Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Everybody's always asking me: 'What's it like playing with LeBron?' It's really hard to describe. I'm pretty fortunate that I got him my first year. He's an awesome guy, a great leader. You're witnessing such greatness all the time and you try not to take it for granted because you see it so often, in practice or wherever.
The Bay Area has become my second home since I arrived here in 2007 and I can't accurately describe how good it feels to be wanted and appreciated by an organization. The Warriors - from Chris Cohan, Robert Rowell, Chris Mullin and Coach Nelson to the last person working in the front office - have embraced me since Day One.
It's not nuclear physics. You always remember that. But if you write about sports long enough, you're constantly coming back to the point that something buoys people; something makes you feel better for having been there. Something of value is at work there...Something is hallowed here. I think that something is excellence.
I want to be a free agent. I think everybody in the NBA dreams to be a free agent at least one time in their career. It's like you have an evaluation period. It's like if I'm in the gym and I have all the coaches, all the owners, all the GMs come into the gym and just evaluate everything I do. So yes, I want that experience.
Kyrie, he's got a big personality. He's one of these guys that's misunderstood. The way that he's construed in the media is probably going to paint him in a light that is not necessarily true. I'd say you could ask a lot of people that played with him and they'd all say that he's a great teammate and a good guy to be around.
I grew up in low-income areas and I've seen people take negative energy and just accept it. They give into and end up living a pretty rough life. At a young age, I just knew I wasn't going to give in because I didn't want to end up being one of those people in the neighborhood that didn't have anything and lived a hard life.
As soon as I discovered PlayStation, I was throwing hints here and there to my dad - cutting out the clipping of a video game, cutting out the clippings of the PlayStation, leaving it on his dresser. I remember on Christmas morning, I unwrapped my gift, and sure enough, it was the PS2. I've been a PlayStation guy ever since.
When the draft lottery came out, and the Clippers said they were gonna draft me, I went to Google to find out more about the Clippers because I didn't know a lot. And I was like, 'Okay, team owned by Donald Sterling.' So then I typed in 'Donald Sterling' in Google, and the first thing that pops up is 'Donald Sterling racist.'
There's the Draymond Green you see out on the floor. But that's not me. I mean, it is, but there's more. People see the fiery guy, the competitive guy, the trash talk and everything. But they don't see the love and compassion. They don't see the person. They don't see the real me, who values his friends and puts people first.
There is so much temptation to hold on to my career even more now. To try to micromanage and dictate every little aspect. But that's not how I want to do things anymore. I'm thinking about how can I trust God more. How can I surrender more? How can I bring him more glory? It's a fight. But it's one I'm going to keep fighting.
My hometown, first and foremost, it's one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. A beautiful lake town. It's one of those communities where, winter rolls around, it's exactly the same as any other small town in America. Sort of a lower socio-economic area. There isn't anything high-end necessarily anywhere around there.
Nick, You know, The first guy I met when I first got to Seattle, As an eighteen year old, You took me in. You believed in me from the beginning. You knew that I had potential. And every single day I know I could look at you And know that you respect me As a man, As a player, And you gonna ride with me to the end. I thank you.
Most players will tolerate their coach, just like the coach will tolerate that player to do what they got to do, but Steve Kerr is unique. Players want to play for Steve Kerr. Everyone who's played in this league, who's coached in this league, who's been a general manager understands exactly what I'm saying - he's one of them.
I don't remember what script it was, but at the Monday table read, the [opening] teaser didn't work.We went back and had to think of a new teaser, and [after] four hours, five hours, we weren't landing on anything.And it was probably Glen [Charles] who said, "What are we, cowards?" You had to do it, no matter how long it took.
A lot of these teams really forget that part of success comes with having veteran leadership. You see a lot of teams forget that and start letting go of these old veterans. They don't realize how important it is to have a veteran voice in your locker room or on the bench. It's important to have guys who have been there before.
Over the course of the game you're probably going to have 10 turnovers or so just because you're playing hard, you're competing, that's the way the game goes. But it's the other 10 that you have to limit. You can't have the careless ones, the ones where guys are cutting backdoor and you throw it, or you try the hail mary pass.
I don’t watch a lot of other basketball away from the gym. But I do look at LeBron’s box score. I want to see how many points, rebounds and assists he had, and how he shot from the field. If he had 30 points, nine rebounds and eight assists, I can tell you exactly how he did it, what type of shots he made and who he passed to.
