Grant Hill | Ep. 139 | ALL THE SMOKE Full Episode | SHOWTIME Basketball

[Music] this official everyone in the internet has possessed the world is weird we will investigate unexplained phenomenon it's a bit convenient isn't it there's something happening in the world that is evil god is here and the devil is too what the hell what happened religion evil new season june 12th then season one and two now exclusively on paramount plus the final chapter of the nba season is underway we got golden state in boston battling for the crown stack you still feel good about your golden state pick i do i do even though they're going back to boston and boston has home court advantage now uh the experience and the confidence of the way they played in game one i think they'll give them a win on the road to even the series the intensity of the nba finals is unmatched that's why draftkings sportsbook is upping the stakes this week new customers can bet just five dollars on either team to win and get 150 and free bets instantly all customers can build their very own same game parlay take player props game spreads and so much more the more legs you add to your ticket the more money you can win be sure to check out this week's all the smoke same game parlays we're gonna end the season hot i can feel it head over to the app and see who we're riding with this week download the draftking sportsbook app now use promo code smoke they're just five dollars on any pro basketball team and get 150 dollars in free bets instantly that's promo code smoke at draftking sportsbook [Music] welcome back to all the smoke new york city yes yes yes our last and final show of the day man we got a good one jack i'm happy this is somebody who i idolize i've been idolized i tell them all the time but i'm gonna let you introduce before i introduce him i've been when i started this show he was one of the first people i hit like gee i need you and he's like uh it's when he first started working on the book three three years ago to three years ago about three years ago and we finally got him you see the book is out now make sure you pick it up but we got the one and only my guy big brother grant hill hey i appreciate it money it's an honor and a privilege oh man thank you thank you thank you i appreciate your patience yeah come on man we come out here with the book it took you five years to write this [ __ ] we would have waited for you exactly come on man it's just an honor to have you on um let's get right to it talk about the book what uh what it's about it's about my life and my journey um you know going back growing up uh duke ears detroit the injuries going through that whole ordeal i felt like getting in the hall of fame that's a moment when you're gonna be naturally reflective right you know we go through life and as an athlete you gotta go and just like like next you gotta just you don't get a chance to really reflect on what you're doing but that moment that celebration it was like you know i need to do this i need to write a book and then you know took a minute in the process and then cove it and you know whatever the case may be but it was it was an incredible exercise i think everybody should go through the process we all got a story i think we get older we go back and look at our lives we learn the lessons we can see things from an older perspective uh i think it's about being vulnerable it's about being introspective like it to me the process of the book like i learned it might sound crazy but i learned more about myself yeah right and i think we spend so much time you know we play and you got to stay in the moment right and you keep every day you're fighting you know every day somebody's trying to take your spot and then you retire and you're like hey what's next right we're all hustling trying to figure things out and so we don't look back and we don't look back all the time and live in those moments and so anyway i don't want to get too deep on that but like to me um it exceeded my expectations of of what i learned about myself and my growth and to share that and to be comfortable putting it all out there was uh you know it's opening that door right it's really opening that door and like you said y'all golden state i don't want to say dominated but they've won seven quarters right yeah you know two games eight quarters and that fourth quarter game one got away from them they got to be kicking themselves right now um but the way they came out in game two um they were able to take away the you know the others so like boston hasn't played well at home throughout this series and they've been up and down they'll have a good game and then follow up with a bad game so you know i i said all along i think golden state in six i still think that i still think golden state will figure it out i think clay will play better um i like this boston team no i like the way they defend they got a toughness about them tatum's gotten better um brown i mean the way they played together it reminds me a little bit of like what could have been with me and t-mac yeah i have been healthy but um nah i mean i i think golden state which is incredible thinking what they've been through the last three years to give back [Music] this might be and this is no disrespect towards golden state but this might be their most least talented roster of all the teams they had going to the fight i was going to say most meaningful okay yeah yo definitely definitely no i agree with you though so i agree with you too you know i mean they had i think what led them before obviously their core was great and young but they had a strong veteran bench and that's what they made that dynasty run for then they lose kd clay gets hurt steph gets hurt they fall flat on their face right to be able to reap like teams don't rebuild that fast remember steph said we're gonna be a problem next year they didn't make the play in last year you know what i mean so for them to bounce back and get i think this will probably be one of the most meaningful ones to them in my opinion i agree i agree you know look and i went through it you know my injury and all that and i'm sure we're getting into it but when something's kind of taken away all right you tend to appreciate and value it more and so i know clay obviously what he's gone through but it's a feel-good story and you know i think everyone likes to see them get back to the mountaintop i know it's good for ratings yeah when golden state's there but it's uh it's been a good serie i think boston's going to win another game or so but i think i think golden state wins great learning experience too though for boston you know that they're getting a great taste to me on how to do it on the biggest stage you know i mean they had immediate success tatum's rookie year you make the easter finals lebron beat you took a while to kind of figure it out email you doka shout first year coach to kind of get his hands on the team and be able to form them so fast it took a half a season right and they've been the best team in the league second half of the year so i think it's going to be a great learning experience i mean obviously it's never promised we all know that going back to the finals is never promised but i think they're going to learn a lot from this finals obviously yeah look i mean there was a lot of criticism this year early on could they could those guys coexist they were 17 and 19 before the new year um but they figured it out right and all that you know as we know you go through tough times it just it builds grit it builds resolve and um they got a lot of runway in front of them and so this team you know it's not good for my hawks but this team is gonna be for real for many years ago right how do you think you would be in this era your game you know i think i think with the spacing and then now they've taken a little bit of physicality out of the game i i think i could it's just more open you think about it back in the day you had big guys in the paint clogging up and i i liked that she was still dunking on them though yeah so i down like it is now so yeah man yeah and the money and the money since the money said he's crazy so but you know i mean i enjoyed my time it was it was a different league the games evolved the shootings been i mean there's a lot of things that are better there's some things i don't like about the league um but um yeah man i mean maybe y'all may this dude right here in this era yeah i would have had some fun yeah oh no question size four look i'm sorry i know you played with draymond every time i see draymond i say this but i'm like draymond you checked in the game i would have been dropped three yeah i don't know how he like he's like a rim protector and he's in there guards big man how tall is he 666 at least when he gets it done man like i i don't you know but anyway it was a different league man but yeah i'd have denied one player you think one player you would want to play with today um i mean right now obviously he's getting up there and things are a little bit crazy in la but i would have liked to play with lebron yeah and um nice i don't know lebron like that i mean we've always been good and but i don't i'm not in a circle like that but um i think everybody that plays with him he's like a glue guy mm-hmm the guys that play with him love him like he's inclusive um you know he he thinks the game at a high level uh i also think no one's endured as much hate we talked about that yeah to live up to the hype and accept what he's done but just you think about like jordan didn't have to experience that when we played in the 90s it was talk radio maybe the newspaper but you didn't hear the noise you didn't hear the slander and now for someone like him the face of the franchise who's been so good man he's got to endorse so much just i mean we all get it i'm sure you guys yeah man let's do levels so let me just i gotta talk about math so i'm sorry man i'm getting off [Laughter] when twitter first came out i think we were in maybe it was instagram i can't remember so matt you know somebody might say something slick to matt on twitter and matt would come back at him like full speed no no no let me tell you we're going to be in your city on this day and we're staying at this hotel meet me at 7 00 a.m until 7 00 pm in the lobby he pulled me to the side one day like matt you got to stop that something wrong with him though so he wanted all the smoke but like literally and like you know i was like yo but like you know just it was around that time the game was changing but we hear all that right and we're adults we're older we're we're you know i'm almost i'm be 50 this year but these young kids man like i think it does affect them a little bit when they hear all that and they're still impressionable they're still trying to find their way so i don't envy that and i think lebron has been sort of the poster boy and so i admire that he's been able to just you know he doesn't always win he doesn't always do you know but he he handles all that and handles it well very well yeah uh born in dallas texas uh your dad was a pro bowl super bowl champ with the running uh with the cowboys is that the last time they won the super bowl man don't do that don't do that mom was successful business only child um football you're always in the mix as a youngster in football talk about those times growing up as a only child in that environment yeah so i was the only child of two only children and um so it was just us and um but you know football was my first love and grew up around it i was i was named by roger starback so my dad my mom and dad were expecting a girl and