"One, Two, Three … Cancun!"

for the postseason to be over. One to three Cancun s I Senior writer Howard Beck joins me to discuss where the saying came from, how it became famous among NBA players and fans alike, and how it's maybe more popular than ever more than two decades after it was first uttered. This is the legend of one to three Cancun. I'm your host, John Gonzalez from Sports Illustrated and I Heart Radio. This is Sports Illustrated Weekly. Howard Beck. Welcome

back to Sports Illustrated Weekly. You're here again. I'm here again. I feel just like a regular guest. I'm just gonna like set myself down on the couch. I'm gonna open your fridge and grab myself a beer. I feel. That's how at home I feel. Make yourself at home, my casa, your casa. You know, we've done a lot of things on this show together. We started the very first episode, we had you discussing the Warriors being back. We previewed

the playoffs together in a very profane conversation. We discussed the NBA's profanity problem. But of all the segments that we've done together, I don't think I've been as excited as I have for this one, because you know, I go s I dot com one day and all of a sudden, there it is, in all its glory. The story of one to three Cancun, which is legendary NBA circles, has written by one Howard Back. It's the catch phrase known and loved in the NBA, certainly by NBA media.

So before we get into the origins, explaining macro terms for everybody, the meaning behind the phrase one to three cancun, how it's employed well too, three cancun means it's over done, time for vacation. So one two three Cancun. In the context of the NBA playoffs and certainly on inside the NBA on t NT that is now part and parcel of the Gone Fishing segment. Your team gets eliminated, either at the end of the regular season if you're out,

or if you missed the playoffs. You lost in the play in now or any round of the playoffs that you've lost, it's time for gone fishing. And when it's time for gone fishing, it's time to say one to three cancoon. And since the Lakers lost, it's what canco. You mentioned inside the NBA, and they're probably the most prolific users of the phrase, but really everybody uses it now. You mentioned the media, But it's been a while now since it originated. It traces back to the Western Conference Finals.

The Lakers had a young Shock and even younger Kobe. They were getting ruined by the Jazz. So take us back to that time and tell everybody about how the phrase originated and the origin an old genius behind it. The Western Conference Finals in is just the most lopsided of affairs. It's Krmelon and John Stockton, of course, the legendary duo for the Jazz and this really mature, methodical team and they're going up against the Lakers team that's

really talented but young. They haven't figured it out yet. It's Shack and Kobe's second year together. Kobe is still just nineteen years old. They've got Robert Ory, Rick Fox, Derek Fisher, like all the guys who you now think of as part of a dynasty. But this is before the dynasty happens, before they figured it out. And they've still got Nick van Exel in his fifth season, They've got Eddie Jones. This is a really talented team, maybe too talented, maybe too many guys who wanted to be

the featured player. That's possible, and at that time, the expectations already through the roof because of all this young talent. They're supposed to make a run. They don't have the polish or the efficiency, the mature, the togetherness to beat the Jazz. So they're on their way to getting swept. And that's the key part of this. So they're on their way to getting swept. They have their team huddle,

you know, like this happens in all team sports. Put your hand in the middle on three, you say a phrase, and the general phrase for everybody else was one to three lakers, right, a pretty stock and standard phrase for everybody to you know, rally around or fake rallying around before they go out and have the Jazz beat their heads. And but there was one guy who didn't do one to three lakers. He did one two, three, Cancun and tell us about him. That would be Nick van Exel.

They're down three oh at the time, we know this. We know this even more now in two than they did. No one had ever come back from three oh. Then twenty four years later, still know what has come back from three oh. When you're down three oh, you know your time is coming. You're almost done. Vacation is close. So in the moment, on a whim they're huddling up one, two, three, Nick van Exel just blurts out Cancoon when everyone else said lakers. And because everyone else said lakers in Unison,

probably not everybody heard it. Those who did hear it, some might have chuckled or smiled, some others might have wrinkled the brow a little bit, because though Nick van Exel could be a bit of a jokester, it wasn't clear to everybody. Is he saying he's done, he's given up, I'm out of here, guys? Is it just kind of dark humor? What does that mean? Because it came across like, well, maybe Nick van Exel is just saying, I don't know about you, guys, but I'm ready to go on vacation.

