Lose in Cleveland. If we go back to Toronto down 3–2, it’s over. I can’t go through this again. I can’t get this close again and not hold that trophy in my arms. I literally cannot handle it.”
It meant so damn much to me. It’s funny, because to this day, people will be like, “Man, that Cavs run must have been so much fun.”
There wasn’t a single second of it that was fun. It was misery until the moment the buzzer went off in Game 7. Even after we took down Toronto and made it to the Finals, I wasn’t sleeping, I wasn’t eating, I was out of my mind.
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I don’t know if that’s impressive, or sad, or insane, or what it is. All I know is that I wasn’t the same person. When you survive in this league for as long as I did, people start looking at you like you’re some kind of monk or something. But I’ll be honest with you, when I came into the NBA, I was not one of those guys who you would’ve predicted was going to be around for 17 years.
I basically felt like I was playing with house money. I was born in South Central L.A. in the early ’80s when things were pretty much at rock bottom. Sometimes people ask me, “Richard, what was it like in South Central back then? People only know the cliche.”
I remember drive-bys and murders and drug dealers and all of that. Those were some of my first memories. My father had a serious problem with drugs and alcohol, which was a pretty common thing, if you know the history of the drugs that were being flooded into our community at that time. But I was extremely lucky, because I had a big extended family around me that protected me. And my mom, being the incredible woman that she is, knew that she had to get me and my two brothers out of that environment, at whatever cost.
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One day — I’m not even exaggerating — it was like half our neighborhood got on a Greyhound bus and got out of South Central. All these families literally just packed up some bags with whatever they could carry and got on the bus to Phoenix. One-way ticket. That was it.
My mom was doing everything she could to get us off welfare, trying to raise four boys all alone in a new city. But the awesome thing for me was that now I could play outside. All I could do in South Central was beat
For the 10, 000th time. But in Phoenix, I could run around and do whatever and feel safe. That was almost mind-blowing to me, coming from South Central. So that’s how I discovered my love for basketball, by playing at Cave Creek Park every single day and night, basically just trying to be Sidney Deane from
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I didn’t even really play any organized basketball until I was 15. And I never thought about playing in the NBA — I’m dead serious. The only thing I thought about was playing at the park and talking
Even when I hit a growth spurt and I started playing high school ball, it was funny because my mom was so oblivious to everything. She was going to school and working and just trying to get us to a better place in life, so she had absolutely no concept of AAU or college ball or anything.
She came to one of my games during my junior year and my coach came up to her afterward and was like, “Hey, you know … Richard is like really good.”
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It was pretty amazing, because I was the first person in my family to go straight to college. Basketball did that for us. But there was no master plan, you know what I mean? Nowadays, these kids are so mature and so professional by the age of 17, it’s incredible. But when I arrived on campus at the University of Arizona, I was not like these young phenoms you see out here now.
. The whole culture was different. This was 1999. The Internet had just come out. You had to walk to the computer lab if you wanted to go online.
Anyway, I’m just setting the scene for you. Because when I say that every single player on that Arizona Wildcats squad was an idiot, I want you to really understand what I’m saying. I don’t want you thinking about Instagram and Snapchat and all that. It’s
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The thing is, there’s so many Gilbert stories that I could hit you with. Like 97% of them I can’t really tell without having the HBO Parental Advisory warning pop up on the screen.
It’s a beautiful afternoon in Tucson. You’ve got proud moms and dads and grandparents and dogs and children all over the campus. It’s a real wholesome afternoon.
There’s a bunch of us hanging out in our apartment, and at some point, I get hungry and I say I’m gonna go to the student union for some food.
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And he’s got that mischievous grin. That mad-scientist grin. I should’ve known. I should’ve saved myself. But I let him drive me.
Now, remember, this was 2001. And in 2001, the big thing was to have the sound system with the ridiculous subwoofers, and the ridiculous rims, and of
Era. So naturally Gilbert had the loudest sound system in the country, and he had like three portable DVD players hooked up to the dash. So we start cruising down East University Boulevard with all the windows down, and we’re
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It at this point. We’re in the midst of our Final Four season, and everybody on campus knows it’s Gilbert Arenas rolling by in his ridiculous car. Students, moms, grandmas — everybody knows.
Or whatever, and the bass is rattling the street. It’s rattling my whole face. And it’s sunny. And it’s Family Weekend. And we’re on top of the world, right?
And he reaches for the 100-strong CD sleeve. Remember those? He slides something into the DVD player, and this movie starts to play.
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Man, it felt like the entire University of Arizona campus turned toward the car. It was louder than whatever you’re imagining. It was stupid, dumb loud. It was 2001 loud.
But Gilbert had an enormous smile on his face. He was waving to everyone. Grandpas, children, professors. He was waving like a presidential candidate.
Guy. Everybody on that team was a good guy. I don’t know if it was just the era, or the fact that the Internet was still pretty new, or what it was — but we were
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We weren’t ready for the league. We weren’t prepared for the money and the lifestyle and the pressure. We were a bunch of damn idiots. Maybe now you believe me.
Honestly. I was totally unprepared to make it through the grind of one NBA season, let alone 17. Even when David Stern walked up to that podium and called my name at the NBA Draft, I remember I had my eyes closed, and my first thought was, “Well, I guess I’m going to be in the NBA.”
You think it’s gonna be what’s it’s always been — that it’s just basketball. But it’s not just basketball. You have no idea all the things that are going to come at you. That’s not just a basketball thing — that’s
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Everybody can remember where they were on the morning of September 11, 2001. I was at an elementary school, of all places. It’s so weird in retrospect, because I actually happened to be doing the exact same thing that President Bush was doing that morning. Me and a few other Nets players had just finished reading to a whole class of second graders. When we got out to the car to head back to the practice facility, we heard the news come over the radio.
Anyone who was in New York City or New Jersey on 9/11 remembers the feeling of looking up — or looking across the river at the skyline — and seeing the smoke. It didn’t seem like real life. It still doesn’t seem like real life. When we got back to the practice facility, there was still so much confusion about what was going on that the coaches had us do our workout.
But I’ll never forget trying to get back home, and seeing all the cars on the highway heading to Manhattan just totally abandoned on the side of the road. They had shut the whole city down. I mean,
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If you weren’t in New York or New Jersey during that time, it’s impossible explain the emotions of what it was like. Before our first home game that October, they brought out a bunch of the firefighters and police and first responders who lived in New Jersey, and there was a minute of silence, and it was one of the most overwhelming moments of my life.
But that’s what the city needed. Even in the moment, I didn’t totally understand it. But now I get it. Between us making our run