um obviously i'm not a girl but um so my dad can't make up his mind and so i was baby boy hill for like three days and starbuck came to the hospital and you know came up with the name grant named after my paternal grandmother's maiden name um and so we moved to dc and you know that rivalry particularly in the late 70s early 80s it's always been intense but it was the redskins were good cowboys coming off the 70s so i was a doc like i'm a cowboy fan like die hard that was tough being in dc and and being oh he's he's not a i'm a niner fan not a friend oh come on of all teams oh that's our nemesis right there so but look i was on the i was on the parade on the float when the redskins won and i think it was 82 83 they beat the dolphins so i was on the float dave butts who was the lineman i went on the float with him and his family and i remember how proud i was because underneath my jacket i had a cowboy shirt on and so that was uh but but football was everything man and my dad wouldn't let me play he wouldn't let me play till i got to high school and so um that killed me and um you know i resented it and uh and so i kind of got away from it and by the time i was in high school you know i wanted to play i was in basketball i was all in but football was my first love no question when did you realize basketball can take you places i first i first fell in love with basketball 82 final four jordan hit that shot jordan north carolina georgetown we we bought a betamax we taped that game and so that was when i fell in love and then a couple years later my dad and i started going to final fours so when georgetown won in 84 and we went every year from 84 to 88 that was our little you know father-son bonding or whatever and so i think for me was probably like aau i was 13. and we went to uh st louis first game we played we played weber jalen super friends and i talk about in the book like my dad he was he saw he saw all these guys he saw us and he was like i'm gonna get my speech ready for case they lose and we smacked them we beat them by 25 30 and um and um and so then that tournament we won the national championship and so at that point i'm like you know what like seeing myself gauging myself against other kids allen henderson was there jamal mashburn and these guys all made it to the nba he's like 13 year olds you say well it was 13 but here's the thing i was i was young for my grade so i started college or high school at 13. i started college at 17. so i should have been probably webbing you know what i'm saying but i was going into high school and so i played varsity as a freshman well those guys were all in 10th grade and so when i came back the next year i was like i was i surpassed all of them i we lost in the finals i still got the mvp and um so that was when around that time it was like okay i got a chance to i wasn't thinking the nba but i got a chance in college right yeah [Music] gentlemen father's day is around the corner and our friends at manscape are here to ensure all father figures are out there looking daddy material this june manscape's performance package 4.0 which includes their signature lawnmower 4.0 is the perfect bundle to tackle any and all old man hair from the head to toe this right here is no dad joke treat him and yourself and join the four million men 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to georgetown games and i don't know if you remember michael jackson was point guard so he went to my high school he used to work for my mother in the summers my mom introduced pat ewing to his wife so i was so i was entrenched with georgetown like i was all in um like we all were i think at that time black people i thought it was a i thought it was hbcu back then i didn't realize it was like 11 20 you know so i didn't realize it was a private school but so georgetown carolina michigan virginia and duke and i made my first visit and it was to duke and coach k just kind of blew me away and i knew right then that i wanted to be there and and the genius of coach k and i know you know love hate duke and all that and obviously now he's had he had great success at the end and coached the olympic team but his ability to get people to buy in he wasn't a great x and o coach but like if he sat he looked you in the eye like you believed in him and that was his genius getting everybody to kind of like buy in to him and buy into one another and um so duke duke really wasn't my fate but like you know it just felt right and um you know made that decision and you know unfortunately we we made history you win titles in 91 and 92 right uh the famous christian leighton shot how big was that moment man it's crazy you know it's crazy to think that was 30 years ago and people still people still talk about it but um christian was a great college player i mean alonzo shaq um i mean everybody he faced he dominated shaq twice and um he um and we had a good team i mean bobby was a great college point guard i was you know i was a good player he had three he had three guys in the college basketball hall of fame and so um so those moments were incredible i don't think we realized while we were doing it the significance of what was happening right we were just trying to win we were i was 19. i was a kid and um but that passed the near that shot um leighton didn't miss a shot the whole game leighton it was cocky leighton was like he he talked trash um he also had a he was a great teammate as well i remember we had a game i talked about in the book we had a game we went to buffalo to play canisius and it was a game for him going back to his hometown and at halftime he had like one or two shots and coach k is like like christian what's going on like this game's for you you act like you don't want to play and he's like i want my hometown to see how good my teammates are and so you know you you coming back home college player of the year you're going to try to show out but he was trying to show us how and um so he he you know you don't hear about that side of christian you just hear the you know the crazy and there was a lot of craziness but um but he was he was a great competitor you know he he and he and he did his work he did his thing with all the noise and and knowing how everybody feel about duke right is the brotherhood tight enough to block out the noise and stay strong you know yeah i mean it's funny man cause i don't think we were aware of what people's perceptions were back then of duke and i looked at duke no different than i looked at wake forest georgia tech georgetown these are pwis that have good basketball teams and so i get it with the you know us beating vegas and the fab five and obviously jalen's documentary and how they felt towards us but i i wasn't aware of that like i i honestly like we we got along with every like you know webb was my guy i talked some stories about webber in there when we were in high school he used to come visit me in virginia um you know we didn't have social media we didn't read the newspaper back then so we were in durham we'd go to durham we go to cookouts barbecues barbershop everybody showed love so i don't think i was aware that there was this stigma yeah like this now i should have known better because i didn't like the celtics for the very reason people didn't like us right i was a laker fan and i identified with the lakers but i think because we had really good white players and had a fairy latener hurley maybe i fit this like emma you know my parents and you know people thought what they thought about me i think that might have contributed to the narrative but at the time like i was totally oblivious to that narrative and um and not until years later i even thought the hate towards duke later on was because duke had success like the yankees or like um you know the cowboys mm-hmm i didn't realize i didn't really realize that you could have used a better example but i feel you yeah yeah the 49ers you know you know so um but i get it now like i understand and it was an interesting time and um you know and so i you know i get the oh yeah the brotherhood is strong coach k moved on you know shires recruited well um you know we hope to stay relevant man that's that's that's the main thing 94 draft you go number three overall to detroit what are you hearing leading up to the draft i mean glenn robinson jason kidd yourself what are you here leading up to there are you hearing one two three so this was this was crazy so glenn glenn was glenn was incredible in college 30 a game like i mean he was a big dog he was unreal man and i think he's underappreciated like people don't he came in 21 his first first year in the league uh scoring 21 a game so at the at the draft lottery mike dunleavy who's the coach gm puts up his jersey so that's a sign they're gonna take them so i figured you know dallas had the number two pick they had jimmy jackson jamal mashburn so they're gonna they're gonna take jay kidd which which was the right you know right decision so detroit to me they had lindsey they had alan houston that felt like the right fit but milwaukee wanted me to come in and work out for him i didn't want to go and my agent was like that's the number one pick you got to go out of respect so i went there i didn't want to be there i didn't want to be in milwaukee yep i don't blame you i dogged the workout mike dunleavy put me through this like he was i was doing laughs and suicide like he was killing me and then he wanted to play me one-on-one mike did coach dunlead and so i'm like so we check ball and i'm standing under the basket he's at the free throw he said you're not gonna guard me i said i don't think he can make that and man he hit like 10 in a row on me man like i would i wouldn't guard him and uh and i was like what is he doing like you know but you know he wanted to see me compete against him which i didn't get but did you no i didn't guard him i was like i don't even want to be there yeah yeah so [ __ ] this yeah exactly but um but detroit was where i wanted to be and i felt like they had won recently and um you know the colors red white and blue i felt was good you know good for my feelings so yeah uh i mean he's right you had a a nice catalog of of nikes over at duke what made you choose fila because they were uh obviously a lesser-known brand go get that bag so let me let me say what happened man so so it was crazy so i'll go out to nike and you know you go out there for your recruiting trip to take you through the store you get all this stuff so phil knight we obviously know his his genius he was thinking about the far east in 1994 and he was like man if i can go into china and penetrate that market and there's a billion plus people i can get shoes on them like he was he was talking about this in this meeting and he wanted me to be via satellite at the great wall of china for the draft and like that would be a way to break into that market and i was like i want to be i want to be my family i want to be with david stern you know saying like that's a dream we all dream that they're getting drafted and that whole thing and so but i tell that story like that's where his head was at but when they started negotiating the money wasn't like it wouldn't fit in the vision you know what i'm saying and so i went over reluctantly over to meet fila and i knew they had mass burn but i know we went through we toured the facility and then we sat in a boardroom and they had this this like proposal and on page two was the money and i turned that page and i was like oh my god i was like you know the money that they were offering like the guaranteed base salary and the royalty i was like like