Mr. Bennett, for just giving me this opportunity. I thank you for always being there for me when I need you. Every time I see you under the basket for a game, I feel confident. No matter how the game is going, I look at you - I say, if our owner's behind us, we can do it all. I thank you so much for giving me this opportunity.
I'm upset at myself. I should have had 50. I missed 13 free throws. That's unacceptable. If I want to be accepted by Wilt and Kareem and Russell I've got to start playing better than that. Right now I'm still in the class of Hakeem and David Robinson and that's not good enough for me. I want to be out there with the immortals.
Talk radio around Boston is brutal, and I think that's part of what goes on is that people as they're driving to and from work start listening to these jerks, and I say jerks, because I don't think they know what they're talking about and they're just serving some things up as controversy so they can sell the show to sponsors.
When I was coaching I always considered myself a teacher. Teachers tend to follow the laws of learning better than coaches who do not have any teaching background. A coach is nothing more than a teacher. I used to encourage anyone who wanted to coach to get a degree in teaching so they could apply those principles to athletics.
I'm just blessed that I was able to have guys around me that had some of the same goals. The man above gave me a gift and he gave me friends and a mentor that can help me reach my goal and reach my potential. And we all had the same goal, so it wasn't hard for us to get, you know, off track because we all wanted the same thing.
He lifted weights, he rode the bike; he kept himself going before and after games, as well as practices. He always kept himself in top shape and was very determined. You put a relentless Dennis Rodman out on the basketball court, and you better have someone there to match his energy. If you don't, it's going to be a long night.
My father was always pushing me to become a basketball player. In Africa, when you're a kid, every kid loves to play soccer, and I loved playing soccer. But my dad didn't want me playing soccer. He would joke, 'C'mon, man, you're too tall!' Then he promised me, 'If you start playing basketball, I'm going to give you my jersey.'
I had orders from the great Bill Russell. Me and him were talking in Seattle the other day, and he was telling me how rivalries should be. I asked him if he ever disliked anybody he played against, and he told me, 'No, never,' and he told me that I should shake Kobe Bryant's hand and let bygones be bygones and bury the hatchet.
Zen is the enemy of analysis, the friend of intuition. The Zen artist understands the ends of his art intuitively, and the last thing he would do is create categories; the avowed purpose of Zen is to eliminate categories! The true Zen-man holds to the old Taoist proverb, Those who know do not speak. Those who speak do not know.
Just like in life, when you play basketball, you have to give in order to receive. On the court, you're not only making things move along by giving the ball, but you're also giving your physical and mental strength, your passion, your talent, your trust in your teammates. This way the power can multiply and the whole team wins.
All the other things that happen, they don't resonate with him other than winning the basketball game. That's just who he is. He's just a humble kid and he's just trying to go out there and do his thing. I wish I could say some secret formula or training method, but sometimes you got to let things be. That's who Derrick Rose is.
I don't believe professional athletes should be role models. I believe parents should be role models.... It's not like it was when I was growing up. My mom and my grandmother told me how it was going to be. If I didn't like it, they said, Don't let the door hit you in the ass on your way out. Parents have to take better control.
I never looked at basketball as work. I always enjoyed it as my hobby. I loved it. Once that love is gone, and I'm tired of working out every day and doing all the stuff to get me ready for games, and I'm tired of lifting and conditioning and doing all that other stuff around it, and I'd rather stay in bed, then it's time to go.
Coach Bruce Weber told me in a meeting that all I have to do is play pretty well. The rest of the guys are doing well now. It takes a lot of pressure off Dee and especially myself. Luther and Deron and all the assists and rebounds and all the points that were lost, somebody has to make them up. In reality, you can't do all that.
I know when I left the game, I could have played more. There is no question. I think I could have played at a very high level, too. But I could not play the way everyone wanted me to play. And I was not willing to compromise what I felt was a standard that I had established in this league and, particularly, for our fans at home.
Sometimes when I hear commentating, it's sickening. People who never played the game, people who never played in the league have an opinion, and that's all it is. You are here to educate the watcher or the viewer. Sometimes it comes off as personal. I don't ever want to come off like that. My opinion is my opinion about someone.