What I love about this story is that you have talked to the principal players, Nick van Exel, and you had a conversation about this. What was his explanation, I mean, was it spontaneous? Did he decide to be purposefully snarky that had just come out accidentally? What was his explanation in retrospect? So I spoke to Nick ve next Well, who is now, of course, an assistant coach with the

Atlanta Hawks. He's been an assistant coach in the league for several years now, and Nick says, there was nothing premeditated here, Like he didn't wake up that day thinking I'm gonna make this joke in the huddle. He didn't think about it on his drive in. I don't think he even knew he was going to say it at the moment that they first started to all say together one to three. It was just what came out. He thought,

you know what, I'm gonna make a crack here. He can't even really account for why it was Cancun as opposed to say Fiji or Maui or Puerto Rico. It was the place that popped into his head first, and Cancoon, as it happens, was a really popular place for athletes and entertainers at that time, or as Robert Orry told me, a popular place for African American athletes and entertainers at that time. That was a big I think they had a jazz festival, and so Robert was telling me that

that was where you see a lot of people. It was a go to spot. As you said, some people might have snickered, some people might have furrowed their brow. And after all this goes down. The next season, Nick van Exel gets traded and there was a report in the l A Times at the time that Shack had complained to Jerry West about the remark and the implication was that he almost got traded because of one two three cancoon. But you debunked this, Yeah, I don't want

to say debunk um. You know, these stories tend to evolve over time. People's memories evolve. And also you know that that initial report in the l A Times was was an item in a notes column, so it's very short. There was a lot of elaboration. It didn't say sources, it didn't say sources who knew it because of so there was a lot that was kind of shrouded in that report. I will say that there are differing views of a couple of things. One, did Shaq really go

to management? Nick told me, yeah, I heard that Shack didn't like it, and yeah, he might have gone to Jerry West who was then the g M, and complained whether that was why he was traded. That's the part where Nick him's self is debunking it. Nick saying, give me a break, and he was traded basically a month later. He was like that. The season ends late May in the conference finals with that sweep. A month later, he's traded on Draft Night for the draft rights to one

Tehron Lou as well as Tony Batty. Why he was traded then a month after one to three Cancun, It would be easy to say it was because of one to three Cancun. Nick says, no, that's not it. I was traded in the middle of the season. I say, what do you mean, you were traded in the middle of the season, because obviously he wasn't literally traded in

the middle of the season. He says he knew by the middle of the season that he was gone, that this was his last run with the Lakers for a bunch of different reasons, and the one that he sided it was just that they had a little bit more camaraderie at the beginning of this run with this particular group, but by mid season he felt like clicks were forming, factions were forming, and they weren't really together anymore. And again, Eddie Jones and and Nick Van Exel had made the

All Star Team that season. Kobe had made the All Star Game despite not even starting for his own team. Shocked me. The All Star Game. Elden Campbell had been a starting center and who was still capable of being a starting center and a starting power forward next to Shack, but when they didn't want to go with that alignment, he had to go to the bench. So you've got his feelings, You've got Nick van Exel, who's a primary

ball handler. There's just so many guys, and so it's understandable and I think believable when Nick says there were just other things going on, other things kind of in the air that made him feel like I'm probably going to get traded. And on top of all of that, and not to be lost in all this, Nick Van exellent Del Harris had very very publicly and privately clashed repeatedly in their time together del Harris being the coach. So we know for sure that Nick van Exel said one,

two three cancoon. But more than twenty years later a little bit of a fog and a controversy around whether or not he was the lone sayer of this fraser of other people joined in. On the one hand, we have people saying, hey, Shock didn't like it, Shack went to Jerry West. But all these years later you talked to Shock and Shaq said, oh, I might have said it too, and I wouldn't put all the blame on Nick van Exel. And then Robert Ory said to you, no, no, no,

it was just Nick. So what's the deal here? Was it just Nick? Or were there other co conspirators? There were no co conspirators. There was no Grassy Knoll. There wasn't a Shaquille O'Neal on the Grassy Knoll. There were no knolls that I know of, anywhere near the Great Western Forum in Inglewood, California. Nick said this on his own. And Nick will tell you that Robert Orry will tell you that Shack has this um knack. We'll call it

for storytelling, embellishing. He did this a lot when I was back on the Laker beat, and you could usually tell when Shack was making something up out a whole cloth, and it was funny because sometimes people would run with those things. This was a case where I think Shack doesn't want to get involved twenty four years later and whether or not he's the cause of Nick being traded, and so Shack says, just say we all said it. Just say it was me, it was Eddie, was Nick?