you said get that bag you're not the type of person to talk about this but i just kind of want to have context because it's 1994 can you explain like what kind of money it was at that time compared to maybe what some of the guys may be getting today so nike was offering me about five hundred thousand and fila was basically it was a five-year 15 million dollar deal don't get that bad so you know 15 million dollars a lot it was more money in 1994 right so 94. that was a guaranteed royalty and the shoe ended up exceeding i think everyone's expectation but i was like hey you know to this day still selling i still get a royal teacher yeah yeah uh first impression uh it's it's in detroit it's the end of the bad boy era and now you are coming in to be the face of the franchise yeah you know it was crazy man because the team had won 20 games i came in there was a void in the league mj had retired i think the league was looking for a face i played in 120 some of my games at duke and all but five of them were on national tv so people i think knew who i was and i came out the gate and i was i was like i came out the gate like oh one mm-hmm i came out the gate i think i got 25 10 and five my first game against the lakers and like my first 10 15 games i was 20 like more than 20 a game i was calling my boys like man the mta is easy man like and like you know until they get a scouting report on you and figure you out but um one thing that that helped me was that summer before my freshman or my rookie year we played pickup ball and in pickleball you know i used to i used to play with it you know i'd come down my my favorite guy was the pearl dwayne the pearl kenny anderson had great handles i used to try to be like tim hardaway chris jackson so i would play with the ball but when i played in the games i would turn my back like like magic and big guard and big guard and so quinn snyder was like man you need to play like this in the league like what you doing out here in pickup you need to play this way not turning your back and so i didn't you know i didn't because i didn't see big guys doing that so when i came in at 6 8 i'm playing small forward you didn't have guys doing that and so they weren't used to having like pippin could handle the ball but pippin didn't come at you like that went across nobody couldn't go exact couldn't go full speed and cross you yeah so that i think the ball handling i was never a great shooter at least early on you know i became a decent mid-range but the ability to get to my spot and uh at the small forward position i think that's really helped me early on and they they weren't you see more of that now guys you know everybody does that but back then you didn't have a lot of threes playing like that mm-hmm as a rookie you made the all-star game and won co-rookie of the year right uh averaged 26 and five um after that first year however you said you called your homies after the first handful of games were you surprised that the actually what you did fresh out of college in the nba yeah you know i was surprised and i was surprised at all the fans like i was like because they kept trying to make me like the face and i'm thinking like i still like i'm i'm trying we won 28 games my friend like you know what i'm saying i'm still i got a lot to learn but um that first year was crazy man like it was you know your shoes you got commercials endorsements um they would try to call me the next jordan but i i thought it was foolish but i leveraged that and what i mean by that is i monetize i gotta even turn down the deals um but you know it was hard because we were losing yeah and you go in college where every year you feel like you have a chance to win a championship and then now all of a sudden you're losing more games you than you've you know lost in a lifetime so that that first year was kind of bittersweet um but i felt like with alan houston with lindsey that we had a promising future and um you know just wanted to get better the next year what was your welcome to the nba moment obviously a lot of success your first year but what was your kind of your welcome to the league moment was it a team was it a player was it a play yeah i just think out the gates man like just you know coming in and like establishing myself being able to do what i want like i felt like it was easier than a college game i think making an all-star game my first year like that was probably like like man like i'm here you know but there wasn't like one signature play or moment or game or anything like that um i think just out the gate coming in and and putting up work and having success um it's like a dream come true you know i didn't you gotta understand i talk about it in the book like i lacked self-confidence like i didn't have great confidence in myself and i also didn't want to stand out growing up and i um i had to get comfortable stepping into greatness i had to get comfortable with that kind of responsibility and my last year at duke i think i really kind of got to that point which helped me when i got to the league but um so all that attention like that wasn't something that i that i coveted you know what i'm saying and so it was a little bit you know now you got money you got fame you're young you got a little bit you know so it was it was a little it was a little wild that first year and um but you know it was uh it was fun though i mean i can't lie you know you recall your first game against so mj was retired your rookie year right he was that was the year he missed he came back though at the end of the year end of the year yeah so what was your first matchup with him like man i just wanted to go at him man i i i played against him with the dream team but i didn't really go against him and um i crossed him up i remember i was like geeked about that and um we lost the game but you know to go against joy like that was that was uh i'll tell you this man jordan was al it's always been good to me like he always would you know we'd go out we'd go eat you know he he um i think because he lost his dad and i think he likes my dad my dad and so you know i don't know if it was me or what but he always and he talked trash about duke carolina and all that but he was always was good to me but um yeah you know i mean i tried to go at you i didn't guard him a lot i'll tell you what was funny so the summer after my rookie year you you weren't at ucla no man y'all chris johnson told me man they ran yeah jalani you always ran l.a after y'all won the championship so i'm out in la and i'm filming live and single and they created that bubble and i go over there to play against jordan and i played the first day and i'm giving him the business like i am the killing like i'm not a shooter but everything i'm shooting is going in i'm i'm crossing them up so we're on a lot they build this bubble he's got a cord and i'm going at joy and i'm giving he wants to guard me i'm giving him the bit matter of fact it was i had the shoes on my my gh2s okay and he had his jordan tens but the patent we both had patent leather um and uh man i'm killing them like i mean like like after i'm calling my boys afterwards like man i'm killing george like he's too little like all this stuff and so the next day i come over and i'm confident now you know i'm man he gave me the bit like it was like oh the next the next day and i couldn't get a shot off he was all that footwork and you know he was just but that was um the best runs i mean not just in la maybe the best runs in the country were in that bubble yeah you had reggie you had reggie miller jawan howard you had a bunch of dennis rodman all the ucla guys were there toby bailey might have been the biggest celebrity in la that summer and um but yeah jordan that was that was a fun fun summer right there and uh had him had my moment against mj i'm talking about i'm talking about giving him business like y'all yeah i know you're modest too so you you're really probably giving them that [ __ ] but geez not gonna talk like that you wanted to go to 1996 in the land olympics how was it traveling and being with those guys with that team well let's name that team because that's that's actually barkley penny hakeem reggie pippen stockton all those guys yeah a lot of personalities shaq reggie gp um charles like it was it was but the best part were the practices and we didn't do much we just scrimmaged so i got a chance to go against scotty every day and um you know that was that was crazy like scotty was great but i got i got confident playing against scotty and to me he was the gold standard at that point um but it was crazy man like it was i was there with shaq when he left to go to la and they had the the article in the sentinel in orlando we were in orlando practicing and they basically had a survey should should they pay shack or not i was on the bus with shaq and he was in the back and he was like i can't believe that they they don't want me and i was like man go out west go to l.a man like you know i'm gonna try to get that big one out the east you know and uh but i couldn't believe that they would let shaq go because he was so dominant at the time um and they really voted not to pay him they didn't pass that was i know they didn't pay but i'm saying there was a there was a the paper did a survey right should say the magic pay shack or not it was supposed to be the first hundred million dollar deal or something like that or and shaq's big thing was alonso got like 110. okay and he was like if alonzo's a bmw i'm a porsche and so if he's getting 110 i should get 125. and so fans there voted i don't know the survey whatever but it was unanimous no and um and so that was crazy but just being with those guys man it was good i remember you know we went out a couple times it was a little wild and you know free camera phones and pre-cameras so y'all were safe yeah man look i'm gonna just say this scotty i went out with him one night and uh we they threw a party in orlando now i didn't drink at this point i didn't drink til i met my wife but true story but um so i wasn't drinking and so we went out we went to a scotty's hammer you know he's drinking we go back to his uh we go back and play cards all night till about six seven play blue ray until like six seven in the morning we got practice at ten i get depressed i'm the youngest guy on the team i have nothing no scotty is like this dude like running off i was like i don't know how uh but he and mj that's that's how they rolled man so you know i had a lot to learn yeah um but no it was great it was we went to gold medal and played with those guys was was was a big thrill what international players caught your eye around the time um oscar schmidt he was older at that time but but he was giving me the business you know he was tall he about six nine he could shoot a quick trigger he was that big big dude and um so he could play but you know man look we we dominated everybody i mean it was no a true story did you play against andrew gays yeah australia yeah i wouldn't worry about him yes he was he was older at that point but in the olympics true story um nobody wanted to be the leading scorer because you got drug tested and so yep the only person that got drug tested every game was carl malone it was carl malone and whoever the leading scorer was we figured it out after a couple games so at the end of the games everybody's passing to each other because nobody wants to shoot and it looks like we're being like real unselfish but nobody wanted to score because it took you know another hour of drug testing and all that so that's funny but it was crazy it was crazy i would have dodged