Character Driven (4 page)

Back on the bench at the start of the fourth quarter, I was better able to focus on the ebb and flow of the game instead of wondering whether I could play and actually contribute. With that question answered, my mind focused more on how to slow down Golden State’s offense. With our guards in foul trouble, the Warriors’ Baron Davis and Jason Richardson were taking it to us with a mix of threes and dribble penetration. With just under eight minutes left in the fourth quarter, we were ahead 99–96. Right before the TV time-out, Baron Davis had converted a layup for his thirty-third point of the night. When one player has a little more than a third of his team’s total output, you know he’s having a night. We had to figure out a way to put the clamps on the guy.

Following that time-out, we went on a bit of a run. At the 4:52 mark, our center Mehmet Okur hit a three to put us up 106–100. Things were looking good, but with the way Golden State was hoisting up and hitting the three, it was still really just a two-possession game. Just as I suspected, Stephen Jackson hit a trey. Next, Jason Richardson fired up a three, was fouled, and hit two of three free throws. He followed that up by hitting a three, to put Golden State up by a point, 108–107, with just a little more than two minutes to play.

I went to our assistant coach, Tyrone Corbin, and said, “I can play defense.” He nodded. The competitor in me came to the surface at that moment. I wanted in there, feeling that I could do what we needed to turn the tide. Tatum and my family were in my heart, but the game was on my mind. With 1:13 remaining in the game, Coach Sloan had me reenter. We were down 110–107. A few moments later, the Warriors scored again, and we trailed by 5 with less than a minute to go. On our next possession, Deron made a great pass to Carlos Boozer for a jam. We put the Warriors on the line, and we were fortunate they missed a couple of free throws. With two seconds left, Deron made a runner to tie the game at 113. Overtime.

The rest, as they say, is history. We jumped out quickly to a lead, but the Warriors scrambled back into it. I forced Baron Davis into a critical turnover just when we needed a stop. With just over a minute to play, we were up by 3 when Deron Williams found me open in the corner. I got the ball in rhythm, got in good bent-knee position, and rose up with my eyes locked on the rim. The shot felt good leaving my hand, but I’d had that feeling before and had been disappointed, but this time my faith in myself proved good—as did the shot. We were up by 6, and I followed up that shot with a pair of free throws in the waning seconds, and we pulled out the W.

I did something a bit uncharacteristic for me following that three-pointer. As I headed back on court during a time-out after that shot, I pointed to the sky. My faith in God is something personal to me, but at that moment I had to acknowledge that I didn’t make that shot on my own. A higher power, God, had helped me make that shot. Jesus Christ was there for me in that moment in ways that allowed me to find within myself the strength to do my job and do it well. I did another atypical thing for me. After the game, TNT’s Pam Oliver wanted me to do the postgame interview. Normally, they go to the star of the game, the guy who had the most points or hit the game winner. Instead, they came to me because of my family situation. Candace and I had agreed to keep things within the family, but when Ms. Oliver asked me about what had been going on, my gut told me that I needed to open up.

With tears in my eyes and an enormous sense of relief, I told her, “It was very, very serious. My daughter’s life was in jeopardy. She has a form of eye cancer called retinoblastoma. And the only reason I’m saying this now is because there are kids out there that are suffering from this disease, and people can’t really identify it. It’s a very rare disease. And I want people out there to take their kids to the ophthalmologist, make sure they get their eyes checked, and make sure everything’s okay, because we could have lost my little girl had we waited any longer.”

I knew that I had a message to deliver. I had to do the right thing, and if I had to feel a little uncomfortable by sharing a personal slice of a sometimes too public life, then I was glad to do it.

This book is, in a lot of ways, a product of those experiences. I don’t know that if we hadn’t gone through what we did and received such enormous support locally and nationally, I would have wanted to write a book. I’ve never felt particularly special just because I am a basketball player. I am more reserved than most people and truly felt that what I did in those days dealing with Tatum’s health, and in the days and weeks following when I asked to be released from my contract so that I could work someplace where Tatum could receive the kind of follow-up care she needed, was simply what most fathers, most parents, would do for a child or other family member. I was somewhat taken aback by all the attention the things I did or the choices we made as a family received. I was, and continue to be, enormously grateful for the outpouring of affection and am humbled by the media attention and people’s view of me. On many levels then, this book is payback. Not only do I want people to know about retinoblastoma (Candace and I have started a foundation to promote education about the disease and possible treatments), but I want them to know that what took place in those few weeks was the product of an upbringing, an environment, a long list of influential people, and an agency with capabilities far beyond what we humans can muster.

