The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz - The Best of SBS: NBA's Toughest (ft. Stephen Jackson, Joakim Noah, & Baron Davis)

Episode Date: January 1, 2026

Dan Le Batard talks with some of the NBA's toughest players over the years including Stephen Jackson on what really went down during “Malice in the Palace”, Joakim Noah on his struggle going from the Chicago Bulls to the New York Knicks, and Baron Davis on the true behind the scenes of Donald Sterling’s Los Angeles Clippers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're listening to Draft Kings Network. for a number of reasons. Stephen Jackson played 17 years in the NBA, unrelentingly authentic, an NBA champion. But so how things escalate? You're surrounded by paying customers, and at some point here, Ron our test gets hit with a drink. So take me through this from your perspective, what it is that you're seeing and what it is that you're remembering here. At this point, pause. Can we pause? Yeah, pause that real quick. At this point, so, right now ron has come on the table his therapist told him when something happens like that during the game go somewhere lay down or you know just try to put some headphones on the blocker he did exactly what they told him to do

but at this time being they being is walking off ron is laying down but the players on another team that's still talking and still pushing and stuff so during that time i walk around y'all y'all a little bit ahead but i walk around and i pull out my jersey and square up with Rip Hamilton and Leslie Hunter. Rip Hamilton is a friend of mine. This is a good friend of mine. I just told we were a McDonald's game together. But it's just a rival at the time, so we're willing to go at each other.

You did pull out the shirt. And I'm squaring up. I'm squaring up. If that's what y'all want to do, like we're trying to break it up, but y'all's still talking. So let's fight. That's what we're going to do.

You were the only one who pulled out his jersey, though, and squared up. Like, I need to be, I need, you know, if this is what we're about to do, right? So I seen that that's really what it was. They really didn't want to fight. You know, so I'm glad because I didn't want to have that bad blood with Rip. I love Riphampton. That's my real friend.

And so I end up going back to by Ron and by that time, as I'm going back, the beer comes and now you can play the tape. Royne goes first. I'm right behind them. But as you see, pause, pause, pause. As you see, this is another reason why I should feel like I should get my money back. If I was

going in the stands, just throw or punches it's a hundred people that I jump past that I could have punched I went up I'm about about eight nine rows I didn't hit nobody on my way up there I didn't push anybody

and now go if going up for it you're going to see me I go straight to Ron to grab Ron I don't punch nobody I'm on my way to grab Ron look I grab him

Oh he's good Go ahead As I get to Ron I put my hand on him I got those another beer in his face I'm like come on bro All bets off at that You ain't going to get away with that.

And that's not, I was forced to throw that punch. It wasn't, it wasn't, I was going up there to punch people. I could have went up there. I could have punched people on the first four or five rows. I'm going to help my teammate because my coach is going, my coach got him. Yeah, that's where it happened. You're the first one there. I'm the first one there.

And as you see, like, I was really going to finish. I was going to go stump him out. But my, they grabbed my jersey and my teammates grabbing, which I'm glad they grabbed me because I was going to hurt that dude. I was really, because I was, that, I'm in Puerto, right now. I'm not in the, I'm not in Detroit. I'm in Puerto Texas at the club right now. And I'm in survival mode. As you see, take the everybody, everybody's in survival mode.

But what everybody grabbing me though? Well, they know who's dangerous there. Well, everybody's grabbing me. Well, but because you're the most in rage. And furthermore, my brother, see, look, my brother, she came, my, he came, she came up there solely to get me out the stands. He came up there solely to get me out of the stands. You're saying you were going up as peacemaker right up until. You're saying you were going up as peacemaker right up until you see a drink right in his faith. Footage, don't lie. Footage don't lie.

That's why, that's why when they came down so hard, I'm like, bro, I didn't, he was assaulted twice, and y'all didn't say nothing about neither assault. So if I'm wrong, and you fined me $3 million for defending my team and after, it's clear that this got through a beer in his face, I know what this is. It's not about right and wrong. I did think one of the things I've said this before on our show that was fascinating to watch is that immediately after this fight, the coverage of the media at ESPN primarily, which is what I was watching, was pro player. It was, the customers shouldn't do that. And then the following

morning, all of that changed in a way that I'm like, somebody made a call here. Somebody didn't like the way that was being talked about. And then the whole story shifted because all I heard was people defending players. Mike Therico was on air. The, the, uh, the, the, the, the, the, The fans, their thugs, it was totally about the fans. The next morning, we can drag, oh, we're like, hold on, bro, we, we was at work. Oh, y'all not going to talk about them throwing stuff at the bus when we leave, and y'all ain't going to bring up none of that. Oh, we know what this is about, this is about the business of basketball.