Was Shack really? And then you know that's why I follow up with Nick and Robert orry about it. No, Shack, Shack's just being Shock, So no, no, but nobody else said it. I think that Shock maybe is a little sheepish now about whether or not he might have been responsible for Nick getting traded. And again, based on my reporting, I truly believe that even if this were a contributing elements to Nick getting traded, it wasn't in the top

five of reasons why they would move on. You know, Kobe was gonna come up for a big contract eventually, Eddie Jones was coming up on a big contract. Shock

of course, was already paid big. Like they had a lot of star caliber players who need to get paid, who needed the ball, who needed to be featured, and it was a natural progression and worth noting that less than a year later they also traded Eddie Jones and Eldon Campbell, so there was a thinning out process that they needed to do to create the team that ultimately became a dynasty. Alright, So Nick Van Exel is the sole author of this incredible catchphrase that is two decades

plus being used by everybody. He could not have known that it would blow up like this. What did he make of it in the subsequent of years that it has endured this long? But the funny thing, John, is that it kind of was I feel like in hibernation. This happens in Nick gets traded. A couple of stories are written the following season about Okay, he's now a Denver nugget, how does he feel about his Lakers time, what does he think about the cancoon storyline, and whether

that was the reason for his being traded? But then it disappears like nobody ever writes about this, no one talks about it, and no one says one to three cancoon to my knowledge in all my years covering the NBA until around sixteen, even t NT officials when I asked them weren't sure exactly when it kind of permeated their presentations, but somewhere in sixteen range, for whatever reason, I'm gonna say it's probably because of Shack They're doing

going fishing, and suddenly now it's one to three Cancun, and then that kind of picks up steam. Other guys catch on. Now they're making cancoon references. And then the t NT graphics staff, that phenomenal, wonderful, incredibly talented and creative staff is now working cancoon to They're gone fishing graphics, and you know, the next thing, you know, a couple of years later, Alvin Gentry coaching the Pelicans at the time they're getting eliminated, and he ends his press conference

with one to three Cancun. What does it want to? Three? Can code? Suddenly now it's a staple. So I think for the first you know, fifteen sixteen years after it was said in that huddle back at the forum, and no one's using it, no one's saying it's not a reference point. And now suddenly, all these years later, it is as much a part of the NBA post season as anything else. Yeah, I love that it's become popular in the lexicon. Again Van Excel told you that he

should have trademarked, and he should have. Does he like that it's become popular? Yeah, it was funny. Nick and Robert Ry both independently. Like rob before I talked to Nick, said, man, tell Nick he should have trademarked that thing, like pat Riley with three pete And then Nick said it on his own, unprompted. He's joking about it. I mean, he's no one's worried about missing out on some sort of royalties. I'm not sure one to three Cancun's, you know, generating

any big corporate sponsorships or anything. Although you know, frankly, I think he deserves at least some kind of kick back from the tourism bureau in Cancoon, right, It's the least they can do. Um. Nick likes it. Nick enjoys it. Nick thinks it's funny. I think he enjoys the fact that, even if especially younger fans have no idea where this catchphrase came from, I think he loves the fact that it kind of originated with him. And it's not as a negative thing, you know, because to him, that's not

the reason he got traded. It's not the reason that his Lakers tenure ended. It was just a quick funny line that he was throwing out, trying to lighten the mood, because the mood, as he says, was pretty dour at that time, as the mood tends to be when you're down three oh in a playoff series in the NBA. Well, he has lightened the mood all these years later, We thank him for We thank you for reading his excellent piece about one to three Kankun a piece of NBA

lare on st dot com. Listen to him on the Crossover podcast. I don't know where he's going this offseason, could be Camcoon, but he has earned a vacation. Howard back as always, thank you for this. Appreciate it. John, thank you, thanks for listening, and a reminder to please rate and review the show that helps people find us. Sports Illustrated Weekly is a production of Sports Illustrated and

I Heart Radio. For more podcasts from I Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your favorite shows. And for more of Sports Illustrated's best stories and podcasts, visit SI dot com. This episode of Sports Illustrated Weekly was produced by Jordan Rozsieri, Jessica Ramoski, and Isaac Lee, who was also our sound engineer. Our senior producers are Dan Bloom and Harry swart Out. Our executive producers are Scott Brodie and me John Gonzalez.

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