Digital Social Hour - Spencer Dinwiddie's Journey from the G League to NBA Stardom | Digital Social Hour #55

Episode Date: July 24, 2023

Step right up, ladies and gentlemen! Gather 'round as I unveil the captivating world of professional athletics. In this episode of the Digital Social Hour, we delve into the lives of athletes and their remarkable journeys. Join me, your host, Sean Kelly, as we explore the highs and lows, the triumphs and challenges faced by these extraordinary individuals. Picture this: the thrill of the game, the adrenaline pumping through your veins, the shining lights of the basketball court. We hear from basketball star Spencer Dinwiddie as he opens up about his experiences in the NBA. From his early years battling for minutes to the evolution of the game itself, Spencer's story is as captivating as it is inspiring. But it's not just basketball that takes the stage. We dive into the world of investing and financial security, exploring the concerns that plague professional athletes. From the pressure to maintain wealth to the changing landscape of the industry, Spencer shares his perspective on the matter. But wait, there's more! Get ready to be amazed as we shine a spotlight on the grueling training routines and wild workout regimens that athletes endure. We'll reveal the unusual requests and peculiar practices that push these individuals to their limits. From underwater handstands to intense stretching sessions, you won't believe what goes into preparing these athletes for the big stage. Now, imagine a future filled with relaxation and contentment. Spencer shares his dreams of being a doting father and his passion for the culinary arts. Will he take the path of a food entrepreneur or perhaps bless us with a family cookbook? The possibilities are endless. So, my friends, are you ready to be captivated by the world of professional athletics? Are you prepared to witness the highs and lows of these remarkable individuals? Then don't waste another moment. Tune in to this episode of the Digital Social Hour and immerse yourself in a world unlike any other. Trust me, you won't want to miss this. BUSINESS INQUIRIES: [e-mail] SPONSORS: AG1: https://www.drinkAG1.com/DSH Hostage Tape: https://hostagetape.com/DSH --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/digitalsocialhour/support Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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100 million is getting thrown out like and you're at your peak right now so you're good time now everybody's getting 100 million dollars every single team that you get traded to is better after you get there like this is like this is not an opinion like this is math Welcome back to the Digital Social Hour, guys. I'm your host, Sean Kelly. Here with my co-host, Charlie Cavalier. And our guest today, Spencer Dinwiddie. Thank you for having me. Absolutely.

First NBA player. I'm appalled. It's an honor. Yeah. What you been up to out here? You know, I mean, typical summer league stuff. You know, watching a couple games, doing a couple practices,

having some meetings, talking to the young guys. Maybe a little blackjack. Okay. But I don't like it too crazy. That's your game? Yeah, that's it. Oh, man, gambling out here is always a miss from, you know, whenever I play. Why blackjack?

It's just the one I understand the most. Gotcha. I have the highest probability. I started playing it with my college coach, actually. Okay. Do you know how to count? No on camera right yeah casino's watching this that's it no no i don't think they're gonna blacklist you even if you are counting the cards yeah i'm not here often enough i come here maybe once twice max a year so yeah nice so you've been getting traded

around a lot lately man how's that life been like getting traded every couple years a lot of upheaval um you spend a lot of time in hotels not just on the away games obviously you stay there for home games too um but i've been fortunate a couple of the stops have been a blessing dallas uh and in brooklyn obviously you're two places i love so you know it's been a blessing to kind of spend time in both those areas nice one of them oh sorry no one of my favorite things i looked up was every single team that you get traded to is better after you get there like this is like this is not an opinion like this is math thank you wow like you add wins to every single team you have ever joined and as soon as you leave you know what happens hey man hey if the stats back it up back it up that's that's an honor too i mean i played a game to win you

know i'm saying i don't play for you know stats and accolades and things like that so yeah you know if the proof's in the pudding then it means i'm doing my job so i'm happy about that that's dope would you say a lot of players play to win or is there some that play for money i mean in terms of the money aspect obviously it's it's a balance right like we we're growing in the feed families you know i mean so there there is a piece of that to it um in terms of like stat padding specifically or plan to win i'd say the majority nba players i think play to win okay i mean obviously some people do have their different mentalities and you know obviously i haven't played with every single person in the nba but i would say the

majority have uh their intentions in the right place for the most part. Oh, that's cool because the money is so good you never know. Right. Yeah, no, I mean, again, like I said, we're growing to feed our families. We do want to get paid. I'm not going to sit here and be like, oh, I would dedicate all this time to it if I was getting paid a penny.

