Top 25 Showdown Headlines Legends of Basketball Las Vegas Invitational

by Martin Kaufmann

Even before he played his first NBA game, Jim Jackson realized that he had to begin preparing for life after basketball.

Jackson was the fourth pick in the 1992 NBA draft after an All-American career at Ohio State. But he only played 28 games his first season with the Dallas Mavericks because of a contract dispute.

“I had already started a (long-term) game plan,” Jackson said. “It really started my first year when I had to sit out. That gave me insight into the way the business works. And then in my third year when I sprained my ankle really bad, (I realized) this thing can be over in a heartbeat, so you have to prepare yourself.”

Through his first four seasons, Jackson was a fixture in the Mavericks’ starting lineup and a reliable scorer, peaking at 25.7 points per game in that injury-plagued third season. During the 1996-97 season, however, he was traded to the New Jersey Nets, beginning an odyssey that came to define his career. Over 14 seasons, he played for an NBA-record 12 teams. Only three other players have played for as many teams.

That’s a mixed blessing for an athlete. Jackson lamented never being able “to establish a camaraderie, a legacy with one team. That’s what you search for when you’re a player.” He would have loved to have become a Dallas institution, such as Dirk Nowitzki, who just retired after 21 seasons. But there might have been some benefits to his itinerant career. He lived all around the country, developing friendships he never would have made had he stayed in one city. “That can benefit you later in life,” he said.

After 14 seasons, and his playing time dwindling with the Phoenix Suns and Los Angeles Lakers, Jackson knew it was time to move on.

“I just wasn’t the type who wanted to be the 12th man on the bench,” Jackson said. “After the 2006 season, I said, ‘I’m just tired of it. I just want to move on with my life.’”

He already had interests in real estate and restaurants through business partners in Dallas, but he balked when his agent, Mark Termini, suggested that he consider moving into broadcasting. Termini finally convinced Jackson to meet with broadcasting agent Maury Gostfrand, who in 2007 steered him toward the Big Ten Network. Jackson spent eight years there, overlapping with son Traevon’s playing career at Wisconsin.

Jackson attacked broadcasting much the way he used to game-plan for an opponent during his playing career. He leaned on his Ohio State network, seeking advice from CBS’ Clark Kellogg and ESPN’s Kirk Herbstreit. He also hired a coach and pored over video of his on-air appearances.

“You’ve got to work. It’s just like watching game tapes,” he said. “You break it down and point out things I’ve done wrong — maybe eye contact, verbiage, maybe slowing down my cadence. It’s a lot of stuff that you might not be aware of ... You have to be honest with yourself. You also have to watch the ones who do it the best. I think that’s the best teaching tool.”

His workload has mushroomed since 2015, when he jumped to Fox Sports 1, where he maintains a busy schedule calling college games. During March Madness, he called televised games for Turner Sports during the early rounds, then moved over to the radio side for Westwood One at the Final Four.

“I love the live games the best,” he said. “There’s nothing like being in the action.”

When he’s not on the road, you often can find him in Fox Sports’ studios, swapping hot takes on LeBron James and NBA life on shows such as “Speak for Yourself” and “Undisputed.” Occasionally some of those contacts he made during his playing career float back into his life.

In December, John Calipari, who coached Jackson when he played for the New Jersey Nets in the mid-1990s, asked his former player to speak to his Kentucky Wildcats when they visited New York. (Jackson joked that when college coaches ask him to talk to their players, “they have to prep the team, because they don’t know who I am.”)

 Jackson urged the players to spend more time focusing on their defense and rebounding rather than obsessing over their offense; if they did that, he said, the points would flow naturally.

“Ride the wave,” he told the Wildcats. “I was fortunate to play 14 years. You’re going to go through this (moving his hand through the air like waves on an ocean). It’s a microcosm of life. But how you handle it, what your outlook is, how you choose to deal with it, is going to determine how you get through it.”

