Inside the Portland Trail Blazers Locker Room | Sole Access

[Music] DJ greetings everyone I'm your host George kill and we're here in Portland Oregon at the Trailblazers practice facility to get another episode of Soul access let's check it out what's up George Brent how you doing man I'm doing well how are you I'm doing pretty good come on in nice to meet you yeah nice to meet you too so check it out we want to get another episode of Soul access so we want you to give us a tour of this place awesome let's do it cool this is where part of the magic happens got some of our new jerseys for this season hanging up over there um basically I'm sizing the guys right now so I'm hanging uh one of each size going from medium all the way to 4X tall um 5x tall on the sleeve jersey cuz they fit a little bit more snug um so I got my sizes set up there I have the guys come in whenever they first get into town throw on the jerseys see what size fits best and then work with them on that so I see they're planning on retiring your jersey pretty soon I don't think it'll be retired anytime soon but uh we get a jersey with our our name and what year we started whenever we first uh start with the organization so a cool little thing that they do that I haven't seen anywhere else this is a garage this is all stuff luggage um apparel sweats uh practice shorts um anything you see the guys wearing this for the coaches uh staff and players um so this is all coming in new this year we spend about $250,000 a year um on all all the Divas product we don't have anywhere to store it right now so it's all in the garage we'll start breaking the boxes out here in a couple weeks once once we get the players in this is a little bit more secure area I've got my cabinets here I had these put in 2 years ago space savers gives me room for everything that we got going here so all these shoes are just outfit the staff to start the season on this side these were all specialty shoes from last season got some of Dame's his gold shoes from what was it the uh Oscars night yeah gramms um and then we got his Rose City debut which pretty sweet U we got a few other pair Chinese New Year one of his options they sent and Dame is one that you said switches his shoes like consistently all the time yeah he likes to wear shoes a lot of games U but what he will do is he won't decide what shoes he wants to wear so he'll pick out of like four or five pair every game so he'll put the Reds the blacks the blues or the greens whatever it is set them all out there and then kind of pick right before the game with which ones he wants to wear so it's a a little bit high maintenance but he's been worth it so far um so then as we as we go down I just give each guy their own cubby as you can tell these are all last season's models cuz I haven't gotten all the new shoes in yet the Marcus still send about 125 pair of season so I just kind of separate him by color with his special makeups I'll do all the all the blacks up here the Reds down there you can see we kind of Mark them second half white um second half black they'll send some to start the season then they'll send some for the second half of the season in December um and then they'll do a playoff colorway as well let's see man some of these I couldn't even couldn't even tell you exactly what what part of the season they came from s so that's his second half of the Season home white colorway our team doesn't have any rules on whether you wear white black at home or on the road um I like everybody to match we wear white socks at home black socks on the road so I try to get the guys in mostly white colorways at home and mostly black colorways on the road or red depending on on what they're doing um they don't always listen but you know there's another another version of the black and I sent I mailed him right after the season ended about 125 pair and I've still got all these left over and I always keep you know 20 or 30 pair around just if they come in in the summer and to work out and stuff like that I was telling you about the the guy who designed the shoe um and this is the shoe that he designed the kind of the home color way um this size 9 and a half this is not Lamarcus is obviously noticeably smaller it's a one of our season ticket holders he's a he sits court side every game um he's disabled and LaMarcus and Nike worked with him on designing uh designing a shoe for Lamarcus to wear so he designed a black color way and a white color way um and had Lamarcus wear them in a game later in the season so so it was a good thing that Nike did get a little bit of awareness um for him as well there's his red yeah a little too much for me I like them a little bit more plain they're definitely getting louder and louder they're trying to cater to the to the younger generation and and they like all those bright colors I got a pair of shoes for you talking about talk about loud this is what Nike sent for Wesley Matthews to practice in and Wesley looked at him said I don't know if I can wear that shoe but that's just that's the way that things are moving right now the bright yellows bright oranges bright pinks bright greens you know and some of the guys are receptive to it some of the guys aren't you know Wesley obviously looked at those and said they're not not within our color way as much as I'd like so not going to wear them um but did go with that where you still get the the infrared um with the dark red like I said these are all last year shoes they'll have maybe five or six different makes or models to offer each guy so what they'll do is We'll order them all in all the different sizes kind of set them all out let the guys decide what shoe they want to wear and then we'll stock up on that shoe in all the different colorways for the season since we're getting a new perspective from you how long does that wear test time take before the season begins for each player it's pretty quick a lot of the guys it's about look as much as it is feel so they'll go with what looks good first and most of them will stick with that all the