I couldn't do it, right? I'd have to have a normal job as well. But, you know given given the most of the players that i know like they're they're out there really competing that's cool and you did have to compete from the jump i mean yeah first i want to ask one funny question before we get into all the grind he had to do what do you think jordan farmar is upset that he's now the second best point guard to ever come out of your high school uh because you're obviously the best yeah probably i mean you know he had a better high school uh career though he was mcdonald's all-american and so he he wore that title for a very long time

won a ring with the lakers so you know shout out jordan farmer but a great player i'm a kings fan so i don't really like the lakers stuff i understand but uh no in general though yeah nba career and you averaged more points in the nba than you did in high school and college. Wow. How is that even possible? Yeah. To be honest, my high school team was stacked. So we had a bunch of great players. I mean, my junior year, we had Bryce Zane Jones, who was actually UNLV, and then played for the Pelicans for a second.

DeAndre Daniels, who got drafted. My senior year, we had a bunch of D1 guys as well. So we were stacked. So I passed the ball a lot in high school. I think I went to Hoop Hall and had, like, two points and 15 assists. Yeah, so. And then in college, it's hard to score that it isn't in. Really?

Yeah. Like, the paint is so packed. And in the NBA, like, it's so spread out. There's no defense in three seconds. So really it's one-on-one. And that was something that I've drilled since I was a kid. And I played all the time. You know, my uncle used to have us playing one-on-one like all the time.

That was like one of the main pieces of our workouts when we were like, you know, 12, 13, 14 years old. Wow. Shout out to our sponsor today, AG1. Man, AG1 has been a great product. Been using it for the past few months now. Used to have some constipation issues. It's helped my body feel a lot better. Every morning I wake up and it's a good start to the day, you know? Yeah, same thing with me. I take AG1 in the mornings and at night before I go to bed, especially before working out, bro. It gives me all the nutrition I actually

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drinkag1.com slash dsh drinkag1.com slash dsh link will be in the bio thanks guys you'd attribute your success to playing one-on-one a lot oh yeah for sure especially the nba game because it's two primary actions it's either picking roles or some level of isolation right yeah and you got drafted in 2014 did you know you were going to get drafted yeah yeah i did so uh you know coming out of Colorado in my junior year um originally I was supposed to be like in the lottery conversation lottery pick or whatever I tore my ACL um unfortunately and uh you know they told me at the time obviously I probably slipped to the second round I still declared so I fully expected

to get drafted it was just a roll of the dice as to what pick which team like i had i think by the time i actually declared i had a draft range of like 20 to 50 which is super high like they're super sorry broad broad yeah um whereas most guys might have like 10 to 20 17 to 22 like it's like five to ten picks match i had a 30 pick yeah i'd be anxious about that not knowing where you're going it has to be hard, especially because, I mean, you came back from that ACL injury. What was that like? Just, you know, your entire career is in front of you, right?

Everything looks bright. Everything's amazing. And then, yeah, I mean, I tore my MCL, but I think ACLs and Achilles are probably two of the worst things you can do. Yeah, I would say probably Achilles won ACL too, more than likely. Yeah, no, I mean, at that stage, that ACL, it was scary. You know what I mean? Because, like you said, I had my whole career in front of me.

I'd finally gotten to a place, after not being the most highly recruited guy, coming out of high school, that I was pretty touted. You know what I mean? And I thought, okay, lottery pick, getting ready to start my NBA career. And what you don't know about the NBA is kind of like where you start can really affect what happens next, right? Like if you are a lottery picker, top 10 or whatever it is, you know, you get the benefit of the doubt. You get that initial shot. You get a chance to make mistakes. When you're a second round pick, you know, it's just it just comes down to investment, right?

Like they only got it at the time. I, my starting salary was like $500,000. You know what I mean? Like, that's far cry from two, three million starting salary just in terms of my investment into you as a player. And so you don't get as many chances to make mistakes. You got to kind of really be perfect. And that's honestly, in part, why it didn't really work out to start. Yeah, a lot of players have that one injury and they're never the same. What was it like fighting for minutes your rookie season? Yeah, I mean, it was tough. So like you said, I got drafted in 2014 to Detroit Pistons.