that too how and where did you celebrate your gold miller you know that's when to me and i started that's when we kind of met before that so after the gold medal i i got a sweet at the bel air for five weeks and that's where we were for five weeks she was living in l.a and five weeks before the season now i was in l.a at the bel air hotel chilling chillin yeah she had you open she had him i had her open okay yeah the book's called game yeah 96 uh gold medal team or the dream team who win it yeah i mean we had six guys from that original team we didn't have mj you practiced did you practice with the dream team as a so in 92 yeah yeah right your college team people who was on their new web meet webb hurley penny mash rodney rodgers rodney montross allen houston so we played him the first game in 92 in la jolla allen hit about 10 threes bobby was getting wherever he wanted penny and i were dunking everywhere in transition webb was a beast like webb was just killing them dudes like to the point where larry bird was like if that's what's coming in the league i need to get out damn but then the next day the next two days they they they smacked us we had no but um that to me was a was a great gauge to know that i could play at that level but i like that you know look man we competitors man you always feel like you can win man like that you know that's the thing about sports man you always feel we had shaq who what were they gonna do with shaq yeah nathan penny was like right yeah people don't realize and appreciate how good you penny and shaq alone and so we you know we reggie mitch i mean we you know we would have held on yeah definitely little hell to own your run from 94 to 2000 was unprecedented five consecutive all-nba selections 21 8 and 6 over that span did you feel personally and you just said you're a competitor you felt like you were the best player in the league at that time every time i stepped on the floor probably after like around 96 i felt like i was the best player and i think i don't think that's unusual i know every time this guy stepped on the court mm-hmm you felt like you were the best player even if i would if i even if i knew i wasn't you're going to see it all on me that's what i'm saying yeah you have like to me like i went against mj like i'm thinking he gotta guard me yeah right so and um you have to have that mentality you have to have it and i think when you're a top when you're just in the league you gotta even i mean matt you didn't score 20 30 points a game but then when you getting out there you compete yeah you got to feel like i'm going to shut this guy down i'm a buster's like you have to have that mentality and so i i did and when i got hurt and in those four years i lost that and y'all never got a chance to really see that that player in person but you go four years of hurt you know i know we'll get into it we get four years of injuries you start to question yourself your abilities your body's ability to stay healthy and instead of feeling like i'm the best player i'm just happy to be out here which is a beautiful thing to have that appreciation but i lost that edge i lost that like and physically i lost a whole lot as a result as well so four years it just you know you're like i remember during that time it was back maybe an 0-4 i went i was at duke and coach k it was the year i sat out he was like who are the top five players in the league and i was like shag kobe hey i'm naming guys he's okay who the next five and i go i go through i give me the next ten and so i start naming all these guys he's like you name 20 guys you didn't name yourself and so i didn't quite at the time like understand but like looking back at it like i i had it was so demoralizing like going through that that when i came back it was like let me just like get in where i could fit it and like i said i enjoyed it i was grateful to be able to play but i lost that that mentality that middle side explain because like i said it happened a while ago like you really explain your injuries and how bad your ankle situation really got because i don't think people understand the extent of your injury and he came back still dunking on people barely i mean it's a long story and i get into it in the book but um you know i i got hurt in detroit and it was a comedy of errors like it was just it was mismanaged the whole thing and it you know i got hurt um we didn't diagnose her correctly i think and um it was probably a hairline fracture it got worse and worse until i broke it and then when i went to orlando what see so that was the season before orlando correct does my last year in detroit okay i had surgery but the surgery shouldn't have been it wasn't a big deal like every team was still coming after me i was healing when i got to orlando i was supposed to be out until december january but they brought me back in september and so there was some miscommunication i ended up getting what's called a non-union so the best way to explain that is if these two fingers are are one bone and they break doctors put the bones back together they put plates in there to hold it to let it heal and what happened with me they healed but they healed as two separate bones that's called a non-union that becomes a problem that took three years to heal so and three more surgeries and so if we had just followed the protocol that was established then maybe that would have been a voice right yeah i can't say that with absolute accuracy but so that's kind of what happened now the fourth surgery in total i got septic i thought i almost died i had a hole in my ankle from a staph infection you've seen the ankle it's nasty the doctor said if the if the skin the free flap surgery they took skin from my arm and sort of used it as a patch over my ankle if it didn't take they would have had to amputate the leg and so not the ankle of the leg yeah like the lower part of your leg and so we didn't have social media we didn't have our the ability to tell what was going on so i think a lot of people didn't know how big it was right how serious it was and uh so i go i go through all of that in the book it was four or five years of just craziness but so that's why you lose that right you know what i'm saying you just like man i almost died like at one point i didn't want to come back but you just like man i'm just i'm just happy to be what are you what age are you not to cut you off what age are you at that time 2000 i'm 27. damn right in your prime and you know what's crazy man like writing this book like going through it all and i talked to you earlier about like you got to stay in the moment like you can't i didn't deal with with all of the baggage mentally emotionally i was just trying to fight to keep playing right getting into the hall of fame in that moment you you reflect you reflect right in your story i dealt with it then um yeah like a lot of that like you know a lot of that that's heavy it was hot it was stark right even the hall of fame the hall of fame should be like the you know the icing on the cake mm-hmm the ultimate regardless of what happened or didn't happen it validates you right and i was mad yeah i was bitter because i'm thinking y'all only got six years yeah y'all didn't get i didn't get a chance to see this all the way through right yeah and so i didn't i didn't deal with that until after my career because you i'm fighting man i'm just trying to stay on the court you can't you're not going to really look back at the good and the bad while you're in the midst of it i say this because you're our big brother like you're the biggest what if ever like we all look like you were the next prototype you they they were fitting you to be the next mj because that's how talented you were you know what i mean and it's just like to hear you kind of explain your story on what you went through like you were robbed we were robbed like you were going where no one has really been for your size your position and what you brought to the game so i always wanted to know like obviously for cool and i've known you for years you're my big brother but we've never got that in depth right like i couldn't imagine like you said you finally unloaded that baggage 20-plus years later yeah because like you were on pace to be one of the if not you know who knows one of the greatest players of all time and to have injury derail that like it's just i i always that's why i'm definitely going to read this but just as [ __ ] the basketball side the mental side had to be not only on the court but off the court in your personal life and all i just wait on you it did it did and you know everybody's got something and everybody goes through something and sometimes i don't want to equate this because there's people who have far more traumatic things in their life but sometimes we we suppress that and sometimes you suppress it to survive and uh but ultimately you get through it by acknowledging it and dealing with it and so i i never unpacked it and i didn't realize i didn't realize how much it impacted me yeah man like i didn't think that like because i used to say to myself like coming back from the injury playing nine more years that's far greater than anything i did prior because i know what i went through but i don't think i really unpacked like like how how how hard that was for him and how difficult that was to go through that and um you know genetics hard work whatever but like i had a chance you know we have a chance to leave a legacy right and and i and i think i did i mean i had a great career but i had a chance to be really really special and it's interesting man like i'm being honest here like when the nba 75 came out yes thank you you know vince i mean there's a bunch of dwight come on why you [ __ ] man like kyrie no no so i i kind of like and maybe this is a way to like protect myself but i was like you know what i get it i i got hurt you know i didn't have i didn't see it all the way through the the hall of fame is college and nba so my college helped get me in so my body of work wasn't enough so i i kind of justified it bro but i'm just talking i'm being honest so i'm at the all-star game in cleveland and i'm working that night i'm working the the pre-game the the the post game and all that goes on and it hit me then and and that was i got him i got i was emotional and it was i was surprised i was emotional you know you're trying to protect you're not trying to show it but you're feeling like like [ __ ] i should be out there and i remember 25 years ago i was in that building for the 50th and it was all-star weekend and i said you know what if they ever do this again i'm gonna be on that next team and when i was there and no disrespect to these guys because they deserving to be on it i'm fans it is they're brothers of mine i love them to death but when i saw people like you know guys from my era like ray and reggie and i used to be like man i used to get into business like that's what i was thinking right so i had you know and they're deserving so i'm not trying to yeah so that it like it hit me and so like this still baggage like this you know what i'm saying and so but it kind of triggered me a little bit but you know i mean look i mean you're better than danny shades bro i'm sorry man well you said it excuse me doll shades you're better than dolph shades hey let me just i want to say i'm sorry i want to say i was nicer than darth shades look you got to give him respect for his time but look i want to say something about y'all man because i know y'all interviewing me but i played first of all i remember matt i watched you play during the lockout at ucla and i