This is about black athletes with all this money should be acting like this. We're trying to change the dress code and change this shit anyway. You know what, we're going to use them as an example. That was dead-ass wrong, and they know they wrong. And that's why I'm glad that, uh, the doctor, the doctor, documentary came out by no response from them or even try to fix this shit when they see how wrong the league was that shows exactly how they stand on that side. Have you come to grips? I know we started with some of this because it seems bittersweet. This is you're one of the few people your

age who could be on the cover of what up the all the smoke is and you know be with your arms cross still at your age and everyone knows that it comes with a street credibility and a loyalty. See, the person that is there, everyone knows, feels like they know what he's about, but they know this much about what you're about. If this is all they're using, they don't, that's not even 10%. The lawyer part of me, yeah, you see that on me. You see that I'm a solid guy, but I'm so much more than that. And you know what, Dan, I don't care if people that don't matter to me look at a different way.

I don't. but because I don't come in contact with you. You're not in my daily life. I care about the people I'm around. I care about the people I'm willing to work with. I care about the people that I'm willing to do things for and reach out to and do give back. I care about those people because that means something to me. Because I'm around you.

Because I'm, we cross to every day. I want you to know that you have a lawyer person around you. I want you to know that you have somebody that's going to speak up with you the same way. I talk about you the same way when you're not around. I want you to know. that I am considered myself the most solid guy ever. I won't you know that's where I stand. But if you're not around me,

I'm not going to put in that effort to let you know how great I am. Because it doesn't matter. The people around me need to know that. And that's how I live my life. Is it something that has its scars on you still? Like when I, am I reading too much into it when I say, the interview I saw with you and Matt talking about this,

it seemed like you were withdrawing, withdrawing into yourself. I'm still pissed. I feel like at this moment, they need to be watching me and you talk about it and be like, you know, bro, we give me y'all money back. Refund. It's just that simple. It's dead ass.

It's no way that they should have took $3 million for me for that when I was at work. I was at work. I wasn't in the club. I wasn't just being a thug. I was defending my, the tape shows everything. Okay, if I were to jump over the first row and start punching fans right there?

Yeah, kick him out of the league. Dan, I was not that person at all. So they was trying to paint a total picture of me and Ron. They couldn't really do it with J.O. You know, because Jail was an all-star. He's one of the best players in the league. And jail, Jail wasn't in trouble. Jail wasn't that type of guy, stand-up guy.

You respect him on the court, but he wasn't that type of guy. So they cleaned it up with him. They dropped his games, I think, to, like, five or something like that. But they upheld it with me and raw for some reason. I know the reason now, because the picture, they wanted to paint. And what happened after that? Dress cold, all of the other stuff. So I knew what they was doing. We just gave them. We just gave him ammunition to do it quicker. What's the most fun you ever had in a season? Those eight-seated

warriors that seemed like fun from afar, the 8-C that beat the one, the Mavericks. You had the championship season. This, I mean, if you've got this kind of foot pain while being the captain for someone who believes in you, where do you look at the 17 years and say that was the best season. My happiest and fun this year was definitely Golden State. My best basketball playing year was Charlotte.

I should have made the All-Star team. I brought that team from nowhere to in the playoffs. So playing-wise, definitely Charlotte, but the most fun, the happiest I've ever been, the most enjoyment I had playing basketball on and off the court, not even close. Golden State by far. Why was that?

Because we showed up to practice together. We left practice together. We went to dinner together. We went to strip clubs together. We went to family meetings together. We did everything together. Everything. And to the point where we had the management of our team using some of our slang, you know, our slang words to address each other. So we were a real family. Like I said, I don't think you'll ever find a team where you got four or five guys that all got married and they ordered each other's weddings.

