This episode is presented to you by Draft Kings. The crown is yours.
Mm hmmmmm, and welcome back to all the smoke.
Man.
This is a long time coming, jack Man.
I almost had some tears when he when he got out the car.
Get some cheers up here too.
I bothered this man the last three years.
Harassed him like I felt mad at some point, like harassed, read his ass, and then we finally got big cysts on the show last.
That's not why I'm doing. You said you would do it. You gave me your word. You gave me your word. Why I'm doing said when yeah, yeah, you said you see this episode or fiction.
You said when you got some time, you will pull up. And man, we appreciate. We know we're right before the playoffs.
Right now.
You told us your playoff schedule. That's incredible. But it's good to see man. Welcome to the show. Regi Miller appreciate.
Smoke. Yes, I want it all by a whole bunch of stuff. I want to tuck your ship. They might think you smoke before the show. You talk to that for your record, and Stack will probably attest to this. I have never ever hoped in my life until ever. Ever, I won't be peer pressure. There little for that. I have no problem with people that do. It's just not my thing. I get high on life and other things. It is so good to see. Oh my god, I came in here to look first of all, Mad Backs.
People don't know mad Box here. Yes, come on, man, I got a podcast because he's on the payroll now, brother Free Crazy certified the best podcast out there for me to be a part of it. I've known you guys for a while. I love and respect all you guys, and uh, let's get into it. What do y'all want to know from me?
The feeling is definitely miche. Well, let's get this out of the way, Madison the Palace. Let's go get this part out the way. A lot's been told about it. Me personally, I'm glad to see you because this I've never had a chance to tell you that.
I'm sorry. Just let me finish though.
Because like I, we are understood what our motivation was for that season.
It wasn't for us, it was for you as a whole.
Motivation for getting things done the right way and getting the championship was for you. So I never got a chance to apologize you for my actions now with me saying that I love you even more because you defended me, because you knew that I was just being a lawyer teammate. I wasn't you know, I wasn't not there being a thug and nothing like that. So it meant a lot to me. But we never had a chance to talk about it during during the time has passed, so much
time has passed. How have your relationship been with guys that was involved in guys that was on our team.
First of all, I gotta take a drink cuz I told you I didn't want to go there.
Man, I'm trying to hold mine in all right.
Let me.
You don't need to say to me. Man, come on, man, so.
You don't need to apologize to me. First of all, you young cats, and when I say young, I mean Jamal, Jamaine Al yourself. Run Those last few years in Indiana my best years. I didn't have my superpowers, but I felt and you guys made me feel like I was super Man. We had some dogs, man, We had a squad that was arguably and I played on some Indiana teams that were destined should have could have, but always came short. That team. We were stacked. Man. We had
the best interior defender in Jermaine. We had the best perimeter defender in my opinion to this day. And Ron just acquired a guy. And it's a lot like in nineteen ninety four when we traded for Byron Scott and I know we're going to get into mentors and all that stuff. In nineteen ninety four under Larry Brown and all that. We got Byron halfway through the season, and he taught us what winning was all about, coming from the Lakers, him being a champion. You coming having been
a champion with these young guys. We had just lost to Detroit the year before without you, and we smacked them there. But you'll need to apologize because that's basketball, that's life. You know, Shit's gonna happen. And even though we were shorthanded, I mean, you were fifteen games or thirty games. Fifteen games started off at thirty though, right.
No, no, I mine got thirty thirty games suspension, yeah're right was thirty.
Okay, those last four to five months when we were shorthanded. Band of brothers. Like when people talk about band of brothers, I mean people forget we had to play the next night with like five or six guys because everyone was suspended still made the playoffs, and still made the playoffs. That was the best man, you young cats you know where.
Racially it bothered me because after, you know, some time passed.
I had a conversation with.
Rick and he told me that they actually came to you before they signed me, because they knew you were on your way out, actually vouching me when I even knowing me.
I knew your body of work, and that's all that mattered to me.
Well, when a guy like you, Hall of Famer, one of the best to ever do it, vouch us for you somebody, I'm.
Even going to take it a step further. When they came to me, I went to them and said, bring me off the bench. That dude needs to be starting. Think about what the starting five would have been with you and Ron in there. I was like, bring me off the bench, and Rick looked at me crazy.
He's like, don't get ahead of yourself, same way I'm looking at you.
No, but that's how I want, That's how I felt and perceived your game. I was like start him. He's like, no, think about this, and he knew I didn't have my superpowers that last year. Start, you who's going to be able to guard this dude in the second unit? And that's how I got him. We got him. That's how it was. Like, Okay, but I'm just letting y'all know I'm cool with it. If this dude is starting and I'm backing them up, well I'm all right with that.
But those were people don't understand that That night was surreal because Detroit had they were the defending champs. We were coming off. In my mind, in my mind, the replay loop of Tayshawn blocking my shit. I want to get back. I'm hurt, I'm in the cast, but we're going in. See. I always prided myself doing stuff on the road. Everyone could play at home. Everyone's good, everyone
talks shit. Everyone you know, you got your girl, your family, whatever. Everyone, How are you with twelve versus twenty thousand when you go into real enemy territory? That's how I always viewed myself, my game, my team, all my teammates, how are you when you go into someone else? We went into Detroit, We're like, we're going to make a statement, and we kicked the dog shit out of them. Fifteen until.
Do you know, do you actually know what was said in the game, because I don't know if you ever heard that story, Jamal Tensley, I'm at the free throw line.
Yes, he tells Ron you can get you, you can get your look back.
I'll turn around like bro, yeah, I'm like.
So when I heard that Ron was going and Ben, when I worked, I after I made the free throw, you see, I ran back down and pushed Ron off and I guarded Ben and when he got they threw the ball to Bend. I just let it's a toke turnin it now, so I just let him score. And that's when Ron got the file. Anyway, what even guard?
But what was the look back? What happened? What it led to?
It was something from the previous then the finals, these commerce final year before the rivalry was built there. I wasn't there, so I didn't know. But you know, I'm lawyer, and that's how it started.
Which to a point, they didn't like us. We didn't like that.
I mean, okay, all right, I mean that's what it is, all right.
I get I get it. But then once if people again go back to the tape and by the way, you and Jail did a great job of putting this all in words and film on the Netflix Malice Palace. I'm over there with Ron, just stroking him while he's laying on the scores table, thinking everything is diffused. Everyone's talking. I mean, that's how you know. Little scrums go, everyone puffs out their chest and everyone breaks it up, and tech, carey, double tech, Let's shoot some free throws. Let's get on
out of here. That's what we thought until because Ron didn't even see the cup coming, I did and slow three D motion flying down bam. And then I said to myself, oh, he was gone. Bam. He turned into the Hulk. He turned green, and I tried to grab him, but he was gone, and I said to myself, it's right or die. I mean, I didn't care about myself. I had to get him back in the safety somewhere on the floor, and I didn't care about suspensions at that point. I don't even know when you jumped in,
did you go? When he went? As soon as I saw him go, I hopped over.
I'm gone. So I went right after.
Him, and it was I mean, people think it lasted like you know, twenty minutes, fifteen minutes, it was like a minute and a half, two minutes. Then it was quick. It was quick, but there was a lot of damage done in that minute and a half. I don't know how. I think Chuck person. Somehow we got Ron back on the floor and it was even crazier on the floor with you. The police tried to them to come up, has his mace out and getting ready to spray Ron, and I I'm like, what is your problem? And he's like,
we got to calm this situation down. I'm like, yes, you do. You see all those people that are coming down the Yeah, we got this. We're at Center Court. It was crazy, it was and then trying to get into the tunnel and the beer and the popcorn and the spit then it was it was bananas and it's funny. When it went down. The fans are deplorable. This is unacceptable. How can this happen? Immediately that's when we were in
the locker room. It's all about the fans. By the time we landed in Indiana, I felt we were all headed to Rikers Island. Yeah, but they flipped the whole narrative. Every everybody getting arrested were getting arrested. Stern Stern called someone like, nah, it was it was us. We were the villains. And I mean you started by saying calling yourself or someone called you a thug. I don't like
that word. I don't like that word because they tried to put us under certain stereotypes African American black, however you want to call us, and it painted us as they painted a picture of us that was not accurate. Something we're not something none of us were. All of us weren't, and it hurts some of us. You know, nothing's guaranteed. Championships aren't guaranteed. You know, you gotta chip, you gotta chip, Max gotta chips. I came close. I
could never get over the mountaintops. It's not guaranteed we would have won that year, but damn it, I would have loved to have seen us at full strength against whom ever, matter, whomever, because, like I said, we had everything. We had scoring, we had defense, we could play slow, we could play fast with Jamal, we could play big, we could play small.
Was Jonathan Bender there at the time. Yes, we had youth.