remember hearing you were a football player and then fast forward i think it was old seven y'all had y'all running in golden state and i'm like who is this light-skinned crazy [ __ ] yeah ran across the court and chat devon or somebody and and i was like yo this dude is crazy like you know say like but then i played with you and and people get to see you know different sides of you guys now but the thing that that showed me a lot about you was when our teammate barbosa and his mother passed and your mom had unfortunately from can and i'm not trying to bring it up but like and i know that was hard for you but to see you there for him and he's crying he's going through it and like i didn't know how to be right supportive mm-hmm because i hadn't really gone through it but i was like yo this dude like mad like all that other stuff and all the stuff that you've gone through i play with you with the clippers you're coming to the aid of a teammate always all your stuff all your smoke mm-hmm it was defense you're defending right a teammate yeah and then this dude right here the same thing in the palace you coming to the to the one time i've been in trouble yeah coming to the aid of a teammate everybody i didn't play with what you uh stacked but everybody that's played with you that i know thinks the world of you and so i was like like as teammates and guys like i i could be in the trenches with these two right here i was with matt um i didn't you know i played one he was a little messed up in phoenix but in la i didn't play i watched can you imagine that real quick in the phoenix [ __ ] they fired terry porter at all-star break that was our code first of all i'm going i'm so i'm going to come out of the we believe season you know nelly mad i don't sign a three-year deal so he gets rid of me i'm going in there and g's there and i'm i tell remember yo to honor you're my favorite player i don't know if i made him feel old at the time but i'm going to [ __ ] tell him that during the game grant hill first of all first of all it was crazy and they fired him and and yeah we had too much talent man that was that we had so much we should have been i mean remember stat [ __ ] but the crazy thing was um with this dude right here i don't know if you remember this but we played we played in orlando and i think after the whole thing in the past that was o405 yeah and then 06 i got i had a sports hernia so i don't i don't know if we played against each other until 0.607 and we're in orlando and i'm guarding him and we're writing on the sidelines and somebody yells something slick out to you about you know to i turned around and cursed him out yeah gee and you remember i remember that i cursed him out and i i didn't know how he i didn't we didn't know each other yeah yeah but because i got to guard this dude and i don't need you know what i'm saying but like yeah but i i and so and then we played the the next year i think at golden state he was in phoenix and uh man y'all ran up and down the court like that year i was like i mean i was fine it was fun but like i always said he was top three four guys i had to go i could never figure him out yeah i couldn't figure jack out i studied him nobody could i couldn't uh he had a different game you could shoot it you played with you couldn't speed you up you shot it you know behind your head and i was i could not i could guard i had a you know you couldn't guard guys but you had a playbook for god like okay i'm gonna you know lebron i'm gonna try to do this or melo i'm gonna do that yeah yeah i couldn't do anything with kobe like i i mean nobody i could i'm out there with one leg and they got me out here 38 trying to guard kobe i'm looking at matt like you was getting after it though i mean but but but i could it was but i couldn't figure you out man i i pierced like i could i had a game plan for paul and i actually did well against these guys but i people don't appreciate how good you were i think those that you know get a bucket no no you know i've always told you that yeah yeah always saying i want to backtrack a little bit so you go to orlando this is you t-mac and a possibility of getting tim duncan at the time walk us through this you're going through injury and and trying to get back on the court you're teaming up with a young t-mac uh and then there's whispers or rumors that you could possibly get tim so what happened was tim and i went we had the same agent so we went down together and tim i think was more in at the time than i was i was still you know i had new york i had a couple other teams i was looking at but tim wanted to be in orlando if he were to leave and so we were down there and they were hosting us and and um they had just had a pretty good season doc rivers first year coaching they were i think they were 500. and so while we were there like everything was going well like it just felt like yo this this this could happen and i know it's hard for people now to think of tim duncan anywhere else right he was after his 30 i think he won a championship in san antonio and i'm telling you man i remember it like it was yesterday we had dinner and tim's girlfriend asked doc a question can wives and girlfriends travel on the team playing i remember that and you gotta understand back then that that didn't happen it happens now but back then it didn't happen and so doc said no it's a business trip that doesn't happen i don't allow that now i didn't know that san antonio had started doing that yes you know and so that's why because i'm thinking that's a bold question like i'm like why is she asking that question so but i didn't pay much attention to it so we got back to the hotel that night and it was funny because to me and i we we're in the hotel almost like the hotel room was bugged so we're whispering to each other like you know and she's like he ain't coming i said what do you mean she's like when she asked that question her whole body language changed with that response and i was like nah nah nah whatever so anyway we get back we get back to uh detroit's funny story so it was too much i'm on crutches so i ended up saying you know what have the teams come visit me in detroit so new york comes in and they bring they bring star jones they bring like all these actors and actresses in they got this tape they play they got like seinfeld and brook shields and all these people like come you know you think you look orlando's night wait till you come to new york like and i always wanted to play in new york so leon you know the actor liam i talk to him all the time so i asked him about this so he's on the video he's like gee you think the women are nice in detroit wait till you come to new york and so to me it was like oh hell no turn that tape off and so to this day we talked she's like man you think that new york would have washed the tape and so anyway you know new york didn't happen but um and and by the end i was probably going to orlando but so then t-mac like but there was a chance as tim was trying to figure it out t-mac you know he's from down there so it just it was coming together like all three of us might play together and i didn't know how good t-mac was at that time and so i didn't know i didn't know until they got to orlando i was like oh my god this guy right here is incredible so not being able to be healthy to play with mac is something that we talk he and i talk about all the time just like wishing that we could have been could it could have done it t-mac and g despite all the injuries you know how me and matt feel about you right a lot of people a lot of people feel the same way about you and even though the injuries you still had a cobias career in our minds the way we look at you right how when you go back and look when you go back and look at all that what's your thoughts like how how grateful are are you you know to make it through all that the injury and still be able to come back and finish on the good note yeah that was special i mean it was a good thing you know on one hand i didn't appreciate how good i was and that sounds arrogant but i didn't appreciate how good i was in detroit because we wouldn't win it and so the one thing i learned from this process of writing the book is when we have success we got to celebrate that right there's a story i um 2000 all-star game so 99 we had a lockout so we didn't have an all-star game 2000 san francisco we're there we play or i guess in oakland the old oracle arena such a such a stupid story so i i'm thinking okay jordan's gone because in the all-star game with joel we had to defer to him yeah you know i mean just nobody said it but you just felt like unspoken you just got to get the ball especially in 98 when kobe was there and like they're going to like which i got issues with the whole um the documentary uh it was a great documentary but it made it seem like i was scared like we were on the bench and what happened was in that game penny was hurt that year he sat out the whole year came back for two games played an all-star game he had gp garden it was it was uh kobe and mj and then people forget garnett was a three early in his career so garnett and i are matched up so penny didn't want to handle the ball because he's not healthy and he's got to go against gp so i'm bringing the ball up i mean i was pointing forward so i'm always back in transition we're farting around it's it's three on one gp got kobe and garnett he's throwing lives i'm back so i'm not trying to be in the frame on these alley-oops in the timeout i'm like y'all got to get back cause i'm out here on the island man what do you do these young boys you know and so the way it looked it looked like i was like scared of co and i had great respect for kobe but i wasn't i wasn't scared of him then right you know so 2000 all-star so you know the trainers always would carry your uh i had contacts then so my trainer mike abdelnow in detroit would always keep contacts so if i ran out i would just go get something from him so i only had one pair of contacts and the day of the game my one contact ripped and so i'm like do i play with no contacts so i put one in and now i'm all screwed up during the game i threw a lob to vince i promised you i'd do it over the backboard yeah even like it's so you know and i remember some i told chip england who's you know you know from san antonio i told chip i said uh man it's always next year like i'll wear you know next year and so next year didn't happen and and so i say all that to say that you got to celebrate when we have success and life's not guaranteed and we got to celebrate each other and celebrate yourself i didn't do that when i was in detroit because to me i was chasing isaiah and until we won i didn't give myself permission to celebrate and so being able to go back now and like you know what i actually was arguing because i don't it's his thing you guys remember that i remember trying to guard kobe at 38 with a bad wheel i remember like standing in the corner waiting for the ball to come to me like that's what i remember i don't i didn't remember those those those those years and so the exercise of not just the dark but also the the light the good the positive and and just appreciating that as you said a lot of people remember them full speed crossovers trust me full speed coming at you with the crossover pivot remember i remember when he got pimping and banged on him pippin was too light man he was like 2 15. man i could just you came right at it where we got 2 20 2 30 30. 