You hear all these stories about, ‘There’s one in a million guys that make it to the NBA and stay there.’ To see people cheering for me and when they say my name, it’s just crazy. It’s still crazy to me.
This was an extremely difficult decision as I take great pride in representing our country. I know that I owe it to my USA Basketball teammates to be totally invested in the experience. After going through training camp with USAB.
I realized I could not fulfill my responsibilities to the team from both a time and energy standpoint. I need to take a step back and take some time away, both mentally and physically in order to prepare for the upcoming NBA season.
I was just a big fan of tattoos always growing up, and I wanted something cool that symbolizes what I’ve been through in my life, and everything on my chest and my back is like a collage.
There’s a lot of falses – out there and if I take up for myself, it’s a bad thing. Sometimes you just got to live with it, but for the most part, I’m like look, I don’t want no problems with nobody.
And last, my mom. I don’t think you know what you did. You had my brother when you were 18 years old. Three years later, I came out. The odds were stacked against us. Single parent with two boys by the time you were 21 years old. Everybody told us we weren’t supposed to be here.
Me as a person, I’m not the president of the NBPA (National Basketball Players Association). I don’t even know what to say. I’m not like this perfect, buttoned-up, suit-and-tie guy.
