Something that my teammates always thought was going to be a punishment for me - sitting next to Coach Russell on the team bus - actually turned out to be the best moment of my life.
— Kenny Smith
I think it is inevitable that I'll be coaching or be a GM.
My situation in Houston is like night and day compared to Atlanta. This system fits my game, and the team has confidence in me to get the job done.
Great players, they start becoming immune to what the defense does to them.
I've played more park games than NBA games, and I had a 10-year NBA career.
I'm not a boxer, I'm a basketball player.
We all want to let fans behind the scenes. We just don't want them following us around.
In Texas, it's football. In Georgia, football. There's an appreciation from the average person about football more than anywhere else. And we have that for basketball in New York. And we'll always have that in New York.
If you practice anything enough, you can be consistent.
Mike Brown wasn't about race relations, nor Trayvon Martin or even Hurricane Katrina for that matter. It's about trust.
I think, for me, one of the things I've been blessed with is the ability to speak with clarity.
There's no representation. That's why the NBA Players Association was formed, players' unions were formed. That's why those unions were formed - to have representation before you make rules for me that I have to abide by. How can I participate and how can it be fair if there's no representation?
The 18 years on TNT has prepared me for a lot of opportunities, and coaching is one of them.
I was overwhelmed meeting him. I didn't know what to say, I didn't know whether to call him 'Coach Russell,' 'Bill,' or 'Mr. Russell.'
Timing is everything in this league, and I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. But I never lost my confidence. Atlanta was changing coaches and systems. I knew they'd make personnel changes.
Any guard would love playing with a great big man, one who rebounds, blocks shots, and scores.
You make decisions just crossing the street.
By the time I turned 16, I'd played more than 300 games outside high school.
This league has great players, and it has great images. Sometimes those two things get confused.
Mark Jackson played 19, 20 years in the NBA. Shouldn't even have probably been in the league, and he's the third-ranked assist guy in the NBA. But you describe his game: Can he jump? No, not really. How's his outside shot? Eh, it's inconsistent. Can he defend? Nah, he can't stay in front of guys. And he played 19 years!
From the outside looking in, I would say the franchise that has had the most stories that are unrelated to basketball are the Knicks.
My high school coach used to tell me there's no correct way to shoot, that the only correct way was to get the ball into the basket.
If you put 100 people on an island with no food, no water, no hope of a ship coming, then some will overcome it and be resourceful, some will live in it, others will panic, and others will show horrific character, which is wrong. But not to understand that all alternatives are possible is wrong as well.
As African Americans, we always have to fight for inclusion, despite your moral background: Christian, Muslim, Jewish - it doesn't matter.
NCAA is looking at how to do a better job enforcing their rules instead of looking at why the predatorial environment is created. There's a predatorial environment that their rules have created, which makes people feel undervalued.
It's difficult to see my daughters on television and in music videos, and then I get tweets or comments about crushes and, 'Hey can I date? And hey, I'd be a good son-in-law type.'
You do the job you have to do where you have to do it.
What made it so special was the city of Houston had never won a sports championship. I think the championship changed people's thinking about their own city. It made them feel like their city had some significance that it hadn't had before.
Dunk, and people anywhere will ooh and aah. But you can wow a crowd in New York with ball handling and passing.
I don't know about bullying and all of that stuff. That doesn't work in basketball.
Image overshadows reality in our league, and there are people who get to believe they are better than they really are.
I always thought it's not that the greatest players in the world come from New York. It's just the guys who shouldn't have made it, they came from New York. That's what makes New York special.
You don't get the accolades unless you win. It took me a while to understand. No one will remember how Kenny Smith played in Game 1 unless we win the series. The thrill is in winning.
I started playing basketball when I was 6 or 7. I wasn't strong enough to shoot the correct way, so I just used two hands. As I got older, I just kept shooting that way.
When you play, you get an opportunity to hone your craft.
You can have your own thought process about things, but you still need to include and co-exist with other people.
Coaching is definitely on the aspiration list.