We had a veteran-laden team. We had a veteran-biased coach. He liked the experience and how they just knew the game better. And obviously, at the time i was what 20 years old or something like that um and so the older guys they just they just know better like you know me now at 30 like i can look back and be like yeah like you know some of the things that are just kind of seamless and just ring off in my head now like i wasn't doing it

20 now still had the talent still had a you know the potential to produce but it was going to take time and you know it wasn't something that i was afforded at at that uh specific stop in my career interesting i uh i read that you spent a little time in grand rapids when you first got drafted and that there was a steve blake shooting slump that led to them going you know hitting you up you got a few starts and your first game out i think you dropped like 15 points yeah eight assists something like that on the bulls if i remember correctly and then from then on you're in and out of the rotation for the year and then by that second year it seemed like you were pretty locked in like you weren't going anywhere even by the end

of that first year like there was never going to be a g league for you ever again after that uh so actually that that's the crazy part So you know that that did happen and then going to my second year it kind of flipped back. So you're you're referring to my third year but that's when I got to Brooklyn. So I ended up having to get cut bulls a whole bunch of stuff and I'm Chicago bulls not bulls. But yeah no so it was my third year actually where I got really locked in but yeah it was a little bit of a care so I spent time in Grand Rapids and yeah sometimes it takes you know a shooting slump or you know an injury or whatever to get your opportunity and you know that's kind of been what got my foot in the door and then I think my work ethic and

consistency have allowed me to kind of stay in the rotation yeah what was it like in the door and then i think uh my work ethic and consistency have allowed me to kind of stay in the rotation yeah what was it like in the g league is it a different game over there or is it similar to the nba completely different really um yeah i mean i i tell people all the time like each level of basketball is almost like a uh a different style of dance like you could uh dance ballet really well but not dance salsa you know i'm saying and so each level high school college uh you know d league uh g league sorry um you know overseas nba they're all the style is different you know i mean obviously d league is similar just because of the rules you know i'm saying obviously but the the players are smaller um i'd say the game is probably a little more physical just in terms of people

fighting for their lives quite literally but um yeah it's just a little bit different yeah because they're fighting for roster spots so it's oh yeah a lot of emotions yeah the the hunger is a little bit different down there for sure yeah that makes sense so we're seeing a lot of these like little viral questions going around like could an average person you know run for one yard in an nfl game if given 10 carries could an average person score a point in an nba game if they played all 48 minutes could my unathletic score two points in an nba game if everyone's going full everything assuming that my stamina can make it 48 minutes yeah i was gonna say that that's tough like you gotta check your stamina first okay um i mean obviously the thing about two points are

like one yard miracles happen yeah it's so many variables you know what i mean like you know you could get fouled while they're in the bonus and just knock down two free throws but do i trust you to get a bucket no like and it's the the same thing. Like, you know, would I trust a normal person to, like, try to run a go route on a DB? No. But if the O-line gets a great push, could you fall forward and get a yard? Yeah. You know what I mean?

But a better question would be, like, could you average 10 points or shoot, even average five points? And the answer would be no. No. No way. What's the most you've averaged in a season? Like 21. That's impressive.

And you were top 20 in assists last season, right? Yeah. What made you step up that much last season, you think? Honestly, it was the change back to Brooklyn, I think, for the most part. You know, in general, like, again, I try to adapt to the team needs, right? So, you know, when you're in Dallas and playing with Luca, a little bit more spot-up shooting. And then obviously when he's off the court,

there is that playmaking aspect, but you're also thinking a little bit more score. You know what I mean? So you're trying to pick up the pace a little bit, think score just to kind of give the defense a little bit different look, right? Because Luca's going to play at his pace. He's going to have post-ups, pick and roll. It's going to defense a little bit different look, right? Because Luka's going to play at his pace. He's going to have post-ups, pick and roll. It's going to be a little bit slower.

And then my task was to try to pick up the speed a little bit. When I went to Brooklyn midseason, you know, it was a group that was thrown together, obviously, and trying to figure things out. And so the task was how best can you kind of, like, keep the group together? Well, of course, and stay in the playoff race, right? Well, obviously, one of the best ways to do that is make sure everybody eats, everybody gets touches.

