaker 3: I had got hurt that my second year when when

740
00:33:11,400 --> 00:33:13,600
Speaker 3: Coach first came in, I was only available for like

741
00:33:13,640 --> 00:33:16,600
Speaker 3: the first maybe ten or eleven games, and then I

742
00:33:16,600 --> 00:33:18,680
Speaker 3: had a bad knee injury that knocked me down for

743
00:33:18,720 --> 00:33:22,680
Speaker 3: about fifty five sixty games. And so you know, I

744
00:33:22,720 --> 00:33:24,680
Speaker 3: got a chance to watch, you know, watch a lot

745
00:33:24,720 --> 00:33:27,200
Speaker 3: of guys go through what you know, what we knew

746
00:33:27,280 --> 00:33:30,160
Speaker 3: was going to be the future. But Coach came in

747
00:33:30,160 --> 00:33:31,920
Speaker 3: with it just a different mindset he was going to

748
00:33:32,000 --> 00:33:34,640
Speaker 3: show us, especially once we reset and everybody was young.

749
00:33:35,600 --> 00:33:37,160
Speaker 3: He's going to show us how to work, how to

750
00:33:37,200 --> 00:33:39,600
Speaker 3: be proms, you know, how to go after it every

751
00:33:39,600 --> 00:33:43,680
Speaker 3: single day. Just a lot of that clear language, like listen, man,

752
00:33:43,680 --> 00:33:45,800
Speaker 3: we're only gonna be in here from him from ten

753
00:33:45,840 --> 00:33:47,720
Speaker 3: o'clock to two o'clock. Man, you got the rest of

754
00:33:47,760 --> 00:33:49,680
Speaker 3: your day to do what you got want to do.

755
00:33:49,920 --> 00:33:52,280
Speaker 3: But when you come in here, we're gonna work. And

756
00:33:52,320 --> 00:33:54,000
Speaker 3: he got it out of us, you know what I'm saying.

757
00:33:54,000 --> 00:33:57,320
Speaker 3: We drafted CP year three. My third year, which was

758
00:33:57,400 --> 00:34:00,600
Speaker 3: Ceepe's rookie year. We had to leave New Orleans because Katrina.

759
00:34:01,360 --> 00:34:01,479
Speaker 1: Uh.

760
00:34:02,080 --> 00:34:03,520
Speaker 4: But but you know, coach.

761
00:34:03,320 --> 00:34:06,200
Speaker 3: Scott was just you know, the staffs he put together

762
00:34:06,360 --> 00:34:09,280
Speaker 3: with a lot of veteran coaches. You know, I've got

763
00:34:09,680 --> 00:34:13,080
Speaker 3: very fortunate, man. I never was on a bad staff

764
00:34:13,120 --> 00:34:16,880
Speaker 3: in terms of like coaching and atmosphere and environment. So

765
00:34:17,480 --> 00:34:19,600
Speaker 3: you know, a lot of my success in the NBA

766
00:34:19,840 --> 00:34:22,759
Speaker 3: came from just having the luck, getting the luck of

767
00:34:22,800 --> 00:34:25,600
Speaker 3: the draw man, like getting guys like when Phil Jackson

768
00:34:26,000 --> 00:34:29,239
Speaker 3: took his brief hiatus from Chicago, his you know, one

769
00:34:29,280 --> 00:34:31,080
Speaker 3: of his top assistant, Jim Clemens, came to me.

770
00:34:31,520 --> 00:34:32,400
Speaker 1: So I had j C.

771
00:34:32,640 --> 00:34:35,479
Speaker 3: For two for two seasons, right, So he's pouring into

772
00:34:35,520 --> 00:34:38,680
Speaker 3: me all the stuff from Chicago and you know got

773
00:34:38,760 --> 00:34:41,759
Speaker 3: Kenny Gattison and Darryl Walker, Like Daryl Walker had played

774
00:34:41,760 --> 00:34:44,640
Speaker 3: with MJ, played with the Knicks, and you know gatt

775
00:34:44,680 --> 00:34:47,719
Speaker 3: was a long time old school vet. Just a lot

776
00:34:47,760 --> 00:34:50,759
Speaker 3: of high quality coaches and guys who could you know,

777
00:34:50,840 --> 00:34:52,920
Speaker 3: throw information at me that I needed.

778
00:34:54,520 --> 00:34:57,120
Speaker 2: So you mentioned that moved to Katrina. The storm hits

779
00:34:57,160 --> 00:34:59,560
Speaker 2: I think on the same day as your birthday, which

780
00:34:59,560 --> 00:35:02,680
Speaker 2: is crazy, and you've said you've said that the just

781
00:35:02,680 --> 00:35:05,080
Speaker 2: the whole Katrina experience kind of really like change your

782
00:35:05,120 --> 00:35:07,879
Speaker 2: outlook on life. Obviously a lot of people know about

783
00:35:07,880 --> 00:35:10,560
Speaker 2: the storm, but what happened after that is like just

784
00:35:10,600 --> 00:35:13,520
Speaker 2: some of like the grossest revisionist history that you can

785
00:35:13,560 --> 00:35:18,600
Speaker 2: go back on. That moved to Oklahoma City. It also

786
00:35:18,680 --> 00:35:21,319
Speaker 2: seemed like the organization and maybe the owner was trying

787
00:35:21,360 --> 00:35:23,399
Speaker 2: to rush back to New Orleans like that first year

788
00:35:23,440 --> 00:35:25,960
Speaker 2: you go to OKC. First off, talk to us about that,

789
00:35:26,040 --> 00:35:28,600
Speaker 2: Like it happens a month before training camp. It's a

790
00:35:28,640 --> 00:35:30,520
Speaker 2: scramble to figure out where you guys are going to play.

791
00:35:30,719 --> 00:35:33,239
Speaker 2: You go to Oklahoma City like during training camp, but

792
00:35:33,280 --> 00:35:34,799
Speaker 2: you don't know how long you're going to be there.

793
00:35:35,080 --> 00:35:36,839
Speaker 2: I assume you can't get back to wherever your house

794
00:35:36,920 --> 00:35:39,319
Speaker 2: or apartment is in New Orleans. So walk us back

795
00:35:39,360 --> 00:35:41,800
Speaker 2: to those first days, Like you show up in Oklahoma City,

796
00:35:41,920 --> 00:35:44,480
Speaker 2: you're all in a long term stay hotel. Like, what

797
00:35:44,520 --> 00:35:46,960
Speaker 2: do you remember from from that that whole period?

798
00:35:47,800 --> 00:35:51,160
Speaker 3: Yeah, so it was it's pretty interesting because we we

799
00:35:52,560 --> 00:35:55,160
Speaker 3: they did. We thought we were going to Louisville, Okay,

800
00:35:55,560 --> 00:35:57,279
Speaker 3: And then we thought, yeah, we thought we were going

801
00:35:57,280 --> 00:35:59,439
Speaker 3: to Louisville because there was like an arena there or something.

802
00:35:59,480 --> 00:36:02,799
Speaker 3: They would look for places that had arenas and then

803
00:36:03,160 --> 00:36:05,840
Speaker 3: you know, maybe like in the like literally in like

804
00:36:05,880 --> 00:36:09,160
Speaker 3: the twenty fifth hour, they're like, nah, we're going to Oklahoma.

805
00:36:09,280 --> 00:36:12,759
Speaker 3: We're like what. They're like, yeah, they've got this. They've

806
00:36:12,840 --> 00:36:16,680
Speaker 3: literally got the most NBA ready arena and they and

807
00:36:16,680 --> 00:36:18,880
Speaker 3: and it was like, you know, the folks are saying

808
00:36:18,880 --> 00:36:22,680
Speaker 3: that that they can support an NBA franchise. So we're

809
00:36:22,800 --> 00:36:25,759
Speaker 3: like whatever, they fly us out there, We go to

810
00:36:25,840 --> 00:36:27,959
Speaker 3: a whope, we go to this hotel and the entire

811
00:36:28,040 --> 00:36:30,680
Speaker 3: organization is being run out of a hotel. I mean,

812
00:36:31,280 --> 00:36:35,080
Speaker 3: the front office was in the hotel. The whole organization.

813
00:36:35,160 --> 00:36:37,799
Speaker 3: We had literally we rented out the entire hotel and

814
00:36:37,840 --> 00:36:40,520
Speaker 3: we were there for two three months. It wasn't until

815
00:36:41,080 --> 00:36:43,719
Speaker 3: November December that we that we all kind of got

816
00:36:43,719 --> 00:36:45,759
Speaker 3: out of the hotel and people find places to live

817
00:36:45,800 --> 00:36:51,319
Speaker 3: in the community. So it was hotel hotel. It was

818
00:36:51,360 --> 00:36:55,040
Speaker 3: literally an extended state. It wasn't something. It wasn't super.

819
00:36:58,000 --> 00:36:58,959
Speaker 4: Those weren't there yet.

820
00:36:59,120 --> 00:37:01,920
Speaker 1: They weren't there developed like that. Yeah, it wasn't used

821
00:37:01,960 --> 00:37:06,520
Speaker 1: to the NBA. Uh yeah, okay, yeah.

822
00:37:05,920 --> 00:37:06,879
Speaker 4: It was not there yet.

823
00:37:06,960 --> 00:37:09,320
Speaker 3: So we were staying in literally like just some extended

824
00:37:09,360 --> 00:37:13,319
Speaker 3: state hotel with you know, and the franchise had the

825
00:37:13,480 --> 00:37:17,719
Speaker 3: entire thing. So we're doing that. We're practicing at a

826
00:37:17,840 --> 00:37:19,080
Speaker 3: D three school.

827
00:37:19,160 --> 00:37:22,520
Speaker 1: I believe, No, that should be against the collect CBS.

828
00:37:23,360 --> 00:37:26,239
Speaker 1: There should be some CBA flags in there the extended

829
00:37:26,360 --> 00:37:29,280
Speaker 1: state D three Nah, so there should be some CBA

830
00:37:29,360 --> 00:37:33,000
Speaker 1: flag but continue d that's my bad.

831
00:37:33,200 --> 00:37:36,880
Speaker 3: We but we were we were there practicing at the

832
00:37:36,920 --> 00:37:41,160
Speaker 3: small and small school and we just you know, we

833
00:37:41,239 --> 00:37:43,520
Speaker 3: knew things were gonna be okay because I'll tell you

834
00:37:43,560 --> 00:37:46,319
Speaker 3: the first time we had a fan coach got us

835
00:37:46,360 --> 00:37:48,160
Speaker 3: practicing and stuff like that, and then they're like, yo,

836
00:37:48,200 --> 00:37:50,799
Speaker 3: we want to introduce the team to the city, right,

837
00:37:51,360 --> 00:37:54,000
Speaker 3: and so we had had I had gone through two

838
00:37:54,000 --> 00:37:56,520
Speaker 3: of these events in the NBA in New Orleans and

839
00:37:56,560 --> 00:38:01,040
Speaker 3: so Max it was like a few hundred people, you

840
00:38:01,080 --> 00:38:03,399
Speaker 3: get the kids, That's typically what it is.

841
00:38:04,000 --> 00:38:04,200
Speaker 1: Man.

842
00:38:04,239 --> 00:38:07,040
Speaker 3: We went to that arena. Man, it was maybe five

843
00:38:07,120 --> 00:38:10,440
Speaker 3: or six thousand people in there. We couldn't believe it.

844
00:38:11,400 --> 00:38:16,200
Speaker 3: We could not believe it. And then it went from

845
00:38:16,360 --> 00:38:19,680
Speaker 3: five or six thousand people to buy like opening night. Man,

846
00:38:19,880 --> 00:38:22,600
Speaker 3: it was rocking it and that place was rock I mean,

847
00:38:22,640 --> 00:38:24,440
Speaker 3: it was almost like the people were trying to prove

848
00:38:25,160 --> 00:38:28,520
Speaker 3: that they could support support a franchise, you know what

849
00:38:28,520 --> 00:38:33,120
Speaker 3: I'm saying. And they had so much energy. They were open,

850
00:38:33,160 --> 00:38:36,440
Speaker 3: they were welcoming of us. It's kind of funny, man.

851
00:38:36,480 --> 00:38:39,360
Speaker 3: I heard Kad say something about he they're responsible for

852
00:38:39,440 --> 00:38:42,239
Speaker 3: bringing a basketball to Oklahoma or some shit like that,

853
00:38:42,320 --> 00:38:45,080
Speaker 3: and I'm like, man, y'all be remembering. We were the

854
00:38:45,120 --> 00:38:47,960
Speaker 3: first team there. We were the team that we were

855
00:38:48,000 --> 00:38:52,120
Speaker 3: the team that made it possible, right Like, we were there.

856
00:38:52,160 --> 00:38:54,880
Speaker 3: We were on the ground before anybody knew that Oklahoma,

857
00:38:54,920 --> 00:38:58,440
Speaker 3: OKAC could support a franchise. We were there playing. The

858
00:38:58,520 --> 00:39:00,960
Speaker 3: fans were great the people in the community were great.

859
00:39:01,880 --> 00:39:04,919
Speaker 3: They made sure that it was like you you all

860
00:39:04,960 --> 00:39:08,160
Speaker 3: came here, We're gonna show you why we need a franchise.

861
00:39:08,200 --> 00:39:10,480
Speaker 3: And so it wasn't We weren't there a month. Literally,

862
00:39:11,080 --> 00:39:13,000
Speaker 3: the season hadn't gone through a month, and they were

863
00:39:13,040 --> 00:39:16,319
Speaker 3: already whispers about the people in Oklahoma trying to buy

864
00:39:16,840 --> 00:39:19,160
Speaker 3: our team. They were trying to buy the franchise. They're

865
00:39:19,160 --> 00:39:22,399
Speaker 3: trying to buy New Orleans. And so we the whole

866
00:39:22,400 --> 00:39:24,279
Speaker 3: time we were the two years we were there, that

867
00:39:24,440 --> 00:39:28,160
Speaker 3: was always right there, like under the surface, like are

868
00:39:28,160 --> 00:39:29,399
Speaker 3: we going back to New Orleans?

869
00:39:29,440 --> 00:39:30,359
Speaker 1: Are we staying in Oka.

870
00:39:30,520 --> 00:39:34,040
Speaker 3: See, the people in ok See like like nobody knew

871
00:39:34,040 --> 00:39:37,319
Speaker 3: about Chesapeake or Devin Energy, but those folks like some

872
00:39:37,360 --> 00:39:41,000
Speaker 3: of the largest oil and gas companies right in the country.