As I stated before, I realize that everything that came before the moment when Tatum was diagnosed was preparing me to deal with that crisis. And as uncomfortable as it can sometimes be to have a light shone on me, I feel it’s my duty and my privilege to share with you more of those moments that led to our victory on and off the court. I don’t feel that my life has been in any way extraordinary, but I do believe that I have something to contribute, and giving back in this way is one form of giving thanks for the many blessings my family and I have received. In the pages that follow, I’m going to share with you some of the many lessons I’ve learned that have enabled me to succeed and stay sane in this sometimes crazy game of basketball. I didn’t get here alone, and I’m glad to have you along with me on the journey.

I also know that in the most rational sense, my having spent thirteen years in the league is in a very real way less a product of anything that I’ve done than it is a product of some large plan laid out for me. I’m going to share with you some of the fundamental lessons I learned on the court and off that have enabled me to succeed beyond what most people who saw me play the game could ever have expected. I’ve always had a quiet confidence in myself and my abilities as a basketball player. I’m also realistic enough, analytical enough, to know that confidence alone wasn’t what got and kept me here in the NBA. I also know that I’ve been blessed beyond all measure—the success of Tatum’s procedure is just one small example of that. I’ve been provided with opportunities and the ability to recognize them when they present themselves, and the skills and faith to seize them.

I don’t know that I go out of my way to be a nice guy, it’s just a part of who I am because of how I was raised and because of all the reinforcement I’ve gotten for sticking with some of the fundamental truths about how to live my life—whether that’s been the Golden Rule of doing unto others as I would want them to do unto me or understanding the fundamental truths of how the triangle offense should be run. It took me some time, but I’ve come to understand that the two selves—the basketball player and the man, husband, father, friend, and brother—that I sometimes felt I had to keep separate actually work together as a team. Who I am, what I do, and how I conduct myself are all bound together in ways that I’ve only lately begun to understand. Just as there’s no sound reason that a guy who is six feet one and not the fleetest of foot can play in this league and contribute to the degree that I have, there’s no logical reason that now, at the age of thirty-four, I should be enjoying one of my best seasons ever as a professional. I should be on the downside of my career, but as I see it, things have never looked brighter, my future never more certain, my love for my family never more a source of contentment and pleasure. In no way am I ready to hang it up, but this seems like a good point at which to stop and take stock of where I’ve been and how I got here. I love playing this game, I love my family and the life I’m privileged to lead. In my mind, my NBA career is only going to lead me to halftime in my life. What’s to follow will likely be as fulfilling and rewarding, mainly because of what I’ve learned about myself and the world during this thrilling ride.

CHAPTER TWO

Practicing the Fundamentals:

Building a Solid Foundation

Go to any court, gymnasium, or college or professional arena, and you’re likely to hear shouted from the bench or by one of the players, “Box out.” Even though we’re often encouraged to think outside the box, sometimes tried-and-true conventional wisdom serves better than innovation. As in most sports, in basketball you can only score when you have the ball in your hands. On a good night, a team will score on about 50 percent of its possessions. When you factor in that when you have the ball, the other team can’t score, you can better understand why each possession matters so much. That’s where boxing out comes into play. When a shot is in the air, the ball isn’t in the possession of either team. It is literally up for grabs. The cliché states that possession is nine-tenths of the law, but in basketball it is everything. The more possessions you have in a game, the greater the number of opportunities you have to score. A simple truth that we sometimes forget.

That’s why you hear coaches stressing that players must box out when the ball is in the air following a shot. By putting yourself in good position to rebound the ball, and by preventing your opponent from getting access to the ball, you’re increasing the likelihood that you will either retain or take possession of the “rock.” Many games turn on those transitional moments when the ball is not in the hands of a player from either team. When you understand that basic truth about possessions, when you really have a firm understanding of that important fundamental, you see things from a slightly different perspective. While statistics such as points scored, rebounds corralled, assists made, and turnovers committed say a lot about the outcome of a game, the things that don’t appear in the box score on your favorite Internet sports site or in your local newspaper often really tell the tale of W’s and L’s. Coaches will frequently talk about those “intangibles” and the “little things” in their postgame press conferences, but sometimes even we players forget the things that determine the razor’sedge margin between going home happy and replaying repeatedly the moments when the game slipped away. I’ve been in both positions, and believe me, I’d much rather look back on what went right than on what went wrong.