You know what I'm saying? Then you got to learn where people, you know, like the ball, et cetera. I mean, you know, some people jump off two feet to catch live. Some people jump off one, right? Some people only like shooting in the left corner or the right corner. So you have to learn all those nuances on the fly and um with that group you know we had a lot of shooting as well so you know my task was to find them more so than uh you know uh scoring as much as that's why it's like i think it was like nine assists something

like that with uh the nets versus probably like five with uh dallas yeah it's a big jump and you guys made the playoffs. You ended the season pretty strong. What was it like in the playoffs? I mean, it was tough. We ran to Philly, who has, you know, obviously a former MVP in Harden, but also the current MVP in Joel Embiid. Right.

You know, it's no real secret. We couldn't really guard him. Harden went off. Yeah, I mean, we were doubling Joel, and then we were in rotations hard ended up having a couple big games and it was just uh it was it was tough it was a very tough matchup for you all you did not match up extremely as much as you wanted yeah exactly like anytime you have like doubling is something you do typically when um you're in a bind right somebody gets cooking or whatever else is using an adjustment um in this situation our game plan was to double essentially all the time which is perfectly fine and fair because obviously

we couldn't really guard you all straight up right um but when you do that now Tobias Harris who's a very talented player Tyrese Max who's a very talented player they're catching you on close outs and in rotations and things like that which makes it immensely more difficult right i'm saying like even if we were playing if i had to run full speed in one direction you got to pick whichever you're going to go it's going to be harder for me to stop you because now i'm just guessing yeah would you say there's certain players like mb that are just unguardable one-on-one um i mean i'm i don't think anybody is unguardable yeah that's what i was gonna say i mean i think it comes down to matchup right like if you have uh i don't know man uh but just another big enough body i mean maybe a brook lopez or something you put up a different type of

resistance to that um style of player right and so a lot of that comes down to matchups yeah whereas like for example nick clackson our center is probably the best uh five minutes switching in the league really like oh yeah like he he can switch out guard a wing etc like with the best of them so we played a played a team that didn't necessarily have a, I don't know how big Joel is, but let's say 275 maybe, a 275-pound center, we probably would have been able to stick to switching everything, which is a big strength of our team with McHale

and Dorian Finney-Smith and Royce and Nick, and then kept everybody in front. And then that leads also to fueling our offense. You know what I'm saying? It helps us get more pace and get on transition. Yeah. I don't want to get you in trouble, so I'm going to ask a positive question. Who's the most underrated player in the NBA right now?

Most underrated? I was going to ask overrated, but I don't want to make any enemies. Overrated? Oh, yeah, no. Underrated? Underrated? Underrated that I'm a fan of? Like maybe somebody – who would – like if you could put somebody on your team,

who do you think is underrated tomorrow? I mean, no, that's two different questions. But I would say somebody that I think got his flowers this year more so than he has in the past, De'Aaron Fox. You know what I'm saying? And you mentioned the Kings, so that's why it's on my mind and i went to kentucky oh well hey no i think i think he got his flowers this year but in general though he's a really he's a really good player and i don't think uh prior to this season he kind of got his flowers just in terms of like the media and stuff yeah do you think it's because he's from a smaller market team i mean smaller market no offense no yeah smaller market hadn't really won and you know sometimes obviously you

know you you get dinged for not winning which is understandable but it's not always like that player's fault either you know i'm saying so you know and i don't know the sacramento dynamics or anything like that i just i'm a fan of uh his game i think he's really good so you've been in the league for about 10 years now have you seen the game change at all from when you first got in? A ton. Really? Oh, a ton. My first year, 2014, our initial starting lineup was Brandon Jennings, Contavious Caldwell-Pope, Josh Smith at the three, Greg Monroe at the four, and Andre Drummond at the five. Those three players that I just named right now would probably be all centers

in today's nba just because of the shooting now obviously josh smith would be more like a stretch for yeah stretch for like like draymond green is like because he was actually really good in the dho and like uh you know passing yeah i think he was really underrated in that um but yeah greg monroe is definitely a back to the basket Center like yokich style and drumming is your typical live threat Center like Deandre Jordan style so we had three it'd be like starting Draymond Green Nicola yokich and Deandre Jordan I can't picture that I mean yeah so you've had to kind of change your game over the years to adapt to the the game for