shoes have been tested and and work really well so it's rare that a guy will put a shoe on him and say it's just not a very good shoe um so I mean all the shoes work really well so it's more about look you know than it is feel I think if you get a guy that gets hurt CJ McCollum broke a bone in his foot last season in the preseason and then we had to get him in a different shoe that was more stiff and you know and didn't bend as much so uh once he had healed so and then it was more about function than it was look but each guy gets her own cubby um obviously a special makeup guy like Lamarcus uh Wesley Chris cayman's won Mo Williams was won last year uh we'll do a whole a full row depending on how much they need um a guy a rookie he obviously will get less shoes throughout the season so that's when he'll get a single single Square type setup so you work your way up into into owning that full cubby and you've been doing this for 3 years and I think you're about to embark on your first signature athlete that you've had so tell us how you prepare in that type of situation those guys are pretty easy to take care of cuz everything's catered towards them with their own shoe so I think it's going to be a lot easier so I'll have a lot more inventory and things like that a lot more storage um but when it comes down to what shoe he wants to wear it's pretty basic it's all about colors after that which is easy it's hard for a guy who doesn't have a signature shoe doesn't know what shoe he wants to wear because then there's a lot more options um I had Myers Leonard I think changed shoes four times last year um so that's when you're you know from game to game like H I don't know or if they don't play well maybe the shoe doesn't feel very good you slightly spraying an ankle or something like that they're double taping my foot doesn't fit in the shoe anymore cuz they're T they double taped so and I'll call Nike and they'll send three more pair and go which ones you like now and try to figure all that out so tell us more about these I think it's kind of cool uh in your job that you get to kind of have some kind of say so in the design of this yeah a little bit I mean who knows who knows the room better than me I'm back here all the time I'm doing all the stocking um all the ordering as well so I know exactly how many units of everything I have coming so um no better person to try to design a room to store everything than the person who's actually doing all the stocking so um so yeah this was something I really pushed for they were expensive um I didn't know if they were going to be able to get him but in the end it worked out um my boss was great got it all pushed through budget wise um and got them here and at our Arena so it was about $100,000 for for these cabinets alone Thomas Robinson and uh Joel Freeland wore the same size shoe and the same shoe last year um like I said uh oh and Myers Leonard but I just kind of filled their shoes up with all the same size and and same shoe so I just had different colorways and then I have Victor C here um he was pretty basic too he wore the same shoe just one size below these 15 and a halfs are pretty rare once you get over 14 they don't make half sizes um he was an in between so they made him some special 15 and a halfs to fit him 15 and 1 12 16 and2 those are really hard to get and typically a special makeup a special model that you have to find there's a Hyper Rev all the guys Tred to wear that it's got a little uh a little booty instead of a tongue to where it doesn't spread out so once you put orthotics in there almost all the guys wear Orthotics you got to take the insole out put the orthotic in it's a lot of the guys foot feet sat too high to where it wouldn't fit in the booty with the tape and everything else so a lot of guys like the shoe but couldn't really wear it cuz it didn't fit properly so you get a bunch of pair of hyper refs sitting around size 16s and 17s sit yeah cut about 5 in off of them then I'd be able to fit in them um and then we get into all the apparel start out with the with the bottom stuff we've got uh all the compression over here one thing that's gotten really big the last three years is the long tights you see all the guys wearing the long tights now the thing that makes you have to have so much stuff is you have you need to have about seven sets of everything so I have a road practice set a road shoot around set a home shoot around set a home PR practice set a backup practice set a game set for the road and a game set for home so no matter what a guy wears you have to have one of everything for every one of those sets it's been nice working with Adidas their products getting a lot better every year um which is good for us and they're definitely listening to equipment managers listen to the players and um trying to outfit the players with with what they want a lot of players wear these like things that cut right here I don't know what they are it's like they look like capri pants I guess yeah yeah that's we call them huckleberries but I'm from the south so you get your get your your Huck fins on and uh but but yeah they're wearing the the 3/4 the Capri uh whatever you want to call them but and right when that right when you get those in and get everything stock they're going to come up with some other style they want to wear and that's going to be out of style anyway here's the new game shorts with the uh with the logo moved you can see it's up here now it used to be down on the bottom of the bottom of the leg come on in the locker room we'll start over here with the new addition Chris Cayman he's wearing the Hyperfuse the same shoe he wore last year and this is actually last year's model cuz we haven't got the new one in um and he wears a 17 you can see every every guy's got a pair of shower shoes um can't live without these you don't want anybody getting athletes feed or anything else I order running shoes for all the guys as well in the offseason cuz we'll take the guys over to the track uh local high school track and they'll do some