873
00:39:41,239 --> 00:39:43,520
Speaker 3: So they've got big money. They're like, nah, we can

874
00:39:43,600 --> 00:39:45,560
Speaker 3: afford this team. If you don't want to give us

875
00:39:45,560 --> 00:39:47,600
Speaker 3: this team, we're gonna find a team. They were very

876
00:39:47,640 --> 00:39:52,520
Speaker 3: adamant about making sure that NBA, the NBA was in Oklahoma.

877
00:39:52,680 --> 00:39:55,759
Speaker 3: So that was a great time for us because you know,

878
00:39:56,320 --> 00:39:59,040
Speaker 3: that was where we grew up, that was where you know,

879
00:39:59,160 --> 00:40:02,440
Speaker 3: Coach Scott basically he gave gave CP the keys and

880
00:40:02,920 --> 00:40:05,440
Speaker 3: you know, was really trying. He put that battery in

881
00:40:05,480 --> 00:40:07,879
Speaker 3: my back, like, man, you gotta go after this thing.

882
00:40:07,920 --> 00:40:10,400
Speaker 3: I need you to be this, this this every single day.

883
00:40:11,800 --> 00:40:12,040
Speaker 1: You know.

884
00:40:12,160 --> 00:40:14,880
Speaker 3: And he really was the one him along with you know,

885
00:40:15,120 --> 00:40:18,600
Speaker 3: Gatt and j. C. D. Walk just really kept a

886
00:40:18,719 --> 00:40:21,000
Speaker 3: foot on us, man in terms of just showing us

887
00:40:21,040 --> 00:40:23,440
Speaker 3: how to be professionals and how to get it done

888
00:40:24,480 --> 00:40:25,560
Speaker 3: on a consistent basis.

889
00:40:26,160 --> 00:40:28,799
Speaker 1: D West. Was it because of that environment that you

890
00:40:28,880 --> 00:40:32,680
Speaker 1: guys could lock in and subscribe to what the Scott

891
00:40:32,680 --> 00:40:34,719
Speaker 1: was telling me? And you got CP three coming in

892
00:40:34,800 --> 00:40:38,120
Speaker 1: from Wegg Forest, You're almost in like a college environment.

893
00:40:38,200 --> 00:40:41,080
Speaker 1: You don't have the accouterm months of the five far

894
00:40:41,200 --> 00:40:44,719
Speaker 1: the four seasons with the popping city and restaurants in

895
00:40:44,760 --> 00:40:48,320
Speaker 1: the background. Really you got you know, Chili's at best,

896
00:40:48,640 --> 00:40:50,520
Speaker 1: maybe a mom and pop, you know what I mean,

897
00:40:50,840 --> 00:40:54,560
Speaker 1: a bar and grill? Did that environment in Okay? See

898
00:40:54,719 --> 00:40:57,120
Speaker 1: with the mixture of what CP three coming in and

899
00:40:57,160 --> 00:40:59,360
Speaker 1: as a rookie and what and you would you know

900
00:40:59,440 --> 00:41:01,920
Speaker 1: with your did that foster? You know what I mean?

901
00:41:02,000 --> 00:41:04,600
Speaker 1: That great with what you initially built and okay, see

902
00:41:04,600 --> 00:41:07,040
Speaker 1: before you eventually moved on to New Orleans.

903
00:41:07,320 --> 00:41:10,120
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, it was. It was it was a combination

904
00:41:10,239 --> 00:41:13,319
Speaker 3: of all of that. We needed the energy that those

905
00:41:13,320 --> 00:41:16,359
Speaker 3: fans had, like just I mean because we were out

906
00:41:16,400 --> 00:41:19,000
Speaker 3: matched most nights, like I'm not gonna like our rosters

907
00:41:19,000 --> 00:41:23,200
Speaker 3: were not great, and so it was literally, we're gonna

908
00:41:23,280 --> 00:41:25,719
Speaker 3: play hard and with a whole bunch of effort, you

909
00:41:25,760 --> 00:41:28,759
Speaker 3: know when the big dogs came in, like we beat

910
00:41:28,800 --> 00:41:32,200
Speaker 3: Miami in there that year, they won the championship that

911
00:41:32,280 --> 00:41:35,040
Speaker 3: year and we we whooped them at home. And pat

912
00:41:35,120 --> 00:41:38,279
Speaker 3: Riley was so he called the whole environment unprofessional. He

913
00:41:38,400 --> 00:41:41,600
Speaker 3: was so pissed because the people were loud. I mean

914
00:41:41,640 --> 00:41:43,760
Speaker 3: they were you know, usually doing the NBA is quiet

915
00:41:43,840 --> 00:41:46,839
Speaker 3: during timeouts, and they were loud during timeouts.

916
00:41:46,880 --> 00:41:48,320
Speaker 1: They were loud at the jump ball.

917
00:41:48,480 --> 00:41:51,279
Speaker 3: They were just just and he was all, this whole

918
00:41:51,360 --> 00:41:52,520
Speaker 3: environment is unprofessional.

919
00:41:52,600 --> 00:41:56,160
Speaker 1: He was mad. He wouldn't say Simon from been in

920
00:41:56,200 --> 00:41:59,880
Speaker 1: the La Boston Series in in beingtown in the eighties

921
00:42:01,080 --> 00:42:03,400
Speaker 1: that might have been getting a little soft by then, man.

922
00:42:05,040 --> 00:42:07,640
Speaker 3: Maybe, but he I just remember he was he was

923
00:42:07,680 --> 00:42:10,960
Speaker 3: disgusted with the type of environment that it was because

924
00:42:10,960 --> 00:42:13,480
Speaker 3: it was so it was it was a college atmosphere.

925
00:42:13,520 --> 00:42:17,120
Speaker 3: It was very loud rackus. You know, it was the

926
00:42:17,239 --> 00:42:19,839
Speaker 3: fans were just cheering. I mean, they were excited during

927
00:42:19,840 --> 00:42:20,799
Speaker 3: the halftime show.

928
00:42:20,840 --> 00:42:21,040
Speaker 1: It was.

929
00:42:21,280 --> 00:42:24,759
Speaker 4: It was never that that NBA quiet.

930
00:42:25,400 --> 00:42:28,400
Speaker 3: You know once the game starts, about you know, twenty

931
00:42:28,440 --> 00:42:30,319
Speaker 3: minutes into the game is when the game starts, and

932
00:42:30,360 --> 00:42:33,040
Speaker 3: they you know, they never bought into that from day one.

933
00:42:33,160 --> 00:42:36,279
Speaker 3: So you know, that environment really helped us thrive. It

934
00:42:36,320 --> 00:42:39,400
Speaker 3: helped us create an identity for ourselves moving forward.

935
00:42:39,600 --> 00:42:43,160
Speaker 2: That whole history of the because you're right that that

936
00:42:43,239 --> 00:42:46,480
Speaker 2: is why the thunder exists. And then they don't end

937
00:42:46,560 --> 00:42:49,200
Speaker 2: up buying the hornets, they go up swiping the Sonic, So.

938
00:42:49,120 --> 00:42:51,959
Speaker 1: That whole history is really interesting. Quick question.

939
00:42:52,000 --> 00:42:54,920
Speaker 2: Do you still have your Oklahoma City Valentine's Day jersey?

940
00:42:54,960 --> 00:42:55,680
Speaker 1: That red one?

941
00:42:55,960 --> 00:42:58,400
Speaker 2: And did you know that that's like probably the most

942
00:42:58,440 --> 00:43:01,840
Speaker 2: sought after jersey from resellers ever, Like those things go

943
00:43:01,960 --> 00:43:05,600
Speaker 2: for like fifty g's that red Oklahoma City.

944
00:43:05,840 --> 00:43:11,880
Speaker 1: Yes, we read Likekahoma City. I have it. I have mine. Wow,

945
00:43:12,440 --> 00:43:13,279
Speaker 1: I did not know that.

946
00:43:13,560 --> 00:43:18,279
Speaker 2: I'll take five percent of that sale as Yeah, that

947
00:43:19,360 --> 00:43:23,600
Speaker 2: red Okay, See Valentine's Day jersey is like white whale

948
00:43:23,960 --> 00:43:26,000
Speaker 2: for those reselling freaks.

949
00:43:26,239 --> 00:43:29,440
Speaker 3: Wow, okay, all right, No, I know exactly where. I

950
00:43:29,480 --> 00:43:31,799
Speaker 3: actually know where it is too, Okay, all right, I

951
00:43:31,800 --> 00:43:32,400
Speaker 3: do know that.

952
00:43:33,960 --> 00:43:35,040
Speaker 1: I'll send you myzelle.

953
00:43:35,080 --> 00:43:38,719
Speaker 2: Yeah, so that you end up going back to New

954
00:43:38,840 --> 00:43:41,000
Speaker 2: Orleans full time two thousand and eight, Real quick, before

955
00:43:41,000 --> 00:43:43,640
Speaker 2: we talk about the Power Forward, Je Lawney, Uh, is

956
00:43:43,680 --> 00:43:45,640
Speaker 2: there anything to read into like when you went back

957
00:43:45,680 --> 00:43:47,960
Speaker 2: to New Orleans those first times, like in two thousand

958
00:43:47,960 --> 00:43:49,880
Speaker 2: and six, when the city was still a disaster, Like,

959
00:43:50,440 --> 00:43:52,080
Speaker 2: was it just like weird? I mean, I assume you're

960
00:43:52,120 --> 00:43:54,160
Speaker 2: going into the city and like half the shit is

961
00:43:54,160 --> 00:43:57,840
Speaker 2: probably still like destroyed, and they're trying to and they're

962
00:43:57,840 --> 00:44:01,120
Speaker 2: like half the city's gone, nobody has homes, and they're

963
00:44:01,120 --> 00:44:04,520
Speaker 2: trying to like basically manufacture ticket sales and prove to

964
00:44:04,560 --> 00:44:07,000
Speaker 2: the NBA that like New Orleans know, you know, we're good,

965
00:44:07,040 --> 00:44:09,480
Speaker 2: we can we can still hold up a franchise. But meanwhile,

966
00:44:09,520 --> 00:44:11,920
Speaker 2: like the city's destroyed. It took like five years for

967
00:44:11,960 --> 00:44:14,240
Speaker 2: them to probably still not even fully built back.

968
00:44:14,160 --> 00:44:15,560
Speaker 1: Up, right right?

969
00:44:15,600 --> 00:44:19,080
Speaker 3: Yeah, No, it was tough because I think when we

970
00:44:19,239 --> 00:44:21,960
Speaker 3: went back and played a few games each each of

971
00:44:21,960 --> 00:44:23,920
Speaker 3: those two seasons, so the first season it might have

972
00:44:23,960 --> 00:44:25,960
Speaker 3: been only like three and then maybe the next year

973
00:44:26,000 --> 00:44:28,320
Speaker 3: it was six so they I know, they doubled trips

974
00:44:28,400 --> 00:44:30,719
Speaker 3: or something, but we would go back and be the

975
00:44:30,760 --> 00:44:33,640
Speaker 3: home team. But we were both Await teams basically in.

976
00:44:33,680 --> 00:44:35,160
Speaker 1: Essence, you know.

977
00:44:35,200 --> 00:44:36,640
Speaker 3: It was it was It was one of those things

978
00:44:36,640 --> 00:44:38,839
Speaker 3: where you go back and like we're seeing we're still

979
00:44:38,840 --> 00:44:40,920
Speaker 3: see the water lines, like where the water was sitting

980
00:44:40,960 --> 00:44:44,400
Speaker 3: on the buildings like that was probably the most uh

981
00:44:44,760 --> 00:44:47,879
Speaker 3: just kind of one of the most eye popping things

982
00:44:47,880 --> 00:44:50,400
Speaker 3: about it is when you know you got around the city,

983
00:44:50,440 --> 00:44:52,560
Speaker 3: you saw where the water the water lines were still

984
00:44:52,640 --> 00:44:55,600
Speaker 3: very present. Even by the time we went back and

985
00:44:55,680 --> 00:44:58,200
Speaker 3: the NBA All Star Game, was there the water lines

986
00:44:58,239 --> 00:45:02,320
Speaker 3: that still were still there. You know, the tent city,

987
00:45:02,320 --> 00:45:07,719
Speaker 3: the people living under the under the freeway was still there. Obviously, uh,

988
00:45:08,000 --> 00:45:10,239
Speaker 3: Lakeside and some of the ninth Ward you know, the

989
00:45:10,280 --> 00:45:14,440
Speaker 3: areas that never got rebuilt were completely completely destroyed. We

990
00:45:14,480 --> 00:45:17,279
Speaker 3: did we did some tours, you know, we did a

991
00:45:17,280 --> 00:45:19,360
Speaker 3: lot of the team. We did a lot of charity

992
00:45:19,400 --> 00:45:23,640
Speaker 3: where even before we left, I remember we went back

993
00:45:23,719 --> 00:45:25,399
Speaker 3: in you know, I was with PJ when we went

994
00:45:25,440 --> 00:45:28,759
Speaker 3: back into New Orleans. Maybe it might have been a month,

995
00:45:28,840 --> 00:45:30,440
Speaker 3: a month and some change after Katrina.

996
00:45:30,560 --> 00:45:31,759
Speaker 1: So they had they.

997
00:45:31,640 --> 00:45:33,600
Speaker 3: Had evacuated as many people as they could, but then

998
00:45:33,600 --> 00:45:35,879
Speaker 3: as the humanitarian aid and stuff started to come in.