Jackson has practiced what he preaches over the past 12 years. Broadcasting became his new passion, and he never took it for granted. To this day, he said, he still seeks advice from experts to help him improve.

“The same tools you used to become a successful basketball player — the work ethic, the studying, the attention to detail, listening, taking advice — are the same tools you’ll need when you move to that third phase (post-NBA) of your life,” Jackson said.

Jerome Williams, known to many as the Junk Yard Dog, earned his nickname during his stint with the Detroit Pistons. His teammates coined him ‘JYD’ for his hard work ethic and willingness to do a lot of the “garbage” jobs, such as rebounding, playing defense, setting strong screens and the other basic fundamentals. Since the conclusion of his playing career, Jerome has used that same mentality to promote the importance of education to the country’s youth via his Shooting for Peace program.

Williams, who initially began his own service project called Jerome’s Youth Development (JYD) Project, has long been an advocate for helping young people reach their highest potential. After starting the National Basketball Retired Players Association (NBRPA) Las Vegas chapter and outreach to the local community, Williams immediately saw the parallels between the NBRPA’s community initiatives and those of the JYD Project, and decided to pair the two together. Today, that marriage is known as Shooting for Peace.

“The efforts on both sides were focused on professional and retired athletes going out and serving the community,” said Williams. “Because doing so really requires a brigade of players, I knew it was the perfect time to bridge the two initiatives. The result is a program that serves a multitude of young people in a significant way.”

Shooting for Peace has since grown into a nationwide tour and includes several different facets that aid students. Benefits include digital education services, scholarships from notable HBCUs, and school visits from the Legends themselves, which include a Q&A panel, poetry and essay contest, and a game pitting the Legends against the school team. Last year, NBA Legends made stops in various chapter cities, including Las Vegas, Boston, Harlem, Philadelphia, New Orleans, Toronto, Miami, Oakland, and more.

It is no secret that students who go on to earn a college degree are more likely to lead productive lives in society. Jerome Williams is no stranger to this fact. He has worked harder than most to achieve his dreams. In fact, Jerome paid his own tuition at a junior college to earn his Associate’s degree. He went on to receive a full scholarship from Georgetown University, as well as several other certifications in his professional life. His passion for this work is clear and reflective of his own personal values.

“I believe that kids today need their education now more than ever,” says Williams. “We take great pride in showing them how the Legends of the game and a good education work hand-in-hand.”

Local chapters encourage all members — from the NBA to WNBA to the Harlem Globetrotters — to get involved with Shooting for Peace. No matter what their professional playing careers looked like, each and every one of them started at the same place: school. All of these stories, especially those that include hardship, are necessary for students to hear.

“By hearing directly from Legends, these young people learn that while they can be an athlete, it is being a student-athlete that is really most important for lifelong success.”

A special thanks to all of the chapter presidents for their leadership with Shooting for Peace. This program would not be what it is today without them.

Husband. Father. Mentor. Investor. These are just some of the many words that describe eight-year NBA veteran Eddie Gill. But before his basketball career took him all across the globe, he was just a kid from Aurora, Colorado who went on to overcome immense odds to realize his dream of playing in the NBA.

After high school, Gill enrolled at the College of Eastern Utah, where he played minimal minutes and was given few opportunities. The decision to transfer the following season to Salt Lake Community College proved to be a game-changer for Gill. He would go on to average more than 16 points and six assists per game.

After a standout season, Gill tested his skills at the D-1 level. He transferred to Weber State in 1998 and went on to play two full seasons for the Wildcats. MVP of the 1999 Big Sky Conference Tournament and named to the First-Team All-Big Sky Conference, Gill leveraged his college successes into a career in the NBA G League and eight seasons in the NBA, and spent significant time overseas for teams in the Greek Leagues and Continental Basketball Association. But, after a career spanning the globe, he still felt most at home in Indiana.

“When I knew retirement was a real possibility, I asked myself ‘what’s next?’” Gill said.