sure i mean that's a that's a part of it um i would say for you know a guard the the transition has been a little bit more seamless um because it's not like my position got kind of eliminated or something like that like the back to the basket fours they're they're gone now yeah um but i think the the premium on three-point shooting is definitely a thing whereas like when I first got drafted that was right before the Warriors kind of took off I think the Warriors kind of took off in like 15 16. yeah um and so being in there in 2014 it was still before everybody was like you've got to be able to shoot not just threes but from like deep right now you need to shoot or else you're a liability exactly it's crazy like even

centers are shooting threes now yeah the mid-range game has disappeared very few people are even allowed to take those shots anymore like you know demar derozan would be an example of someone who still gets the green light on that and stuff like that but where is your favorite spot to score from on the court i'm sure this is in all the scouting reports so we're not giving any too much away but no no not at all i mean my whole game is based is based on breaking the paint, basically, causing havoc in that manner, whether that be through isolations or picking roles. So, I mean, the low hang fruit would probably be a layup. Yeah, I mean, just because like my job is literally getting the paint right and then make the read off of that. So I would just probably go with that one. And if not, then a step back.

Your step back's nasty. Thank you And if not, then a step back. Your step back's nasty. Thank you. I wish I had a step back. What age would you say most people are in their prime in the NBA? Oh, I would say it kind of depends on, are we looking for like a prime year? Are we looking for like? Yeah, prime years. The window.

Like maybe three year period yeah um probably like 28 to 32 or so would probably be like your your peak um in terms of athletically at least and then if you're good and with your body and stuff and because your game's going to continue to evolve you know we LeBron, for example, and guys get more skilled heading into near 40. But I would say your athletic peak is probably at 20 to 32. If you take care of your body, extend that to 35, 36 probably. Nice. You're in your prime right now.

Yeah, like dead smack in the middle. You're feeling good right now? I feel great. You're talking about how much you take care of your body. What does your daily routine during the season look like to take care of yourself, rest, recovery, all that? Because it's hard. You're in hotels. You're doing everything.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, we have kind of like, I would say, three days during season. It's not Monday through Sunday, right? It's like you got game day, you got got practice day and you got like light practice day right um you know practice day you could be in there hour and a half two hours right with the actual practice but you're going to get there early you probably got a hour and a half worth of lifting prior to that you got some level of table work so you're you're talking to the pt uh getting some level of adjustment etc so that probably takes 30 minutes so you're you're talking to the pt uh getting some level of adjustment etc so that

probably takes 30 minutes so you're looking at a two-hour block for that two-hour block for practice afterwards you probably got massage or any other type of stretch routine so let's put hour and a half for that then you talk about sauna cold tub um things of that nature. So, I mean, you're not a 9-to-5, but you're probably like a 9-to-3. You know what I'm saying? With no lunch break. Man. Man. Wow.

Now, you see a lot of these younger guys coming in the league getting injured, and there's talk on social media that they're playing too many games in high school leading up to it. Like these tournaments are like 5, 10 games a weekend. Do you think that's true um i mean i'm i'm not a uh you know biomechanics expert but i would say i mean you would think right like uh we only have so much cartilage we only have so much you know miles etc and if you wear it out then you know you're not and remember the other thing too is we play 82 games but again what i just say we're we're there nine to three four four of those hours

are body focused right whereas only two of them are like basketball focused for real so we're we're and we're gonna have a different style of diet we're gonna just just the investment into our body is gonna be a completely different thing with a kid you know they're gonna eat mcdonald's between the day yeah you feel me like and not saying that's bad you're a kid like go for it you know i'm saying i don't want you to be like you know super strict at 12 years old and hate your life yeah um but all that contributes to breakdown yeah i feel like they don't teach the diet aspect when you're a kid like in high school i eat terrible yeah i mean it's getting more famous now, all the health and wellness movement and stuff like that.