999
00:45:37,280 --> 00:45:39,759
Speaker 3: Actually we flew into Baton Rouge and then made our

1000
00:45:39,760 --> 00:45:42,560
Speaker 3: way down to New Orleans for some charity stuff. We

1001
00:45:42,560 --> 00:45:45,719
Speaker 3: were i mean, we had gone into Mississippi to do

1002
00:45:45,800 --> 00:45:48,920
Speaker 3: some stuff where people were displayed, so it was a

1003
00:45:48,920 --> 00:45:55,279
Speaker 3: different experience. It definitely changed a lot of my perspective about,

1004
00:45:55,440 --> 00:45:58,440
Speaker 3: you know, about life, and about the the the immediacy

1005
00:45:58,640 --> 00:46:04,480
Speaker 3: of fame and fortune and how also how helpless you

1006
00:46:04,560 --> 00:46:09,600
Speaker 3: can be even with access and even with resources, because

1007
00:46:09,640 --> 00:46:13,799
Speaker 3: it was such an impactful moment for that city. I mean,

1008
00:46:13,880 --> 00:46:16,920
Speaker 3: people's everything, you know, folks lost every single thing. And

1009
00:46:17,560 --> 00:46:19,239
Speaker 3: for us, right it was like okay, well we'll let

1010
00:46:19,320 --> 00:46:22,000
Speaker 3: go of the furniture, but we have careers. Some of

1011
00:46:22,000 --> 00:46:24,200
Speaker 3: these folks, you know, we're never able to get back

1012
00:46:24,239 --> 00:46:27,239
Speaker 3: on solid footing. So when we went back, we were

1013
00:46:27,280 --> 00:46:30,560
Speaker 3: always you know, we had the city and the life

1014
00:46:30,600 --> 00:46:31,520
Speaker 3: of the city in mind.

1015
00:46:31,560 --> 00:46:33,040
Speaker 4: And then when we ultimately.

1016
00:46:32,600 --> 00:46:37,040
Speaker 3: Returned for good, we were like, you know, we're we

1017
00:46:37,120 --> 00:46:38,920
Speaker 3: took that on. It's like, okay, we're going to be

1018
00:46:38,960 --> 00:46:41,320
Speaker 3: a part of one of the things that makes folks

1019
00:46:41,560 --> 00:46:44,640
Speaker 3: proud to be from New Orleans, proud to be back

1020
00:46:44,680 --> 00:46:46,560
Speaker 3: in New Orleans like that was one of the things

1021
00:46:46,600 --> 00:46:49,600
Speaker 3: that we carried for us as we you know, as

1022
00:46:49,600 --> 00:46:51,160
Speaker 3: we made our way back into the city.

1023
00:46:53,200 --> 00:46:55,560
Speaker 1: Before we get into the two thousand and seven, two

1024
00:46:55,600 --> 00:46:58,200
Speaker 1: thousand and eight season, you're still in the golden age

1025
00:46:58,239 --> 00:47:01,040
Speaker 1: of Power Forward at this time. I mean a couple

1026
00:47:01,040 --> 00:47:04,840
Speaker 1: of names. You know, you got Timmy Dirk, KG, Paul Boozer,

1027
00:47:04,960 --> 00:47:08,400
Speaker 1: A Marii's Zacher. That's damn near everybody. Now I'm not

1028
00:47:08,480 --> 00:47:09,879
Speaker 1: even going to I'm not you know what I mean,

1029
00:47:10,080 --> 00:47:13,800
Speaker 1: in various degrees of their career and development, you know

1030
00:47:13,840 --> 00:47:16,040
Speaker 1: what I mean. This is when they're still adding tools

1031
00:47:16,120 --> 00:47:19,720
Speaker 1: to their bag, and we know Mari's you know, Adam.

1032
00:47:20,120 --> 00:47:22,840
Speaker 1: It's just, you know, it's golden age of power Forwards.

1033
00:47:23,760 --> 00:47:25,839
Speaker 1: I know you don't have a lot of the accolades

1034
00:47:26,000 --> 00:47:30,040
Speaker 1: and you know, multiple All Star appearances, you know what

1035
00:47:30,040 --> 00:47:32,239
Speaker 1: I mean, like some of the teams and kg's of

1036
00:47:32,280 --> 00:47:35,600
Speaker 1: the world, Rashid Wallace's, uh, players of that matter. But

1037
00:47:36,360 --> 00:47:39,000
Speaker 1: how do you how do you do you take that

1038
00:47:39,280 --> 00:47:41,239
Speaker 1: over the battles that you have Other than that, do

1039
00:47:41,360 --> 00:47:43,440
Speaker 1: you have this That sit better with you knowing that

1040
00:47:43,600 --> 00:47:47,120
Speaker 1: you survived in those battles and succeeded in the Golden

1041
00:47:47,200 --> 00:47:51,160
Speaker 1: Age of power Forwards over you were like a twelve

1042
00:47:51,280 --> 00:47:55,160
Speaker 1: time All Star and you know, fifty thousand points whatever

1043
00:47:55,239 --> 00:47:58,000
Speaker 1: the metric is to be you know, successful as a

1044
00:47:58,080 --> 00:48:01,160
Speaker 1: power forward. Do you take your career during the Golden

1045
00:48:01,239 --> 00:48:04,319
Speaker 1: Age over accolades as a sis right now today? How

1046
00:48:04,360 --> 00:48:06,799
Speaker 1: do you think about that as you retired? Yeah, well,

1047
00:48:07,000 --> 00:48:08,560
Speaker 1: I you know, I do take a lot of pride

1048
00:48:08,600 --> 00:48:12,000
Speaker 1: in you know, it wasn't that I was necessarily gunning

1049
00:48:12,080 --> 00:48:14,920
Speaker 1: for those All Star seasons, but I do take pride

1050
00:48:14,960 --> 00:48:16,680
Speaker 1: in the fact that I was able to get, you know,

1051
00:48:16,760 --> 00:48:19,799
Speaker 1: become an All Star amidst all of these I mean

1052
00:48:19,960 --> 00:48:23,800
Speaker 1: tremendously talented guys at my position. We didn't have a

1053
00:48:23,920 --> 00:48:26,560
Speaker 1: night off, bro, I didn't have a night off. There

1054
00:48:26,680 --> 00:48:29,759
Speaker 1: was no There was no night off at the power

1055
00:48:29,800 --> 00:48:33,719
Speaker 1: forward position for a few years there, and then once

1056
00:48:33,840 --> 00:48:37,600
Speaker 1: LaMarcus came in, it was like God, dog like, it's

1057
00:48:37,680 --> 00:48:40,359
Speaker 1: not gonna stop. Because you got to remember, see, Webb

1058
00:48:40,520 --> 00:48:42,440
Speaker 1: was still even though he was on one knee, he

1059
00:48:42,560 --> 00:48:45,040
Speaker 1: was still still he was still dangerous.

1060
00:48:45,160 --> 00:48:48,200
Speaker 3: Shariff and Sharif was the same way in Sacramento. Like

1061
00:48:48,320 --> 00:48:52,399
Speaker 3: Sarif was still a handful the last couple of years

1062
00:48:52,440 --> 00:48:56,520
Speaker 3: of his career. You know, obviously she and guys like

1063
00:48:56,640 --> 00:49:00,720
Speaker 3: that KG Thirk, but guys like Luis skola On Howard,

1064
00:49:01,920 --> 00:49:04,680
Speaker 3: you know, Mimddle Core, Carlos Boozer and Paul millsp were

1065
00:49:04,680 --> 00:49:07,760
Speaker 3: all on the same team. Fact like Millset was Millset

1066
00:49:07,880 --> 00:49:08,440
Speaker 3: was coming off that.

1067
00:49:08,680 --> 00:49:10,520
Speaker 1: Was annoying that YouTube.

1068
00:49:10,520 --> 00:49:13,640
Speaker 4: It was like, yeah, AKR Andrew Kerlinko.

1069
00:49:13,719 --> 00:49:14,359
Speaker 1: It was a lot.

1070
00:49:14,719 --> 00:49:17,480
Speaker 4: There were a lot of guys, and so you.

1071
00:49:17,520 --> 00:49:19,160
Speaker 3: Know the fact that I was able to, you know,

1072
00:49:19,719 --> 00:49:23,080
Speaker 3: set myself apart not get overwhelmed because a lot of

1073
00:49:23,160 --> 00:49:24,120
Speaker 3: careers were killed.

1074
00:49:24,760 --> 00:49:27,279
Speaker 4: A lot of guys came in at that position. How

1075
00:49:27,360 --> 00:49:28,719
Speaker 4: did you set yourself apart?

1076
00:49:28,840 --> 00:49:31,400
Speaker 1: D West? I got my own notions. I believe it

1077
00:49:31,560 --> 00:49:35,560
Speaker 1: was that damn mid range seventeen foot foot. You had

1078
00:49:35,600 --> 00:49:37,800
Speaker 1: a lot of bouncy people that you can I remember

1079
00:49:37,880 --> 00:49:39,919
Speaker 1: the D West shit. You could play with your eyes

1080
00:49:40,000 --> 00:49:42,000
Speaker 1: and get you up out of your toes a little bit,

1081
00:49:42,520 --> 00:49:44,759
Speaker 1: and you had the you know, you almost was big

1082
00:49:44,920 --> 00:49:49,120
Speaker 1: doggish where you can react within a fake and decide

1083
00:49:49,120 --> 00:49:51,239
Speaker 1: whether you're gonna shoot or not shoot, you know what

1084
00:49:51,280 --> 00:49:53,840
Speaker 1: I mean? I know that about you from fifteen and seventeen.

1085
00:49:53,960 --> 00:49:56,000
Speaker 1: You face up, you know what I mean. You're looking

1086
00:49:56,040 --> 00:49:58,040
Speaker 1: at feet and you can react within your face, but

1087
00:49:58,120 --> 00:50:00,840
Speaker 1: you're gonna shoot. It was that your main the midig

1088
00:50:01,040 --> 00:50:03,239
Speaker 1: The mid range game is a lost art, whether it

1089
00:50:03,320 --> 00:50:05,680
Speaker 1: be through the point guard, the wings are now the

1090
00:50:05,760 --> 00:50:07,480
Speaker 1: big man. We got the sheet and we got the

1091
00:50:07,520 --> 00:50:10,239
Speaker 1: big man out here shooting threes. Now, d West, you

1092
00:50:11,000 --> 00:50:15,120
Speaker 1: seem to have eaten very well during your career off

1093
00:50:15,160 --> 00:50:18,319
Speaker 1: the mid range game. You know what I mean? Where

1094
00:50:18,360 --> 00:50:20,719
Speaker 1: did that come from? How did that blossom?

1095
00:50:20,800 --> 00:50:21,239
Speaker 3: And was this?

1096
00:50:21,400 --> 00:50:23,120
Speaker 1: You know what I mean? You're like you said you

1097
00:50:23,239 --> 00:50:26,040
Speaker 1: had your vets told you be honest with yourself. Is

1098
00:50:26,120 --> 00:50:28,640
Speaker 1: it's just you being honest with yourself and like I

1099
00:50:28,760 --> 00:50:31,000
Speaker 1: am going to master this. They're gonna have to deal

1100
00:50:31,080 --> 00:50:33,880
Speaker 1: with this and react to me as opposed to me

1101
00:50:34,080 --> 00:50:37,359
Speaker 1: reacting to the new power forwards or what you saw

1102
00:50:37,480 --> 00:50:37,920
Speaker 1: coming right.

1103
00:50:38,320 --> 00:50:41,000
Speaker 3: So I'll take you back. So the reason why I

1104
00:50:41,080 --> 00:50:43,880
Speaker 3: started shooting jump shots, I was not a jump shooter coming.

1105
00:50:43,760 --> 00:50:44,400
Speaker 1: Into the elbow.

1106
00:50:46,000 --> 00:50:47,840
Speaker 4: Never I scored, listen, bro I was.

1107
00:50:47,920 --> 00:50:50,040
Speaker 3: I scored over two thousand points in college, and I

1108
00:50:50,120 --> 00:50:54,480
Speaker 3: will literally bet that nineteen hundred of them were within

1109
00:50:54,760 --> 00:50:58,520
Speaker 3: eight feet. Like I was all at the rim, back

1110
00:50:58,560 --> 00:51:01,239
Speaker 3: to the basket. You know, I could beat you off

1111
00:51:01,280 --> 00:51:04,480
Speaker 3: the bounce, but everything was at the rim. And then

1112
00:51:05,000 --> 00:51:07,279
Speaker 3: my second year I got hurt. And I got hurt

1113
00:51:07,360 --> 00:51:10,800
Speaker 3: because I wasn't listening. So I would listen to all

1114
00:51:11,000 --> 00:51:14,399
Speaker 3: of the vets and Darryl Armstrong, what did you get hurt?

1115
00:51:15,760 --> 00:51:19,640
Speaker 3: My second year? So it was my knie, But I'll

1116
00:51:19,680 --> 00:51:22,160
Speaker 3: tell you so, Darryl Armstrong my whole rookie year, said

1117
00:51:22,200 --> 00:51:25,239
Speaker 3: David D. West, you gotta shoot the ball. I wouldn't shoot.

1118
00:51:25,280 --> 00:51:28,239
Speaker 3: You gotta shoot that ball, young fella. The reason why

1119
00:51:28,360 --> 00:51:31,200
Speaker 3: I got hurt. I got hurt against the Pistons and

1120
00:51:31,680 --> 00:51:34,680
Speaker 3: it was a play. Somebody dumped it off to me

1121
00:51:34,920 --> 00:51:36,759
Speaker 3: and I should have shot the ball right. And I

1122
00:51:36,840 --> 00:51:38,920
Speaker 3: heard Larry Brown behind me. And you know, if you

1123
00:51:39,000 --> 00:51:41,359
Speaker 3: ever played in a game with these older coaches, they

1124
00:51:41,480 --> 00:51:44,279
Speaker 3: coaching everybody, they coaching eight team, coaching you. So I

1125
00:51:44,400 --> 00:51:46,680
Speaker 3: hear him as I as I go to drive and

1126
00:51:46,719 --> 00:51:50,640
Speaker 3: get fould, I hear Coach Brown specifically say you should

1127
00:51:50,680 --> 00:51:53,080
Speaker 3: have shot that ball. West, And in my mind, I

1128
00:51:53,160 --> 00:51:55,160
Speaker 3: go to the free throw like man. He another one.

1129
00:51:55,200 --> 00:51:56,920
Speaker 3: He's another one man telling me to shoot the ball.

1130
00:51:56,960 --> 00:52:01,479
Speaker 3: I don't shoot the ball. Two possessions later, same type

1131
00:52:01,480 --> 00:52:04,640
Speaker 3: of play and I go to the basket and I

1132
00:52:04,800 --> 00:52:08,439
Speaker 3: get completely destroyed. Ben one side, Tayshawn on another side,

1133
00:52:08,560 --> 00:52:12,600
Speaker 3: Rashid the other side. Fifty five games I missed. It

1134
00:52:12,760 --> 00:52:14,799
Speaker 3: was that play and if I had shot the ball,

1135
00:52:15,400 --> 00:52:17,759
Speaker 3: I wouldn't have got hurt. So at the end of

1136
00:52:17,840 --> 00:52:21,640
Speaker 3: that season, Kenny Gattison, who was the coach, one of

1137
00:52:21,680 --> 00:52:24,080
Speaker 3: my assistants. Kenny comes up to me and he says, David,

1138
00:52:24,160 --> 00:52:26,560
Speaker 3: you ever watched you ever heard you? Ever watched Karl Malone?