Gill turned in his jersey in 2011 but couldn’t stay away from the game for long. He started a youth skills development program in Indianapolis called, “All Out Training”. Through the program, he led after-school initiatives for kids that focused primarily on exercise and training.

“The NBA has a number of youth initiatives. Working in camps, clinics and schools,” Gill explains. “Through all these initiatives, I developed a passion for working with kids, especially on the court, regardless of their skillsets. Not everyone wants to go to the NBA — some kids just want to be able to play better on the playground! That’s why I started ‘All Out Training’.”

What Gill didn’t know at the time was that his youth training program would be an avenue for another career option. One afternoon, Gill began talking with a father of one of the boys in the program. The man had a successful career in wealth management and Gill was intrigued. Fast forward to today and Gill has been active in the financial management and investing industries for years.

“Networking is tremendous in any business,” Gill says while reflecting on his past. “It doesn’t mean you’re trying to get something out of someone, you’re just building a relationship. You never know what you could do for someone or what doors they can open for you. That’s what happened to me.”

Gill began hiring more coaches to run All Out Training while he pursued his new goal of becoming a financial advisor. He also knew that, through his time playing professional basketball, he could be a great resource for other athletes looking to do the same thing. But it wasn’t as easy as asking his new friend for a job.

“I had to do some serious studying to get certified and licensed,” he says. “To be 34 and studying ... that was a different experience than the first time around. It was hard!”

Gill worked for it and turned into an incredible success story in the process. He has moved up in the ranks as a financial advisor, while simultaneously juggling All Out Training and pregame/postgame analyst work for the Indiana Pacers.

One of the most rewarding aspects of Gill’s life is helping younger players through the process. The biggest piece of advice he offers to current players is that basketball won’t last forever. Even if you have a great playing career, 15 years or so is still a short amount of time to make a lot of money. And then what? If you stop playing at 35 years old, then you still have 65 years of life left.

“Plan for your future,” he says. “Don’t just save, but think about what you want the rest of your life to look like. Your community involvement. Your next career. Think about it now.”

Gill’s final piece of advice? Get out of your comfort zone, and never be the smartest person in the room. “When we’re comfortable, we’re not making progress. In order to be a better basketball player, we had to be uncomfortable; the same holds true beyond the court. Surround yourself with high achievers, and don’t be the smartest person

by John Fawaz

Haywood v. NBA. 1971. For a time it seemed more like Spencer Haywood against the world.

Booed in every arena but his own in Seattle. Protests filed by numerous NBA teams, including one by a franchise that had tried to sign Haywood. Sued by the ABA. Injunctions served during warmups. The Cincinnati Royals kicked him out of the arena, and into the snow. Opposing players delivering elbows to Haywood’s jaw. And those were the polite objections.

“There were some serious threats,” Haywood says. “Booing was ‘nice.’ People would try to entice me to fight because if I punched somebody, the whole case would blow over.”

The controversy entered the realm of farce when Chicago, after losing to Seattle, demanded $600,000 for the diminution of the Bulls’ playoff chances and for the injury to All-Star Chet Walker. Imagine how much money the Bulls would have asked for if Haywood had actually checked into the game.

Haywood’s offense? He wanted to play in the NBA, and he didn’t want to wait until he was 22 years old, as the League required.

“The NBA was not accepting of the idea,” Haywood says, putting it mildly. “They said you have to wait two years [or] you can go play in Belgium.”

An unstoppable 6-foot-8 forward with a unique skill set, Haywood led the U.S. team to the gold medal at the 1968 Olympics at the age of 19, and then averaged 32 points and 22 rebounds per game in the 1968-69 season while playing for the University of Detroit. For Haywood, the youngest of 10 children of a single mother worn down from a lifetime working in the Mississippi cotton fields, college was a luxury he just couldn’t afford.

Haywood went to the ABA, which enacted a hardship exception in its bylaws that allowed its teams to sign players who hadn’t completed their college eligibility. Hysteria ensued. The end of civilization was near, so it was said, or at the very least the end of college athletics. All censure, of course, was couched in terms of concern for Haywood and other student-athletes.