Chalk it up to genetics, to good teachers, or what have you. The thing that has kept me in the game of basketball for thirteen professional seasons isn’t my blinding speed, my stunningly quick first step, my prodigious hops that allow me to take a quarter off the top of the backboard, or my possessing the wingspan of a jumbo jet. Instead, what has made me a valuable part of three different NBA teams and what brought me back to the Los Angeles Lakers, where I was privileged to be on three championship teams, is my ability to execute the fundamentals of the game. Whether it’s putting a body on my man to box him out, taking a charge, or doing any of a dozen other “little things,” those are among the skills I bring to the court each night. As all coaches will tell you, your shooting touch will come and go from night to night, but the energy you bring, the intensity with which you compete, and your ability to focus on doing the little things shouldn’t vary from game to game.

So many people focused on the three-point shot I hit in overtime in the game the night following Tatum’s procedure; what I remember, and what many of my teammates and coaches recalled, was the turnover I forced in overtime. That little thing produced big results. Similarly, the eighteen-foot jump shot I hit in the 2003–4 Western Conference semifinal at the buzzer to beat San Antonio still looms large in people’s imaginations. Some people referred to me as the Fish That Saved L.A. for making that basket. What they don’t remember is that in that game I grabbed a couple of rebounds that led to opportunities for us to score. Regrettably, I also missed one of two free throws—and making free throws is another of what I consider to be the game’s fundamentals. Not that I’m hard on myself and demand perfection, but that missed free throw stands out in my mind almost as much as those made shots—more on how I deal with that tendency later.

Just as important fundamentals must always be kept in mind on the basketball court, similar kinds of fundamentals exist in life. I’ve been fortunate that from my earliest days I was surrounded by people who instilled in me the values and beliefs—and showed me how to put those intangible things into action—that have led to success in all phases of my life. The most influential people in my development as a human being also happened to be devoted to basketball as well. Had I been born into a family of mathematicians, musicians, or mechanics, I would likely have succeeded in those fields and been much the same person I am today. It just so happens that my career is basketball.

Well, maybe “just so happens” isn’t the best way to put it. My mother, Annette, played basketball all through school, as did my father, John. He played for a couple of years at Southern University, but then he left school and joined the air force—more on that bit of influence in a while. My father was a Lakers fan from the beginning, and my earliest memories of growing up in our house on West Twenty-second Street in Little Rock, Arkansas, are the sounds of radio and television broadcasts of various games. Those were the Magic Johnson years, and he was my favorite player. My dad was also a huge Oakland Raiders fan. Why the California connection I have no idea, since Dad was originally from Louisiana. Because we had no pro teams in Little Rock, and the Lakers and the Celtics were the top teams in the league back then, it made sense that we’d root for one of the perennial powerhouses. I followed my dad’s lead and became a big Lakers fan. That I would later be drafted by the team I rooted for as a kid is just another example to add to my list of events that have fit into the larger pattern that was not of my design.

Despite his affiliation with West Coast teams, Dad introduced me to the marvel that was Julius “Dr. J” Erving of the Philadelphia 76ers. By the time I was born in 1974, Dr. J had just led the New Jersey Nets to their first ABA championship. Later, when the two leagues merged in 1976, Irving joined the NBA as a Philadelphia 76er. I was too young to remember all of that, but my dad told me about Dr. J’s standing up to the Nets owner and demanding that he be traded because the Nets had reneged on a promise to redo his contract. Dr. J was one of the league’s most important stars, had been the ABA’s Most Valuable Player, and was a charismatic figure who helped the NBA emerge from the shadow of Major League Baseball and the National Football League to become a huge and profitable industry. My dad reinforced the idea that what was right was right, and Dr. J’s demands weren’t out of line or greedy. He was simply expecting to be treated fairly and honestly.

More than those elements of his off-the-court dealings, my dad held Dr. J in such high regard because of what the man could do on the court. His incredibly athletic “above the rim” style of play ushered in professional basketball’s modern era. His spectacular dunks were legendary and inspired many future pros. As talented as those 76er teams were, they couldn’t win the championship with Dr. J until the 1982–83 season, when they beat our beloved Los Angeles Lakers in four games. I was only eight and a half years old at the time, but I still have vague recollections of those games and the conference finals against Boston leading up to that championship. The Dr. J vs. Larry Bird rivalry and later Bird vs. Magic Johnson set the tone for the NBA’s marketing of marquee matchups. I don’t remember many of the specifics of that championship season, but I’m sure my dad could recap all the games, and especially how torn he was to see one of his personal favorites go up against his favorite team.