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Bet must win to receive bonus bets which expire in seven days. Minimum odds required. For additional terms and responsible gaming resources, see dkng.com slash audio. Limited time offer. I'm excited to do this one because I really admire Joe Kim Noah for a number of different reasons. I mean, obviously he's a champion,

defensive player of the year. top five and MVP voting, but one of the things that I love about you is that I always thought that you were willfully tough in a way that was unreasonable, that you were playing through a great deal of pain, and also that you're a bit of an artist who was always himself in a world where I wondered how he got along with everybody because it seemed like you were built a little bit differently, and the world that you occupied was an interesting one to me from afar, so I'm happy that you're going to allow me to explore it a little bit with you today. respect that nice to be here i don't think the average person understands the kind of shape that

you were in um i think being in shape was something that came natural for me i i played with a lot of fear you know just always feeling like did i train like i don't think i trained enough so i was always doing extra uh because i i was this fear of losing of not being good enough I think that you know a lot of it before the injuries and the pain it's like it's it's really mental and it's like what gets you there what's emotions help you get through the the hard part the tools what are the emotions that help you there because you're talking about you mentioned self-work I don't know when you started doing that. I don't know that the athletic space allows for it very much

if you have to be singularly minded about like getting ahead. Did you mention that phrase purposefully or is it something that post-career you've had to get tools with? No, I think that the self-work is something that I had to go out and search for myself, you know, especially when the injury started happening. I played for the Knicks, hometown, so excited to come home, and, you know, I failed miserably in a very public way. And, you know, I lost my confidence. How was it going to find that joy out there on the court?

You know, that was my safe haven. This is where I felt the most at peace. This is where I felt like I could express yourself. But when you're not right, it's a tough place to be. It's a very lonely place. So, you know, I was just therapist and, you know, that wasn't really working. How am I going to figure this out? You know, it's just, so I started doing some really unorthodox training and, you know,

training underwater with Larry Hamilton and Gabby Reese and finding some new mentors. you know, they were doing all these underwater pool exercises where you would just a lot of breath work and, you know, I even went to the jungle and I did everything, I did everything. If I may, because when you talk about your 2018, I don't want to be presumptuous, but I thought from afar that must be very hard what he's going through. Going back to New York with expectations, got the big contract with super, coveted as the rescuer of the New York Knicks, and now his body's not working quite right, what a dark spiral that can be that the dollars don't help you with when the dream you thought

that was your body doesn't let you do it, and now your mind's falling apart. Because I imagine when you say your confidence was wrecked, you're not even just talking about basketball. If basketball's all you are, then who are you without basketball? That's right. That's right. You know, New York is a different place because there's no hiding in that city you know um i felt like a fish and a fishbow you know it's like you're walking in the street something you've been doing your whole life and now of a sudden it's just everybody's stopping you in the streets want to talk to you what's going on like um but you know when it's going well in new york it's the best but when it's when it's shit yeah when you feel like you're failing right if your self-worth is wrapped up in your work and you're

walking around and your body doesn't work right and you want to be known as more than just a body but you also are using you're squeezing everything that body will give you out of trying to please these people being unreasonable to your body because you like I associate you with pain

do you know how weird that is I'm only watching you but I associate what you were doing at the end to physically hurt because it seemed like I was I was watch you and I'd be like holy shit this man is so willful yeah i would probably do anything to be out there on the court and um you know what i had it was some

tough lessons during that time um but it was like my mentality i got to fight through and that was the way i was able to you know inspire my teammates to play harder as well as just you have to go out there and go through the fire yourself first and when my body wouldn't let me there was a lot of um lessons uh to be learned for me for sure I didn't know whether the man in New York, the man who chose to go to New York, had regrets about going to New York because it became a different thing than whatever it is his identity was in Chicago, which was more warrior, more success and whatever the best version of yourself publicly was. Yeah, but I think that like I said, that was, it's like that pain that I had to carry throughout my New York experience, it made me better. It made me realize that it's not all about what people. people think about you like fuck that and you know you have to move on from that eventually you know

like um the persona that I had in Chicago was a different than one in New York like absolutely did I want that back at all cost absolutely but it taught me a lot as well just like okay this is this is actually not making me happy anymore you know um this chase for you know for the glory um that's not what it was anymore so i had to dig deep um i got kicked off the nix um you know i got into it with the coach and um i got suspended for drugs you know that's all like really heavy stuff on a in a really really public platform but i was able to and i when i got kicked off the nicks It was February. I didn't make a team.