And so what was your welcome to the NBA moment? Welcome to the NBA moment. When you were like, holy shit, these guys are good. I'm here. I mean, probably just in practice. Brandon Jennings was somebody I looked up to, being from L.A. Yeah. And then going into Detroit, obviously coming off injury

and having to guard him and stuff in practice. And, you know, people forget he was probably on pace to have an all-star year before he tore his Achilles. So, like, he was in prime form. He was hooping. And, obviously, there was that balance of, like, you know, a guy that I looked up to because he was, like, a senior in high school when I was hooping. And obviously there was that balance of a guy I looked up to because he was like a senior in high school when I was going into high school. You know what I mean?

And McDonald's on America and the whole nine. One of the probably best high school guys that we've had in America, which is why he got to go overseas. So I would say my welcome to the NBA moment was probably just having to compete against him in practice. Because, again, like I didn't play that much. So when people were like, you know, who busted your a** rookie year? It was like, honestly, guys, I didn't really play.

So nobody did, but this isn't being cocky. This is literally like I wasn't on the floor to even get my a** busted. Yeah. You know? Now you've played for a lot of different coaches. I've seen Shaq's take on coaches. He said they don't matter. What's your take on coaches?

No, they matter. It's just that it's different than it is in high school, college, et cetera. It has far less to do with like X's and O's. You know, it's more about like managing personalities. You know, I'm saying managing egos. You're almost like a professional psychologist at that state because like i said most nba actions like we may run a ton of misdirection we may have pin downs over here and screens over there and all the other stuff nine times out of ten when it breaks down it gets to a pick and roll in isolation

that's where like and we'll do a whole bunch of other stuff we'll run over here and run over there this guy's screaming for that guy and whatever but then you'll get it to one of your best players, and he'll do one of those two things. Right. So that's why I think a lot of guys say it's less so about the coaching in terms of the X's and O's. But, nah, you still got to be there and be a psychologist and create chemistry and culture.

You know, that's supremely important. I think part of the reason we were able to have the the run in dallas when we went to the conference finals was just purely down to chemistry and culture because you wouldn't look at that team and think that we were the most talented in the world coaching is a tough job man they don't last long nah and you see they get all them grades and stuff getting stressed man i think three of the last four coach of the years have been fired i saw that that was crazy like don't win that award that's tough hey man you gotta remember like the owner can't fire himself right and then the max player probably ain't gonna get fired neither so like yeah and the gm's gonna point

to the coach before he points to himself well i mean you gotta the only two are left for gm or coach you gotta pick one like I'm just being real. Like, you know, LeBron ain't getting fired and the owner not firing himself. So that means the only two people you could point at are either GM or coach. Yeah. You know, I'd say it's probably kind of unfortunate

in that respect. It makes their job a lot harder for sure. Was Stan the coach when you got to Detroit still? Van Gundy? Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's why it's hard cracking the rotation because he loves vets. Yeah.

Okay. That's tough. Do you think a lot of coaches don't get respect from the players um I think in any situation just because of how I kind of like name that pegging order in terms of like you know owner max player then we kind of get into the and that's if you have a true max guy like some teams don't right you know I'm literally talking about the Lebron yannis's of the world right um as long as the the top guys respect the coach then the coach has the respect it's just that like you can have that fracture in the locker room if like just like anything else right these people over here and then these people over here and then these

people over there and then you know that's over there and then then it becomes hard for the young guys to follow right because i'm a rookie do i you know listen to lebron do i listen to the coach do i listen to gm as long as everybody's on the same page and again this goes with anything you know i'm saying in life any organization any you know group I'm saying, in life. Any organization, any, you know, group, whatever. Like, if you have a kind of a confirmed direction, everybody's on the same page, then everybody follows and everybody gets the requisite respect. Yeah, that makes sense.