They're going to come to me and they're going to say numbers for three years and I'm going to use my division and if it sounds good when I hear it, then I'll take it. But I'm not going to say I'll take less (than the max) . . . Put it this way. I won't take a BMW from somebody when I know I can get a Maybach from somewhere else.
I use a lot of balance training and functional training. Basically it's where you add an element of instability to a regular exercise. So whether it's on the physioball or the Bosu ball or just balancing on one leg, I try to incorporate an instable plane and/or movement to the exercise, so the body's doing two or more movements.
Seven years ago, my father and I realized that our relationship was extremely unique, especially in the African-American community. He raised me to not only understand the fundamentals of basketball and to try to be a player with a high basketball IQ, but he wanted me to understand that my image and my name meant more than stats.
My life changed irrevocably four-and-a-half years ago when my spine failed and collapsed. I spent two years on the floor, in excruciating, debilitating and unrelenting pain. I can only describe the pain as being submerged into a vat of scalding acid that has an electric current running through it. And you can never get out, ever.
I feel like when it comes to rap - like, real rap music - and knowing the pioneers of rap, I feel like there's no competition for me in the NBA. Other guys can rap, but they're not as invested or as deep into actual music as I am and always have been. I think that might be what the difference is. I'm more wanting to be an artist.
In my era, where I'm from, I only had Donald Whiteside. He's from Englewood and he's the only one that came out of Englewood. Other than him, I really didn't have anyone else to look up to that was from my area. So in seeing him, I never gave up hope, just kept playing and then I realized that I might have a future in basketball.
I was not very strong growing up, and my uncle used to look at me, like, 'This kid is not growing up, he is growing tall but he can be broken like a banana.' The banana in Congo is called 'Dikembe.' So my uncle start calling me, 'Dikembe, Dikembe, look at you Dikembe, you cannot even stand up.' It took a long time for me to walk.
My priority as a father should always remain first. My kids look to me as their example. Every decision I make and everything that I do always has to come back to the question, "Does this make me a better father?" "Will my kids benefit from this?" It's no longer just about me…but about my kids. My perspective in life has changed.
I think going to Virginia and playing in that program, you definitely take a lot of ownership in the fact of possessions and understanding the value of each possession. And that goes on both ends. Trying to be as efficient as possible on the offensive end, and not turn the ball over. But then defensively, making everything tough.
I wanted to learn how the business worked. I wanted to see how people got drafted, how players got traded, how they got picked up in free agency, how the salary cap worked, how do you manage an organization, how do you negotiate contracts. The Bulls gave me an excellent opportunity to answer all the questions that I wanted to ask.
I don't want to just be an athlete. I kind of obsess on that sometimes. I don't want my son to be reading, oh, 'disappointment, just a scorer, selfish, didn't win enough, never quite the best' -- whatever. I want to be bigger than that. I want to shape my own destiny instead of just having him read about whatever on the back page.
Every generation has their own great players. Who's to say that anyone's better than Cheryl Miller or Nancy Lieberman? Whose anyone to say Michael Jordan is better than Oscar Robertson or Magic Johnson or Larry Bird? Every generation has its great player. There's never going to be one player that's so above and beyond anyone else.
A basketball diameter is 10 inches and a rim is 18 inches so I made a 14-inch rim I put in to practice on. Few people could do that because it was so frustrating that it drove everyone but me nuts. That led to me shooting very high, which basic physics tells you is the best angle - the hole is bigger from above than from the side.
Sadly the very thing that strikes us as obvious always defeats our thinking about it in more penetrating ways: just as the Romans said that "the good is the enemy of the better," so too "the self-evident is the enemy of the very process of clarification or understanding," not to mention the enemy of the "transcendent or ultimate."
I played six to 10 hours a day, every day, 90 days during the summer, and I'd do incredible things. I would dribble blindfolded in the house. I would take my basketball to bed with me, I'd lay there after my mother kissed and tucked me in, and I'd shoot the ball up in the air and say, 'Finger tip control, backspin, follow through.
My mom would never let us quit. She always taught us the importance of sticking with it, even when times are tough. We didn't just hear her, we watched her. I know what to do because she led the way. She showed us that if you put your mind to it, you can accomplish the world. No matter where you're from and what you're up against.
I play knowing that there is somebody watching me out there in the crowd that has never had the opportunity to watch a game before and it might be the only chance they ever to see one, live in person. Michael Jordan once said that in an interview, and I really took it to heart; whenever I step on the floor, I play for that person.