I didn't make a team until November. So for six months, I was free. I was getting paid a lot of money. And I was free to figure this out for myself. And it was deep, man. You know, I traveled. I went to, I did ayahuasca therapy. I mean, I just, I went all in.

and I trained every day by myself. It was not a coach telling me practices at this time. You know, no, I got a trainer. I went to go work out at Lairdon Gabbies every day, sauna, ice, whatever I could find to help me get to what I needed, to where I needed to go. And you know what? In November, when I signed with the Memphis Grizzlies, I went by myself and I was coming off the bench. It was a completely different atmosphere, different vibe. And you know what? I'm really proud of that because I came back from a long, long, dark journey. And I was able to appreciate the game and just being out there and enjoying my 15 minutes a night. it was just back to the simple things of just enjoying playing basketball. I don't think people understand how difficult that had to be for you in that six-month period. You're talking about swimming through the darkness, needing some sea therapy and

needing some general spiritual healing on, oh, shit, it's almost over. Like, I'm going to have to really fight to get back. It's almost all ruined and over, and I didn't have warning. And what do you mean? It's drugs and I'm fighting with the coach. And now I've got to check in. on my identity and who am I without basketball? Am I going to be my own man these six months?

Am I going to be, like, you must be as proud of getting to Memphis as you are of winning defensive player of the year? Absolutely. That's deep. I will explore deeper asking you about what it was like for you at the loneliest in New York. You go there, Phil Jackson, goes to your house to recruit you. They're making you their big free agent priority. You're going home.

All of your dreams are going to be made real. You've been defensive player of the year. You're still ascending in your mind to the top of the sport, correct? Well, I had a really bad shoulder injury before I signed my deal with the Knicks. So I was actually, you know, on a hospital bed. And, you know, after the surgery, you know, just doing a very, you know, the rehab was just, you know, rehab is very lonely. You know, guys are out there on the cord doing their thing and you're not being able to be out there and do your thing. Yeah, that was definitely some of the lonelier times.

It was drudgery there, but when you go to. the period where you're talking about the difficulties, the mental tests that were the six months after the season, after everything blew up, where you're feeling like your career is over and nobody warned you? You know, it's a very lonely time. It was a dark time. And, you know, I was, it's a time of my life where I probably had to do the most soul-searching. and find tools that could help me get through this.

I remember talking to, you know, sports therapists, things that were just easy for me on the court, very comfortable for me on the court, were really difficult. And, you know, I would talk to, you know, all the teams would put me on with the therapist, a sports therapist, and, you know, talking to me, and I just, it didn't help at all.

I was just... They don't understand me. They don't know what it's like to be me. Well, they don't have to be on that court. They're not 6-Eleven, walk around New York City with a ponytail where everybody kind of sees you as the reason why your team is losing. Yeah, it was very painful. And, you know, I had to go dig deeper and like, okay, what, what's my why?

What are the tools that are going to help me? I felt like therapy didn't really help. The things that really helped me was, you know, connecting with the right people. I give a lot of credit to Laird Hamilton, Gabby Reese, for, you know, opening their home to me that summer. How did this all happen, right? because you're talking about an aquatic training that ended up with you feeling very close to the earth, healing, spiritual, physical limits.

Like, what's the training that you were doing with them and why was it soothing you? I think it was different than what I was used to. It was an unorthodox style of training. And I remember taking these heavy dumbbells and being under. you know 12 feet of of water and um the first reaction was get me to the top so i can get a breath i feel like i'm going to die um and the more i did the training the more i realized that i had to you know

just relax in this immense amount of pressure um everything in my body was telling me to go up but you have to just learn to be in a relaxed calm state and and you know as as the workouts kept kept going I feel like I got better and better at it it really translated onto the court relaxed amid panic your training with one of the world's best surfers and a professional volley player a volleyball player you're testing the capacity of your lungs and it is bringing you healing to test yourself this way as opposed to testing yourself against others? It was very healing because there was nobody out there telling me anything. No noise. It's just you and your thoughts. And sometimes the demons are