The ABA proved to be no friend, either. After Haywood won the 1969-70 ABA MVP Award as a rookie, the Denver Rockets gave him a new contract worth $1.9 million. Or so they said.

“I signed it without legal counsel,” Haywood says. “I got a raise from $50,000 to $75,000, and they would put $10,000 a year into the stock market, and when I get to age 55, I start drawing from that money if it’s there.

“And the agreement inside the agreement said that I would have to be employed by the truck line that owned the Rockets until I was 70 years old.”

Haywood hired an agent (Al Ross), and when he and Ross tried to renegotiate a clearly unfair contract, the Rockets’ owner told them to get out (peppered with a racial slur). Play for Denver or don’t play at all because the NBA won’t touch you.

Enter Sam Schulman, a lawyer and the outspoken managing partner of the Seattle SuperSonics. NBA Commissioner J. Walter Kennedy warned Schulman to steer clear of Haywood. But he couldn’t. Schulman wound up signing Haywood in December of 1970.

“Sam said, ‘I will give you the same contract you signed in Denver, but all in cash,’” Haywood says. “I got money, and I can play. I will do whatever Sam wants.”

The courts agreed. U.S. District Judge Warren Ferguson issued a preliminary injunction allowing Haywood to play for the Sonics. The NBA appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which upheld the injunction in a 7-2 decision on March 1, 1971. Fewer than two weeks later, Ferguson granted Haywood’s motion for a summary judgment declaring the NBA rule invalid because it violated antitrust law.

As Schulman said later, “It was a matter of principle. I couldn’t see any logical reason for keeping a man from making a living.”

And the sky did not fall. In the decades that followed, veteran players did not lose their jobs to younger, cheaper players. The opposite occurred, as the influx of talent allowed the NBA to expand. College basketball became bigger than ever. In the NBA, revenue soared. All those extra years created tremendous wealth for NBA players and, more importantly, gave them more control over their lives and careers. Haywood v. NBA ended a system that benefited everyone but the players.

Haywood, who was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2015, is proud of his role as a Pioneer. But as he said in his induction speech, “Now remember guys, I had game. It’s not like I just did this Supreme Court thing. I had some serious game.”

by Sam Smith

“I long to hear that you have declared an independency. And, by the way, in the new code of laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make, I desire you would remember the ladies and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the husbands. Remember, all men would be tyrants if they could. If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice or representation.”

—— Abigail Adams’ letter and reminder to John Adams of the Continental Congress on eve of American Revolution, 1776.

It was certainly revolutionary in 1997 when the National Basketball Association committed to advancing the women’s game. Sure, there had been basketball leagues for women, and the college space was vibrant with famous programs like Immaculata and Delta State. Women played in the Olympics as an official sport in 1976 after the Title IX law in 1972, and many found participation outlets in Europe and Asia. But there seemed no sustainability in the United States, the birthplace of basketball, the land of the free and the home of the brave and where all men — and women — were supposedly created equal.

David Stern and the NBA were determined to finally remedy the great inequality with a commitment that today makes the Women’s National Basketball Association the most stable and successful women’s professional sports league in the United States. The fact that the change comes under the aegis of the National Basketball Association is both predictable and appropriate. As many will recall, it was the NBA that first introduced all-African-American starting lineups to professional sports along with African-American management and ownership, easily making it the most progressive sports league in the world.

“The WNBA has been a change agent,” agrees Carol Blazejowski, basketball Hall of Famer and former NBA official. “It’s changed a lot of societal views. It has become a platform for women to feel a sense of pride and upward mobility, and to feel that they can achieve bigger and better things in the sports community, to be viewed as athletes and not separated as women or men. It has allowed us as individuals who are very capable of playing the game of basketball to serve as role models, and to offer all we can to the sports landscape.”