I was the old head. We had everything. We were well coached, you know, Carlisle Championship coach himself. But don't you ever apologize to me or anyone else. That's life, that's basketball. Shit happens. Man. I was honored to be on that team again. Y'all made me feel like Superman. And I mean just being around you cats every day in practice, it was. It was a different I came from, you know, I came from Chris Mullen and Mark Jackson,
Derrick McKee. I mean, we were Sam Perkins. We were an old team that went to the chant not old, but veteran old, old team. And then once we got to the finals and lost to the Lakers, Jermaine comes in and Al Harrington. We drafted Al. I mean we went younger. Larry's gone, Larry Bird is gone, Isaiah's in. So it was a different vibe, different and that's just how it was. And I said to myself, how can
I get Jermaine and Al Harrington, baby Al Jonathan? How can I get these young guys thinking like veterans and turn the switch as quickly as possible Because I only had some I knew I only had so many years left. And that's you know, I wrote them hard. I talked shit to them a lot because I wanted to see
the name of the show, all the smoke. I want to see if they can handle it, because if they can't handle it for me in practice, how on the hell are they going to handle going into the garden, going into Philly with Ai, going playing Detroit the New Bat. I mean, how a y'all going to handle that? Y'all can't handle me riding you every single day in practice. That's my job is to ride y'all, get you to
a place where nothing fazes you. And they did, and you know, with the help of my David boys, because Al was with us, with with Dale and Antonio, so he was around them a lot. Same with Crow and Jeff Foster Feisty, so they were around they understood. You know, when we walk, we walk with their chest out. We talk ship. We don't don't ever take a step back, man, don't take a step back anything, take two steps forward. That's why when me going in the stands, you go
in the stands, we're taking step forwards. Man. I ain't taking a step back. Okay, you can find me, you can suspend me, you can talk shit about me all you want, but I'm gonna do what's right. That's my teammate that's going out there who just got assaulted with a cup full of beer. You don't know what was in that, and he's going to go handle this business.
I have to go. I have to go because if you don't go later on in the locker room and you know, the whole locker rooms are you don't want to be called out man, you know, and then here's what's gonna happen. But he's gonna come. Film sasters like this. Coaches, y'all go, y'all, y'all can go. We're good and slow mo, what's you doing? Where are you hold on? Was like, where are you? Let me? I'll rewind it. So what did you say? You said you were aware holding each
other accountable. That's why, that's why I wanted to get the young gig. We had to hold each other accountable, and then started with the young guys. I got to hold them accountable because they'll understand later on. You know, you had already wanted Chip because I'm sure Timmy, Steve Smith, Steve Smith, they all held you accountable. And you got to hold the young guys accountable because they're coming in young, loose a lot of talent, but they don't they don't know,
don't know how to be a professional. They don't know how to be a professional. I'll being on time. That was for me. The best thing in my career that happened being drafted by Indiana was I came in with a lot of old dudes, Herb Williams, Verne Fleming, Clint Cherson, Steve Stapanovich, and my biggest mentor of all time there, John Long. I don't know if he was the two guard and he had played eighteen years himself mainly was Isaiah and them in Detroit, and he knew he was
just a place soldier until I took over. I never started a game my rookie year. I played anywhere from fifteen to twenty minutes, sometimes more, sometimes less. But every game John in nineteen eighty seven, eighty eight, and this is you know when you just had VHS. It's every game. Go over the scouty report, go over who you're playing, their tendencies, every single who to talk shit to, who not to talk shit to? This is what you can get away with. This official says this every game. He
was thirty eight at a time. I'm twenty one, and I hung on every word. You want to stay in this This is what you have to do. Film work, prep is key and that's how I was molded. That's how I was taught. You come early, you stay late. When practice is over. Practice is not over right, you're young, Actually not over. Practice is almost starting. You have a two hour practice, and back then there were two and a half three hours because there was no regulation like
there is now. You're done with your three hour practice, you have another forty five minutes hour of shooting that you.
Gotta do and then wait sometimes too Red, Why do you think that the NBA moved away from veteran leadership and presence? We've harped our five years on this show, as I feel like that's what one of the things that the league is missing is. As you just spoke to how important every word that your ogs gave you when you first came in the game. Why do you think the NBA has moved away from that?
Well? Number one, I think the physicality in the game has moved away. Where is the veterans? That's what veterans because they've seen and done just about everything. And I think, let's face that the league has gotten younger. You know, when guys started to come out of high school and they stopped that then yet to go to college for
one years. So now you're nineteen or twenty coming in, So the league got younger, and I just don't think there's a point of it, like for me looking at the heat and then winning them championships to have you Donnis Haslam on that team, who may have played one hundred career minutes out of those eighteen years. But Pat Lay said, nope. You sit your ass on that bench and you make sure that locker room is tight, and if anyone takes out d Wade, anyone takes out Lebron,
you need that. You need that for championship. I'm sorry one every team had them. And the physicality in our game is gone because you go to the replay now, so you can't get away with the check an elbow because now guys are flopping and if you stay on the floor long enough, they have to report the don't look at the replay up right. Before you used to be able to chuck hold hit. It was a must max the biggest thing. And the players are different.
What is this called.
Cross fire? Right? So I had to go across instead of screen on shot? Patrick Ewing on Elijah one cross five, cross five, I'm one eighty going. And you had to again because if you don't in the locker room, you can't set it. You can't set a screen, you can't get me free. So you had to sacrifice your body absolutely.
And if you if you didn't meet guys like Shack at the free throw line of damn, the three point line.
You buried. You can't do nothing with nothing you can do. You had to meet them up there. Nothing you can do, and you you had to take your lips. You had to take your punishment. You had to can't be a punk man. It's different. I respect some of the aspects of the game now, but it's funny because starting now, starting Saturday, the officials are gonna call it a different way now. So for five months, it was freedom of a movement. You could do. You can shoot all the
threes you want. So starting Saturday, all those fouls that Shaye thinks he was getting all that's gonna stop because they're gonna championships win on defense. So it's gonna be much more physical. We saw that in that playing game with Memphis in Golden State, how physical that was. They let a lot go that's just how it is because they let the players decide. I mean, there's a lot
riding on this. During the regular season, they want fans to come in, they want one hundred and thirties and forties and threes and oh my god, this is so great. But come playoff time, how the points start to go down and officials are told swallow that. Suck on that laws in general a little bit, sucking on it a little bit. We'll get back to playing.
But transitioning into sports media while you were playing, what was your thought process and when did that When did that come into into fuish and that was something you wanted to try.
Well, what was cool that Cheryl was a part of it. Cheryl was working with first ABC and then she transitioned over to T ANDT, so she was covering a lot of our games. So having to see how she prepped and being a part of that, I knew it's going to be an easy transition. And I got my feet wet,
feet wet. Which was great. Is when the w NBA started, and people forget the inaugural season, there was three networks I believe it was ABC, maybe NBC and Lifetime and Cheryl and I were part of Lifetime Television and the inaugural WNBA year, Michelle Defoyle was our play by play and so that's how I got my feet wet of calling games and prepping and were you've done? Are you still playing? Oh? I was still playing? Yeah, it was ninety seven ninety eight. Have my superpowers, But I'm calling
women's games. And they told us then, since it was a new game and we were introducing them, they didn't want us to talk x's and o's for the women's They want us to tell us stories. And so I was like, okay, that's great. So that kind of taught me mix in x's and o's of pick and roll or drops or whatever, but tell stories as well. So I was able to benefit from having both sides covering the WNBA. And then once that last year, I knew
it was up. I knew I was going into this type of feature and I just didn't know with who at the time.
Joining NBC Sports as their first season back as a league partner after being on the other side for so long, what is that going to be like for you?
I've had some of my best moments as a player. Yeah, right right, that they're bringing that back. So to be a part of NBC and to be on network. I mean, I've been on cable for the last nineteen years. It's different to be and you're on network. Can you believe that thirty seven years in professional basketball, eighteen as a player and nineteen my only two things I've known for thirty seven years. It's two organizations, Pacers and Turnings, right.
I mean, God is good. God has been really good for me to have almost forty years in the professional space, and to have the best seats in the house, to be surrounded by great people, to be able to come on podcasts like this. It's a blessing because nothing is guaranteed in life. You know, I told you guys out there about fact or fiction. You know, having Cheryl no man, that's right. Y'all can talk all you want about who's the greatest? All right, brother, that's right? I know first
head see mm hmm. Not many people I can say they grew up in a household with the greatest of anything. Right. I can tell people I grew up in the house with the greatest woman's basketball player ever. All good to my grave was that. Can y'all understand how good and how talented. She was it is as a person and as a storyteller. You guys know she was here some of those battles. See when we're playing factor fiction, I'm going to tell you why the DNA is where it is.
I blame herl a little bit, but I blame our older brothers more so. They're eight or nine years older than us. Saw Junior and Darryl Darrel, as you guys know, played professional baseball for the Angels. Saw the oldest, followed my dad into the Air Force, was there for twenty five years. Saw Junior is the best athlete out of all of us. People just don't know it because he never played. He never did anything those two on two games. And the problem is, since Saul was the oldest, he
always got to pick who he was playing with. So he always picked Sheryl Darrel's a baseball guy, and he was stuck with me and I was stuck garden Cheryl, and he was torching Durrels Saul Junior those games in the backyard of two on two. That's so I don't fear anything. If you guys have older brothers and a military dad, I don't fear anything.
When did that tide start to turn for you in those games.