1139
00:52:26,880 --> 00:52:28,640
Speaker 3: And I'm not a car Malons fan at all. I

1140
00:52:28,760 --> 00:52:31,520
Speaker 3: go nah, I ain't nah. He said, well, if you

1141
00:52:31,640 --> 00:52:34,200
Speaker 3: want to have an NBA career, you need to watch

1142
00:52:34,280 --> 00:52:34,880
Speaker 3: Karl Malone.

1143
00:52:35,000 --> 00:52:36,120
Speaker 1: So Gat gave me.

1144
00:52:36,280 --> 00:52:39,640
Speaker 3: He literally handed me a stack of CDs of Carl

1145
00:52:39,719 --> 00:52:43,839
Speaker 3: Malone's best games from ninety five, ninety six, ninety six,

1146
00:52:44,000 --> 00:52:47,400
Speaker 3: ninety seven. He handed like a stack this big of

1147
00:52:47,840 --> 00:52:52,200
Speaker 3: those games and then he handed me the Western Conference semifinals,

1148
00:52:52,280 --> 00:52:55,200
Speaker 3: Western Conference Finals and the NBA Finals against the Bulls,

1149
00:52:55,239 --> 00:52:58,560
Speaker 3: and he said, d West, go watch these tapes and

1150
00:52:58,920 --> 00:53:01,719
Speaker 3: Gat would check in the summer, you're watching them tapes,

1151
00:53:01,760 --> 00:53:05,480
Speaker 3: watching them taps. So I started watching and I realized.

1152
00:53:05,000 --> 00:53:07,600
Speaker 4: Like, man, call him alone. That's all he shot was

1153
00:53:07,680 --> 00:53:09,600
Speaker 4: fifteen to seventeen foot jumpers.

1154
00:53:09,680 --> 00:53:12,080
Speaker 3: Man, But like we saw on TV, always saw with

1155
00:53:12,160 --> 00:53:14,359
Speaker 3: the dunk right with him dunking and running the lane.

1156
00:53:14,760 --> 00:53:17,840
Speaker 3: But the majority of his buckets were jumpers. And so

1157
00:53:18,040 --> 00:53:20,880
Speaker 3: that summer I was like, Okay, I'm gonna just start

1158
00:53:21,239 --> 00:53:24,719
Speaker 3: catching and shooting. And I talked to CP because you know,

1159
00:53:25,000 --> 00:53:27,239
Speaker 3: he played for Coach Prosperate at wake Farest, so we

1160
00:53:27,440 --> 00:53:31,319
Speaker 3: had you know, we were communicating before and we had

1161
00:53:31,400 --> 00:53:34,520
Speaker 3: met each other before he was drafted. But that summer

1162
00:53:34,600 --> 00:53:37,719
Speaker 3: we drafted him, I had already kind of reshaped how

1163
00:53:37,760 --> 00:53:41,000
Speaker 3: I was gonna play, and it was it was before

1164
00:53:41,040 --> 00:53:42,840
Speaker 3: we knew he was even coming to the team. I

1165
00:53:42,960 --> 00:53:46,080
Speaker 3: had basically been giving those instructions from Gat to like,

1166
00:53:46,440 --> 00:53:48,399
Speaker 3: you know, you gotta be able to shoot this ball

1167
00:53:48,880 --> 00:53:49,560
Speaker 3: when you're open.

1168
00:53:49,640 --> 00:53:52,840
Speaker 4: And so you know, my numbers almost doubled.

1169
00:53:52,840 --> 00:53:54,680
Speaker 3: I don't know what I averaged my third year, but

1170
00:53:54,760 --> 00:53:57,040
Speaker 3: it went way up, literally because I was just willing

1171
00:53:57,120 --> 00:53:59,279
Speaker 3: to shoot the shoot the jumper, and it wasn't a

1172
00:53:59,320 --> 00:54:01,200
Speaker 3: whole lot of craz is you work? It was just

1173
00:54:01,719 --> 00:54:04,359
Speaker 3: getting in the gym making four, five, six, seven, eight

1174
00:54:04,440 --> 00:54:04,919
Speaker 3: hundred shots.

1175
00:54:05,000 --> 00:54:07,200
Speaker 1: See, that's the ship. I remember when you was cracking

1176
00:54:07,280 --> 00:54:09,520
Speaker 1: and went, when the when the when the jumper went?

1177
00:54:09,600 --> 00:54:11,320
Speaker 1: I was like, when did West start doing all this?

1178
00:54:11,880 --> 00:54:14,000
Speaker 1: And then I slready started hearing about the story. But

1179
00:54:14,760 --> 00:54:18,160
Speaker 1: he was shooting eight hundred jumpers a day for four

1180
00:54:18,360 --> 00:54:21,200
Speaker 1: months and all that. I was like, Oh, well, that

1181
00:54:21,400 --> 00:54:23,120
Speaker 1: tends to happen when you when you put it in

1182
00:54:23,200 --> 00:54:25,880
Speaker 1: that much work. Why do you think the mid range

1183
00:54:26,520 --> 00:54:28,840
Speaker 1: game has disappeared? D West? Because it seems to be

1184
00:54:28,960 --> 00:54:34,320
Speaker 1: at the at the biggest moments of the game, playoffs, championship,

1185
00:54:34,440 --> 00:54:36,960
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, big shots throughout NBA history,

1186
00:54:37,120 --> 00:54:39,960
Speaker 1: they tend to be the mid range. Why do you

1187
00:54:40,080 --> 00:54:43,520
Speaker 1: think it's ignored? You know, why do you think it'll

1188
00:54:43,600 --> 00:54:46,120
Speaker 1: never go anywhere? And can you just speak to the

1189
00:54:46,200 --> 00:54:48,960
Speaker 1: importance of the mid range game and like specifically and

1190
00:54:49,080 --> 00:54:52,440
Speaker 1: like the postseason uh posts, yeah, does it?

1191
00:54:52,520 --> 00:54:54,200
Speaker 2: Did it paint you in your did it paint you

1192
00:54:54,280 --> 00:54:57,160
Speaker 2: in your heart? When you start hearing coaches and talking

1193
00:54:57,239 --> 00:54:59,480
Speaker 2: heads saying well, mid range is the worst shutting the game,

1194
00:54:59,480 --> 00:55:00,880
Speaker 2: you alwly sh threes and layups.

1195
00:55:01,480 --> 00:55:06,239
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's bad. And I would just say that part

1196
00:55:06,280 --> 00:55:09,760
Speaker 3: of it is I think, you know, there's a tendency

1197
00:55:09,840 --> 00:55:13,640
Speaker 3: to want to make things less complicated, and I think

1198
00:55:13,719 --> 00:55:16,920
Speaker 3: from a coaching standpoint, that's what we've that's kind of

1199
00:55:17,000 --> 00:55:19,759
Speaker 3: the world that we're in now in basketball, is these

1200
00:55:19,840 --> 00:55:22,799
Speaker 3: coaches just want it to be less complicated. So that's

1201
00:55:22,840 --> 00:55:25,279
Speaker 3: why you don't see a whole lot of defensive strategizing.

1202
00:55:25,480 --> 00:55:28,520
Speaker 3: Everybody just switches because the coaches just don't want to

1203
00:55:28,560 --> 00:55:31,120
Speaker 3: deal with whether or not this guy can figure out

1204
00:55:31,160 --> 00:55:31,680
Speaker 3: this coverage.

1205
00:55:31,719 --> 00:55:32,560
Speaker 1: Man, just switch it.

1206
00:55:32,719 --> 00:55:35,000
Speaker 3: And so it's like we'll just draft guys that can

1207
00:55:35,080 --> 00:55:38,359
Speaker 3: switch everything, and to hell with defense. So that's why

1208
00:55:38,480 --> 00:55:44,520
Speaker 3: the scoring numbers are astronomical. But I also think that offensively,

1209
00:55:44,600 --> 00:55:47,560
Speaker 3: it's just an easier way to play, right because there

1210
00:55:47,600 --> 00:55:50,719
Speaker 3: are guys just because you shoot threes doesn't mean you

1211
00:55:50,760 --> 00:55:54,160
Speaker 3: should be shooting threes. I watch games every night where

1212
00:55:54,200 --> 00:55:56,960
Speaker 3: there are guys who should not be shooting threes, and

1213
00:55:57,680 --> 00:56:00,560
Speaker 3: you know, they're guys shooting twenty five from the three

1214
00:56:00,640 --> 00:56:03,520
Speaker 3: and they and they still chucking them up because you know,

1215
00:56:03,880 --> 00:56:07,120
Speaker 3: the numbers say, like that's the best shot and all

1216
00:56:07,120 --> 00:56:10,200
Speaker 3: this other stuff. But more importantly for me, I think

1217
00:56:10,280 --> 00:56:14,520
Speaker 3: it just takes away the different styles of basketball that

1218
00:56:14,680 --> 00:56:20,120
Speaker 3: can be different a couple everybody plays the same. So

1219
00:56:20,280 --> 00:56:22,960
Speaker 3: I think part of the mid range is, like, you know,

1220
00:56:23,120 --> 00:56:26,760
Speaker 3: it's it. It changes the way that the game is played.

1221
00:56:26,960 --> 00:56:29,000
Speaker 3: It's a it's a legit because I mean, I still

1222
00:56:29,360 --> 00:56:32,319
Speaker 3: you watch Kawhi Leonard still shoots, still plays in mid

1223
00:56:32,440 --> 00:56:33,759
Speaker 3: r in the mid range.

1224
00:56:34,800 --> 00:56:36,800
Speaker 4: You're you're watching them in the playoffs.

1225
00:56:37,040 --> 00:56:39,279
Speaker 3: Right in the playoffs when things are on the line,

1226
00:56:39,360 --> 00:56:43,440
Speaker 3: guys are taking best available shot. Ye're not necessarily Ye,

1227
00:56:44,040 --> 00:56:47,520
Speaker 3: they're not necessarily hunting the three, which they do the

1228
00:56:47,600 --> 00:56:48,960
Speaker 3: majority of the regular season.

1229
00:56:49,719 --> 00:56:54,560
Speaker 4: It's also a copycat league. And once everybody again we.

1230
00:56:54,600 --> 00:56:56,960
Speaker 3: Started talking about we were talked about conformity earlier, right,

1231
00:56:57,000 --> 00:56:58,920
Speaker 3: I think a lot of these teams have just conformed.

1232
00:56:58,960 --> 00:57:01,839
Speaker 3: They've just given into the idea that you know, it's

1233
00:57:01,920 --> 00:57:03,920
Speaker 3: easier to just coach guys up and say, hey, run

1234
00:57:03,960 --> 00:57:06,399
Speaker 3: to the corner, shoot threes. Come set a pick and roll.

1235
00:57:06,440 --> 00:57:08,000
Speaker 3: If you can't get to the rim, throw it out

1236
00:57:08,040 --> 00:57:11,640
Speaker 3: and you shoot the three's. And so it makes the

1237
00:57:11,719 --> 00:57:15,080
Speaker 3: game a little less exciting, and it makes it a

1238
00:57:15,200 --> 00:57:18,240
Speaker 3: little less nuanced because again, when you've got a team.

1239
00:57:18,360 --> 00:57:22,440
Speaker 3: So when I remember my time in Indiana, before everybody

1240
00:57:22,560 --> 00:57:25,000
Speaker 3: started just switching and playing the same way, there were

1241
00:57:25,080 --> 00:57:28,600
Speaker 3: different styles of play, right. We played a certain way,

1242
00:57:29,200 --> 00:57:32,400
Speaker 3: Memphis played a certain way, Dallas was playing a certain

1243
00:57:32,520 --> 00:57:35,400
Speaker 3: kind of way. You know, the Warriors way wasn't necessarily

1244
00:57:35,520 --> 00:57:37,680
Speaker 3: set because Mark Jackson was still there, but like the

1245
00:57:37,760 --> 00:57:40,160
Speaker 3: Spurs played their kind of way. And then you know

1246
00:57:40,280 --> 00:57:42,320
Speaker 3: you had the Knicks who played a certain kind of way.

1247
00:57:42,440 --> 00:57:46,840
Speaker 3: Like there was different styles of play. Right now, it's

1248
00:57:47,080 --> 00:57:51,080
Speaker 3: all the same style of play, right, And that's what

1249
00:57:51,360 --> 00:57:53,240
Speaker 3: sort of changed it down. Now, that's why the mid

1250
00:57:53,400 --> 00:57:56,200
Speaker 3: range game is not you don't see it anymore, is

1251
00:57:56,280 --> 00:57:59,400
Speaker 3: because it's a different style. Everybody plays the same style

1252
00:57:59,480 --> 00:58:02,520
Speaker 3: of play. I mean, guys get trapped, bro like they run.

1253
00:58:02,600 --> 00:58:05,400
Speaker 3: Their guys are getting trapped in the half. They're playing zone.

1254
00:58:05,520 --> 00:58:07,400
Speaker 3: Fact like we could. You couldn't play zone when I

1255
00:58:07,480 --> 00:58:09,200
Speaker 3: was in the NBA because you had a thread at

1256
00:58:09,240 --> 00:58:11,560
Speaker 3: the rim. You had guys who would shoot. But now

1257
00:58:11,680 --> 00:58:13,440
Speaker 3: you know, guys are only going to shoot three, So

1258
00:58:13,640 --> 00:58:16,560
Speaker 3: you can play zone. You can trap guys out front,

1259
00:58:16,640 --> 00:58:19,800
Speaker 3: and it's just a different style it's just a different game,

1260
00:58:19,920 --> 00:58:22,680
Speaker 3: and they've done it in a way that's eliminated the

1261
00:58:24,280 --> 00:58:26,360
Speaker 3: nuance to the game and some of the variety that

1262
00:58:26,480 --> 00:58:26,840
Speaker 3: you could have.

1263
00:58:26,960 --> 00:58:29,600
Speaker 1: In speaking of nuances, d West, let's get into it.