What's on your NBA checklist? What are you trying to accomplish before you retire? Oh, easy one would be championship. I was going to point to the – do the LSU point to the ring? Yeah, yeah. Easy one is championship. Yeah. I mean, like, I think especially for a guy in my position

and to your point of how I approach the game, how I play the game, and then just understanding, like, how individual awards are won, like, it would definitely be a championship. Have you made an all-star game yet? No. No, I haven't. There's an argument to you made that i should have but i have not you definitely should have a 21 point a game season yeah yeah

that's a lot yeah i wonder who got in over him what do you think has been because there's been an overriding theme right like you like you said high school your junior year i think you average seven points a game yeah and like five assists right senior year 11.2 and like seven assists you're talking about how you're on a stack team yeah you go to boulder i don't know how your freshman year went but i think sophomore year you made pack 12 all pack 12 stuff like that but then you tear your acl yeah you go to the league you're fighting you're in grand rapids you know injuries are happening you've seized every opportunity and it's been so important for you because you've been doubted until that opportunity came and then you kick it out of it yeah what do you think it is about i don't know i don't want to call it clutch but you just seem to

show up when it's time to show up is there something that you think gets you going internally when it's like this is my time if i don't do it now i might not get it again um i think when i was younger there was some of that like back against the wall feeling for sure um as you're in the g league and things like that i think um like the the resoluteness comes from like uh just the work you know i think um my parents instilled a work ethic in me my uncle's done a great job i'm saying training me and i feel like i've worked harder than everybody or most people and you know when you've done that you just don't really have regrets so you live and die with whatever happens like i i genuinely again to your point like i feel like i'm trying to make the best decision possible like i'm not out there just shooting for the of it right like if i shot it's because i thought that was the best shot at the time if i passed

this because i thought it was the best pass at the time and And so I don't live with very many regrets. And I think that's why I'm able to kind of do that. And I understand, like, I'm going to shoot this shot. And if I miss it, 20,000 people are mad. If I make it, 20,000 people are happy. And you got to, it is what it is. You got to move forward. Did the haters get to you at first, though, on social media?

Because they'd be ruthless. Yeah, I mean, there were time periods like it would it would bother me i think um you know as you get older as you mature things like that um a lot of times people that are that mad on the internet are only doing that because like something's going on with their lives you know i mean and it's not to necessarily even say their lives suck or anything because i'm not taking this like oh my life is great approach or whatever but literally like if i'm angry right if i'm pissed off at my job or whatever happens and then you know the one piece of peace that i get is the nets winning a basketball game and i feel like spencer stole that piece from me i'm already angry at my job. Yeah.

Like now I'm mad at him. And, you know, it's not even at that point really a personal attack because you don't know me. Right. You know what I'm saying? And, again, I wasn't trying to mess up. It happens. Yeah. And so when you take it in that light, you don't – it doesn't get to you.

You don't really get mad. And then the funny part is most of the time when you're greeted with that type of energy and you're like, hey, chill out they turn right back into like fans like oh man like i was just mad like it wasn't like that much respect much like i'm like yeah you know much that's all good so you got a burner account no honestly honestly i i i don't have a facebook app on my phone i don't have a twitter app on my phone. I don't have a Twitter app on my phone. I'm not on threads. I'm just on Instagram a little bit. A medium amount.

I'm not going to say a little bit. A medium amount. That's really it. I do mostly collab post basketball stuff. That's really it. I saw you're into cryptocurrency. How do you invest all the money you're making now? Do you have a plan, future business in mind?

Yeah, no, I mean, I think the life cycle of investment strategies is kind of like, y'all ever seen those target funds with like Vanguard or something like that, where it's like you target it out to like 20, 60 or something like that, and it starts out with a bunch of stocks and it goes to bonds, things like that. I think, um, you know, I've been fortunate to do some VC stuff, you know, have a couple of hits, uh, you know, building a company, um, Galaxy done some cryptocurrency stuff. And, you know, now in my, uh, life cycle of investing, I'm looking into like multifamily real estate and getting into that. And so I guess this would kind of be my bonds era of playing it safer.

Yeah. Bonds era of investing. You know, I've been very fortunate. You know, I'm saying companies like Lemon Perfect and Janie's and, you know, being in the like seed rounds and stuff like that. Yeah. No, like, no, you have misses too. Don't get me wrong. You have misses, but I've had some hits that have been pretty fortunate. Yeah. Does it worry you that like 80% of athletes go broke? Does it worry me?

Yeah. Personally or like just in general? Like when you were coming into the league, was that a thought or not? No, not really. Because you got to remember like when I was first in the league, I thought or not no not really um because you gotta remember like the when i was first in the league i wasn't really making no money right so like i was like man i shouldn't even be in this statistic yeah then obviously once i broke through and uh you know kind of started hitting the contracts and then everything is like set up the way it is and the

tv money's going up and you know now everybody's getting $100 million. You know what I'm saying? And it's only going higher. Like we're supposed to get more TV money, I think, in 2025. Wow. So, like, when everybody was like, oh, man, how, you know, this guy get 80, this guy get 100 this summer. Well, you got to remember, the cap goes up next year. It goes up again the year after.