2 30. yeah so for all you young people google him nah google him what was the 2010 playoff experience like with steve nash that there was the western finals run right now yeah we played i don't know you were in orlando oh yeah 2020 we were in orlando we had a good year you know it was weird because we had as great as shaq was and his greatest steve where they didn't really mix and um so when shaq left and amari was healthy and then alvin gentry was coaching us we had a really good season we were third seed and uh we beat portland we beat san antonio and then we faced l.a they got us the first two games in l.a we beat them the first the next two games and in game five man like we're right there on the ropes jay rich banks in the three to tie it in overtime kobe gets a ball a three-pointer the one time he missed the one time he missed a shot of me like in that situation uh he airballed it i'm writing this like i'm right there in his face he airballs it but meta world peace gets the rebound jay rich didn't box him out he tip in and he he they win game five and i don't know if emotionally we recovered and then covey in game six i mean he started cool dude like so here's the thing man so he you know he's doing he's doing this thing he always look with kobe like like with lebron when i guarded lebron back then my attitude was i'm not going to crash the offensive glass when we shoot i'm going to find him i'm not going to let him get out full head of steam so i'm not going to let him turn the corner and go right and get to the rim i'ma make him make contested jump shots and i'm not going to foul if he posts me up don't help because he beats you with his passing as much as so like you know he had a game plan and i actually did okay i mean lebron would have moments but like you know i didn't have a strategy for call like i didn't know what to do and so sometimes man like i would just he'd go up and shut i just hit his arm like just hit his arm and just like you know and the problem too was i i couldn't go back at him because that my role you know in phoenix nash had the ball in his hand so i'm stuck in the corner and i'm not you know i'm not a spot up shooter um so he was hard to defend but in that moment man like i mean a couple times i guess right like i'm like like he's gonna go right he's gonna shot fake i'm not you know i know what he's gonna do and i'm like and then you know you know how hard it is saying this and you know when you square it off against him you're saying that in your head as you're d as you're doing i know i knew he wanted to go right and i knew he had a great ball fake and i i've seen him do it before and so he too one shot right in front of our bench we tapped alvin on the and so he hit a tough shot on me before that and i tried to deny him the ball but he gets it he goes right i go with him he shot fakes i don't go for it i actually get closer into him i go up when he goes up do you know how hard it is to do a shot fake reload from three and somebody in your group and i'm i'm i i couldn't be any closer to him without fouling him man this dude like i was like i mean i was actually proud of the defense i played yeah like i'm thinking i couldn't have done anything other than just prevent him from getting the ball but he was the best player i played against and and i say this respectfully with georgia i didn't guard jordan pippen and i matched up yeah but the the best player that i i played against hands down was kobe and one of my regrets it's in the book in 07 when i left orlando phil jackson called me three times to get traded for him right no no well that was that was in detroit oh no i don't know how true that was i've heard that but i don't know how true that was but when i left orlando phil called three times i didn't call him back wow and i'm thinking oh it's over in l.a kobe you know he's talking about bynum and you know they you know they're imploding in the playoffs and all i got i just thought the run was over in l.a and i ended up going to phoenix in part to stay healthy but i think phil would have played me more more suited for my game he liked tall guys i could handle and i think he wanted me to come in and kind of be a primary ball handler or whatever me sitting in the corner was not my game you know i'm saying i mean i played it i did my role but like that wasn't who i was and so i think now like man if i had just that would have been interesting we were number one in the west but then they traded for gasol and then later that that season and that was a game changer for um for the lakers and they you know you went on and had a great yeah play with some some great teammates anyone uh who's your favorite teammate during your career damn man 19 years man that's that's something you got a hell of a run i think in detroit lindsay allen those are my guys we came in together you know and in orlando was tough because i didn't play a whole lot in orlando jamir um was good people you know actually it's crazy you know you know who bond who and i bonded a lot because we were rehabbing all the damn time was pat garrity thank you we like we were hurt two years so we spent a lot of time together gary yeah you know i enjoyed playing we didn't hang out we didn't you know i didn't partake uh but i enjoyed matt man like bad words i'm telling you like just in terms of teammates doing whatever is needed yeah the ultimate teammates you know i'm saying like people don't get enough credit for that or give you enough credit for that but like you should have started in l.a with the clippers that year you know but he came off the bench he never never made a i remember seeing i remember seeing you at the facility like you didn't have i don't think you you had a it was like late too might have been like august september and you were unsure where you were gonna sign and you were in there just playing pickleball every day and then you playing so well they brought you in but like just like whatever's needed you know what i'm saying didn't complain just did what he had to do if something popped off he was always in it like he was there for your teammate like and so but there's so many man i mean you know nash was fun to play with barbosa was a good guy those phoenix years were fun yeah um i don't know if i had a favorite but you know shaq was fun man shaq was crazy remember the shaq and lou armitson back and forth remember when shaq took his mouthpiece and put in his uh tights during shoot around i was just talking with shaq about that last night [Laughter] lou's bike butt naked i'm a out shag right here but i remember one time we it's so bad man this [Laughter] i mean one time man shaq it's so bad man i i can't repeat this man come on you already started all right man we you know we're in the showers after practice and he goes to jay rich jay rich you got a fat ass man i'm like i'm like how do you come back like what does j rich do man like oh you know saying shaq was just he was funny he was he uh and we had poor terry porter man he had no chance remember we used to say that bill cartwright on average fifth fire what what he used to break his stats so terry porter we're in film session and uh we're watching film in the film room and and he stopped filming say shaq like don't you think you could come over from the weak side and maybe block the shot right here and shaq would be like tp i'm top five all time in the nba shot blocks i think i know when i can block a shot yeah like like just like the disrespect the craziness so calm down so calm about a couple times he show up late this is bad too but he showed up late for prayer ain't nobody it was it's just [ __ ] it was shack late and like coach i'm sorry man the passport truck tipped over on 51 man they were mexicans everywhere that's why i'm late to pray like he was just like he was saying things man it was it was constant humor man and and uh he just kept it light he was fun he was crazy we didn't make the playoffs but you know he was entertained i can't believe i told our day every day something not surprised but bill cartwright used to coach the biggs bill i average so and so and so and so and so will go against you in this game and my career number from high school to college and the pros he would break all this into i'm 70 lifetime from the field give me the damn ball middle school high school i can't listen to the car right i averaged 30 and 10 against him like he just just unbelievable he was he was unbelievable bill cartwright's just like ah a mumble under his breath shaq was funny fast forward co-owner with the hawks uh how did you happen to uh land that spot congratulations by the way appreciate that when we were in la i wasn't playing i was hurt matter of fact it was that december when you guys when we were undefeated we had a great month i had i figured i was in la my family was in phoenix so once a month i would have dinner with this duke alum a guy named bruce karsh and bruce actually one of the partners with the warriors okay and uh he's a duke grad so we were talking about the clippers and i was like you know i think they might they might be in play they may i'm hearing they may have to sell the team for estate tax reasons so we kind of concocted this whole sk this this plan that we knew adam was going to be commissioner the next year all three of us do grads let's meet with adam and see if we can get into you know maybe buy a piece of the team with the chance to buy it all later down the road and then the next year everything and so bruce brought in a guy tony wrestler because he knew now was going to be an open auction when the team was for sale and uh we bid 1.2 billion dollars and um funny stories so i'm in new york with bruce cars tony's in l.a we're all on speakerphone and we're on the phone they're gonna get mad that i told the story we're on the phone and we're like okay 1.2 billion is gonna be our deal that's uh that's for the clippers that's to buy the clippers okay which we were out bid by 800 million steve ballmer but we're on the phone they're like all right so tony says i'll put in half a billion and then bruce says i'll put in half a billion and they look at me so i swear i said i got five on it like you know just you know i was being funny yeah and uh but i i told them my amount and they just wanted to know that i did that i was gonna put something in yeah and you have to put something in so but that didn't work um the hawks came up right after similar circumstances some racial overtones some emails so on and so forth and um i ended up getting tony and convinced him on atlanta you know i think the perception of atlanta historically the franchise was just way off yeah it just wasn't good you played there so it was and so i felt like for me my selling point was we got a chance to come in in that value you got a great city international airport quality of life uh guys like to be in atlanta living cost of living is low yes you know what i'm saying all of that we got a chance to come in and change that narrative and build an emotional connection with the franchise if you're from boston and you're a basketball fan there's a 99 chance you're a celtics fan but if you're from atlanta you might be a bulls fan you might be it's so transient people aren't really from there so you know we came in and you know redo the arena practice facility you know try to create an atmosphere try to understand atlanta embrace what atlanta is the previous ownership group thought it was too too much diversity um two black you could say i'll say two black yeah and so we've tried to embrace who we are i love when you go to a game in atlanta you got people from all walks of life you know different political different ethnicities different gender orientation all they're supporting the team but we're