A well, Cheryl was always taller than I was younger, but the tide factor fiction. I would say my freshman year, she's one years older, Charl's one year older, and I've seen her do things because we used to go looking her and I. We went. We go all around the I E. Because we wanted, We wanted everyone. We'd go to Banning, We went to all the bad dagors, Banning, Ruberto Samburudino, and we went looking like, we don't look look for another. We weren't looking for dudes. We want
to play, y'all. Let's go, y'all think, y'all, let's go, and we'd get into scraps and things, and then before cell phones fight broke out, we had to get to a payphone to call sault. Hey, it's pop it out. We need help, we need they come on down. Other than that, y'all handle your business. So that's how we that's how the DNA of like we always went looking for games. We always went looking, and that just built up that tenacity of always coming. And we didn't win
on them all. But he was in it, got in it. We were in it. But people don't understand. I love Maya Moore. She might be next on my list, Candace Diana Trossi. I love them all, but I'm telling you, guys, one is my camera man. And here's the thing. One Cynthia Cooper was coming off the bench. She was right. I mean, she was their sixth man. With the McGee twins and Cheryl, I mean, they had they were cold, they were outdrawing the men. It was like literally a show.
It was. It was like magic and Kareem and James. It was. It was that they were that big and they were just and I love the women's game. Is there? Finally it's there?
Yes, But I've known.
This my whole life. I'm like, now y'all want to jump on board. You grew up with it. Now y'all want to jump on board? Does it?
Does it pain you a little bit that she didn't get her chance to play in the w.
I just wish you know, in today's social media environment and landscape, everyone has YouTube and clips and all that they they have, they haven't seen her. And that that's what burns me, because trust me, I've seen it up close personally against me.
You've seen jumpings in your face, and it just wasn't me, by the way, in Riverside, it just wasn't me.
I wasn't the only guy I've seen it. And she would put on absolute clinics and barely breaking a sweat. It was like easy for her, and there was there was only one one woman. She raised an eyebrow that was like, oh, And I asked her about this, Lynnette Wad. I don't know if you guys know I heard the name for sure.
She's actually the all time league scorer, right, yes, that Caitlin just broke Sherylwood raise an eyebrow like I might have to go to bed early.
That night. Everyone else she was like next, She didn't next, no one. Where did you guys' passion come from? You? Pops grew up in the in the We grew up traveling a lot, being a military family. We lived in mark Knock, North Dakota, Nebraska, Omaha, Nebraska. We settled in Riverside, growing up in a military household. For those of you who don't know, yes, sir, no sir, yes, ma'am, no, ma'am. Everyone had chores, Everyone had something to do, respect, being
on time, honor. You say you're gonna do something, to do something. If you don't like something, you don't like a coach.
So make it work. None of this, I'm gonna leave. I'm gonna go.
I mean there were some coaches I played with in college and in the professionals. I'm not gonna go to Donnie Moffs. I'm gonna I have to make it work. So you So that discipline came from saw Miller senior because he didn't play. And I think we were more scared of our mom than we were him, because she was a reflection of Pops and she was to stay at home. He worked at March Air Force Base, and we knew not to get out of line because no
one wanted to see that switch or belt. Sorry, y'all, that's what happened back there.
Yeah, it used to be the worst my dad, but my mom was the same. To stay at home, mom, And if I fucked around too much and he didn't want to get heard whooping and he go sit in your room. Your dad gets home, that's the worst.
One of the worst ones is too, when they make you go get picked with picket.
Yeah out there, I wanted about this long.
Oh yeah, you haven't had the one when when you they wait till you get out the tub.
At the tub and they come in there with the bill. Oh, that's the worst one. That's that's the worst one. So that's sorry, mom.
That's how the DNA started in the family. It was obviously the military background, but my brothers they molded charl and I and Tammy. Tammy's three years younger than me, but they they helped mold us. They don't get enough credit for what they were doing was making us competitive, making us com everything clue, no spades, everything was everything was a game, everything the good old days.
Any truth that your form came from trying to shoot over Sheryl, talk to us about that fact.
Okay, that's fact, because again she was three to four inches taller than than I was trying to get over her. Boom boom, How on the hellme? So I would step back further boom. So then I started the I was able to get a high arc and for some reason long way because I wasn't strong enough is I crossed my hands and it just Jack knows the click, and that's how that started. I started moving further back and then, like I said, just in ninth grade when I we
were almost the same height. That's when it took off. First step came shooting was down and but that's fact. Yes, her blocking my stuff. You just said some.
Why is this generation making it seem like the step back shot is just coming?
I know you've been doing it forever, and I got it a lot from Kicky Vandaway okay, from U C. L A. From our one on one battles. He was like, this is this is an unstoppable move and if you can do it left and right, you'll play a long time. So that's where I really honed it in. But I've been doing it. That's now a lot of the guys today, I can't know what the Travelers not four steps James Harden and that's four steps. Wow. I was like, man, if I could have done that versus Mike Ship, I
might be I might be the goat. But if I'd have done that against Mike four steps, four steps Ship, I did it all two and a half. I forget sim.
If I can get four talk to just about your childhood and you had a hip deformity and you were in metal leg braces as a kid. What age range was that for you?
From two to about six or gump. Yeah, that's exactly what it was. Both my legs were like this out and they had to wear them to bring them back in. This one was ended up being normal. This one if if you see me without pants on, my knee still kind of goes this way, even though like so my feet are straight now, this knee goes this way. Like this one's lined up. This one's kind of this way. And that was the most frustrating thing is being inside with my mom in the kitchen window washing Sheryl, Saul
Durrel and tam me to a degree. But those three, you know, playing knockout around the world corkball, didn't do none of it. I'm just in there with mom, and she said, your time will come. Your time will come, like but when? And they didn't even think I was gonna be able to run even when I got them off. Forget that. I don't want to will maroulaf She wore bracest too, and look what happened to her. So I had to get out there with them. I mean, it's something to
be said about having big families. You know, you want to be a part, You won't to be left out.
Don't want to be last no, I had to be out there with them.
But just that support system of knowing what to say to you to keep your confidence, you know what I'm saying. Going through that as a kid, you don't know, you know where you're live, you're gonna be able.
To ever run right, you know what I'm saying.
So to have that support system to keep that confidence in you, like a lot of people, that's a blessing to have, right.
And it's funny because if you watch me run, I mean this, I run like this. It's always out. I mean you can kind of see how I even just it's just always out. So I run weird. But it's effective because you know, I never had any knee issues, no ACLS. Cycling has helped, you know. It's Yeah, it was frustrating, but I think it was a blessing in disguise because it made me even more hungrier to do because my first love was baseball. Okay, that was my
I didn't basketball. I picked up secondary. I wanted to be the next Rock Carew. I wanted to be like durl I wanted to play baseball. Baseball was my that was gonna be my end, and I was all everything in Little League pitch, hit, I could do everything got better in Pony, and then once high school came, I was like, okay, I'm going to settle in. I'm going to be center field. I can control the outfield and I was a great pitcher in the little league. And
the high school coach said, you're going to pitch. I'm like, uh, you know, the mound is different. You know little league mountains here and here. You know, of course I'm throwing fast. Why don't you get to high school? The bounds moved back. I'm like, I'm not going to pitch. She's like, oh, you're gonna pitch. I'm like, no, I'm not going to pitch. I want to play center phil if you want me to play, It's like, no, you're going to pitch. I'm like.
That's when I started concentrating on basketball in track. I mean, and I so wanted to be a two sport. I still wanted to do that, but I stuck with basketball and a little bit of track, and that was it. I think it worked out all right, it worked hard. I'm sorry. I wish I could have played baseball at UCLA, if if that would have happened, or because I think I would have been decent.
Speaking of UCLA, you were you were You were there early enough to not see any three point lines for a little bit of your college time.
My last year was the first year there a three point line. Then what was that like for you?
When did you realize, Like, obviously your form and being able to shoot deep came from the family, but when did you realize, like, once that line came in, this is something I can be consistent in it.
The pro game had it, and being at UCLA. And do you guys know this because you got have been up there the those summers men's gym. That's the next question actually, so I'm going to put it all in one for those of you who don't know, especially and this is in the mid eighties, late eighties, the men's gym was the mecca of summer basketball. Course, because you would have magic in the Lakers and this is the height of show Takers and Showtime and Boston, that whole rivalry.
And during the summer you would have a Lakers team, you would have a team of pros that were hanging out all summer. You would have our UCLA team, the A and B team, So you had four teams and you had two courts and go and started at three and ended at about five, five thirty games to ten by ones. And so I knew going against the pros, and I know, you know, we want to talk about
mentors and all that. I talked about John Long. The reason why I'm even on this show in this position almost forty years in the professional space, if it's not for Byron Scott Michael Cooper, who those two guys in particular, taking me under their wing when I was a freshman. I hung on every word because again, remember now these are the Lakers showtime, and those two dudes at that position, my position, I wanted to know everything and right I'm an LA kid Riverside to be exactly, and the Lakers
are everything. Though I patterned my game after Larry Bird, so I was conflicted because I wanted the Lakers to win everything, but I wanted Larry Bird to do well because that was the guy I wanted to play like. So I hung on every word that Coop and be Scott would tell me, you know, this is how you gotta work, moving without screens and all that. Byron he would literally walk me through this during the summers. Do this look at their feet, look at their chest, look
at their waist, look at their hands. This is how you throw them off. Grab by the wrist, act like you're going one way, throw them. I mean, all the little tricks. Sorry, Vernon, I used to do that to you a few times too.