1264
00:58:29,680 --> 00:58:32,480
Speaker 1: Let's get a little technical. For a power forward, I

1265
00:58:32,600 --> 00:58:34,640
Speaker 1: consider you were known to be. You know, we're good,

1266
00:58:34,720 --> 00:58:38,680
Speaker 1: you know, both offensively and defensively. What does a what

1267
00:58:38,840 --> 00:58:41,360
Speaker 1: does a mid range shot do to a good defender?

1268
00:58:41,600 --> 00:58:45,080
Speaker 1: If I'm a good defender, I'm bouncy, I'm bouncy, I'm long.

1269
00:58:45,160 --> 00:58:47,160
Speaker 1: You already know I'm bouncy. You know what I mean.

1270
00:58:47,200 --> 00:58:49,520
Speaker 1: I can pint it on the floor, I can move Latterly,

1271
00:58:49,960 --> 00:58:53,320
Speaker 1: What does a good mid range do from the four?

1272
00:58:53,560 --> 00:58:55,800
Speaker 1: You know what I mean? We can specifically talk as

1273
00:58:55,880 --> 00:58:57,720
Speaker 1: big man. We want to talk about for a wing players,

1274
00:58:57,760 --> 00:59:00,360
Speaker 1: We'll just talk about for a big for a If

1275
00:59:00,400 --> 00:59:01,680
Speaker 1: you want to be good as a big and a

1276
00:59:01,720 --> 00:59:04,520
Speaker 1: good score, what does a good midi do for you

1277
00:59:04,800 --> 00:59:08,480
Speaker 1: offensively against a good bouncy defender that can switch off

1278
00:59:08,520 --> 00:59:11,400
Speaker 1: and do all these things that you're talking about, right.

1279
00:59:11,600 --> 00:59:15,120
Speaker 3: It keeps the honest, That's the first thing. It keeps

1280
00:59:15,160 --> 00:59:19,240
Speaker 3: them honest. It gives you a catch and shoot well

1281
00:59:19,320 --> 00:59:21,480
Speaker 3: within your ring. So if you like, you know, right

1282
00:59:21,560 --> 00:59:23,120
Speaker 3: off the elbow. So if I catch the ball off

1283
00:59:23,160 --> 00:59:25,000
Speaker 3: the elbow, if you don't close out to me hard,

1284
00:59:25,000 --> 00:59:27,320
Speaker 3: I'm letting it go. If you close out to me hard,

1285
00:59:27,880 --> 00:59:30,040
Speaker 3: I get my shoulder down. Now I'm one or two

1286
00:59:30,120 --> 00:59:34,080
Speaker 3: dribbles away from a rim attack. Also, the mid range

1287
00:59:34,160 --> 00:59:36,400
Speaker 3: puts you in best. For me, it was always being

1288
00:59:36,480 --> 00:59:39,760
Speaker 3: a passer from that spot. So now I've got better

1289
00:59:39,880 --> 00:59:43,160
Speaker 3: angles to hit the corner that I can play with

1290
00:59:43,360 --> 00:59:45,840
Speaker 3: my big who's under the basket, and I can also

1291
00:59:46,040 --> 00:59:47,320
Speaker 3: find guys on the perimeter.

1292
00:59:47,520 --> 00:59:47,640
Speaker 1: Right.

1293
00:59:47,760 --> 00:59:51,600
Speaker 3: So now when you look at it a game, that

1294
00:59:51,840 --> 00:59:54,840
Speaker 3: part of the floor is wide open, like there's literally

1295
00:59:54,960 --> 01:00:00,080
Speaker 3: often nobody occupying those areas. So again, like I said that,

1296
01:00:00,160 --> 01:00:03,080
Speaker 3: it make to me, it makes makes teams easier to

1297
01:00:03,200 --> 01:00:08,439
Speaker 3: guard because you don't have those those specific spots feel

1298
01:00:08,520 --> 01:00:10,760
Speaker 3: like you don't have anybody playing the yelbow, You don't

1299
01:00:10,800 --> 01:00:14,160
Speaker 3: have anybody playing sort of that that out. I guess

1300
01:00:14,240 --> 01:00:16,320
Speaker 3: a step we call it the Malone posts, which was

1301
01:00:17,000 --> 01:00:20,720
Speaker 3: remember that long trapezoid line that they would draw sometimes

1302
01:00:20,760 --> 01:00:23,080
Speaker 3: on the court. A step or two outside of that

1303
01:00:23,280 --> 01:00:25,480
Speaker 3: is a mid range post catch. You can face up

1304
01:00:25,520 --> 01:00:27,920
Speaker 3: shoot it. You know, a couple of dribbles, even if

1305
01:00:27,960 --> 01:00:32,120
Speaker 3: a double comes, there's still enough enough room to move it. Yeah,

1306
01:00:32,160 --> 01:00:34,200
Speaker 3: it just it just changes the dynamics. But I think

1307
01:00:34,240 --> 01:00:35,760
Speaker 3: it makes you, especially if you're a guy who can

1308
01:00:35,840 --> 01:00:38,400
Speaker 3: knock that shot down, It just always makes you a

1309
01:00:38,480 --> 01:00:39,360
Speaker 3: threat to the defense.

1310
01:00:42,400 --> 01:00:46,000
Speaker 2: Technical lesson man, that Larry Brown's that that that Larry

1311
01:00:46,040 --> 01:00:48,720
Speaker 2: Brown story is crazy. It's like the old dude who

1312
01:00:49,000 --> 01:00:51,000
Speaker 2: maybe tells you something you don't want to hear, but

1313
01:00:51,080 --> 01:00:54,120
Speaker 2: deeper he knows he right, Yeah that's crazy.

1314
01:00:54,560 --> 01:00:57,360
Speaker 4: And he was the opposing team coach. Yeah, but they

1315
01:00:57,440 --> 01:00:58,080
Speaker 4: used to be like that.

1316
01:00:58,240 --> 01:01:00,760
Speaker 3: Those like Don Nelson was that way too, Like he'd

1317
01:01:00,800 --> 01:01:03,360
Speaker 3: be coaching his team, but like if you saw you

1318
01:01:03,480 --> 01:01:06,240
Speaker 3: make a mistake, he'd be like, hey, man, I don't

1319
01:01:06,280 --> 01:01:06,440
Speaker 3: do that.

1320
01:01:06,720 --> 01:01:09,400
Speaker 1: You know they can't help it. Yeah, they can't help it. Right, Hey,

1321
01:01:09,880 --> 01:01:12,120
Speaker 1: what's dope? I want to real quick. Dylan was dope.

1322
01:01:12,160 --> 01:01:14,880
Speaker 1: I'm telling you back then. D West is absolutely right.

1323
01:01:15,040 --> 01:01:17,320
Speaker 1: Even in the runs in the summer, Like if you

1324
01:01:17,360 --> 01:01:20,000
Speaker 1: weren't comfortable with your little fifteen foot and you pass

1325
01:01:20,080 --> 01:01:21,560
Speaker 1: it up, they'd be on you. They'd be like, hey,

1326
01:01:21,560 --> 01:01:23,960
Speaker 1: you got to shoot that. Because he going to the

1327
01:01:24,080 --> 01:01:26,000
Speaker 1: rim and he doing this, and we would like for

1328
01:01:26,120 --> 01:01:28,360
Speaker 1: the science of the whole thing. You start to learn

1329
01:01:28,440 --> 01:01:30,600
Speaker 1: as a pro. There's just some shots you have to

1330
01:01:30,640 --> 01:01:32,880
Speaker 1: shoot that you have to get better at, you that

1331
01:01:33,000 --> 01:01:34,760
Speaker 1: you have to learn to develop. But they will be

1332
01:01:34,880 --> 01:01:37,760
Speaker 1: on your ass, whether it's a coach or opposing coach,

1333
01:01:37,840 --> 01:01:40,280
Speaker 1: what it is, because like you said, them dudes be

1334
01:01:40,360 --> 01:01:44,720
Speaker 1: thinking about like injuries. No, they already crashed into the rim.

1335
01:01:45,120 --> 01:01:47,240
Speaker 1: He already going back this way. You just have to

1336
01:01:47,240 --> 01:01:49,560
Speaker 1: shoot it, son, you know what I mean. So just

1337
01:01:49,640 --> 01:01:51,840
Speaker 1: to go back to yeah, yeah, go back to OG's

1338
01:01:51,840 --> 01:01:53,680
Speaker 1: and basketball sponts. Go ahead, Dylan.

1339
01:01:53,920 --> 01:01:55,840
Speaker 2: So the two thousand and eight season, your first full

1340
01:01:55,880 --> 01:01:57,880
Speaker 2: season back in New Orleans, fifty six wins is the

1341
01:01:57,920 --> 01:02:01,200
Speaker 2: best season in Hornets Pelican's history to this day. You

1342
01:02:01,320 --> 01:02:03,680
Speaker 2: said that there was kind of a symbolism of bringing

1343
01:02:03,720 --> 01:02:08,120
Speaker 2: the city back together, giving them hope. Not to discredit

1344
01:02:08,320 --> 01:02:11,200
Speaker 2: rest in peace, Kobe Bryant, I think Chris Paul probably

1345
01:02:11,240 --> 01:02:14,200
Speaker 2: wins that MVP if Kobe didn't have zero MVPs at

1346
01:02:14,200 --> 01:02:17,040
Speaker 2: that time. Uh, speak to us about how good Chris

1347
01:02:17,120 --> 01:02:19,640
Speaker 2: Paul was. I think that's his probably fourth year in

1348
01:02:19,640 --> 01:02:23,000
Speaker 2: the league or third year in the league. He's he's incredible,

1349
01:02:23,080 --> 01:02:25,760
Speaker 2: the kind of dual pick and roll that he had

1350
01:02:25,800 --> 01:02:28,200
Speaker 2: with Tyson at the rim and then popping with you.

1351
01:02:28,720 --> 01:02:31,280
Speaker 2: How good was Chris Paul? And we see today kind

1352
01:02:31,280 --> 01:02:33,120
Speaker 2: of the death of the true point guard, but that

1353
01:02:33,240 --> 01:02:36,320
Speaker 2: dude epitomizes that to the fullest and he was nasty.

1354
01:02:36,720 --> 01:02:38,600
Speaker 2: So give us a couple of minutes on how good

1355
01:02:38,680 --> 01:02:40,920
Speaker 2: Chris Paul was and what your relationship was like with him.

1356
01:02:41,560 --> 01:02:41,760
Speaker 1: Yeah.

1357
01:02:41,840 --> 01:02:43,800
Speaker 3: No, Like I said, you know, I knew c before

1358
01:02:44,640 --> 01:02:47,720
Speaker 3: he came to the Hornets, and you know, Coach Frost

1359
01:02:47,920 --> 01:02:50,120
Speaker 3: was super high on him, just loved him to death

1360
01:02:50,200 --> 01:02:52,160
Speaker 3: and felt like he was one of the his Like

1361
01:02:52,440 --> 01:02:55,919
Speaker 3: you know, he's say, Davy, he's gonna he's gonna change

1362
01:02:55,960 --> 01:02:57,960
Speaker 3: things for you, guys, I'm telling you, and I say, Coach,

1363
01:02:58,200 --> 01:02:59,960
Speaker 3: I hope. So man, we're trying to win, trying to

1364
01:03:00,080 --> 01:03:03,000
Speaker 3: get better. But you know, when he came in, he

1365
01:03:03,160 --> 01:03:06,720
Speaker 3: just had the youthful energy probably one of the I

1366
01:03:06,800 --> 01:03:10,080
Speaker 3: mean before you know, obviously the NBA seasons, you know,

1367
01:03:10,200 --> 01:03:12,400
Speaker 3: it takes a toll on you, but you know, his

1368
01:03:12,560 --> 01:03:14,120
Speaker 3: first two years, I mean, I don't think I've ever

1369
01:03:14,160 --> 01:03:18,280
Speaker 3: played with somebody that fast, you know, he had so

1370
01:03:18,560 --> 01:03:23,000
Speaker 3: many tricks, and you know, there's one thing I don't

1371
01:03:23,080 --> 01:03:26,480
Speaker 3: I've never seen another guy do this ever, and it

1372
01:03:26,600 --> 01:03:28,840
Speaker 3: might be hard for me to explain it, but just

1373
01:03:29,000 --> 01:03:34,280
Speaker 3: imagine you're dribbling the ball and he's chasing you and

1374
01:03:34,600 --> 01:03:37,160
Speaker 3: he would tap. He would he's chased. So a guy's

1375
01:03:37,240 --> 01:03:39,760
Speaker 3: dribbling the ball and Chris Paul is chasing that guy.

1376
01:03:40,520 --> 01:03:43,400
Speaker 3: He would tap you on the opposite side to make

1377
01:03:43,480 --> 01:03:45,560
Speaker 3: you think that's where he was, and as soon as

1378
01:03:45,600 --> 01:03:47,560
Speaker 3: you switch the ball to that hand, he would take it.

1379
01:03:48,240 --> 01:03:50,560
Speaker 3: I saw him get like he got j Kidd with that.

1380
01:03:50,720 --> 01:03:51,880
Speaker 3: He got two or three guys.

1381
01:03:52,840 --> 01:03:55,800
Speaker 1: I'm glad you's verifying that d West because there's rumors

1382
01:03:55,840 --> 01:03:58,720
Speaker 1: of that that that CP three sick a little move

1383
01:03:58,800 --> 01:04:01,800
Speaker 1: that you're talking about, right, Oh, unbelievable.

1384
01:04:02,240 --> 01:04:05,480
Speaker 3: Never seen anybody do it to this day, I haven't

1385
01:04:05,520 --> 01:04:07,200
Speaker 3: seen guys been able to pull it off in that

1386
01:04:07,360 --> 01:04:10,560
Speaker 3: and he did it multiple times his his rookie year.

1387
01:04:11,400 --> 01:04:13,440
Speaker 3: And then obviously, you know, the NBA gets hit to it,

1388
01:04:13,600 --> 01:04:16,160
Speaker 3: so you know, nobody's playing around with him anymore in

1389
01:04:16,240 --> 01:04:18,320
Speaker 3: that way. But he just came in the league with

1390
01:04:18,920 --> 01:04:23,080
Speaker 3: a determination to play, to compete, to not let his

1391
01:04:23,280 --> 01:04:27,200
Speaker 3: size be a factor. You know, he was in practice

1392
01:04:27,240 --> 01:04:30,040
Speaker 3: every day. We had to you know, we were young,

1393
01:04:30,200 --> 01:04:31,720
Speaker 3: and you know again I was in my third year,

1394
01:04:31,760 --> 01:04:34,880
Speaker 3: but this was like my first full time year's starter

1395
01:04:35,520 --> 01:04:38,800
Speaker 3: somebody who's gonna be counted on. So we had to

1396
01:04:38,920 --> 01:04:41,080
Speaker 3: learn how to practice even when you know, Coach Scott

1397
01:04:41,280 --> 01:04:43,720
Speaker 3: was kicking our butts. We had to figure out how

1398
01:04:43,720 --> 01:04:45,760
Speaker 3: to get through it and then be able to perform

1399
01:04:46,840 --> 01:04:47,560
Speaker 3: in the games.