building that you know we're we're trying to build it and trae young having a young star uh is helpful but um but yeah so we're changing that we i don't know if you've been to a game in atlanta i know i know you had y'all see me they'll be in your city it's a party man like man it's a party at our game we got concerts we got two chains there's a partner with the g league team the food is unbelievable the food we got sweets we got amenities we're trying to create an environment there barbershop we got a killer mic got a barber shop let me tell you the genius of that it's dead space that you could not sell yeah and so we said let's make it a barber shop we got a dj in there it's a whole energy in their whole vibe and so just embracing atlanta we try to reflect atlanta and all that we do and we got a lot more work to do but excited about the progress we've made man coming down the home stretch post career you've been very successful what are some other things you're into um outside of ownership of the at hawks yeah i got a lot on my plate man maybe a little too much but i'm on this thing i'm on a board of campbell soup so we you know in our portfolio we have everything from cape cod chips kettle chips um obviously camel soup chunk chunky soup i'm on the board of uh empire state realty trust we own the empire state building we'd love to have you guys come do a show oh that'd be dope empire state bill i'll personally host you a day i hear that down the road we can make that happen we got it it's all me um we make that happen we'd be honored um i um managing director usa basketball so i'll be picking the olympic team uh that's fine and you know steve kerr is our head coach for the next next cycle what else am i doing um i'm on the board of duke um shoes coming back out shoes coming back out matter of fact these he licensed this is a partnership right here with two parts of the state it's a partnership these will be coming out um he wore these the gh2s butter on um no on all eyes on me yeah and so so that really helped with the shoe but yeah just you know keeping it busy man we're rebuilding downtown atlanta we're pouring four billion dollars into downtown atlanta looking good too and so uh trying to do like a la live kind of in downtown atlanta so just staying busy man you know doing tv as well trying to be like y'all love it is it true anita baker introduced you and tamiya kinda yeah yeah kinda so so isaiah has his jersey retired and um anita baker sings the national anthem at the jersey at the game so afterwards there was there's a reception i meet anita baker so she and her husband so she's like you know so i know you gotta i know you like breaking all the hearts and all this and i mean i'm just like yeah i can't you know i'm struggling i wasn't really struggling i was like i'm struggling you gotta hook me up you know you know and so so the next week she was at the soul train awards and she met tamiya and to me it was you know from windsor which is right across the river from detroit big fan of anita so she was telling her this and he is i got just the guy for you so she kind of she planted the seed i ended up connecting with tamir you know a couple months later but yeah you know it's a good story to say need a hook to say yeah partially true you bring me joy your oldest daughter is an mma as a father what is that like watching your daughter punch people in the face and get punched in the face dude i don't understand it's crazy you you have dogs you have a girl you have two boys but yeah three boys excuse me um so she's you know she started doing jiu jitsu and as a parent you think okay girl young lady getting to go off to college learn self-defense that's a good thing but that just kept going kept going and so right before covet she's like dad i think i want to fight so i got a buddy who's the general counsel at ufc so i took her to a fight and we're sitting up close i'm thinking you know she sees up close she won't want to do it i'm you know so we get this in north carolina we go to the fight we fly home that night we get in at 2am i'm like milo what do you think she's like dad i could be a champion and i was like backfired like my plan didn't work but she kept going and she fought last she fought last october and i mean she's passionate about it and you know like if somebody if your parents tried to tell you couldn't play basketball you're gonna do it anyway you gotta support your kids whatever they want to do so let me tell you so to me and i so she goes to the fight she goes early we drive from orlando to lakeland florida about an hour drive we don't say a word in the car there's no music no nothing on the right we're not saying that there's a nervous energy we get to the fight there's a bar man we probably each had about eight roman coasts oh i know right you had like you just had to edge by the time she came on she comes out her uh her walkout music was rigged rocks y'all feeling good the devil was the devil is a lie so she comes out i'm like all right you know but we're like now we're like this your first time actually seeing it first time seeing it yeah so she gets in the ring she goes in first the young lady she's fighting who's fought before who looks like she's been in some fights you know and so we're a little nervous about but like she gets she comes with studs in her ears and that's a no-no so they can't get them out and so they're going through all this they're trying to get them out it's been 10 minutes so now we're kind of mad it's attacked yeah they're stalling so now to me and i won't repeat what tamiya was saying it's what they say in memphis a lot and so um and so anyway she gets in the ring she chokes her out with 15 50 seconds wow and uh you know so she's into it man and you know what do you do man you know but she was flying quick flies but she and she and she you know i mean she's quiet sweet kind like the last person you would think but dude she goes six days a week she teaches it she loves it she's a brown belt like she's she wants to fight she wants to try to go for it she wants to open up gyms down the road so she's got a plan and you know we'll see what happens that's dope you were always forward thinking in basketball uh so much that you didn't have an agent what did that where did that idea come from and you were able to be successful i realized early on that the nba is a global marketing and public relations firm that's disguised as a league we went to china remember we went to china and we're over there and people knew who we were we go places recognize us and that's because that's what the nba does and so i felt like i needed an attorney who could negotiate my contracts but all the marketing opportunities that was coming from the league that was coming from different you know because the league's pushing young players and i was delivering early on so why am i going to pay somebody 10 20 um and then why am i going to let them own that relationship and leverage it i want to sit with with coca-cola and sprite i want to sit with nestle i want to sit with and talk about marketing plans sit with the ad agency uh a lot of times agents might leverage that you know for another client right scratch their back so you know i got hurt all that momentum kind of went away but it was invaluable experience like having an office having employees doing evaluations raises um sitting in meetings talking about strategy like i'm doing all this while i'm playing and it just helped you know help me think about and learn about other things so you know it was fun and i had a good time and um you know maybe if i had the muscle of a big-time marketing firm maybe things would have been a little different but i had pretty well i had a lot of deals real quick uh before we get to quick hitters um the sprite situation i thought you were gonna ask about uh a night biggie oh [ __ ] yeah cause you i remember you asked me about that in l.a yeah i talk about in the book so yeah the night the the night biggie pass yeah talk to us about that damn i totally forgot about that we just had we just had the photographer that go ahead we're in l.a it's over here march 8th yeah because he died on the 9th my birthday's the 9th that's right march 9th so we played the clippers we beat the clippers i did work i did my thing and uh and so to me his label is throwing a party so after the game i go with tamiya and i don't know if you know jay brown so jay was at the label we get in the limo we go back to tamiya's manager's house first of all i was like that that first night that was the first time i heard hypnotized it wasn't on the radio yet just had a disc and they kept saying detroit players you know pink gators mighty like run that back run that back who in the limo every time you know hearing that song so we go to the party now understand t and i have been together almost a year that was the first time we had been out publicly yeah and so we walk in and everybody turns like everybody's looking at us because they hadn't seen us out but everybody was there we saw biggie we saw a puffy we weren't there long we we might have been there 10 minutes we might have left five minutes before they left because when we left they were kind of near the door and uh by the time we got back to timmie's place it had already circulated that he got killed and so it was it was crazy um it was a little weird thinking that they were out there mm-hmm because it was still all that east coast west coast stuff and um shoot that even happened with tamiya like she got caught up you know we got caught up in the situation um she was in the studio working on her album stevie j produced one of the songs and so um before i got there i'm with jay brown we're at benihanas and we're doing socky bombs and uh and so we come to the studio so before we get there they were in the commons room stevie j and his his bodyguard and the outlaws are in the other studio and so i guess they had words in in the common area somebody pulled out a gun so this all happens before we get there so i show up we get there and 10 minutes after we get there police come in rifles drawn hank we're all on the wall i'm thinking like this r b session like i'm like man right this ain't rap right and so anyway i found out what happened and you know we we i don't i don't know what ultimately happened but i say that that was that was probably the summer of 97 so so but it was just still tension right you know what i'm saying and so when we saw big e m at the it was just like i mean i didn't think what happened would happen but it was just it was it was weird energy was off yeah it was a weird night yeah it was a weird night real quick before we get to quick hitters the grant hill drinks sprite i mean to me you know that and little penny are kind of what i remember growing up from like athletes and commercials so how did that come about and the idea and behind the actual commercial the idea it was kind of genius man it was basically obey your thirst don't let somebody tell you to drink it and so we're making fun of pitchmen and uh and making fun of myself and so that was um sprite attaching himself aligning himself with the nba you know i got involved with that um so we had a we had a great run did a lot of fun commercials even did a commercial with kobe um his second year crazy story we did a commercial together his second year during the season i fly out to l.a now i'm at this point i'm like i'm the big you know what i'm saying like the man yeah he's like it's like midway it's before the all-star break but he's young he's got a lot he's having a great second year i fly out to la and we're gonna