I learned that just all kinds of tricks.
So I knew I could shoot with them, but preparing and prepping with them, that's what made me believe I could shoot. And when the three point line came in my last year it was nineteen nine, I'm like, I've been shooting twenty five thirty footers since high school, so I knew it wouldn't it wouldn't be anything.
I don't know if you remember this, but it was two thousand and nine ten season and I somehow tracked your number down because I was guarding Ray Allen in the playoffs and I wanted to ask you, how the fuck do I slow him down coming off screens?
And you gave me the.
Grab the wrist to grab the shorts.
And some other things, and it's crazy I remember that, and obviously I didn't stop him, but just getting those just to.
Down, because I mean, Ray would be great in today's game if you can't hold like the freedom of movement. Then you want oh my god, yeah rip Hamilton, Yeah, I mean you would too though.
All that pushing ship, I gotta put that in there.
Players in today's game has such an advantage. Yes, yes, I mean you almost had to draw blood to get open against Vernon. You almost had to. And then if you got open, you had oldest thorp, the longest ship. Drive into the hole. You're driving into the dream. Don't you don't you come in here? Don't you come in here? Back to the men's joke, was magic call the bullshit.
God, Oh my god, don't be oh man, man, oh man.
There was an a corps, you know, be a winner's court and the loser court a court court man. The Lakers always stayed on the winning court matter what. Max, no, matter what, he could go to the hole and be wide open and miss the Layah, you're like teammates. He don't even call him fire. He called him for his teammates.
If like, like you said, if Max would have missed the shot, he is on no no to bring that back, you fellow.
And the only time this didn't happen, it was one magical I don't know how this happened. Oh, I do actually know how it happened. It was the first year of Magic's Midsummer Night's Game, the very first year, and it was in Pauly Pavilion before it moved to the Forum, and he had everyone because it was the first year, and Larry came out and before that game actually happened. So Larry was out maybe two days ahead of time
for these pickup runs. And Larry walks in, right, So you have the Lakers, you have the selection of pro players U C, L, A, A and B team. So of course Larry says, all right, I'm gonna be on that, you know, selection of proteins, and everyone's like, oh my god, Larry Magic then like you know, that was the first time I saw Buck like, Okay, there ain't gonna be none of this bullshit because Larry, Larry was like having it.
Larry wasn't having it. Larry was not having and it was some of it was like this is there's no footage, no one, no one knows how to the oh my god, some of the passes. And then and then Coop Coop and Larry didn't they really didn't like one another, I mean really didn't like one another. No, I got him, you know cool, I got him. I want him, Like this is what I was learning, right, this is this
is all going into the DNA. This is why I'm like, okay, I mean again, never take a step back, take two four, don't ever take a step back. No. I want him. I don't care if a summer league. I want him. I'm like, oh man, this is good. So you see we're over you see them. This is unbelievable talking all this shit. I mean, this ship is for real. This is how we grew. So as a nineteen eighteen, nineteen year old kid, you're like, okay, and that was it
for my four years. That used to la every summer was like that, Oh, how are you really you really want to get to the next level. Okay, we'll meet us on Drake Stadium at seven thirty. We're gonna run down stairs. And do you remember at Drake they had that pull up bar in the end zone, right, and
it was great about that pull up. It was like for tall people like you had to jump up and do and Malik Monsieur, who was one of the guys who was doing workouts, Yep, we're gonna do King Kong's new fronts, and then you know they're like, you don't have to get in the weight room and get big, you know, because you sa later like, oh you gotta get bigger, you're bigger and cooping. No, you gotta get strong. You ain't gotta get big. You gotta get strong. You mean,
it's on the track. It's like, are you all really going to be there. It's like I put you like this. If you ain't there, if you come at seven thirty one, you ain't. You can't work out with us. Man, I was there at seven o'clock. Sure enough, seven twenty five. Those dudes roll up. These are champions, right man. What to be exposed to that different?
Yeah, we got a taste of that too. I mean to me, I credit that getting us over the hunt and we had so much talent. But those summer runs, like you said, from the time I'm seventeen, just turning to eighteen, playing with Cob and Shack and oh man, guys, just like every single day.
In every day, religiously playing with the best.
It made you think your life, playing a couple of days, some of the rough days and make it they like, damn, I gonna be able to do this. Rest in peace to the great Loutolsen. You and you and lout Uh had some battles.
Damn lout Damn Arizona Wildcats, Damn Steve Kerr. Yeah, damn Craig Bill was Bushley there then too, you know? Yeah bush Sean Elliott, Yeah, Ratchet, Ratchet place Ratchet. Here's the problem, not the problem? And why lout Olson and I Before he took Arizona, I believe he was the head coach at Iowa and he was recruiting me and I wasn't gonna go to Iowa. And then when he got the job at Arizona, I thought about it. I considered it, but being a hometown kid, everyone wanted to play for
the Brew. Everyone wanted to be used to late Bruers, kt La Chama five. You knew where your games where. Everyone wanted to be part of the wooden system. So I went there. He went to Arizona and turned it into a powerhouse. I'll give him all the credit, but man hat Feels and McCoy's you, of course you say the USC is, yes, but our next was Arizona. We hated them, They hated us. They hated me in particular, because I just loved going in there and.
Busting their ass, busting their ass.
But you know a few times I crossed the line, But who's counting. I mean it's college. There's no footage, I don't think, so it never happened. Never happened. When does shit talk and become a weapon for you? I think it goes back to Sheryl blocking my shit in the rose bushes and Sol and Durrell. I mean that's all we But there's an art to it, and there's a way to it. Because you don't want to get two. I mean, you know you're not out there talking about
people's mamas and things. You got to do a little homework too to know a person's DNA and personality and what triggers them like people, And I want people to understand this. I love me some John Starks a lot like that dude over there will run through a wall
and will do whatever it takes to win. I love dudes like that, But unlike mad Max, Starks could be triggered, and I knew that, and I would play not only on his emotions, but I knew if I talked to Oak and Patrick an earshot of him, like I'm talking to Patrick you want to during the game about Starks. It would trigger him because he couldn't control his emotions because he was just you know, he came almost from nothing.
You know, he was bagging groceries. They found him, you know, and now he's playing the number one media market, on the number one stage and MSG. So he would do whatever to stay there. And so you have to do a little homework on your opponent. So that's how I used it, And a lot of times I would talk ship to get myself going too. Yeah yeah, self motivation, yeah yeah. Fact to fiction.
Your old AOL email address started with the letters t T for trash talking trash tar got.
We all know that ship.
That's good, they to They told Wayne's right.
You bought dictionaries in different languages before the Olympics, so you can tell to other.
Yes, I did, and I was butchering the language, but they knew what I was trying to say. Yes, I want it because I wanted them to know I'm here, baby, Yeah, in their own language. You getting this? Yes? Fact yeah?
Is it true that you had to if you lost the bet to Spike Lee, you had to visit Mike Tyson the jail very fact.
And so that first year in ninety four, that series that went in epic seven games, the whole choking twenty five point quarter, that whole episode series. We made a bet we win. At the time, I was married, he would put my wife in cameo spot in one of his films if they win. At the time, Mike was incarcerated in Indiana on a rape charge. I had to go visit the Champ. I'm like, okay, obviously they ended up winning that summer. I think it was mid June. I go to the facility. I'm like, hey, I'm here
to see the Champ Mike Tyson. And the guard was like, you know, obviously he knew. He knew the series, he knew everything I had gone down. Okay, I'll go get him. Just take a seat right there. I'm like, okay, five minutes goes by, he'll be out in another five minutes. I'm like, okay, fifteen minutes goes by, twenty half hour, hour, hour and a half. I'm like, I mean he knows I'm here to see him. Right Like, Mike got in
an altercation with one of the guards. Shit, I think he broke a guard to draw will not be coming out to see you. I was like, did he really do that? I don't know if that was true or if that was the story they were telling me, or he was embarrassed to come see me because he had to have known what was online because it was national news that this was the bet between Spike and I.
But I was there for two hours. I don't know if he broke a guard's jar or not, but I wouldn't put it past him to have done that, no question.
So that's a fact might look at some people join to just yes, yes.
It's gonna jump out the way.
You have any favorite form, swear words that you still remember it.
Any swear words foreign did you used? Didn't remember none of them. I wouldn't either. How did you guys find that out? That was only a select few who found that one They told you about dyling before. You can't deal with this. Damn very good, very good. And the one I tried to do this is before the Olympics. And it's funny because I saw when mad Max was in this seat talking about him.
There was one dude, God damn all right.
For those of you who do not know who drawing petrovit draws man and I tell people this. You know, Curry is the goat of all shooters. You know. Look, I'll give him all that, but before him, man, you could be this close to the mike. You could be this close to him. It didn't matter. And not only is he giving it off, he's telling you about it too, English, broken, broken, good English.
Oh yeah, you don't know what the hell he's saying. He's bobbing, he's talking.
Giving it to you, giving it to you. I mean, treat that. I didn't get frustrated against a lot of players. That dude listen to me. And then on top of that, you got Derek fucking Coleman like backing them up. Yes, sir, this dude was the best shooter. Catch and shoot one dribble to dribble. He did not miss no, literally, And I said to myself, how the hell was he not playing in Portland? But you had Clyde there. But when he got to your new jersey, the good lord, good lord, oh.