between your ears. How did you cope with that? How do you cope with that? The demons between your ears because you have told me off air here that the the expressing of things is not necessarily for you it's not necessarily the way that you've been built it doesn't mean that you wouldn't be somebody aspirationally who'd want to be that but you're when free spirit isn't a lot in this in the speech it's it's in movement and in energies and peace of mind I think peace of mind is is just it's the most important thing is can you be comfortable in the uncomfortable moments that's what it's always been about and things that were comfortable were not comfortable anymore so how do i do that you just got to push yourself um

and navigate to navigate just how how do i get my peace of mind back i got a lot of my piece of my being underwater with nobody talking to me under this pressure of feeling like i need to breathe and just relaxing myself and getting through it and getting the job done. What do you want to see from young players today? I want to see, I want to see camaraderie, you know, I want to see competition at its highest level. You're going to say they like each other too much. I want to say They're too friendly.

They're too friendly. Yeah, but, you know, I don't like it. I don't like it. I don't like it. You're trying to get it. Like, you're trying to get to the top. He's trying to get to the top. Like, stop being friends.

I don't like that shit. I'm just happy that I got to enjoy playing basketball again because you realize this thing goes on with or without you. Quick. It's hard to see when you're in it, though, right? You think you're going to live. forever when you're in those battles with lebron and wade and you're fighting with the cities of miami and cleveland your life is going to be an eternal immortality that's what you think you're

never going to get old yeah but i think that every kid in his 20s feels that feels that way and then you get older and you realize that you're not immortal you actually we're actually very fragile beings and vulnerable being and um it's it's deep you know and you know and you know That's why it's all about how you deal with the highs and how you deal with the lows. I was an emotional player and, you know, I got to live it at the highest level. And, you know, when the NBA was basketball was almost taken away from me. And I think that that was a great lesson for me because you realize these games go on with or without you. I have a hard time understanding how this person fits with that person, though.

They seem like two different entities in terms of how you carry your way through life and who you had to be in the furnace. 100%. 100%. I mean, I think everybody is. It's interesting. Just even watching the games now is, it's interesting. You know, I watch yesterday the Knicks come back win that game against the Sixers.

And, you know, Joel Embed is going to have. have to live that one that was a tough loss yesterday you got to mentally get yourself right for game three and i'm seeing him do the interview yesterday head down i was like it's not just about how you're feeling you're the leader in this locker room you got to conduct yourself a certain way it's different as much pain as you're in the other guys in the locker room can't see you with your head down like That's just, I'm just, and, you know, it's one of the reasons why I don't love, it's, I'm not saying that to critique. I'm just saying this as is just my opinion. So careful, so gentle.

You're saying that's your, you don't want to be, the man is a little bit broken. You don't want to pile on on him, but you also want him to represent leadership. in a way that you're, look, you're saying I've been there. It hurts. You got to stick your chest out a little bit there. You got to keep up appearances. Head up. Head up, soldier.

Come on. Big game three coming up. This isn't over. I feel for him because I know he's playing on one leg. Been through a lot. You know, just being able to play the way that he played earlier in the year and to not have your body respond. mentally is

it's one of the hardest things ever and now the scars after all these years all of them are healed everything no not everything you see held I wouldn't say all of them are healed I mean I think you learn to live with it and and but yeah it's

it's not you know those those losses I'll live with that for the rest of my life but I'll be able to talk about it and be but I'm not going to lie and say I'm all the way healed, no. Which are the ones you're thinking of? I mean, all those games, you know, ending the seasons, you know,

when you're in a routine for, you know, 200 days straight where you know exactly where I am, what I'm doing for 200 days and then seasons over and then, boom, you got three months off to think about it. those first four or five days are dark and i'll say that even when we were winning championships at florida you know having you know winning the championship you know it's like the best feeling in the world you know you reach the pinnacle you know it's your the highs of of living and winning a championship are so real, and then whatever goes up, it must come down, you know, so. Well, but especially when you care the way you do.

Like, if it's that unreasonable, if you're treating them as near deaths, if we're talking about them 10 years later and you're saying, I'm not healed and I never will be, and having a certain pride about that, like you don't even want to be. No, I want to live in a higher plane where it hurts like that. No, I don't want to. You'd rather get it off of you. You'd rather find the healing tools to get it off of you?

