Inside the MEMPHIS GRIZZLIES' $250,000,000 FedExForum Facility | Royal Key

a lot of things you gotta do she's got pay your dues fill responsibilities and overtime for a hard worker and God's will good things can happen to you what's going on whether it's another episode of Royal key there on your screen I'm your host George kill and I'm in Memphis with my man Charles Sweeney what's going on man hi George doing well usually when we start this we get right into the shoes right into the jerseys but you have an awesome story of how you started in equipment managing and our fans always ask how can I get into it kind of give us your story and how you started it was back in 2001 this is my 17th season basketball is always my first love so at the University of Memphis where I was a student manager they called saying with dirt being wound out like to help us on game night like a team a team that helped around the locker room helped our game things that nature so my resume in the fortune you have to get a call back so I came in as a team a team in at first so I worked at every home game and also worked when a team left after the home game to prepare for the team ride back to Memphis for a practice or another game and also I worked full time in the summer with the pre-draft workout process the summer league mini camps and just offseason workouts with the players I'll work my way into a position in after I graduated college I became the assistant coach manager at the official title then over time I became the head equipment manager and with travel coordinators neuro I have but just I was just fortunate enough to just a lot of patience and perseverance and God's will that everything came in to tuition so it's just like a lot of things you gotta do she's got pay your dues right right so to let everyone know it's not just you just get there and and everything is smooth sailing you have to work your way up is there a certain degree or anything that you got that okay background degrees exercise sports science contrary meniscal education but you don't have to have a degree in sports or or physical education or health promotion it's more of the experience after you have a receive a job and just like I say a lot of hard work and dedication and loyalty and responsibility right and speaking of the grit and grind that paints the city what is a day in the life of you because a lot of people think that oh you have a dream job which you do to a lot of people but describe the hours you put into it and and how you're constantly at work so my rule of thumb is also always try to get facility two to two-and-a-half hours before our practice times supposed to start myself and God worked with Vince for I'm very fortunate to work with we fold the towels from the previous day we'll also prepare for the game if we have a game the next day or will prepare for travel or for leaving later that afternoon after a practice for departure city then you go to practice so I practice I'm there to minor in the situation just help out like where needed if I need a pass out Gatorade or water for players or player falls on the floor clamp a wet spot or coach Lewis of throwing a drill to set a pick or says screen or make a pass I try to do that we clean up after they leave then we also reset the locker room for the next day throw everything to wash and before we leave and make sure everything's in the dryer make sure there's no emails I've got taken care of besides emails no more like mail that's received like players receive shoes or equipments come in and by that time it might be five o'clock like a full time job it's time to leave and that's just a practice day yeah game days all together different because you're the first one in the arena and you're the last one Lee you just make sure there's no stone unturned and you can leave the gym with a good feeling knowing that everything is doing alright so you're talking with brands washing clothes and getting knocked down by Marc Gasol screens in practice like a holiday put the players if I'm shooting a shot maybe they're gone Chuck you do this I'm like no what I don't get paid to make shots that's your job all right I'm just here to make you look pretty alright now it speaking of pretty uh the the merchandise the clothes the shoes that's what we're here for so enough of the small talk let's get to it okay sounds good okay so you can see this the back stockroom here players really don't go through a lot of shoes as they used to when I first came to league seventeen years ago Jason Williams for example to wear a new pair of and won every game but now players they like to keep a shoe that's fits which orthotics these different issues so they're not really always changing a shoe it's not really superstitious to me it's more about comfort players like for example my colleague as you can see team Jordan really takes care of my Colleen off his shoes so someone's shoes that Mike has the thirty twos white and blue navy blue he has some goals and