I think I started learning lessons about being a good person long before I ever knew what basketball was. And that starts in the home, it starts with the parental influence.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
My father helped me become a ballplayer and take the good with the bad.
I played basketball to try to get my parents from working so hard.
Part of my growing up was always trying to make my parents proud and always trying to keep them happy. I think part of what held them together was my involvement in sports.
Faith, family, academics and then sports was the order of priorities in my family. My parents really stuck to these principles when raising me and my two brothers. As long as we took care of everything, they let us play as much basketball as we wanted.
I started playing ball when I was a kid. My dad was a pro ball player and he passed on his knowledge to me.
I started playing baseball and soccer. Those were my sports on the streets and in school when I was growing up. I didn't even start playing basketball until I was 14.
When I grew up, my father taught us the value of hard work. He wanted us to enjoy ourselves, but he also wanted to know what it took to be successful. He coached a lot of our sports teams growing up. We weren't very good, but we learned about hard work and enjoying life and your teammates.
Seven years ago, my father and I realized that our relationship was extremely unique, especially in the African-American community. He raised me to not only understand the fundamentals of basketball and to try to be a player with a high basketball IQ, but he wanted me to understand that my image and my name meant more than stats.
I was very fortunate when I was little - I played basketball. You really absolutely learn how to be a team player, how to win a game, to accomplish things, not just for yourself.
Basketball was my whole life until I was 20 years old. All I knew was basketball. Then came golf, and I thought that's all I wanted to do then.