My god, that I mean, you could be It didn't matter single double motion you and and God rest his soul, smell.
Terrible, smell terrible, And you had to be all on us. Hit you.
You ain't gonna be like that all shows they're gonna be with me.
Come on, man, So no easy giving it to you, hogking ship to you. But after the game you smell your teammates are like, damn man, hop in the shower man. That's crazy man.
That's a part of his package.
Look, I want to tell you, so I'm gonna give an education of other guys that people don't know about, because that would give you buckets. Mad Max won't know this. Here's another name for you, guys that would give you buckets. And that came out of my draft. And there was three of us. There was Reggie Williams, please myself. But there was another Reggie that would bust your behind. Duh Lewis.
Reggie Lewis would give you buckets. And again he had the luxury of having Larry Legend and Kevin McHale and all them dudes in his DNA. Reggie Lewis, y'all, God rest his soul in peace. Yeah, what a walking bucket, Oh my goodness.
Yes, Boston and kind of in that era of Boston lost two young gratce Lynn Biason.
If you think about the championships, they would have had m h I mean Lynn and this was Larry was still Larry. He had his superpowers when they drafted Lin Bis so Lynn Bias. Learning under Larry Bird with a superpower would have been scary. So you got so wrong with you me? Yes, what happened?
You said the smell was part of his baggage.
That was in his bag. Smell was in his bag. It's part of the game. So obviously your ship talking is so legendary. You're one of the very few and maybe the only person that got in got into a fight with Kobe and MJ.
What kind of homewor did you do for both them? Dudes?
I just think they got in the fights because they got tied to.
Chasing this nigga like man slowed down Rench. You got that, all right? I've been waiting, Okay, yeah, I've been waiting because people always ask me. I've been waiting for the right forum to tell the story. Welcome to death Rope. We're honored. We will start with the MJ fight. Shall we watch them? We shall a little trip down memory. But you gotta go back, gotta go back to when they have the ball, So go back, go back. Oh no, he got to pull the whole clip up, pull the
whole clip up there we go. Yeah, so this is it. Watch this one two. I'm like, okay. I tried to get him there and he got out the way. So I was like, all right, tip in, I'm going straight to him. Let him know. Okay. I had to hurry up and turn around me because I don't want him to come in like choke hold me. He tried to rake you. So I'm like, okay, we both get into we get into this. He scrapes my eye like you can't see he was trying to scratch it. I saw him right.
So all this goes down. This is in ms A, by the way, this is it. We're at home. We are at home and Marcus Square Arena playing Michael Jordan's So this ship goes down. Ronnie Nunn. Ronnie Nun comes in, breaks it all up. They huddle up. I'm thinking, okay, so back in the day, a lot of it. Look at this. Scratch scratch the crap out of me. Look at this. But look I'm holding them and controlling them. I'm like, okay, but you ain't going anywhere again. Goes
pull ups stadium. So I'm thinking, okay, maybe we'll get double technicols maybe if I get thrown out, he's gonna get thrown out.
We both are.
Throwing Jess curseyes man. Okay, Jess had a fresh do for the game. Say that cut was clean. Hold on, so just you got kicked out the game. I didn't know that. That's wow. Both punches that now three?
They ain't never throwing Mike who shooting free throws right now?
You found him rich.
They thow Mike got no motherfucking.
Game in our in our building, maybe in Chicago, in our building.
He's shooting the technicals too.
Goddamn forty five on us. Not that he wouldn't have scored forty five with me in the game, but ship give me a chance in our building. MJ threw three punches and then get kicked out the game. That's crazy. The next day I got a one game suspension. You got kicked out any game suspension, and he got three games? So why did he get three games then? And it was kicked out day in the game. Wow, So they let him play the game.
This suspended and then suspended us. And that's what they did me at the San Francisco program.
Come on, man, because my mix in.
Town Max said when Mike came to Houston, all his women started working.
Here's here's the thing, man, you would see these you would see you know, you go out to a club or whatever, bar, whatever, and you see these same chicks, real regular you come to a bulls game. Why are you dressed like it's Sunday church?
Man saying I told you about this Mike come to your city, just coming out and they think they're gonna getting married. One of them thinks it's gonna get hit by Mike.
Of my whole career, one thing I wish a regret. And you know, people will say I wish we would have had I would have had more than one series versus that dude. I'm not saying I would have won. He would have won, probably not, but you're judged by wins. I won a few battles. He always won the wars. He's got six of them, and we took them seven games. I just wish we would have had more. I wish I could have gone against him more. Yeah, and I don't want people jumping on the internet. I'm not saying
we would have beat them. I would if I would have been.
The same thing.
But man, I want to see I got confident. I want to see how I am versus that dude thing too, you know, I want to see how I am versus that dude. He obviously had a lot of respect and spoke highly of you.
But what what was different when you played a game against him and the bulls.
I can only speak for myself. I can't speak for Max. There was no weaknesses. Try to force him left, you try to force them right, you try to top lock them, you try to hold you, try to be physical with him. I equated to like this. It was like and maybe this is how sinners feel when they were going against Shack. He was shock of shooting guards. I don't care. There was no way you can get around him, in front him.
He was just too strong. And then he had a forty eight inch vertical so you were never blocking.
His shot, and he.
Could stop on a die his handles. And then he held the ball like it was like an orange. So he's tawning you holding the ball in your face. The tongue is all out and shit and shooting the fucking gum and all that shit. And then come down, the black eyes are looking at you, and I'm looking right back at it, and I'm the fuck I ain't going anywhere. Yeah, and he's looking at you and man, no weaknesses, none, zero,
I could look. I loved you. I'm watching. I'm always trying to find a tail, and I found the tail on everyone. I could not find a tail, not one nothing. Damn Like, Okay, if he goes left x amount of times, what is his percentages? Great? Right? Great, step back great, great, great, rebounding great, passing great. You can't punk them. I'm trying to find something. So it's almost like ship by committee there, key, I mean.
We got to get some help down this motherfucker.
Come on, come on now, I've been calling.
You crowd to be the toughest shouting basketball. Which is the fight away. He shot that ship, I mean high clip and at the I cannot blocking.
You can't get it. But it's fade away and it's at forty eight inches.
Yeah, when it got to learn how to put it back to the basket and get in that post.
That's what he got. And then he would do the one. Yeah, he get that. He get that him and maybe maxkinis hast to this pick and rolls. Don't let your big be one step to he's splitting and then now it's up to dal and Antonio alone.
He's your's your problem.
Now he splits, But then when you would extend him to half court, he would get this shoulder or this shoulder, which the way he was coming off, and get under the big and then it's downhill. So now if you're trailing, as shooting guards are, you got to get under and then he's putting. And on top of that he can shoot. He can shoot. They talked about it.
I've seen a lot of videos about his leticism, but I seen the video recently and when he got a till bar and they passed on him, he went up a vertical on Charles Bark.
That shit was so bad. I'm like, that's another thing that people don't understand. Not only could he he's known for, you know, the two handed, but he could one leg too, either leg too, yeah, either leg like it was, and be out till four or five o'clock in the morning, smoking, drinking whatever. Yeah, car yes, all this shit games at seven, seven.
Thirty it sometime he'll go play golf the same day he'll play man.
It's almost like he was trying to make it fair.
Let me go get a buzz into some heat strokes. You guys can have a chance to know.
Didn't have a tail guys, and you know it. You hear it all the time, who's the goat, who's the greatest and all that between you know him and Lebron. And I try to stay away from that because he went against Lebron his first year. He was a rookie my last year, so I don't have no point of reference. But I will say Lebron has the greatest career. I say that all. He has the greatest career. But Mike is the best basketball player ever. But Lebron has the
greatest career. And I think while a lot of old heads want to dog out Lebron is because they were never as good as he is this late in their career, and they want to get on him for that. Lebron at twenty two years in, at forty one, forty whatever he is and he's about ready to be first or second team all NBA. As old guys, they were never call him all out. Some of them won't just good in a prime that's today. They wasn't. And for him to be this good this long, you've got to say
he has the greatest career by far. But is he the best? That's greatest and best is two different things. And I think that's why old heads are getting it mixed up and they don't want to give Lebron his due. He deserves that. I mean, we all wish we could be playing like him in year twenty two, in any year period. I mean, he's about ready to be on one of the All NBA teams at forty from the Master to the Disciple, Cob, I've been waiting on this. I've been waiting on this story. They had just won
the championship the year before. It's almost kind of like the Detroit, Indiana thing. So we're in Staples and they're about ready to win the game year. This is the year after they won. So that's one two I believe right. You got a Q okay, yes, get a cute okay, so get a cute kigy. So they're getting ready to win.
This is in Staples, and can I can I go back a little bit of the history with Kobe and I. Okay, before we get to the when he was drafted and getting ready and going through the process, he and I had the same agent, Arn tell him, okay before he's flood off t Ra Polinka, who was under arn Tell Okay, so Arn as they're getting ready to as the draft is going on and they're getting ready to sign him, calls me up, Hey, I want you to mentor and talk to this young kid, Kobe. I was like, absolutely, Yeah.