And it's going to apparently balloon after and it's gonna apparently balloon after that damn you know what i'm saying now they have the minimums yeah like the minimums are higher i mean like i said when i came to the league the minimum was like 500 000 now it's like 1.3 the team has a minimum oh that's right the spurs had to sign somebody just to get over the team salary cap minimum that's how they were spending yeah wow so it's like a it's a whole new world out there like 100 million is getting thrown out like and you're at your peak right now so you're good timing i mean well yeah i mean i hope i hope uh you know to stay on the nets uh long term and you know not have to you know go through any of that but you know if it does

happen obviously like yeah it's just just the market i mean so you know 100 million in terms of real life that's a boatload of money right but everything has to be done to your point with percentages of cap right so it's like the team has to spend 90 or they have to spend let's say it's 150 million dollars any given year right and then this guy is my starter, so he has to get 18% of said cap. So it's a slot. You know what I mean? Got it. Yeah, so it's not like, man, $100 million is a lot in real life. Spencer didn't get that.

Well, if Spencer's getting the slot for a starting point guard, then he has to get this amount of money. For a basketball team that's worth $4 billion. Yeah, like it's just the slots dictate what it is. And, you know, the TV money has a huge effect on that yeah i saw a gilbert arenas thing recently where he said obviously you have a you know you have bonuses structured and you get certain points per game stuff like that he said on uh shitty teams yeah that they purposely will try their best to make sure that you don't hit some of those bonuses do you think that's true oh i've

never been in that situation okay maybe back in the day yeah i've never i've never been in that situation yeah gil was talking about how like you know if you're at 19 if you're like 19.9 and they're going the last game of the year and you get like a mil bonus for hitting 20 like they they ain't playing you that game oh i'd be pissed yeah i'd be hot i saw in the miami heat you got to have a certain body fat percentage have you heard of that eight i think it's eight eight or less that's crazy did every team do that or no no wow but the heater definitely uh i mean i don't say notorious because that could have a negative connotation but you just hear the stories about how dedicated they are to like fitness

conditioning like like team-wide you know i'm saying and uh but at the end of the day though they're in the finals like every other year so yeah i saw that stuff so i said like i saw something like pat riley's been involved in almost half of every nba finals that has ever existed as either a player coach or executive you serious yeah it was like it was like literally like but like it was like literally like a third or half of every nba finals that has ever existed pat riley has been involved in one of those three that's crazy he's a goat for that so you're mentioning like different training staffs miami and stuff phoenix is you know famous for having all the you know stretching

the ligaments and stuff like that what has been the most ridiculous training or physical thing that anyone's ever asked you to do as an athlete like like go i don't know do a handstand underwater for 30 minutes or go we're gonna stretch all your hamstring you know just weird stuff that we would never think about uh no i i haven't i've witnessed the water workouts that I guess would be weirder or tougher you know what I'm saying but I've never really been in any of those I think I've been blessed to have a phenomenal trainer shout out

Mike G Mr. Do It Moving on Instagram yeah it's all like applied movement style lifting and conditioning and stuff. So I've been really fortunate to have him in my corner. Love that.

Spencer, what's next for you, man, and what are you working on? What's next for me? Well, I mean, I said in terms of investing multifamily, but honestly, like when it's all said and done, I really enjoy being a dad and I really enjoy cooking in my spare time. So I'm pretty chill. Like, when it's all said and done, like, I'm going to be relaxing for a minute. Okay.

You going to drop some food company or something? Maybe. Or a cookbook or something. I mean, maybe put together family recipes. I don't know. But something creative to feed my mind a little bit. But chill, at least for the first couple years, probably. Hell, yeah. Well, thanks for coming on, man. It was a blast. Thank you for having me. Yeah. Thanks for watching, guys. feed my mind a little bit but but chill at least for the first couple years probably hell yeah well

thanks for coming on man it was a blast thank you for having me yeah thanks for watching guys i'll see you next time