1400
01:04:48,160 --> 01:04:48,280
Speaker 1: Uh.

1401
01:04:48,400 --> 01:04:50,280
Speaker 3: And he and you know, CP just bought in from

1402
01:04:50,360 --> 01:04:52,600
Speaker 3: day one, like there was a certain way he wanted

1403
01:04:52,640 --> 01:04:54,640
Speaker 3: that coach wanted us to play, which was fast. He

1404
01:04:55,080 --> 01:04:57,040
Speaker 3: you know, we did some of the Princeton stuff, but

1405
01:04:57,200 --> 01:04:59,560
Speaker 3: more so he was like, you know, let's get you know,

1406
01:04:59,640 --> 01:05:02,040
Speaker 3: let's get thirty five forty picking rolls in a game,

1407
01:05:02,160 --> 01:05:03,120
Speaker 3: which was a lot then.

1408
01:05:03,640 --> 01:05:05,760
Speaker 4: And then we just kept up in the up in

1409
01:05:05,840 --> 01:05:06,640
Speaker 4: the ante.

1410
01:05:06,480 --> 01:05:08,760
Speaker 3: You know, more and more every every time, especially as

1411
01:05:09,280 --> 01:05:14,080
Speaker 3: as he gave Chris more more freedom. Uh, he gave

1412
01:05:14,200 --> 01:05:17,600
Speaker 3: Chris more freedom to be the leader on offense.

1413
01:05:18,000 --> 01:05:20,320
Speaker 2: Does Chris Paul do he should he be brought up

1414
01:05:20,360 --> 01:05:23,640
Speaker 2: in that kind of tier a point guard defender conversation

1415
01:05:23,880 --> 01:05:25,560
Speaker 2: with the likes of it, like a Gary Payton and

1416
01:05:25,600 --> 01:05:28,920
Speaker 2: Adjason Kidd because accolades wise, he's right there with him.

1417
01:05:29,600 --> 01:05:31,600
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, definitely, And I mean, you know, it was

1418
01:05:31,640 --> 01:05:33,600
Speaker 3: a way he was doing it his you know, he

1419
01:05:33,800 --> 01:05:38,000
Speaker 3: was he was doing getting passing lane steals on the ball,

1420
01:05:38,280 --> 01:05:41,120
Speaker 3: so he'd be guarding the ball. He was fast enough

1421
01:05:41,160 --> 01:05:43,160
Speaker 3: that a guy would pass the ball and he could

1422
01:05:43,240 --> 01:05:45,800
Speaker 3: get in the passing lane from on the ball and

1423
01:05:45,880 --> 01:05:48,440
Speaker 3: steal it like he was he was an off ball defender.

1424
01:05:48,560 --> 01:05:51,440
Speaker 3: So and then he also, you know, see was very

1425
01:05:51,560 --> 01:05:55,720
Speaker 3: He's very competitive, and so his competitiveness kept him in

1426
01:05:55,800 --> 01:05:59,000
Speaker 3: the fight against bigger guards, kept him in the fight

1427
01:05:59,080 --> 01:06:01,880
Speaker 3: when teams were you know, because at one point folks

1428
01:06:01,920 --> 01:06:03,600
Speaker 3: were saying, you know, he can't shoot, so make them

1429
01:06:03,640 --> 01:06:07,040
Speaker 3: go under. Then he started, you know, he can knock

1430
01:06:07,120 --> 01:06:11,080
Speaker 3: down that mid range pretty proficiently as well. So, uh,

1431
01:06:12,040 --> 01:06:14,400
Speaker 3: what he was and who he was right, I ultimately

1432
01:06:14,440 --> 01:06:16,920
Speaker 3: put him at the upper echelon of the point guard position,

1433
01:06:17,640 --> 01:06:19,600
Speaker 3: and he made everybody when you were on the floor

1434
01:06:19,640 --> 01:06:19,920
Speaker 3: with him.

1435
01:06:19,960 --> 01:06:20,960
Speaker 1: His only thing was right.

1436
01:06:21,000 --> 01:06:24,240
Speaker 4: He wants he was an assist hunting like CP hunted assists.

1437
01:06:24,280 --> 01:06:26,400
Speaker 3: So you want to play with a guy that's looking

1438
01:06:26,480 --> 01:06:29,760
Speaker 3: to hunt to make passes to get guys open shots.

1439
01:06:30,960 --> 01:06:35,280
Speaker 1: For sure, facts spurs series. He ended up putting up

1440
01:06:35,320 --> 01:06:39,760
Speaker 1: thirty balls. What a broken back? If my back, if

1441
01:06:39,840 --> 01:06:42,200
Speaker 1: my back doesn't go out, bro, we run through them.

1442
01:06:42,440 --> 01:06:43,120
Speaker 1: We beat them.

1443
01:06:43,800 --> 01:06:45,840
Speaker 3: We probably pushed the Lakers to sit because we had

1444
01:06:45,960 --> 01:06:47,720
Speaker 3: I think we had won the season series against the

1445
01:06:47,760 --> 01:06:50,560
Speaker 3: Lakers that year. We were we were as confident as

1446
01:06:50,680 --> 01:06:53,600
Speaker 3: any in our ability to beat anybody in the NBA

1447
01:06:53,880 --> 01:06:57,440
Speaker 3: that year. We had no there was absolutely no fear

1448
01:06:57,920 --> 01:07:00,640
Speaker 3: of us going matching up with anybody at any point

1449
01:07:02,080 --> 01:07:02,680
Speaker 3: that season.

1450
01:07:03,200 --> 01:07:06,320
Speaker 1: D West, I got it. I got it. Not to

1451
01:07:06,400 --> 01:07:08,600
Speaker 1: cut you off, but I got a horrible back. How

1452
01:07:08,640 --> 01:07:09,480
Speaker 1: did you get through?

1453
01:07:10,520 --> 01:07:10,640
Speaker 3: Uh?

1454
01:07:10,920 --> 01:07:13,440
Speaker 1: That that that series with a with a bad back?

1455
01:07:13,600 --> 01:07:14,480
Speaker 3: Was your man?

1456
01:07:14,640 --> 01:07:17,560
Speaker 1: Did you are you doing the usual tour dough or

1457
01:07:17,840 --> 01:07:22,640
Speaker 1: NBA whatever at the NBA cabinet to get the job done? Everything? Everything? Yeah?

1458
01:07:23,080 --> 01:07:26,240
Speaker 1: Every yeah, yeah, my you know, my back.

1459
01:07:26,720 --> 01:07:28,640
Speaker 3: It was just a combination that I got hit a

1460
01:07:28,720 --> 01:07:32,200
Speaker 3: couple of times, and then maybe it was Game six

1461
01:07:33,040 --> 01:07:37,480
Speaker 3: because my back it started bothering me about Game three, Uh,

1462
01:07:37,560 --> 01:07:40,280
Speaker 3: and we're trying to manage it, manage it, and then

1463
01:07:40,920 --> 01:07:47,000
Speaker 3: I had a bad during our shoot around before Game five.

1464
01:07:47,760 --> 01:07:51,360
Speaker 3: It went out completing. Ironically, that was the best game

1465
01:07:51,360 --> 01:07:53,240
Speaker 3: I've ever had in my career. That's what happened to.

1466
01:07:53,240 --> 01:07:53,760
Speaker 1: Me one time.

1467
01:07:53,880 --> 01:07:56,880
Speaker 2: Thirty eight thirty eight, thirty forty.

1468
01:07:57,440 --> 01:08:00,680
Speaker 3: Just just yeah, just statistically it was. But I remember that.

1469
01:08:00,840 --> 01:08:04,440
Speaker 3: I remember that moment because they wanted to shut the

1470
01:08:05,280 --> 01:08:09,080
Speaker 3: trainer and our physical therapists wanted to shut me down

1471
01:08:09,120 --> 01:08:13,920
Speaker 3: because they didn't know sort of how close to my

1472
01:08:15,160 --> 01:08:17,880
Speaker 3: my vertebrae was because I mean, I was getting the

1473
01:08:18,040 --> 01:08:22,000
Speaker 3: zingers down my leg. So I've never I've actually never

1474
01:08:22,080 --> 01:08:25,040
Speaker 3: seen I've never seen footage of that game. I don't

1475
01:08:25,080 --> 01:08:27,000
Speaker 3: know what happened to the footage of that game Game

1476
01:08:27,080 --> 01:08:29,400
Speaker 3: five against the Spurs, And I always laughed because it

1477
01:08:29,479 --> 01:08:31,680
Speaker 3: was like maybe it was some liability thing, but like

1478
01:08:31,840 --> 01:08:36,400
Speaker 3: I literally probably should not have played because I mean

1479
01:08:36,479 --> 01:08:38,600
Speaker 3: every time I took a step, I could feel just

1480
01:08:38,680 --> 01:08:41,880
Speaker 3: a sharp down in my leg my footwin number a

1481
01:08:41,880 --> 01:08:45,439
Speaker 3: couple a couple of times. But they, you know, we

1482
01:08:45,600 --> 01:08:48,719
Speaker 3: tried like I was in a full ice ice bath.

1483
01:08:50,160 --> 01:08:50,800
Speaker 1: I mean I was.

1484
01:08:51,000 --> 01:08:53,800
Speaker 3: They came to my house, Mark came by the house

1485
01:08:53,920 --> 01:08:56,280
Speaker 3: to like treat me during the middle of the night.

1486
01:08:56,400 --> 01:08:58,760
Speaker 4: The next day. I mean, it was intensive stuff. Just

1487
01:08:58,840 --> 01:08:59,920
Speaker 4: to get me through that series.

1488
01:09:00,880 --> 01:09:03,920
Speaker 3: Then after that series, man, you know, if you look

1489
01:09:03,960 --> 01:09:06,760
Speaker 3: at if you find a video or a picture of

1490
01:09:06,840 --> 01:09:09,599
Speaker 3: me the next season, I was sitting on a physio ball.

1491
01:09:09,640 --> 01:09:11,320
Speaker 4: I couldn't sit on a hard chair. For about a

1492
01:09:11,400 --> 01:09:11,880
Speaker 4: year and a half.

1493
01:09:13,600 --> 01:09:18,120
Speaker 3: I was I couldn't sit on the toilet, no deeps,

1494
01:09:18,320 --> 01:09:20,320
Speaker 3: so it was I couldn't sit on an NBA bench.

1495
01:09:20,360 --> 01:09:22,000
Speaker 4: I was bouncing on a physio ball.

1496
01:09:22,400 --> 01:09:24,360
Speaker 3: When I would come out of the game, I would

1497
01:09:24,439 --> 01:09:29,200
Speaker 3: I would be icing literally for the majority of the time,

1498
01:09:29,240 --> 01:09:31,800
Speaker 3: I was in hotels. And it took me about a

1499
01:09:31,920 --> 01:09:36,519
Speaker 3: year and a half to really get past that with

1500
01:09:36,920 --> 01:09:42,280
Speaker 3: with just physical therapy, no surgery, you know, listening to

1501
01:09:42,439 --> 01:09:46,439
Speaker 3: different some holistic doctors and doing some different things with

1502
01:09:46,640 --> 01:09:50,439
Speaker 3: my posture. I was able to make it through that,

1503
01:09:50,600 --> 01:09:52,200
Speaker 3: but it took me about a year and a half.

1504
01:09:52,280 --> 01:09:54,280
Speaker 3: And then I'll never forget when I got to Indiana,

1505
01:09:55,000 --> 01:09:57,120
Speaker 3: and Indiana does you know they're one of the best

1506
01:09:58,439 --> 01:10:01,439
Speaker 3: medical staffs in the league. So when you go to Indiana,

1507
01:10:02,080 --> 01:10:04,240
Speaker 3: Josh and Carl, I mean, they they're gonna they're the

1508
01:10:04,280 --> 01:10:09,400
Speaker 3: ones that caught Levert's cancer. So because of the just

1509
01:10:09,479 --> 01:10:11,840
Speaker 3: the intense screening that Josh and those guys do with

1510
01:10:11,920 --> 01:10:15,000
Speaker 3: the body. So when they looked at my back, they

1511
01:10:15,120 --> 01:10:17,120
Speaker 3: were like, because I was coming off of a c L,

1512
01:10:17,160 --> 01:10:19,000
Speaker 3: They're like, man, the hell with your a c L.

1513
01:10:19,120 --> 01:10:21,559
Speaker 4: That back is worse than that than that knee.

1514
01:10:22,720 --> 01:10:25,120
Speaker 3: And you know, And so the whole time I was there,

1515
01:10:25,160 --> 01:10:27,080
Speaker 3: I mean, it's, you know something, if you got back problems,

1516
01:10:27,120 --> 01:10:30,280
Speaker 3: you know something, you gotta manage everything. But they really

1517
01:10:30,360 --> 01:10:34,040
Speaker 3: did a good job of of of getting me under control,

1518
01:10:34,120 --> 01:10:37,160
Speaker 3: because my back would still flare up. I mean, I'd

1519
01:10:37,240 --> 01:10:39,599
Speaker 3: have to put a you know again, like a five

1520
01:10:39,680 --> 01:10:42,840
Speaker 3: almost like a two gallon bag of ice on my

1521
01:10:42,960 --> 01:10:45,880
Speaker 3: back just to keep this thing, uh, keep this thing,

1522
01:10:47,000 --> 01:10:50,439
Speaker 3: just to keep it, but only to go out there

1523
01:10:50,479 --> 01:10:54,040
Speaker 3: and if I don't hurt my back, we get past this.

1524
01:10:54,160 --> 01:10:54,479
Speaker 1: Frest.