Sprints and things like that so I always have some some running shoes for the guys as well obviously the weather's not the greatest in the winter but in the summer Portland's a great place to be talk about der real right because we we've talked to him on a number of occasions about signing to Dwayne Way's brand and I see they have a limitless amount of colorways for him yeah it took till about midseason last season before they kind of got down exactly what he wanted um he was wearing Dwayne Wade's signature shoe for the first like month and didn't really like it um so he did like the uh just kind of their team shoe that they have um and so they've got a rep that deals pretty much with him and Dwayne Wade um maybe a few other their athletes and he came up and did some special makeups for him um you can see his orthotic the most colorful orthotic that they make um so he does we do the same thing take the insole out and then actually we'll cut the orthotic ourselves to shape it to the shoe and then put it back in the shoe and then he's ready to go and then even sent some bright greens for green week um they sent some purple ones for MLK and um Black History Month uh which was pretty cool so they take pretty good care of him get to Myers you can see him he hasn't decided what shoe he really likes um this is a Zoom Soldier and he cuts a strap off um so you don't have the crown on the front of there but they don't they don't make the shoe anymore and it's hard to get I had I think three pair left um he finally ripped through two of them the other day and now he's down to one um so we got to figure out what kind of shoe he wants to play in this season he wore these in the other day which are the old school LeBron's um which are pretty cool you have to have that all red one around here somewhere is that he probably put that away yeah I think he took it home at the end of the season that was actually the main shoe that he came and asked me for he's like I don't know where it's at if it's at the arena or in your road bag or whatever but I got to make sure I I get that one back so I think I did ship it to him afterwards CJ made up he went on Nike id and made a few of his special colorways for himself um like I said earlier he's the one that broke the bone in his foot he was wearing the Kobe with that and it's just a a lighter uh more flexible shoe so he moved to the Hyperfuse um that's a little bit more stiff gives him a little bit more support there's one of his uh a special colorway he came up with and that's a Zoom Soldier as well so a little bit different than the Hyperfuse but still gives you a pretty good amount of support this is what daman's going to be playing in uh to start the season this season like you said he's coming up with his own signature shoes I'm sure it'll fit name pretty well I know he wants to go to like a a lower a lower top shoe which is is kind of a kind of a mid or a lower top shoe um that he likes so and we're not going to ask you to you know tell us too much about the new upcoming signature but if you could tell us from seeing it on the other side if you can give us one word to describe it what would you say um one word to describe it streamline I think it'll be a shoe that people like wearing around and on court every game I would come come up and this is the this is the setup I would do not knowing which shoes he wanted to wear on the road at home I'd put him all out there like that have his locker all set up so he walks in he sits down he starts getting dressed and then he'll come up he'll put put this pair on to warm up and then come back in and switch it out and put that pair on for the game um and then it got where Adidas said we want you in these shoes and he would say ah well sometimes I want to wear them sometimes I don't so um you know it's all on the players and what they feel most comfortable in um look good feel good play good you know and that's what it's all about so and I know being in this locker room I'm sure you've witnessed a few four bar Fridays um I have one of our coaches actually does uh does a little four bar Fridays on uh during the season on Fridays before the games um and I've seen a few of those but uh yeah those guys are good I don't mess with any of that stuff that's a little out of my league um Steve Blake's new he's got a few different pair he likes wearing the co in La he'll do here's a colorway I don't think I showed you in there um that was his playoff colorway from last season uh which was pretty nice a little bit busy busy up here but I do like the how it shines and um you can definitely see it on the court so um but he's the same I would set all set three or four pair of shoes up for him um you know each game put them all out there he's he stti pretty much sticks to to black with black socks uh white with white socks and then he'll throw the Reds in kind of when he feels like it so and BR whatever shoe he was playing in for games one and two against the Rockets that's the shoe you need to keep him in believe me we we did unfortunately it doesn't work like that so every now and then you come down to earth Nick's obviously playing overseas right now with the France national team so I don't even have any shoes in his locker I don't know what he's going to be wearing whenever he comes in he wears his shoes until you get holes in them and his foot goes through the end and then he he gets upset and doesn't want to try a new pair of shoes on I can barely get him to break in a new pair of shoes you get that and then you get a guy that wants a new pair of shoes you know every day derell wears a new pair of shoes every game yeah so the max he'll wear him is maybe two games but he doesn't like doesn't like the broken in feel he likes it to be stiff and and really have that new shoe feel every game um Wesley's tough we did some special makeups for him last year um that are pretty nice there's another one of the special makeups I don't know what he does but one of his main problems is after two or three games this the whole sole right here will just start