Yes, absolutely. I'm working on that every, I work on it every day. And even doing this, it helps because, you know, you're talking about vulnerable moments, you know. But losing's allowed. It's part of it. Like losing failure is routinely a part of it. I've talked the last couple of months here about how bad I am at treating failure as immediately gently as learning. I don't do it well.

I wish I could do it well. You're talking about failing publicly. You're talking about failing in a way that hurt you more than I'm thinking about the things that hurt me. Like you're, when you talk near death about basketball games, you're talking a language I don't understand. That kind of grief, I don't care about things like that. But you're telling me I couldn't be who I was if I didn't. That's right. That's right.

You know, you just got a, it's the life we chose. And you know what? that's not my life anymore. I like to try to look at things a little bit differently and, you know, I try not to be competitive anymore, you know.

You know, I've learned late in life that that doesn't have a lot of value. It did, it served you well, but being competitive. In the real world, it's, it's tough. I'm going to call this man my interview nemesis because he only wants to show you so much of himself. He likes this creative process a little bit. You tell me whether I've got anything wrong here.

Baron Davis, two-time All-Star, but so much more than that. Like, I don't know if two-time All-Star is the least interesting part of his story, but he's got more story to tell here. I really appreciate throughout all of this, the intimacy and the vulnerability, over the course of the years, I have at various times tried to ask you some form in short interviews where you're not in a totally trusting place about the Clipper experience, at least in part, because I thought to myself, my God, that could have been and should have been for him such a beautiful story. That seems from afar like he expected one thing, and it was the complete opposite. It was like, get out. of that thing. So you're being heckled by the owner in the stands and that person turns out to be very publicly a racist.

There are all sorts of reported stories about him bringing people into the locker room and looking at showering basketball players and talking about their beautiful black bodies. Oh, man. You have never shared any of these stories with me because they've, because you know. they're going to get aggregated and you know it's going to be a whole thing. Well, the thing is, like, the people who are telling the stories, right, are doing it for a whack-ass TV show, you know what I mean, a whack-ass documentary, and, you know, I'm a storyteller, so I know who was there, you know what I mean? You know, no disrespect to Ramona Sherbourne, but she wasn't even a fact, like, she was a rookie

when I got there. And so I look at that And I look at people and say Oh y'all just gonna take this story and run How y'all want to run Oh y'all other athletes Y'all gonna take this story And wave a black power fist on

Man I'm not with none of that You know what I mean? Because what I had to do Was I had to understand this man Right to be able to articulate What type of person he was What type of business he ran And all the people who work for him

Right And what they had to do right whether they wanted to or not he's the boss yeah and wherever their moral compass was they was fucked too so there's a lot of fuckery going on

right and so when you have somebody and I have to make sure that people know Donald Sterling is not a racist he is a hate everybody is he don't give a shit

he don't understand he don't understand black Latinos, Asians, white people. He don't understand shit. He's delusional. And so whatever he says to you is like, whatever the fuck he's thinking. And he is beyond ignorant.

Right? And so when you have that much money and you use the team as your scapegoat, if you use the team as a media play for your other business, like he wasn't a basketball fan. basketball was just a real estate holding that he probably didn't even like

but he knew it gave him fame and notoriety and shit like that I would have to walk into the clipper practice site and see the person in community relations bawling her eyes out now I gotta go to work just like she at work but I gotta stop going into the gym get my shit together to make sure like hey man I'm worry about it you know what i mean like he ain't gonna do nothing you know like i became i became now

like the only person who cared about other people because i saw with the clippers there was no care everybody was there telling on each other snitching on each other backstabbing people and the people who were actually honest and working and hardworking that were scared and terrified they had they had nowhere to go you know what i mean they had no way to go and people and people need a paycheck. You ain't got no other job coming from the clippers back then. Ain't nobody hiring no motherfuckers from the clippers. So like you were at the bottom of the bottom in the worst environment

and you worked for him. It didn't matter with the team. The team was just a tool. The players were just tools, right? They were never to be understood by him. and so when you have people like Ramona you know are other well not just that because they were at the center

before George Floyd there's all sorts of stuff being moved around politically on black white causes Doc Rivers has to decide whether to boycott a game oh man that's bullshit man that's bullshit that's bullshit I don't know the real story I went in the locker