My mom still has a photograph of me, no more than two years old, wearing a tiny Dr. J T-shirt. In the photo, I’ve just released a shot at a mini-basketball hoop, and I don’t mind telling you that my form even at that age was really good. Dr. J and I couldn’t have more different types of games, but in the years since I’ve been in the league, I’ve come to understand that Dr. J was someone worth emulating for what he did off the court as well as what he did on it. Following his retirement, he put his business savvy to work as an owner of a Coca-Cola bottling plant. He also worked as a television analyst, became a part owner in a NASCAR team (he saw that African-Americans were underrepresented in that profitable enterprise). He has also served on the board of directors of Converse (prior to their 2001 bankruptcy), Darden Restaurants Inc., Saks Incorporated, and the Sports Authority. In 1997, he joined the front office of the Orlando Magic. I’ve always felt that it’s important to have a plan for your life, and clearly Dr. J was looking beyond his years in the game to the rest of his life.

As much as my dad idolized Dr. J and impressed upon me how the man conducted his life, there was always Magic in my life. For as many pictures as we had of Dr. J around the house, we had more of Earvin “Magic” Johnson. That I would one day wear the same uniform that he wore, that I would one day meet him and have him serve not just as a distant role model but as a mentor and as a friend, was something I could only dream about. That it all, and then some, became a reality is again part of that larger plan that I could not have put into motion on my own. When I came to the Lakers, I knew about the transition that Magic had made from basketball superstar to entrepreneur and advocate. As much success as he earned on the court, he has achieved even more off the court. Magic Johnson Enterprises and the Magic Johnson Foundation are two parts of that success. The first is an enormously successful business organization, and the second is a charitable foundation that has done incredible good work. What unites them is Magic’s sense of community and empowering those in ethnically diverse communities to take charge of their futures. As a two-year-old, of course, I had no sense of the possibilities that were open to me.

Many years later, I was proud that Magic recognized something in me. Magic had no way of knowing this, but during the first month of my first season in L.A., as I stood on the balcony of my apartment in Marina Del Rey—I was alone, and the city lights sprawled out beneath me—I said to myself, “One day, I’m going to be big in this city, big like Magic.” At the time, I didn’t fully understand what an affirmation was in the way that I do today. Thirteen years have come and gone, and there are certainly bigger stars in the L.A. firmament than me, but something close to magic has happened in that time. Dreams are powerful things, and the Lord has moved more than mountains it seems since I was that two-year-old kid with the good shooting form.

I’m not sure who instructed me in the good shooting technique captured in that photo of me as a baby, but it could have been my half brother, Duane. My mom had previously been married, and Duane was ten years old by the time I was born. He was already playing on various school teams and at the local Boys Club when I came around. I can’t say I idolized Duane, but I did want to go to the gym with him. Today, I understand that when he was fifteen and sixteen, the very last thing he wanted was to have a little brother tag along. My mom and dad insisted that he take me to the Penick Boys Club in the Boyle Park section of Little Rock or to the gym at Parkview High School, where he played.

At first he resisted the idea, but not for long. My mom and dad, my dad especially, knew how to lay down the law. They did not put up with any back talk. That was part of the reason Duane moved out of our house to live with his biological father for a short while. At the time, I didn’t really know what was going on. Duane was there one day and gone the next. A few months later he was back. Whether it was the military that instilled a sense of discipline in my father that he carried over into his family life, or if his own father was a no-nonsense man, I’m not sure. All I know is that my backside was on familiar terms with my father’s hand. Divorce is never easy on a kid, and I suspect that Duane had some issues to deal with—the “you’re not my real father” kind of thing that would surely have upset my dad. I remember my mom saying once that Duane needed some discipline in his life. I think that my mother’s soft side must have taken over in the wake of the divorce.

Of the two, my mom was definitely the softer touch. What do you expect of a woman whose people came from a place called Sweet Home, Arkansas? I can’t think of a better word to describe my mother than
sweet
. She could be strong, too, when the situation required. That sweetness carried over to her cooking as well. I can remember eating a lot of meals with one of her specialties—minute rice with sugar and butter sprinkled on it. I know it doesn’t sound like much, but even today those simple flavors can stir up all kinds of pleasant memories. With my mother’s family nearby and my father’s in Louisiana, we spent more of our time with her family than his. We were a tight-knit bunch, and that was reflected in our Sunday-afternoon, postchurch family dinners. All my aunts and uncles and my cousins would gather at my Grandma and Grandpa Johnson’s house. He insisted we call him Papa, and my mother got her pleasant disposition from the two of them. That was also where she got her grounding in religion.