some are uniform he likes to wear a darker color shoot like at home and stuff like that so he'll wear like a blue and baby blue at home which is white uniform he just enjoys being part of team Jordan and stuff like that so I should say be like Mike we have Marc Gasol he's Nike as well but it's flashy versus a hyper dunks right here he has his own little special logo and not to mention the shoe size what I mean this is Mark's is 17 marks one portion of students summer time he plays for his national team so when he comes to us in any preseason he's like chug I why try out the new high for dunks they're fine I'm cool with it I'll be found that chute so it's good that he has that availability and also some of our other suture Nike athletes Nike schism shoes in the offseason to try stuff like that so when I get there special makeup shoot it's no surprise they've already had the time to try the shoe out and was his superstition if he has March just likes to be uniform so if we're in our white uniform he's gonna wear its white shoes okay we're gonna wear our navy icon Jersey he's gonna wear his Navy shoes he's gonna wear the statement which is our alternate jerseys and more baby blue shoes and then we have Andrew Harrison he's one of our Under Armour guys the only owner oh my god we have so they're just a basic shoe they sent him before his signature who came in oh they wanted him to be comfortable in this shoe before they made more shoes in line with our color scheme and things that nature they just wanted to send him a basic shoe that no they know he's not gonna wear and in their season to cinema' shoes back because he took care a lot of people what the unfortunate events that have been Houston this past summer so a lot of players like in offseason what we'll do is we'll go ahead and ship them majority of their shoes because we know we can get more to next year and what we'll do is we'll keep probably like four to six pairs on hand so if they come in all season do a summer workout they have some shoes here [Music] so as weird just no overflow storage this is what could pretty much everything on hand like I mentioned eight of Harrison these are the white shoes that he wears so how much wears as a home road wherever they also sent him a navy player that he could wear on the road or alternate wherever you can be besides this is that pier okay I mentioned my colleague has the color ways here's a blue here that might be my favorite pair so far I like that one hey Marcus all the baby blue oh so that's this your shoe the shoe I had shown you know upstairs was overflowed of last year's model I have some ideas athletes like Chandler Parsons nothing too fancy just basic just yesterday Nike and I were on the phone and also email pouring shoes for black history like I said when that comes I've got mine space board and that's gonna saw the overflow storage medium small right here just overflow of our shower shoes and then like crisis t-shirts travel t-shirts practice here game gear game shorts then we have more uniforms right here this is a statement jersey right here this is the icon right here then we have the association and then we have one more uniform which I'll show you in a minute is our fork uniform Nike College is our city uniform so we're gonna build on MLK days we special for the city of Memphis no you see of Memphis but the United States of America in the world we're gonna wear this total of 10 times this year all Black History Month hit home when we're a couple times in March and also in April we're able to wear this uniform up to 12 times moving we're up to 10 times so we just want to make sure we could TV carry dr. King's legacy not just for his birthday but throughout the rest of the season well I got you for two is that you're able to wear up a lot of combinations we have a special shooting shirt which where of this we can also wear the MLK shirt with this we also can wear the NBA is providing a Black History Month t-shirt with this so this uniforms will be warned multiple times but in multiple combinations I'm gonna put you on the spot here what is your favorite Memphis jersey well there's two of them it was from our ABA team Memphis pros it had a good hot colors worked great you know ice wish we had a red white and blue ball to play with in that game but we didn't but here it's a great uniform my other second pairs uniform that we've had us portion of have a jersey made for myself I'm sorry I'm not trying to be talking anything before Jerry West left us we had team flow that day I had Jerry hold up the Jersey that said Sweeney 13 shook my hands like my press conference Jersey okay and the funny thing about that Jersey to me it's special because as Jerry's teener to Grizzlies we never had a number 13 player we had one after him but not law he is here and while he's with the Lakers he never held number 13 Jersey because as well Chamberlain was retired so the only number 1330 he ever held his hand for a Memphis Grizzlies to me nice okay