I went to that game I literally went to that game because I wanted to see what they were going to do you know what I mean and when you look at that squad none of them dudes was playing like all of a sudden oh you hell of woke

because the media say you gotta be woke now y'all got to be woke now y'all got like if you was that woke if you cared that much if you were standing up to racism if you wanted to make a statement why the fuck didn't you not play that game suckers a week it's weak it was weak it was weak

it was weak everybody in the league was ready to shut down for you and what y'all do y'all turn y'all jerseys over ran out there got your ass whoop and asked for people to feel sorry for you and then here you know and then doc standing out like you know like uh he a black figure you know what i'm saying so like for me that's why i'm like talking about it because i start start picking apart like all the pieces and saying like the reason why i don't say nothing because i got a lot to say i know what the fuck i gotta say right and then everybody else are opportunists in this situation so when opportunists are mining i get out of that i've noticed that

with you and I want to give you the space and context on all of it but what if I were to push back with saying to you look basketball players for the clippers also had to live in the same world that you experienced of where all employees of this lunatic that's not true that's not true that's not because I remember I went to work every day my problem right with all the other players was they didn't give a fuck you know what I mean and I could not for the life of me figure out you know but that's why like well when we had the Lob City stuff when we started that with Blake and DeAndre when Blake got there it was it was different because Blake was different you know he was number one pick him and DeAndre were like on their way up and Blake didn't

give a fuck about none of it and so I was like finally starting to see like hold on These young kids, they're just hooping. I come from an era where, like, I have to deal with owners and deal with all this shit. And, like, I'm seeing everything. They just seeing the gym. You know what I mean? And so it became, like, I start to realize, like,

damn, dude, these young dudes, like, I need to be more like them. I need to care less. I care too much, right? Because I really wanted, like, I really felt like, you, by the time I get three years with the clippers, like we will be where the warriors is, where the warriors are, right?

That was your expectation. That was my expectation going in. Don Levy was the coach, so that didn't work out well. Lord and mercy. Hold on. We'll get back to this stuff for a second, but how is it that you could be so wrong, signing, thinking that the clippers were going to be one thing?

Is it ego? Is it because you thought you were good enough? to be able to be the change you wanted? No, you know, Elton Brand, I was supposed to go there with Elton Brand, and then he did some punk shit and, like, sign with Philly and didn't tell me that he was signing with Philly, so I had already signed with the Clippers, so I was like, fucking, I'm going home.

I had made my mind up anyway. But I did think that the Clippers had talent. At the time, they were literally right there. So it was like if they were playing games, you know, it was like eighth, ninth, 10s, 7, 8th, 9th, it was all kind of like us, the Clippers, Denver, Golden State, all these, like, new teams

were trying to fight for a position. So I figured Clippers had the talent. And with Eln Brand, you know, you already got a big deal, so I can just, these next four or five years, I can just play traditional point guard shit, pass the ball, he get double teams, shoot threes, and, you know.

So you go in thinking, like, oh, man, I get to, I don't have to, like, carry the team, you know what I mean I don't have to do all like I just play point guard like I really just want to play point guard and like runoff offense and shit I don't want to do all this shit

that's why I went to the Clippers because I felt like all right they got two big dudes they got Catino Mobley you know what I mean like we got a cool we got cool four right now Tim Thomas like we had

size and talent and dogs you just had a coach you know once Eln Branden didn't come then everything just kind of fell out Marcus Camby we traded for. Marcus Camby show up the training camp first day, and then I'll show up for two weeks.

He about to retire. We got to go, I got to go find Marcus Camby, sit with him. He's like, man, fuck this shit. Like he, you know what I mean? Because Denver traded him. So like, you know, it's just all the shit that people go through. You know what I mean? So right from the start.

Right from the start, I could not walk in and play basketball. The very first day of media, the media guy comes up to me and say, look he pulls me to the side he said I know you having fun I'm just going to let you know when he comes in here don't get upset don't get offended he may or may not say something to you that'll offend you and like or he may say some shit I'm like what are you talking this is media day what are you talking about he's saying a report he's talking about the owner dude so he didn't say Donald Sterling he just said he he might come in here he may come in here and say the wildest

shit to you be careful don't get upset y'all in the good mood you know because everybody was saying like you know when the seasons like before I got it when the season started man you know it's fucked up around here and you know everybody has nothing but negative energy and negative shit to say you didn't know any of this beforehand I mean I no not like that yeah not like that like that like all teams are dysfunctional you know I just came from the warriors you know what I mean when an owner you know he'd be riding a bike when he hung over. You know what I mean?