He loves Michael Jordan. He knows everything, you know. He wants to know everything about Mike. Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike. So I would call Kobe. I would talk to Kobe all the time during that seven game series with the Bulls and all that. Afterwards, I'd be in the office and I'd be calling Kobe. He's like, Hey, what was Mike doing on that play? What were you saying to him? He wanted to know everything about that Wow. Right, he was a true student. He was studying all of us.
He wanted to know everything about that series. Why did you do this? What was his counter? So there was a history between Kobe and I. Fast forward to us playing them in the finals, and before that, Kobe and I did a shoot. It was he and I versus At the time. You guys remember on MTV the Real World, the cast, the people that all lived in the house. This is when reality TV was just starting. It was Kobe and I versus the real world. There was like twelve of them that were living in the house we
were playing. They were going to play us. There was fifteen of them and us two versus them and the losers, and they made the bet washed Kobe's dogs or something like that. And this was a chance he and I. This is before we made it to the finals, that we had a chance. And Gail dia Castino, who Dylan you've worked with, she worked with both of us, and she's like she came to me and she's like, hey, just letting me know. Kobe's gonna want to play you one on one and I'm at the height of mine.
He's just you know, this is his second or third year, maybe second year. I'm like, I'm not gonna play one on one, but i mean I'll teach you some stuff. I'll you know, we'll get on the court. And so we're on the court. He's like teaching that step back. I want to know about that step back, you know, like what are you looking at? Are you looking at the feet the knees? Like how do you do it going left? And how are you doing the right? Like don't they close? So I'm out there teaching them and
doing all this. The world, world, the kids, the world, world. People come in. We do our skit. We went we killed him. He's like, I'm like, you know, let's have fun with it. You know, we'll do a couple of hours. He's like, no, I want to crush them. I'm like, all right, let's go crush him. Let's let's do it. So I'm just throwing him out and he's just going crazy. I mean, he's nineteen eighteen whatever. Fast forward to the finals. Shot goes down, Game four, shot fouls out. We're thinking, shit,
we about ready to tie this thing up. They had won the first two in Staples. We won game three. We about ready to tie this thing up. Damn. Kobe Bryant turned into the reincarnation of MJ. And not only did he turn into the reincarnation of MJ, that same shit that I was teaching him in that they'll step back, he's hitting it on me. Well, what look at Reggie Miller sparing him up.
These two guys playing one on one.
All summer in La. Kobe takes it between his leg, he pulls it back, hits the jumper, and then sort of gives it, you know, take your time. Everything's cool. I'm like, this dude was prepping for this moment three years ago. That's how deep you was. I'm like, he is using this what I taught him on me and us. They win that game, they win the series in six.
Fast forward to the next year they're winning. Now. The unwritten rule in basketball is when you're up twelve, yeah, twenty two seconds left, what are you supposed to do? Hold the ball? Dribble it out right? So here, He's like, if I get this ball, I'm shooting it. I'm like, yeah, I'm sure you are going to shoot at Kobe, because that's what you do. You just out here to try to get stats. So are you telling him? Yeah, that's
what I'm telling right now. I was like, yeah, a little buster, Yeah, go ahead and get your your numbers, Kobe, that's what it's all about. So then we start to have words and I was like, if he comes to me, it's on. And he took one step to me and I body checked him right here. Boom. I was like, that's all I wanted. That was almost the first Madison all I wanted. So then I have a pinned on the scorer's table. Look at brass there. He don't really want to jail, won't it? He won't it? Oh, jail,
poor Austin Krazer. Look at his jersey. He was trying to push shack back originally, right, oh man, look at Look at Austin's jersey. Man, scratch marks all on the back. He learned. Oh that's why he that's why he did that.
In thew madice in the palace when everything was going on, he just put his hands up and started walking through the crowd.
He just put his hands up. He said, I'm familiar with this. Oh god, this is great. This was great. Look at this. What does just one step? I said, just one step? Just come come a little bit closer across that line. Just come a little bit closer. There we go, gotcha watch this? Mm hmm. You showed me what you had boom. Pick him up, take him to the scorers table, yep, take a seat here.
We tried to lean in with one day.
He tried to lean in with the right look. But I had the Roy Jones. I had the Roy Jones. Okay, pick him up, put him right here. Everyone to jump in. Sit down right here, take a seat right here.
That was almost the malice, the actual first Matlae right there.
But God rest. And then here's the thing. The funny thing about that, the day after m H you call Man, well, we're rethinking. I'm like, but what I tell you. He wanted to do everything like Mike. He knew our history, for Mike's and I's history, I think he I think he want a part of that. I really did in the back of ound. Maybe I'm wrong, but my only two real real scraps I had one with Doc, but I mean those were the real, real real He said, we got a problem, Mike, he got a problem only
beef with goats. For me to have beef with those two dudes, the two best shooting guards are our game has ever seen. Man. I mean, I'll take it as a form of respect that they both for myself, the respected my game.
I respected theirs brought that out of them.
I didn't fear them, but I respected the respected. I mean that you didn't fear. I mean, to this day, I think I probably would take a swing on Mic if I saw him.
That shows out to Los I might.
I don't know. I don't know, because there's certain things that are said in between lines. Yeah, you know that that triggers you. Yeah, it's funny because what do you say during the seventy fifth anniversary. You remember, Mike wasn't part of any of the pre picture and all that, but he showed up before we all walked out, and you show that. Pull it up, Dylan, like with him
he's going at Magic, like, let's put him on. Let's go right now, like everyone, We're all around there, and I'm saying to myself, I might, I might just go over there, get my leg back right, I might go even to school. I might. I mean, we got the seventy five grades right there, right now, And in my head, I'm saying to myself, I'm damn, I'm triggering. My hands is sweating. It's like past all that, past all that before we walk out. When he goes at at Magic.
You hear stories from Ai and d Wade about that moment like, oh my god, you could tell you yes, he is king among all these kings, because they all did it, bow down to him, keep going, yeah, here we go. I've seen that too, when he walked in there like there is here it is. Turn it up. Yeah see I'm right behind a little bit to the right. Of d Wade. I'm saying, this is your time, this is a moment, on this is your moment, this is it. I mean, it was great to see him in Magic.
Go at it, but don't come this way with that ship. I don't cook. Some wounds are hardy, they're hard to heal. I love it. I tell people, Hey, it's no question to me. He's the best bet I've ever seen. I mean his body.
But man, where does kobe skill set rank with?
See? He took it to a different level. I think Kobe was a much better shooter. I want to hear this from you, because you play Kobe was a much fundamentals, who wow, they're but Kobe was a better three point shooter. He took it. He was almost like MJ on steroids. When I tell you he watched every film when he was over in Italy on J. I'm not kidding you. He had the footwork down to a pack down everything, but he he put his little flare into it. You
know people talking about you know, Magic or Lebron. That's what I wanted to ask you. I can think. I mean it gets looked over a little bit in that Kobe gets left over. Tim Duncan gets left over. I mean, because he's so quiet. Kareem man killers many y'all. This trip down memory lane. It's nice and all, but it brings back, yeah, man. And then you got Robin out there talking shit. And look I had some crazy dudes on my I mean my Davis Boys, Davis boys killers.
You got Robin out there hooting and hollering.
Scottie, how good with Scotty?
Scotty he was the best Robin. He was the best Robin because he did everything he had to do. And then through to twenty three but defensively, see, and this was a great thing. And this is why come playoff time and all y'all know this coaching matters. Asolute players will do eighty two games, players will win it. Then now your coaching, can you really? From game to game coaching matters. And when they put pip on Mark Jackson, it kind of the water off and shut the water off, right,
because we weren't used to that too long. And as great as Mark is, I mean six seven but a wingspan of seven five that can move, I mean, it was tough. And Jack was our pipeline for our offense. Took him out, took him out talk to.
Us about la Berry. He was your favorite player growing up. He knocked you out the ninety one playoffs and ended up being your coach.
Talk about Labird. It's funny because when I talk about you know, I pattered my game after Larry Legend my rookie year in the Boston Garden, our first game there. I had met him briefly at a game in Indiana that he and I both played him, but he barely said a word to be But after that first game in the Garden, it's closing moments of the game, he walks by me and says, keep working hard, Reggie, You're gonna be a great one. And you know I played it cool. But I'm saying inside, like, oh my god,
Larry Burk again. I remember who my mentors were, Magic Byron, Scott Coop. So I mean, I've been around the greats. But for Larry Bird to say this to me, I was like, Oh crap, this is crap. This is my first year. Fast forward to two years later, my third year, when I have the reins to it's my team now, I feel I have a superpower make the All Star team. We're playing the Celtics in Marcus Square Arena at the time, and it was a close game, but they were gonna
end up winning it. He's at the free throw line and gamesmanship and talking a little bit. You know, I'm gonna try to, you know, throw off his rhythm, thinking I'm gonna throw off Larry Bird's rhythm, and you know, as the official goes to give the got the ball, you know you'll cross the lane, like, hold up, You'll cross the lane and you know, just try to ice the ice the shooter a little bit. You know, I
did that once and then I kind of did it again. Right, So he gets the ball from the official trouble of his once he's like, Reggie, are you are you freaking kidding me? Reggie, You're fucking kidding me. I'm the best shooter this game has ever seen. You think you're gonna be able to ice me? As he's as he's talking, next one, wha damn. I walked through other side, and Kevin McHale goes, yeah, that was kind of stupid of you to do something like that. Right, I'm like, oh shit.