as you can see right now we're in a brilliance Maine locker room so this is where all the players we greet this is new too so we haven't seen a locker room that has I mean what do you call these couches or lounge I with all the big player would just sit in there lock yeah so it's wise to keep a clean Locker because at the end of day you'll have to sit in your mess this is almost compatible to me as a first-class airline seat right now I'll just go through something I like you have a brand right these are the Nike - um I'm Cheryl years ago like we always say we're based here for the players comfort so he actually had them to himself so he brought him back to Memphis from his offseason home and he's like Chuck him aware days I'm like that's fine because it's compliant and be a rule because it's white matches their uniform and also most importantly you're comfortable wearing a shoe so if you're comfortable winning I'm five so we got Mario Chalmers Mario love shoes Mario one day might want to wear team Jordans or one day you might feel like he wants to wear Tyrese or one day he might want to wear Paul George one day he might want to wear Kobe but he's a veteran I respect him he also knows it's a rule yeah say like rule you wear white gray or black or color shoes in your color scheme so then you have someone like mark over here the baby blue shoes icons Navy associations white but he can wear any of these shoes and any combinations with all of our 3d effects but like I said mark wants to be compliant whatever his jersey shorts or his shoes on my Colleen here's some more of his goons I know everyone loves Jordans these were the ones he is supposed to wear for Veterans Day right there for our troops week join brain is here also personalized every drone athletes their own shower shoes some guys like the ice slides like these right here at the end of the day I just want to player be able to be comfortable in the locker area in the unifor in their shoes so they can go out and perform or all these fans in the world Tariq he's been trying to tie race this year stuff like that he has different options right here some signature shoes right here that Nike made him but his preference was the car reeks gonna name some grizzly greats I kind of want you to tell me about you know how they are shoe wise and we'll start off with Jason Williams he started when he first came to us he's with m1 that's what a.m. was popular so he had have shoes in every color way imaginable he would change his shoes every game he you had shoes say white boy on the shoe you just always changed his shoes he always want different shoe options so J will went through a lot of shoes when when he came back a second time around he has more about comfort so he rarely changed his shoes out let's go with Vince Carter this was hard to get him to change shoes I'm like look at him Vince's shoes I'm like man these shoes are done they've been through it we got changed his shoes so over time Vince like you're right Chuck let's change him out or eventually he look at me like it's time so we knew what that meant and actually guys she he was good to go yeah let's go with Eddie Jones Eddie Jones when I first joined athletes I ever had he liked to change shoes every other game he was fortunate to have a lot of Jordans and he made sure he adopted me to wear and last but not least let's go with the great Chuck Sweeney Chuck Sweeney's collection I have a lot of shoes be honest with you I have more shoes and groceries at my house I like Chuck Taylors when I was fortunate to go to San Francisco on a team trip got a converse tour you can personalize your own Chuck Taylors so I have a limited edition 101 Chuck Sweeney all-stars so that's what I prefer to wear off the court on the court whenever but my also motto fair shoe I had to go with a parachute from Nike is to Ermac science so Chuck man thank you for letting us come out and check out the facility man it's pretty awesome you guys have it organized you events doing a great job man Oh things or to appreciate you coming out here like you said Vince is here with me as well it's not a one-person job I appreciate Vince everything he's done I appreciate you coming out to our facility today you took time here today to come see us come to Memphis experience some barbecue get also one lucky fan might be lucky to have Griggs care package like we say where the bearer so follow Koichi media CEO is ki media on Instagram to find out how to win that lucky package some Chuck man let's go get it together sounds good [Music]

Channel: Sports Dissected by COISKI

Views: 424,108

Keywords: coiski, content is king, media, digital media, Memphis Grilzzlies, Memphis, Grizzlies, Locker Room, Arena, Basketball, Sneakers, Sneaker Room, Sneaker Closet, Shoe Room, Shoe Closet, Facility, Facilities, Memphis Grizzlies Facility, Tour, Locker Room Tour, Jordans, Adidas, Under Armour, Mike Conley, Marc Gasol

Id: Ssk450g5thk

Length: 14min 59sec (899 seconds)

Published: Mon Jan 15 2018