do this commercial where he's on he's on one shoulder i'm on the other shoulder and we're going back and forth with this kid and um so when you do these commercials you you approve the script before you commit so the script had been approved for for a week so i fly all the way out to la on an off day we get there and the director comes in and he says kobe wants to rewrite the script and i'm like he must have what he wants to rewrite the script i'm like all right so they come back like 30 45 minutes later he got all the good lines now [Laughter] he got all the good lines and they're like and i'm like look nah i said man look i come all the way out here this is what i agreed to mm-hmm if he wants to do this i'm gonna get back on the plane and fly back and so now meanwhile we're trailers right next we just could have gone and talked to each other but but that was cold like i i kind of respect that he was bold enough to want to do that and anyway we went back we did a script that we we agreed to but yeah the sprite stuff man that was that was fun and and um poking fun at people having pitch men mm-hmm was the whole premise behind the sprite campaign so yeah so well man it's been a great interview quick hitters first thing to come to mind let us know duke all time starting five including yourself so you plus four all-time dukes dookies man i gotta go with leighton he he did work he was killed he was a killer he's i think late in his top three top five maybe all time in college just in terms of his accomplishments later i got to go with i got to go with johnny dawkins because he kind of said it all people don't people don't appreciate how talented he was you don't get me in trouble man two more i'm gonna show the young fella some love jason tatum i think when it's all said and done i think he's gonna be the best oh and he might he might already be there he he i don't know if there was a more skilled guy coming in out of high school i had it all you know offensively that final spot kyrie he was only there for nine days and i know sometimes we claim them sometimes we don't yeah but but talent yeah he he was he was so kyrie kyrie dawkins yourself lightner jason tatum yeah ooh it's a nice five nice five right there what album can you listen to with no skips you can't have your wife no brownie points here biggie's first album hmm ready to uh uh point no was it boring no born to die to die yeah the little baby on the front yep that's my first that's my favorite one right there yeah i mean you kind of already mentioned if you have a better story but best kobe or mj story off the court uh kobe probably like 98. um i go up one night to me is living she's living on the wilshire corridor and um i think we're engaged at this point and it's late like i go to the men's gym at ucla maybe like midnight and i'm i'm re i'm redoing my shot so i'm changing my mechanics and i'm just going in there to do like just some set shots by myself and i go in there and kobe's in there and he's lathered up and he's got his guy and uh so i'm down at the other end and uh he's like you want to play one on one ah yeah and i didn't because i'm like i'm changing my shot like i'm not i'm not there yet but i'm like i gotta i can't i can't say no and uh so we played one-on-one and i'm telling you it was like a game seven in like late july like it was i don't think i played that intense in the summer and he was like he was i mean you know he's what second years coming off his second year 98 he's 96 drafted yeah for second year yeah and so like the work ethic and and how hard like up until then man like i didn't really work on my game and i just hooped mm-hmm to play pickleball and that summer was when i started okay i'm gonna start like working and getting better and trying things and and that was the hard part because i did it in 98 i did it in 99 and then after that i never i never worked on my game in the summer because i was hurt i was trying to get healthy and it finally got healthy and now i didn't touch a ball in the summer so those phoenix years i didn't i'm trying to preserve my ankles so just you know going through having a strategy working on stuff all of that like i enjoyed doing that um and a lot of it i got from being like watching this kid this kid younger than me grinding like getting after it by himself it's like a friday night i'm alright i'm wifed up i'm telling you you know i'm just wanting to go get some shots up late at night and he's in the gym going at it and um and so that was that was a moment that that um that i remember that was i was like man this kid yeah i remember my freshman year at ucla is 98 so he used to be on campus all the time to see him normally during the day at night yeah working out playing it was and and you know he he impacted a whole generation now that they do that yeah yeah work they put that like you know back in the day you might go in five spots five makes i got some shots up you know what i'm saying but like he he put the work on mm-hmm for sure it's a crazy question but i know your game and i just seen you play so much and not elijah would you either cross someone or dunk on someone but i've seen you do that too many times in the same play right those of you go hand in hand yeah so for you that go ahead and but for the questions say no maybe who the maybe the favorite pr the someone you crossed up and dunked on thank you that was your that was the [ __ ] that was your patented thing so you got a lot of people on that list it was always it was always fun uh dunking on the chem bag they came back yeah i got them a couple times very few people got it and he um i used to tell them i'm a clown i'm a climb mountain tumbo i'm coming and uh no no you ain't gonna hit me and uh and so that back and forth um the thing about mutumbo and morning they jump for everything yeah yeah and even if they got jumped a lot of guys won't won't come over i'm shack they won't come over yeah you know they don't want to get posterized but like the ken bay he came out every time every time and he got got he got got you know more than he got done oh no no question sure for sure uh five dinner gets dead or alive what's that five dinner guests dead or alive you know what you know i was thinking man for my for my 50th to get five like five rappers that like i grew up and and having them over for dinner like rakim krs won kane man people don't know you make beats bro oh you done grant is nice on the uh keys i retired man because you know tamiya said i was she started calling me quincy bones started calling me pissed beats pissed she was like you know cause you know she she's like where's the melody like you know i'm like wait look look it's not all srb is a different you know but she her thing was she's spending too much time doing it for not getting a check yeah you know but i just i love it man i love music and uh when i listen to a song i don't listen to the lyrics i listen to the music like what's the drum track what's what's the bass line doing what's so i you know i retired from making beats but you make a beat for rhapsody yeah rap city jump here yeah i i went to the studio with knife wonder back in the day and i was trying to i was trying to chop to uh shalom not shy lamar climax um song and i was i couldn't get what i wanted so i put on tamiya put on still and i chopped up the beginning part and put some drums over it and she heard it she was in the studio and she went in and put it on her mixtape rhapsody before she yeah before she blew up and so uh but i always love music so you're gonna get five legends to come to your birthday yeah i got i got to figure out i wanna get five rappers that i grew up right that were like and i i know those three i gotta think of the other two but it'd be fun to bring them in and just just chop it up with it trick question okay uh who would you like to see on all the smoke but but who would i like to see on all of us on our show but you have to help us get your answer on the show get get that person on the show obama i think that'd be cool you heard what i said though right you have to help us get that person on the show i don't know if i can let me let me kick somebody out of somebody else oh great if anyone could probably get obama it'd probably be granted to get a silver's been on right no we haven't been adam sylvia adam yeah yeah yeah i think we can get that done i want to ask him do we can i get some of my money back now he looked at everything that's going on and looked at the brawl like do you really think y'all should have took my money we was at work i want to ask him that seriously well adam always says this i'm repeating what al adams says but he works for me he says that so i'll repeat what he said we appreciate that but that'd be nice that'd be good i think he would do it too got something for you bro oh man can't let you leave empty-handed all the smoke gear for my new uh line that's dropping where can they get that all the smoke dot store if you didn't know now you know go grab some you might not look as good as us in it but you can you can try you can try it yeah well gee man we appreciate you we want to make sure you know how important you wore to us yes man as a mentor as an athlete the way you live your life off the court as well i mean you've just been that dude and we really feel like you know you're still one of the greatest players of all time and all right so we really appreciate your time stopping by i've been chasing your ass for three years we finally got you make sure you check out his book out now where can they get the book get everywhere amazon bookstores buy the book buy the book to have it's a good story man game out now happy you finally got first i appreciate y'all man and i admire what y'all are doing y'all y'all killing it man and um the feeling is mutual yeah i love the fact that like i said the fact that you got to unload that's a heavy weight to carry yeah that makes it a fan of yours and you guys need to write books yeah at some point when your time is right yeah tell your story because you all got stories there yeah definitely it completes everybody you know what i'm saying like i'm telling y'all just put the puzzle pieces together gee thank you man appreciate it this is how i know it's something some feelings expressed in here you ain't getting no fresh cut on them on the cover oh no no i wonder that was on purpose trust me i know you like i mean i know it was a temperature it was intentional symbolism yes with that yeah yes i can't wait to do it y'all should write a book that's a wrap grant hill you can catch us on showtime basketball youtube and the i heart platform black effects see y'all next week peace go get the book i'm not comfortable living in hot it's still dogs better than your house kenny i can't do this anymore mom if you won't listen to me then i really don't have a choice so you're running away south park the streaming wars now streaming okay well i see you bye honey thank you exclusively on paramount plus you

Channel: ALL THE SMOKE

Views: 505,115

Keywords: showtime basketball, showtime, basketball, shosports, showtime sports, sports, showsports, NBA, All The Smoke, All The Smoke Podcast, All The Smoke Full Episode, NBA News and Notes, NBA Playoffs, Playoffs, NBA playoffs, Ernie Johnson, Hawks, Inside The NBA, Shaq, Kobe, Kobe Bryant, Charles Barkley, Dean Smith, Michael Jordan, All The Smoke Grant Hill, Grant hill, grant hill highlights, Turner Sports, Duke, Duke Basketball, Grant HIll NBA, Grant Hill Duke, christian laettner

Id: kiC-fTPT1Ug

Length: 102min 14sec (6134 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 09 2022