He's like, I am the best shooter this game and he's saying.
It out loud so everyone can see I'm like, oh my god, he's outing me at my home in front of all my family and friends. I'm the best shooter this game has ever seen. Wow, Like, oh shit, it's true. It is true. And people talk about what was harder playing against him or being under him as the coach,
No question, being underneath him. There was so much pressure on us, not only to win every game that we had going back to Boston, which I think we were nine to one in those three years, but every game was like it had to be like a Game seven. That was his mentality. And this is how big Larry Bird was coaching our first exhibition game. We were playing in like Daytona. You know how you go to weird places
for exhibition games. We're playing in Daytona. Not only did they televise the game, but they put him in a one.
Box, just sitting down.
Game one box and just Larry's sitting there. I'm like, shit, every game is going to be Game seven, World Series, super Bowl with this. But man, practices were intense. He didn't talk a lot. We had an offensive coordinator in a defensive coordinator, Rick Carlisle offensive coordinator, Dick Harter defensive coordinator, and then Larry would come in in time out and say, yeah, like this yet go. We had a veteran team, Mark, the Davis Boys, Derek McKee, Rick Smith's, Travis Best, so
he didn't have to he wasn't. It wasn't like our young team with Carlisle, which you know will probably have been a little different from He knew and played against a lot of us, so he kind of knew our our temperament. But it was and we wanted, we wanted to win that Lakers championship in two thousand for him too. I mean, you know, man, that dude, it's a bad white boy band called me.
That's who gave me the phone call when I was got my first big contract when it came in coming and Nap, that's who gave me a call. And I still remember, like today, who was going crazy?
This Larry Bird?
I'm like, who put the most speakerphone?
Everybody running around like yeah, do you think it's funny that Isaiah took over for Bird? And when Bird came back as an executive.
Fire So when the All Star Game was in Indiana two years ago, moved there. Okay, Turner came to me. It was like, hey, we want you to do a sit down and it's going to be Larry Legend and Isaiah. I'm like, really, I was like, Larry's okay. I was like, yeah,
Larry says, no problem. I was like, Isaiah's good with this because you know, there's a lot between the bad Boys and the Celtics and history between them two and what went on during playoffs, slaying if he was a regular remember all that, All that could come up and you know me, I'm not going to sugarcoat anything. That's
my job is to bring it up. I said, okay, So that came up with you know, he was the executive and he was really brought into fire and he said on the show the interview, I like you, Isaiah, hell of a basketball player, and I think he did a great job. But I like Rick carl al better, your services are no longer needed because I don't think Donnie Walsh wanted to fire Isaiah, and he brought in the one guy who's gonna say or question Larry Legend,
and I mean Carlile. He took us to different heights too, though in the right decision. But Isaiah's response to all that was and I don't know if you heard about this maybe. He said that the malice in the Palace probably wouldn't have happened if he had been coaching that night, because the fans would have respected him and Ron would have listened to him. That's what he said on the show.
Have controlled it, he could have controlled he. He said that the mouth of the Palace never would have happened if he was coaching that night, and I mean that's the bird was like, you know, it is what it is. But that was his response to when Larry said, you know, hm, I just like call out better. He's like, well, I think you made a mistake. This is Isaiah. I think he made a mistake because what happened in Detroit never would have happened.
What people don't know is it was a possibility that what happened to Detroit could have happened in.
Any that season.
Yeah, yeah, straight up, Roy legendary sneaker care though you've been big with the sneakers you uh, we do.
We got a partnership with stock X used to wear Jordan's. How did that happen? Well, first of all, you could not wear Jordan's when Mike was out his superpowers and when he was with the Bulls and all that only Mike wore Jordan's. I believe. I don't think Jordan brand started to take off is when maybe he went to Washington and he was starting to face his way out and to keep the Jordan brand going. So I knew, remember, you had to do your homework. I knew it would
be an irk for him. He wasn't gonna call me and tell me he wanted me to be on Jordan brand. There's no way, he was. You would never do that, never ever do that. So during a couple of times, maybe one game or two when he was with the Bulls, I wore him the game just to irk him because I just wanted to with them. And I heard it later on from you know, hey, you cannot be wearing Air Jordan's at all, even if you're playing them or not playing, you can't be I was like, okay, who said that?
Though like higher ups, executives, someone really someone.
That he called arn I was like, it's like, I ain't tripping. I just wanted to do it for that game. I'm not gonna be wearing them all the time. But then the people called him was like, hey, you want to be part of brand Jordan, you look good them. I'm like, ship all right, I'll gear. I'm like, all right, be sure you put be sure you put uh my name on them? You know him Spreddy go with his legs all out. It does say Reggie on there, Reggie, I see Reggie thirty. They get my own oil bit,
so they did some of that. It was, you know, I'm not a sneaker head in per se, though I do have a lot of the Jordans my last five years because I was a part of them, but I wasn't high up like Eddie Jones and Ray and those guys. Again, I was starting to lose my superpower. So it was more of like a courtesy because I had been with Nike basically my whole career, and they're like, all right, you could wear Jordan's.
When did you start training with mic and off season with Jordans. I only did it one once.
And it's when he was coming back when he was filming Space Jam and Jack Haley surfing. Jack Haley who was my center at UCLA, who was drafted by the Bulls and then he came back to the Bulls when Rodbin was there around ninety five ninety six, whenever he came back from baseball the first time, and he was filming at Warner Brothers lot and they built him they called it to Jordan Dome, and he would film all day.
This is what it was crazy. This dude would film all day, starting at seven am, finished shooting at four eight, and then the runs started at about five thirty six. And he would have all at the time, all the top players, kind of like how playing at UCLA was in the men's gym, but it all went over the valley to Burbank to Warner Brothers. I mean this. I
was like, man, Damn, they're crazy. They built this dude, state of the art court work, officely like top line everything, and I'm thinking, okay, here, I'm gonna do my reconnaissance on this. Fuck. I'm gonna find I'm gonna figure out. So every single time we never played with I was like, I got, I'm going to find something. I got, I'm going to find something. I'm gonna guard him every single time.
Damn you got some of the runs. Pull it up. Man. Again, this is before the age of cell phones, and this dude, I was like shit. And only when he we play from six to about eight and then I was like when I tell people your practices aren't dead when practice is over. And then he's getting up another seven hundred to one thousand shots. Look at this. Look at the state of the fucking art this dude, one dude, look
at this ship everything. Juwan Howard Eddie Jones said about us, said, man, come on, what the fucker South Thompson Surfer Jack Hayley lighted O could pass? Yeah, keep here, kick turnover, damn it. He shot. Daddy was running back for the ball. He went through the whole Yeah, man, turn this off. I don't want to see him turn this ship off. Man, I don't want to see him. So those were great. Those are That was a cool experience to be a good time run before we get you out of yours.
It's been incredible.
I want to go back to the Spike Lee, Madison Square Garden, all that whole legendary stitch. I don't know if you saw your picture. We had your picture up there when you walked in.
The guy. Talk to us just about the.
You know, like you said early on, you hung your hat on being able to go into behind enemy lines and really do your things.
So talk to us about that. Particular day in that series. It was set up the year before because we played them in a best of five the year before and I believe they beat us three to one, but you could tell the tension was kind of rising with them, and going into that series, we had beaten Orlando, shock and pity. Then we beat Atlanta and then oh my god, like we came out of nowhere. In ninety four, we're in the Eastern Conference Finals and oh, by the way,
we're going togainst the bullies on the block. We're going against New York at the number one media market, and everyone's like, oh man, this is gonna be a sweet these hicks, who are these I'm like, y'all have no idea because I mean, again, I love me some Davis boys, them dudes, Rick, We did not care. And we had Larry Brown one as hard asked as he is as a coach, and he drives his players extras the nose. He's one of the best. So I knew, I knew we had a legitimate shot to get to the finals. Man,
to go against that motherfucker over there. God, this hurts. It hurts because people always, you know, fans always come up and say they talk about the twenty five point quarter, they talk about eight points a ninety, all the great shots and all that me I internalize to this day. I think about the losses they hurt. It's the what ifs. So that series to be that close, and I was twenty seven at the time too, and you don't know if you're ever going to be back. We were, but
you don't know. And it was such a magical run. And we rechanged Indiana. And because no one looked at us like that, no one respected us they, you know, and it was my job. I brought everyone, you know. We Indiana's predominantly all white, you know, and there's a lot of racism at times. Yeah, and they were on board. The races were on board with us. Man, I mean, you doing something, and we changed the city. We were
all in it together, Hicks versus the Dicks. And if you do not build up a true disdain for your opponent, I just don't feel you could ever beat them because you're That's why, you know, all the hugging and kissing and all that. Now, which I they I get it, I understand it. I just don't sit well. I mean, Byron Coop, they would look at me crazy. They would they would be so disappointed if I would have done you know, if I would do something like that. So that series, though, we had our God at the end
of the day. And it will always be on me. When when you're Superman and you have your superpowers, it's always you, it's always you fit. I failed those dudes. Every time we were in the conference finals, the finals against the Lakers, it's me. I fail them, And you want to win for those guys, because you know, it's all the supporting players that talk the most shit when they get a ring and they didn't do shit to get you know, it was always Scotty or Mike or
it was always Shock at Kobe. But you know, you hear some dudes as the twelfth man talking the biggest noise. You want to win it for those dudes. I failed them, and I had my opportunities to win that series. Game six, after the twenty five point quarter, the choking and all that, we were up three to two going back to Indiana. Yep, you got to close it out in your building. You're the man. You got to close them out. With a chance to play Vern and Hakeem in the final. You
have to you have to do that. That falls on you. We lost, Yeah, you have a two chances to win one, but you really have You don't want to go back to the guard game seven. You don't want to go back for Game seven. And even though it came down to the last possession in game seven, we lost that series. In game I lost that series. Excuse me. In Game six, they were up big the whole way we cut it. It's three minutes left, we cut it to two. I
get fouled. I go to the free throw line and we had not led at all, and I knew if we could tie or take the lead, we were going to break them. That is, you just know when it's gonna break, like a one. For freaking I go one for two at the free throw line and we're down one, and it's almost like they exhaled, like they didn't catch us. I did that. These are the things I internalize. It's me so when I'm you know, in my thoughts thinking, these are the things I think about as a former player.
