What’s something you’ve learned about yourself from writing this book?
Man, I learned a lot. Shit, it’s been a long journey, man. And what I learned is… I look at my 14-year-old son today, and what I learned was, I never was a kid. I never had the opportunity to really be a kid. When I was 13, 14, I was hanging with adults. Grown men, 35, 40 years old. Just going back, I learned that growing up in the environment that I did was really fucked up, man. It’s such a gaping hole in those environments, as it pertains to life and what life’s really supposed to be like. Everything was fast-tracked. You’re thinking about money, and you’re thinking about sex. And you get in a hotel room, and you drinking champagne. You’re 14. Girls getting pregnant at 14 and 15, and people going to jail. And every day it was action. Every single day on that corner, where you see me standing in front of that store, every single day, it was action, man. And I’m not talking about monkey bars. It’s not that. There’s action, prostitution, distribution of drugs, uses of drugs, violence, violence through verbal violence, violence through physical violence, every day. And that’s not an environment for a kid to grow up in.
And it’s traumatizing. Still to this day, at my level, it’s traumatizing. There’s nights that I go to bed and I can’t sleep, because of the trauma that I went through as a kid. And so I learned that, number one, that doesn’t give you an excuse to just give up on life and say, “Fuck it.”
You started as a more behind-the-scenes guy—coming up as an agent, working in agencies. But a book like this, in addition to all the other stuff you’ve got going on in your life, is the latest reminder that you’ve really become a public figure. What has that transition been like for you?
That’s been a little challenging because the last thing you wanted was your picture snapped, in my neighborhood. And so that’s been a little challenging, because I’m used to just going places by myself and walking around by myself. And I don’t see myself as a public figure or a celebrity of any kind, at all. The challenge is realizing that I’m not the same person anymore—not necessarily anything from the public. And having to understand that you can’t do or say anything, because there is a responsibility that you have being a so-called public figure.
Can I hit you with a couple basketball questions?
Sure, depending on which ones.
So what’s surprised you most about the NBA this season? What’s the big story to you?
I think the parity throughout the NBA is the biggest story.There’s a lot of talent. And I think these young guys today, they’re coming in, and there’s no fear of anything. People always talk about, “Oh, well, I feared Michael Jordan.” You knew that we had to be twice as good to beat these guys. I think today there’s much more depth amongst teams. And it’s good for the league. It really is.
Sam Schube
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