1525
01:10:54,479 --> 01:10:57,200
Speaker 2: I'll tell you that he speak speaking of not sitting

1526
01:10:57,240 --> 01:10:59,000
Speaker 2: on the bench. I think maybe that's why you're I

1527
01:10:59,040 --> 01:11:00,760
Speaker 2: think it might be the only player in NBA history

1528
01:11:00,760 --> 01:11:06,160
Speaker 2: to get a TECH from the bike right right, talking

1529
01:11:06,200 --> 01:11:08,479
Speaker 2: about the just the last thing we got on the

1530
01:11:08,520 --> 01:11:11,720
Speaker 2: Hornets then just closing it out. So you've losing seven

1531
01:11:11,720 --> 01:11:14,240
Speaker 2: to that series. You said that the team probably didn't

1532
01:11:14,280 --> 01:11:16,240
Speaker 2: realize how hard it was to even get to Game

1533
01:11:16,320 --> 01:11:19,200
Speaker 2: seven of a Round two the next year. Obviously there's

1534
01:11:19,200 --> 01:11:23,519
Speaker 2: a lot going on with ownership. That Tyson Chandler voided trade,

1535
01:11:23,560 --> 01:11:26,759
Speaker 2: I think is one of the most sneaky what ifs

1536
01:11:26,920 --> 01:11:30,519
Speaker 2: ever it killed your team. But also, if Tyson Chandler

1537
01:11:30,600 --> 01:11:33,439
Speaker 2: goes to the Thunder, he doesn't go to the MAVs,

1538
01:11:33,520 --> 01:11:36,200
Speaker 2: the MAVs probably don't win the championship. But the craziest

1539
01:11:36,240 --> 01:11:39,560
Speaker 2: part about that voided trade is he gets traded to

1540
01:11:39,640 --> 01:11:42,960
Speaker 2: the Thunder and they wait, they cancel the trade because

1541
01:11:43,000 --> 01:11:45,719
Speaker 2: of a medical on his toe, and the Thunder team

1542
01:11:45,840 --> 01:11:48,680
Speaker 2: doctor is the same doctor that did the surgery a

1543
01:11:48,800 --> 01:11:52,439
Speaker 2: year before, so they the doctor who operated on his

1544
01:11:52,520 --> 01:11:54,479
Speaker 2: toe is the same dude that looked at him a

1545
01:11:54,560 --> 01:11:57,120
Speaker 2: year later and said, whoever did that tow didn't do

1546
01:11:57,160 --> 01:11:59,200
Speaker 2: a good job. We can't do the trade. So he

1547
01:11:59,320 --> 01:12:01,439
Speaker 2: gets traded to the Thunder. Then he they say no,

1548
01:12:01,600 --> 01:12:04,040
Speaker 2: never mind, He's got to go back to the ex

1549
01:12:04,160 --> 01:12:07,000
Speaker 2: girlfriend's house and stay there for the rest of the lease,

1550
01:12:07,439 --> 01:12:10,080
Speaker 2: and the team just kind of never never gets the same.

1551
01:12:10,600 --> 01:12:12,920
Speaker 2: Uh So that that that, to me is kind of

1552
01:12:13,040 --> 01:12:16,160
Speaker 2: Everybody talks about the canceled trade with the Lakers for gasol.

1553
01:12:16,560 --> 01:12:19,880
Speaker 2: But that one is arguably like a bigger sweat.

1554
01:12:20,760 --> 01:12:24,160
Speaker 3: Yeah, that that killed us because we loved Tyson. We

1555
01:12:24,320 --> 01:12:27,360
Speaker 3: wanted Tyson when he was in Chicago. So bringing Tyson like,

1556
01:12:27,439 --> 01:12:30,920
Speaker 3: we were like, man, we just need Tyson. What happened was,

1557
01:12:31,880 --> 01:12:34,519
Speaker 3: you know, and this is what you learn when you

1558
01:12:34,640 --> 01:12:37,519
Speaker 3: get older, is that if the front office and the

1559
01:12:37,680 --> 01:12:41,600
Speaker 3: coach and philosophies are not tied together, it's it's a

1560
01:12:41,680 --> 01:12:44,280
Speaker 3: disaster waiting to happen. So the front office had an

1561
01:12:44,320 --> 01:12:48,080
Speaker 3: idea of how they wanted us to play and how

1562
01:12:48,120 --> 01:12:50,760
Speaker 3: they wanted their center to be versus what we knew

1563
01:12:50,840 --> 01:12:53,000
Speaker 3: what we needed as the guys who were on the

1564
01:12:53,040 --> 01:12:54,800
Speaker 3: floor and coaches who were in the locker room, and

1565
01:12:54,920 --> 01:12:58,280
Speaker 3: so that you know, nobody wanted Tyson to be traded.

1566
01:12:58,400 --> 01:13:01,920
Speaker 3: Coach didn't want that trade. Tyson didn't want to be traded.

1567
01:13:03,320 --> 01:13:06,920
Speaker 3: You know, you know we I'm not gonna say Tyson

1568
01:13:07,600 --> 01:13:10,320
Speaker 3: made sure that he failed that physical, but I would

1569
01:13:10,520 --> 01:13:12,680
Speaker 3: I know that. You know, he didn't want to go

1570
01:13:12,800 --> 01:13:15,639
Speaker 3: to Oklahoma. But at the same time he was mad

1571
01:13:15,840 --> 01:13:19,439
Speaker 3: that that he was that he had to come back

1572
01:13:19,439 --> 01:13:21,439
Speaker 3: to New Orleans because they, you know, basically didn't want

1573
01:13:21,680 --> 01:13:23,519
Speaker 3: he knew he was gonna be gone the next season,

1574
01:13:24,960 --> 01:13:28,040
Speaker 3: and we traded away championship because again I believe that

1575
01:13:28,360 --> 01:13:33,200
Speaker 3: you know, the guys that they won that championship, Yeah,

1576
01:13:33,240 --> 01:13:35,400
Speaker 3: that dirt, Yeah, that dirt championship should have been our.

1577
01:13:35,760 --> 01:13:37,800
Speaker 3: I mean, we had beaten that MAVs team, We had

1578
01:13:37,880 --> 01:13:41,400
Speaker 3: gotten over that MAVs team, and then we send our

1579
01:13:41,479 --> 01:13:45,200
Speaker 3: center over there, we sent Page over there, and they

1580
01:13:45,280 --> 01:13:45,560
Speaker 3: win it.

1581
01:13:46,320 --> 01:13:48,400
Speaker 1: You know, we had a chance. You know, we had

1582
01:13:48,439 --> 01:13:48,760
Speaker 1: a chance.

1583
01:13:48,880 --> 01:13:50,880
Speaker 3: Nobody knows this, but we had a chance to get

1584
01:13:50,920 --> 01:13:53,360
Speaker 3: rip Hamilton and we went and got Luther head and

1585
01:13:53,520 --> 01:13:56,640
Speaker 3: that was the last straw for CP. You know, c

1586
01:13:56,840 --> 01:14:00,320
Speaker 3: P was was mad about Tyson and they and when

1587
01:14:00,320 --> 01:14:03,680
Speaker 3: they did the like literally we're like, nah, people are

1588
01:14:03,720 --> 01:14:07,040
Speaker 3: telling us, like y'all can get rip Hamiltons. CP's brother knew,

1589
01:14:07,520 --> 01:14:12,400
Speaker 3: you know, we had it like Jordan and they were like, nah,

1590
01:14:12,520 --> 01:14:17,400
Speaker 3: Luther had Yeah. It was that was when that happened.

1591
01:14:17,600 --> 01:14:19,599
Speaker 3: When that happened, we knew it was over.

1592
01:14:19,800 --> 01:14:20,479
Speaker 1: Like we knew that.

1593
01:14:21,160 --> 01:14:23,080
Speaker 3: You know, I knew CP wasn't gonna you know, he

1594
01:14:23,280 --> 01:14:25,200
Speaker 3: was gonna one way or the other get out of

1595
01:14:25,200 --> 01:14:28,639
Speaker 3: there because you know, the team just wasn't looking at

1596
01:14:29,280 --> 01:14:31,240
Speaker 3: things the way that we wanted them to look at it,

1597
01:14:31,320 --> 01:14:34,000
Speaker 3: and Moni came in that last year and Moni did

1598
01:14:34,000 --> 01:14:35,679
Speaker 3: a great job him and Dell did a great job.

1599
01:14:35,760 --> 01:14:37,559
Speaker 3: They It was the first time we had been they

1600
01:14:37,960 --> 01:14:42,240
Speaker 3: we had talked to the front office about players and crazy,

1601
01:14:42,320 --> 01:14:44,720
Speaker 3: first time we were being included in decisions. And this

1602
01:14:44,880 --> 01:14:47,240
Speaker 3: is like my eighth season in the league, you know,

1603
01:14:47,360 --> 01:14:49,840
Speaker 3: we were and so it's like that was all new

1604
01:14:49,920 --> 01:14:53,599
Speaker 3: to us and we knew, but we were just like, yeah,

1605
01:14:53,640 --> 01:14:56,120
Speaker 3: it's just too late, Like we gotta go in different directions.

1606
01:14:56,160 --> 01:14:58,320
Speaker 3: Once I hurt my knee and then we kind of

1607
01:14:58,320 --> 01:15:01,880
Speaker 3: anticipated the lockout coming. We knew that it was just

1608
01:15:01,960 --> 01:15:03,639
Speaker 3: the end of the end of the line.

1609
01:15:05,360 --> 01:15:07,800
Speaker 2: So the second half of your career is I mean,

1610
01:15:07,840 --> 01:15:10,519
Speaker 2: that's where you won two championships. You were a huge

1611
01:15:10,600 --> 01:15:12,519
Speaker 2: part of that Indiana team that pushed the heat to

1612
01:15:12,640 --> 01:15:15,880
Speaker 2: seven twice. When you won the championship for the first

1613
01:15:15,880 --> 01:15:18,200
Speaker 2: time in Golden State. In your postgame interview, you said

1614
01:15:18,240 --> 01:15:21,360
Speaker 2: something to David Aldridge. You said, and before I get

1615
01:15:21,360 --> 01:15:23,200
Speaker 2: to that, I think the second half of your career

1616
01:15:23,280 --> 01:15:24,840
Speaker 2: can also there was a similar theme and that you

1617
01:15:25,240 --> 01:15:28,280
Speaker 2: often took less money to get to the better situation. Right,

1618
01:15:28,360 --> 01:15:30,479
Speaker 2: You turned down like twelve million dollars from the Pacers,

1619
01:15:30,760 --> 01:15:32,679
Speaker 2: took a smaller three million dollar deal with the heat

1620
01:15:33,120 --> 01:15:35,800
Speaker 2: or with the Spurs. Excuse me, most players don't do that.

1621
01:15:35,920 --> 01:15:38,400
Speaker 2: And when you won the championship, your reasoning for that

1622
01:15:38,640 --> 01:15:41,560
Speaker 2: you pulled an Egyptian theory that the Egyptians learned that

1623
01:15:41,640 --> 01:15:42,760
Speaker 2: you can't take it with you.

1624
01:15:43,200 --> 01:15:44,040
Speaker 1: So what does that mean?

1625
01:15:44,200 --> 01:15:45,800
Speaker 2: Because I had to look up, you know, that didn't

1626
01:15:45,840 --> 01:15:47,240
Speaker 2: come really clearly to me. I had to look that

1627
01:15:47,360 --> 01:15:48,160
Speaker 2: up and do some research.

1628
01:15:51,479 --> 01:15:55,760
Speaker 3: They would bury theirselves, bury themselves with their treasures, and

1629
01:15:55,840 --> 01:15:59,920
Speaker 3: they would bury themselves with sort of the monetary games

1630
01:16:00,080 --> 01:16:03,680
Speaker 3: that they and they could it didn't that didn't guarantee

1631
01:16:03,760 --> 01:16:05,960
Speaker 3: or they could not take it with them. So, you know,

1632
01:16:06,080 --> 01:16:08,680
Speaker 3: the things that you that you carry with you are

1633
01:16:08,880 --> 01:16:14,320
Speaker 3: your memories, are your experiences. As we get older, we realize,

1634
01:16:14,360 --> 01:16:17,080
Speaker 3: like those are the things that are the most valuable.

1635
01:16:18,360 --> 01:16:20,800
Speaker 3: And so I was chasing a feeling more than I

1636
01:16:20,920 --> 01:16:24,759
Speaker 3: was chasing a monetary number. I was chasing the feeling

1637
01:16:24,880 --> 01:16:28,760
Speaker 3: of accomplishment, of like finite, like I didn't want to

1638
01:16:28,840 --> 01:16:32,160
Speaker 3: go through my I got so close in Indiana, I

1639
01:16:32,360 --> 01:16:36,880
Speaker 3: literally could not imagine playing any more seasons without the possibility.

1640
01:16:36,880 --> 01:16:39,120
Speaker 3: I didn't wasn't necessarily say it was going to be guaranteed,

1641
01:16:39,120 --> 01:16:43,360
Speaker 3: because there's no guaranteed NBA championship. But I always I said,

1642
01:16:43,560 --> 01:16:46,920
Speaker 3: I have to play with that possibility or I can't play.

1643
01:16:47,040 --> 01:16:49,720
Speaker 4: Like I couldn't. I couldn't muster it up to just

1644
01:16:49,800 --> 01:16:51,120
Speaker 4: go out there and play.

1645
01:16:51,200 --> 01:16:53,720
Speaker 3: That's why that's why I kind of retired when I did,

1646
01:16:53,840 --> 01:16:58,080
Speaker 3: because I could, I had options, you know, I didn't

1647
01:16:58,160 --> 01:16:59,880
Speaker 3: like the role that that I that I would have

1648
01:17:00,040 --> 01:17:01,960
Speaker 3: had to go back to Golden State with, which was

1649
01:17:02,080 --> 01:17:04,640
Speaker 3: like and Andre was situated for it, like sitting there

1650
01:17:04,640 --> 01:17:07,719
Speaker 3: in street clothes kind of being a veteran player coaching.

1651
01:17:08,200 --> 01:17:10,320
Speaker 3: I still wanted to play, but then I was like,

1652
01:17:10,520 --> 01:17:12,800
Speaker 3: is it worth you not playing and sitting and being

1653
01:17:12,920 --> 01:17:15,920
Speaker 3: taken on this role or could you go play? Because

1654
01:17:15,920 --> 01:17:19,200
Speaker 3: I had like two or three opportunities to go after

1655
01:17:19,320 --> 01:17:21,920
Speaker 3: that my time in Golden State, and I was like, yeah, nah,

1656
01:17:22,120 --> 01:17:24,760
Speaker 3: it's just not The fire is not going to be there, right.