Everybody's got something. He was a hot mess. You know what I mean? But at the time, but not like this. This was like, with the Warriors, like, okay, that's the owner. You know, you like him, you don't like him. It was a separation between, you know, what he does for the team versus what he do for himself.

This situation was like, you cannot detach. from nothing. Everybody's a spy. Everybody's lying to move up or to save their face. And then Mike Dunleavy has all the power. So he can literally say whatever the fuck he want to the owner or to anybody, right, about anybody. And so like when you have leadership like that, it's a circus. I remember in training camp, I was like, man, this is a fucked up. This is a circus. Like, I ain't never seen no shit like this. I would say that every day in practice. Like, y'all, I've never seen it.

I did not think that the NBA, like an NBA team could be ran like that. And you'd been some places at that point. You'd seen some. We had some bad year. You know, like, I'd just come off a bad year with Byers Scott, where I got traded, you know, and the Warriors was having a bad year. But, like, wasn't, like, nothing was like this. This was like, man, Chris Kamen.

uh we in practice he grabbed a rope uh lasso it around uh what's the one of them do is pull the shit just all got people pulling each other pans down kicking water bottles over it's like man this ain't no fun this is a fucking circus uh what is the context that people would need uh again with the space to do it not worried about uh because i i i'm so appreciative that we've done this this way and I hate for you the entirety of your career I have felt like the back and forth with journalists isn't stimulating enough to you isn't something that appeals to your greatest curiosities what are the things that people need to know as someone who was in the fire of that the context that they don't have when you say that wasn't actually a race war that was just a

basketball team that was stuck under an owner that had an organization a profound dysfunction man it was it was just extreme dysfunction like it wasn't it was just every day it was dysfunctional like you don't know you don't know what the fuck you're doing when you go to work you don't know if you got anything like how do you go to the gym and not play basketball like we wouldn't scrimmage like we would just talk went through plays like it becomes came like the who the fuck wants to be here this is like now you're talking about stress PTSD imagine can't do what you want to do how you want to do it all they doing is just telling you what to do telling you what to do and I felt sorry for the people like you know you think

like Jason Powell he's still there and a head trainer like this dude is brilliant this dude is doing all that he can, right, to solve a problem because the players keep getting hurt and they keep telling him, no. Right? And so, like, I'm watching. None of the competent people have power to do anything. Crazy.

Undermine. Crazy. And so now you got to be, you got to, like, everybody got to be a little sneaky to get some shit done to benefit the players. You know what I mean? Or the players have to go and, like, Like, come back, no, which you don't care.

You got to come back to the gym to get extra shots because you realize, man, I ain't got no shots in practice in three weeks. And so, like, the environment that was created made you not want to be in the gym. You just wanted to go to work. As soon as your shit was over, you didn't want to see nobody. Like, you wanted to, like, imagine being living as a basketball,

player and not wanting to deal with like it was literally like oh this is a job that I hate and when you go to work like your other teammates and homies like damn man what's wrong with you you all right like you don't look good like and then you're playing the game they're like yo what the fuck like what's wrong with you and your homies and your friends here in L.A. who showing up to the games they're like yo we came to see BD play and it's like I ain't know how to play last school no more if i get talking to me he like i can't there's got to be some joy around what you're doing there's got to be freedom for me there's got to be freedom artistic freedom freedom creativity and like i know what i'm doing out here you know what i mean i can't play

support it don't undermine it support don't undermine it support don't undermine in the next year of any del negro and you got to think we we were the clippers were going to have success because dionre blake your cornerstones were getting better. You know what I mean? The younger guys were getting better. And then Vinny the Snake, I call him Vinny the Snake, because he didn't lie a motherfucker. I don't know.

Vinny the Snake, you know, he was just positioning to keep his job so he could, like he knew he had a good team and he could. They started bringing in the right people, like, once I left. But I was like, damn, dude, all we needed was, all I needed was one Chris Paul squad, like the Matt, Jamal, JJ, give me that team, like, who are on in the championship?