to rip off I think CU he's got so much weight and moved so fast when he's running and and stopping I don't know what it is about rolling that toe over right there um but this always rips off and last year um I think I had to glue about five pair of shoes cuz it'll start to rip and I I get some shoe glue push it all and then I'll wrap it up with tape let it sit overnight and I'll get another game out of it before it rips again on to Thomas Robinson he's always Chang engine um he's an interesting guy he likes all the bright colors there's some personal walkaround shoes those are his mlks from last year he wanted to switch out the Sho strings to be a little bit different so we went some red Sho strings um he brought out the pennies for a couple games I don't even know what those things are and then he's got his uh Hyperdunks that he played in most of the season last season would you say Thomas Robinson is the biggest sneaker head on the team uh um it's probably between him and Myers like I said Myers is a pretty big sneak sneaker head and uh but Thomas definitely is right up there with him um I haven't been to Thomas's house but he told me he's got over 250 pair of shoes just in his bedroom stacked up that he'll wear one time and put him back in the box and who knows when he'll break him back out again so Under Armour takes takes good care whe to Thrill um he's got all kinds of different shoes and this he actually just cleaned his locker out so this is the cleanest his has ever been those are some new ones there's the red colorway of his newest addition that he'll probably wear to start the season so now we get to what I feel is the most interesting man on the team shoewise Robin Lopez tell us about him and you know his artistic behavior on his shoes well first of all he wears the biggest shoe on the team which is a 20 so he's got a lot of canvas to work with as you can see I think he started doing this uh towards the end of the season I think it was in the playoffs is when he started coming up with uh with all his little artistic designs he grabs a Sharpie whether it be on the plane um in a hotel or at home and he just starts drawing on his shoes uh he comes back into my equipment room and ask me for a new pair of shoes uh that he can draw on you know every every three or four days and he'll carry the Box around that I give him with the shoes in there half drawn and his Sharpie inside the box he brings it on the plane brings it on the buses um and it's pretty cool he does some pretty awesome work as you know Wes is known as Iron Man um so it had a picture of Iron Man all around his shoes and Wes took the pair home and and and kept them he was going to play in them and they he said they look too cool so he didn't want to mess them up as you can see the the design gets all smeared from playing in him um but he's kind of kind of got a a little design for his his hair right there uh kind of like a sideshow Bob so um his numbers right there I would guess just whatever he's feeling at the time and kind of just brings it brings his personality into it this is our training room uh we remodeled a couple years ago uh state-of-the-art it's pretty awesome bright um gives everybody all the tools to do their job keep the players healthy um we were really fortunate last year to have one of the healthiest teams in the league um I think four out of our five starters started all 82 games which is unheard of um so hopefully we can carry that over state-of-the-art weight room this was all remodeled as well uh we got a beautiful facility here we're lucky I remember you guys came to San Antonio and I saw every one of the players weighing themselves after the game what is the significance of that yeah we were carrying a scale um mostly was for hydration you can weigh him before the game and then after the game to see how much fluid he lost so I think what we were looking for not we what our athletic training staff was looking for was how much weight they lost during the game to see how many how much fluid they need to be drinking to to sustain their weight and that way you keep them as hydrated as they were when they started the game so we did all kinds of little interesting tests last year um to to see kind of what works what doesn't work and um and so I think that's that's what that was part of so BR before we close tell us how you got your start in this um I have a pretty unique path to the NBA um I actually moved to San Diego right after high school um and my neighbor was a ball boy growing up for the Golden State Warriors so he graduated college moved up to the Bay Area to be an assistant equip manager up there so I went and visited him a few times and went to a few Warriors games met Eric how and the equip manager with the warriors uh became good friends with him and uh he called me when he had a position open asked me if I wanted to move up and work with the Warriors so i' had never worked in basketball um never watched much basketball um so I didn't know what I was getting myself into but figured it'd be fun for a year or so and 10 years later here I am still in the NBA so I was the assistant equipment manager with them for six seasons um Portland had a position open up here and so I applied went through a few interviews um got a little nervous ended up getting the position and uh and it's worked out really well all right and shout out to Eric one of the hardest working people in the industry most definitely most definitely big shout out to Eric taught me taught me uh most everything I know and um and great guy well Brent thank you for taking out the time to you know give us a tour man for sure all right see you soon yes sir

Channel: Nice Kicks

Views: 745,731

Keywords: Nice Kicks, Portland Trail Blazers (Professional Sports Team), Sole Access, Sneaker Collection, Sneakers, Sneaker, Collection, Sneaker Room, Room, Locker Room, Locker, Damian Lillard, adidas, Nike, Jordan, LaMarcus Aldridge (Award Winner), Sneak Peek, Sole, Access

Id: CtNJDR4Uo2Y

Length: 22min 44sec (1364 seconds)

Published: Tue Oct 21 2014