1657
01:17:24,840 --> 01:17:29,000
Speaker 3: The reason for doing it is to win, and we

1658
01:17:29,080 --> 01:17:31,599
Speaker 3: had gotten so close, you know, we winning fifty games

1659
01:17:31,640 --> 01:17:34,720
Speaker 3: in Indie and challenging the heat and playing every game

1660
01:17:34,840 --> 01:17:37,400
Speaker 3: meant something. So that's what I was chasing the last

1661
01:17:37,439 --> 01:17:39,840
Speaker 3: few years of my career, was that meaning, like wanting

1662
01:17:39,960 --> 01:17:43,439
Speaker 3: every game to be important, setting the super high goals,

1663
01:17:43,520 --> 01:17:45,920
Speaker 3: Like that's what I had got addicted to, you know,

1664
01:17:46,760 --> 01:17:48,720
Speaker 3: you know what my time in Indiana. So that was

1665
01:17:48,760 --> 01:17:51,680
Speaker 3: what the end of my career was about. And then

1666
01:17:51,720 --> 01:17:53,640
Speaker 3: I just wanted to see I just wanted to be

1667
01:17:53,800 --> 01:17:56,719
Speaker 3: around or be in that environment because I love coaching,

1668
01:17:57,280 --> 01:18:00,439
Speaker 3: love coaching youth, but I wanted to see what that

1669
01:18:00,600 --> 01:18:03,519
Speaker 3: championship formula was, like how do you do this? Like

1670
01:18:03,640 --> 01:18:06,719
Speaker 3: how do you get to an NBA championship from start

1671
01:18:06,760 --> 01:18:08,880
Speaker 3: to finish? And you know, thankfully it was with a

1672
01:18:08,960 --> 01:18:12,599
Speaker 3: really good, high level group of guys in Golden State.

1673
01:18:12,840 --> 01:18:13,479
Speaker 3: You got it done.

1674
01:18:15,560 --> 01:18:18,840
Speaker 1: When you look back at your fifteen year NBA career,

1675
01:18:19,200 --> 01:18:22,719
Speaker 1: what did you merv learn from your NBA career outside

1676
01:18:22,760 --> 01:18:25,840
Speaker 1: of basketball or what lessons did you learn through basketball

1677
01:18:25,960 --> 01:18:26,680
Speaker 1: that ended up?

1678
01:18:27,160 --> 01:18:27,400
Speaker 4: You know.

1679
01:18:28,960 --> 01:18:31,160
Speaker 1: What's the word I'm looking for? Ended up and you know,

1680
01:18:31,280 --> 01:18:34,439
Speaker 1: applying applying to life. But it almost like because you

1681
01:18:34,760 --> 01:18:37,479
Speaker 1: you seem to me, d West is like you're not

1682
01:18:37,560 --> 01:18:41,040
Speaker 1: an accident. The success you had in your career as

1683
01:18:41,160 --> 01:18:45,720
Speaker 1: not an accident, through discipline, through hard work, through educating

1684
01:18:45,800 --> 01:18:49,040
Speaker 1: yourself on things like it seems like to me listening

1685
01:18:49,080 --> 01:18:51,240
Speaker 1: to you and watching you from afar, things you have

1686
01:18:51,360 --> 01:18:54,160
Speaker 1: an interesting and want to speak on. What did you

1687
01:18:54,320 --> 01:18:56,439
Speaker 1: learn through your NBA career? You know what I mean

1688
01:18:56,560 --> 01:18:59,200
Speaker 1: outside of your legacy as obviously an All Star and

1689
01:18:59,280 --> 01:19:01,759
Speaker 1: what you accomplis start good team, good teams?

1690
01:19:02,240 --> 01:19:02,560
Speaker 3: What what?

1691
01:19:02,800 --> 01:19:05,240
Speaker 1: What like that? What did your fifteen career you know,

1692
01:19:05,360 --> 01:19:08,960
Speaker 1: prepare you for? But did anything cement you? All the

1693
01:19:09,040 --> 01:19:12,160
Speaker 1: things that you led left to your comer. NBA career

1694
01:19:12,320 --> 01:19:15,480
Speaker 1: wasn't worth it? What was your fifteen years of experience

1695
01:19:15,600 --> 01:19:19,360
Speaker 1: worth as a total? Yeah?

1696
01:19:19,760 --> 01:19:22,840
Speaker 3: Uh well, I would say, like from my perspective, it

1697
01:19:23,720 --> 01:19:26,439
Speaker 3: uh it just taught me a lesson in humility. And

1698
01:19:26,479 --> 01:19:29,439
Speaker 3: I'll say that you just have to be careful being

1699
01:19:29,520 --> 01:19:34,519
Speaker 3: too humble, you know, because you know, I think that

1700
01:19:34,600 --> 01:19:36,439
Speaker 3: there were times in my career where I could have

1701
01:19:36,600 --> 01:19:38,599
Speaker 3: I probably should have made the All Star All Star

1702
01:19:38,760 --> 01:19:44,200
Speaker 3: Game two or three more times, but I didn't have

1703
01:19:44,400 --> 01:19:48,400
Speaker 3: the individual mindset to do so in terms of the

1704
01:19:48,520 --> 01:19:51,760
Speaker 3: level of say selfishness. But in order to be like

1705
01:19:51,840 --> 01:19:55,040
Speaker 3: an elite player, you have to have a level of selfishness,

1706
01:19:56,280 --> 01:19:58,360
Speaker 3: and there were times where I wasn't willing to be

1707
01:19:58,560 --> 01:20:04,080
Speaker 3: that selfish, be that greedy, and also you know, in

1708
01:20:04,560 --> 01:20:08,040
Speaker 3: terms of not wanting to get outside of what the

1709
01:20:08,200 --> 01:20:12,639
Speaker 3: team's goals and the team's aspirations were. So I would say,

1710
01:20:12,680 --> 01:20:15,160
Speaker 3: like the biggest lesson would be, like this, the fine

1711
01:20:15,240 --> 01:20:18,800
Speaker 3: line humility plays because at the same time where there

1712
01:20:18,840 --> 01:20:20,960
Speaker 3: were a couple of seasons where I probably should have

1713
01:20:21,000 --> 01:20:23,000
Speaker 3: had my foot on the gas for a little bit longer,

1714
01:20:23,800 --> 01:20:26,560
Speaker 3: those are the same seasons where people kind of discount

1715
01:20:26,760 --> 01:20:30,880
Speaker 3: what I did, kind of discount the impact that I had,

1716
01:20:32,560 --> 01:20:35,679
Speaker 3: you know. And because again I'm just a naturally somebody

1717
01:20:35,720 --> 01:20:38,400
Speaker 3: that's not gonna I'm not gonna solicit my opinion just

1718
01:20:38,520 --> 01:20:41,639
Speaker 3: out of the blue. I'm not gonna, you know, walk

1719
01:20:41,720 --> 01:20:44,280
Speaker 3: out here and beat myself on the chest, uh and

1720
01:20:44,479 --> 01:20:46,000
Speaker 3: just tell everybody look at me, look at me. But

1721
01:20:46,120 --> 01:20:49,160
Speaker 3: sometimes you have to do that, you know, especially in

1722
01:20:49,200 --> 01:20:52,719
Speaker 3: the NBA. And so that's probably one of the biggest

1723
01:20:52,760 --> 01:21:00,040
Speaker 3: lessons is just be careful being humble, because sometimes the

1724
01:21:00,240 --> 01:21:04,719
Speaker 3: conversations there's some there are conversations that I hear people

1725
01:21:04,840 --> 01:21:06,360
Speaker 3: have it and I'm like, man, I should be in

1726
01:21:06,360 --> 01:21:09,080
Speaker 3: the middle of that conversation. Fact because I was a

1727
01:21:09,120 --> 01:21:12,639
Speaker 3: little too humble, I was a little too reserved. Folks

1728
01:21:12,720 --> 01:21:16,479
Speaker 3: don't know I should be in that conversation. And so

1729
01:21:17,439 --> 01:21:19,600
Speaker 3: that that's where I say, you just have to be.

1730
01:21:20,000 --> 01:21:22,920
Speaker 3: It's a fine line, you know, between where humility can

1731
01:21:23,000 --> 01:21:25,840
Speaker 3: help you, but then there's also a line where humility can,

1732
01:21:25,920 --> 01:21:27,240
Speaker 3: if you go the other way, can hurt you.

1733
01:21:27,439 --> 01:21:29,960
Speaker 1: On the opposite side of that firm line, as there

1734
01:21:30,040 --> 01:21:34,719
Speaker 1: is fine line between where free thinking can also affect

1735
01:21:34,840 --> 01:21:39,360
Speaker 1: one's career and regardless of what particular time it comes

1736
01:21:39,439 --> 01:21:41,840
Speaker 1: in and where you're at in your career. For a

1737
01:21:41,920 --> 01:21:44,519
Speaker 1: twenty in ten guy, you know, let him think he

1738
01:21:44,600 --> 01:21:46,000
Speaker 1: want to go in there and paint, you know what

1739
01:21:46,040 --> 01:21:48,160
Speaker 1: I mean, whatever he want to do, paint his nails,

1740
01:21:48,280 --> 01:21:49,800
Speaker 1: whatever you want to do, let him do it. He's

1741
01:21:49,840 --> 01:21:51,920
Speaker 1: sided a twenty in ten guy, we know what he's

1742
01:21:51,960 --> 01:21:54,479
Speaker 1: gonna do. Is there a point, looking at that same

1743
01:21:54,600 --> 01:22:00,960
Speaker 1: coin where free thinking can either help you or hurt you? Absolutely?

1744
01:22:01,280 --> 01:22:05,000
Speaker 3: Absolutely, Because again, uh, you know, we're athletes first, and

1745
01:22:05,200 --> 01:22:07,760
Speaker 3: so it doesn't just because you're an athlete doesn't mean

1746
01:22:07,800 --> 01:22:09,880
Speaker 3: but MANI Jones, someone's on time. Just because you're an athlete,

1747
01:22:09,920 --> 01:22:12,160
Speaker 3: doesn't mean anybody wants to hear what you have to say,

1748
01:22:12,800 --> 01:22:15,519
Speaker 3: and we have to we have to remember that, Like

1749
01:22:15,720 --> 01:22:19,960
Speaker 3: and so sometimes right your opinion, like nobody wants to

1750
01:22:20,160 --> 01:22:22,320
Speaker 3: nobody wants to hear what you have to say about

1751
01:22:22,600 --> 01:22:25,240
Speaker 3: certain things as an athlete. And I had to learn that,

1752
01:22:26,280 --> 01:22:28,360
Speaker 3: and you also have to learn that. You know, again,

1753
01:22:28,479 --> 01:22:32,200
Speaker 3: some people may not know the perspective that you're coming from.

1754
01:22:32,360 --> 01:22:34,799
Speaker 3: So if you come from a perspective that they don't understand,

1755
01:22:35,400 --> 01:22:39,080
Speaker 3: a lot of times their ignorance, they're in their ignorance,

1756
01:22:39,120 --> 01:22:43,200
Speaker 3: they'll take that offensively. Right, Like this guy is saying

1757
01:22:43,280 --> 01:22:46,000
Speaker 3: something that you know, I don't necessarily understand, and it's

1758
01:22:46,000 --> 01:22:48,640
Speaker 3: a it's offensive to me because I don't know, I

1759
01:22:48,760 --> 01:22:51,720
Speaker 3: don't have a full context or I can't understand, you know,

1760
01:22:51,800 --> 01:22:54,040
Speaker 3: what he's saying. On top of him being an athlete,

1761
01:22:54,080 --> 01:22:56,719
Speaker 3: that I may not want to hear an athlete's opinion

1762
01:22:56,800 --> 01:22:59,920
Speaker 3: on who the president should be or you know, taxes

1763
01:23:00,080 --> 01:23:03,479
Speaker 3: or anything like that. So you know, I figured that

1764
01:23:03,600 --> 01:23:06,120
Speaker 3: out pretty early on obviously. Like I said, I'm one

1765
01:23:06,160 --> 01:23:08,800
Speaker 3: of these people, like we talked about off camera, I'm

1766
01:23:08,800 --> 01:23:10,960
Speaker 3: one of these people I can get triggered and I've

1767
01:23:11,240 --> 01:23:14,400
Speaker 3: gotten better. Like when in the NBA when I was

1768
01:23:14,680 --> 01:23:17,200
Speaker 3: the Donald Sterling thing was a very triggering thing for me, man,

1769
01:23:17,240 --> 01:23:19,720
Speaker 3: and I was far away from it, but that that

1770
01:23:19,880 --> 01:23:21,640
Speaker 3: was the triggering moment for me. So I had a

1771
01:23:21,720 --> 01:23:24,320
Speaker 3: big outburst. And you know, it's a lot of stuff

1772
01:23:24,400 --> 01:23:28,880
Speaker 3: that came with that, which was fine. But you have

1773
01:23:29,000 --> 01:23:31,200
Speaker 3: to know what you're talking about first, and then secondly,

1774
01:23:31,280 --> 01:23:34,639
Speaker 3: you have to understand your audience and understand like I said,

1775
01:23:34,720 --> 01:23:37,960
Speaker 3: sometimes you know your opinion is not even though it

1776
01:23:38,040 --> 01:23:40,400
Speaker 3: may be valid, it may not be on to people.

1777
01:23:40,520 --> 01:23:42,519
Speaker 3: The people they may not want to hear it.

1778
01:23:43,160 --> 01:23:47,840
Speaker 1: That's a bar. Yeah, man, thank you so much for

1779
01:23:47,920 --> 01:23:49,040
Speaker 1: your time. This was amazing.

1780
01:23:49,200 --> 01:23:51,080
Speaker 2: I know you're not going to do the podcast tours,

1781
01:23:51,160 --> 01:23:52,880
Speaker 2: but whenever you want to talk more, just let us

1782
01:23:52,960 --> 01:23:54,439
Speaker 2: know because we're.

1783
01:23:54,120 --> 01:23:56,519
Speaker 4: Yeah, I got you. I appreciate it. Guys, it's been fun. Yeah,

1784
01:23:57,439 --> 01:23:57,599
Speaker 4: Wes

1785
01:24:13,240 --> 01:24:13,679
Speaker 1: Pony