It's not the shots and all that, it's the what ifs, the what ifs versus Chicago in Game six or in Game seven in Chicago Stadium jump ball. I can recite all this. Pull it up, Dylan. We're up six jump ball between Rick Smith's Scottie Pippen. I believe on their side of the court. We win that go down to score. We go up eight, possibly nine with a three, with three and change left. Then you can start to massage
the game a little bit. Scotty wins the tip, finds little freaking Steve Kerr hits a three, cuts it in half. We gotta win that tip. We win that tip and score God. So those are the things I think about.
That's does it still haunt you to this day or you have peace with it now?
It will always haunt me. It will always haunt me not winning a chip. It wouldn't haunt me as much if I was never so close. Yeah right. You could be a great player and never be close. I never had the opportunity. Oh, I had opportunities. That's what hurts is I had opportunities. And that's why it burns me.
It just burns me because you want to win it for for the guys in that locker room that lay their run through a brick wall, for you, when you're the man for my Davis boys giving up their bodies Dale Davis having a dislocated shoulder, popping it back in the playoffs saying I'm good to let's go. Come on, man, man, I want to win it for those dudes and the fans on top of what makes this series. Why this is how we were thinking. This is how jack and I Mark Jackson and I were thinking. This is how
cocky we were, but you have to be. We wanted to retire that dude because this is remember this is his last year, like we want to retire, send them home. That's how we felt. And another thing, why this is my fault? Twenty points at half for me and I end with twenty four. That's unacceptable. Second chance points too, that's unacceptable. This has got to be a thirty five to forty point game for me in the playoffs versus him, and he was nine for twenty nine, so he's not
having a great night himself. Everything is stacked for you to beat these dudes.
God, do you ever go back and watch any of these series that either you win or lost after all these years.
I don't need to go back and watch them because in your mind constantly it is a non stop loop, non stop, non stop loop, in my head how I can just recite certain things. It's just we had them.
We had them, Steph Curry, his greatness, the revolution, they kind of revolutionizing the art of the three point shot. You were someone who was back then they called it volume, but it wasn't the volume compared to today. Thoughts on Stephan and what he's been able to do to this game and what your game would have been like with that kind of freedom and that kind of could you played an area where it's inside out if you can come down and transition whenever you wanted and just shoot threes.
I could shoot ten to fifteen threes a game, Max Bull of us. There's only a handful of players that you think about that has truly changed the game. Having a six or nine point guard. I don't think we'll ever see that again in magic, having a guy who flies air Jordan, having someone as dominant as the Shaquille O'Neill, even though they say, will someone who changed the culture like an Ai and then to me, Stephan Curry, you.
Get that all let on the nose. I mean, you can't explain it better than.
That, right, There is no those five guys changed basketball, and if you go to any rec league, you go to any high school, any AEU, and you see those kids. We all have kids. The first thing they do just run to that three point line and shoot and say Stephen Curry, Kirby range. He has changed and you know they try and he's come out and said, look there are steps here. I didn't just come out shooting. You know twenty five footers. You know form shooting. I work my way in and work my way out. But all
they say is the end result. And he has mastered it. He is one of the all time game changers. That's big quick hitters. First thing to come to your mind.
Let us know top five shooters of all time, and don't be shy.
No, I'm going to say President Company excluded Larry Legend, Stephan Ray, Mark Price, and I'm gonna tell you who could shoot it. Pastakovich, Slash Draws and Petrovich. I'll put both of those itches in there. Itches, those itches, you gotta put those in the one album you can listen to with no skills. Man Thriller, Michael Jackson, I answer. I knew the answer that man, MJ. Thriller. You know how much I love it.
I heard sugar Free said you had the same amount of motherfuckings and Michael Jackson he became your.
You still became yourself. Thriller, baby anything, MJ. I'm listening to it NonStop. I love it. Five Dinner Guests you plus five bed or Alive. I'm gonna go with Mohammed Ali. I'll go with Barack. I will go with Denzel Rosa Parks because I want to know. I want to know that strength. I want to know. And I have one more. I'm gonna go with Walter Peyton Sweetness, sweetness. I want to know too. Five NBA champ Whos gonna win it? Because I have to call games, it's hard for me
to say who's going to win it? But I'll give you my who do I like? Well? I think it's time now for Okac to show up. All right, the last two years they've had the best regular season, but come this time of year, they faltered. And this back to your point of about vets and all that. It's time. It could be theirs to lose. But if Boston is Boston and porzingis remember they want a championship. And basically Perzinga's played two games, it was that much of a
difference though. Boston is making threes and you can talk about Tatum and Brown and Perzinga's all you want to me, Drew Holliday and Derek white Man and then Pritchard off the bench. Is kind of like the year if though. If they're making threes and all that, they're going to be a very difficult out Cleveland. Man, I was so impressed in that last Indiana game playing without those they have a lot of depth. But I would love to see, okay,
see in Boston in the NBA Finals. But okay, see, it's time now you got you gotta prove it because.
Your windows closing fast and you know you got Luca and Lebron.
Is this gonna be the last go round for for Lebron?
And Clippers hot at the right time. Clippers are hot to me? Yeah, I think?
And WHI is quhi now why zubots is quietly having most James Harden has killing it, Norman, Paul Lebrew and brother Clips are gonna be tough out. I feel like, hypothetically, would you trade.
The game winner over m J and the ninety eight Eastern Finals for the Tayshawn block in the Eastern Finals.
In four Hell yes, because it's I don't know if we would have won that Chicago series anyways if I missed that shot because it's we go back to their place. Yeah, I would definitely because if I make that layup and we win that series. Because I remember going into the locker room and telling Jo and Ron because you know they butted heads whose team it was. I was like, do you guys understand whoever wins this series is going
to win a championship? Because the Lakers were waiting with Kobe and Shaq and all that, I was like, but they ain't playing defense like Detroit in us, whoever wins this series is going to win a championship. They could not understand that. What happens Detroit pizzas and it was a gentleman in five games suite, they beat the crap out of them. I'm like, so yes, I would change
that goaltending block by Tayshaun. I would change that because if we win that series, I think we're gonna win the championship versus the Lakers.
If you could see one guest on our show, who would it be? But you have to help us get your answer on the show. You said his name because we got business to do.
Have has Denzel ever been on here?
No, that's the name, but that wasn't who I was thinking about who I got business with.
But you, Spike Lee's never been on here.
And he just commented because I was mister Spike, I wanted more. I played in spekes and he saw it on our page on stock X so he made a coming.
So that's yeah.
Actually, if I pulled my stocks off, I have manicured feet.
Bring that kind of cured feet, so my feet are nice. I don't know. Maybe he gave me to be not he ain't no corns, MA able to see if this is a real number or not. He calling Spike right now, hold on, I'm going to see. I'm just gonna see if this is a real number. Ring that came list.
He's like, man, just going on, man, I don't think we've ever had this on site, right.
I don't think everybody. I don't know if it works. I don't know everybody come through like reds though, I don't know if I can't either. Your call has been forwarded to Uh. I'm a man, all right, so this is the right thing because here's here's I got a thread. Hey doing all the smoke they need sit down, gee through your jinky ass reds. Man. We appreciate you. We got some for you. All the smoke, yes, yes.
Indeed, I mean one of the greatest players, but even better person.
Uh you what it's all about.
You've always been solid it to us, rid So we appreciate you, man, We love you.
Thank you for your time. Man, Thank you.
Guys got it emotional lear tears everything.
I'm soft now, that's a man.
It's okay, long over. It's okay for men to let their feelings out and cry.
We've been trying to learn, man, we've been trying to learn.
Okay, as black men, you gotta let it out, Let it out, man. That's a Reggie Miller, the Great.
You can catch us on all the Smoke Productions, YouTube and the Draft Kings Network.
We'll see yeah.
H mm hmmm mm hmmm