 “There have been some bumps, some successes and failures,” continues Blazejowski. “It’s still going to take some time and patience. Society always accepted the male athlete, and it was a struggle [to be accepted] when I played. But that stigma has changed and it’s a rite of passage now, understanding that opportunities in sports are as important to your daughter as much as to your son for so many reasons — the chance to earn a scholarship, boosting self-esteem, and everything else that comes with playing sports.”

Tamika Catchings, a 15-year WNBA veteran who is now an Indiana Fever executive, figured she would follow her father and play in the NBA.

“Watching my father play (for four NBA teams) sparked interest in me being a professional basketball player and wanting to play in the NBA,” Catchings admitted. “We didn’t have the WNBA at that time. This is the generation that has grown up having an opportunity to be a part of something that is so much bigger than them, a league designed specifically for us. My goal was to be in the NBA, to follow in his footsteps. That really was the only thing I knew about. I didn’t even really understand the fact that women didn’t play. We had Annie Meyers and Lynette Woodard and the Harlem Globetrotters. I felt my dad did it, so I could do what my dad did.”

There are three- and four-sport athletes, and then there’s Ann Meyers, a seven-sport athlete in high school and the first female scholarship athlete at UCLA. Meyers actually did play in the NBA, albeit in preseason with the Indiana Pacers.

“I wouldn’t have done it if they were not serious,” Meyers says. “Yes, publicity was involved. But my whole intention in life was why was this any different? I like to think (I got close).”

Forget the glass ceiling; what needed to be shattered was the barrier to that glass backboard.

“We had actually commissioned a study some years earlier about what might be possible with respect to women’s basketball,” Stern said in an interview for the Retired Players’ Association. “I thought the time to do it would be in 1992 coming out of the Olympics, especially if the Americans won the gold. But they didn’t. They finished third and got bronze and it sort of went on the back burner.”

“Val Ackerman was working in our office and was a fiery advocate, as was Carol Blazejowski, and gradually (with Adam Silver) we began to develop a plan and we said, ‘OK, we could do this. We’ll do it coming out of the Olympics in ’96.”

Thanks to advocates like Ackerman and Blazejowski, the setback didn’t stop the birth of the new league.

“Val was totally intent on making it a dignified and authentic basketball experience,” Stern recalled. “The only thing I remember putting my foot down on was the ball. We agreed generally it would be smaller, but went back and forth on the color. I said if you never want to sell a WNBA ball, make it the same color as the NBA ball. We went with the oatmeal and orange, which has become a symbol of the league.”

Though the league is still not where it needs to be economically, there is no denying the quality of play is far better than anywhere in the world. It’s difficult to watch a WNBA game and then wonder why NBA players don’t consistently compete as intensely.

“Watching it is quite extraordinary,” says Stern, who still is active on several major U.S. boards and business ventures. “I remember when we started off and said this is the best women’s basketball in the world. But I would say the game is a factor of three times better.”

“We didn’t even know that some of these women existed because they were playing in countries you didn’t even know had basketball,” Stern added. “And so as it continues to grow, there will be increased revenues, salaries will be increased and from outside I would love to see these salaries and the revenue supporting a salary structure that allows WNBA players to play only for their team and not have to go to a foreign country to earn a maximum amount of money. But they only go there to earn that because they are WNBA players. They get their fame, reputation and celebrity from playing in the WNBA.”

WNBA players make about 20 percent of the NBA minimum salary in a league, of course, that generates substantially less revenue. Almost two thirds of WNBA players play during the winter outside the United States. It makes for a long year and creates heightened risk of injury. Seattle Storm star and league MVP Breanna Stewart suffered a torn achilles in Russia last April just before the start of the 2019 WNBA season. There are no one-and-dones as there is a four-year college rule for eligibility with a maximum salary slightly above $100,000 with some bonuses. WNBA players opted out of their collective bargaining agreement to negotiate additional economic terms after the 2019 season.

“The reality is people misconstrue this message,” she says. “It’s not about making the exact same amount of money NBA players make, or men make in general. We simply need to open people’s eyes to the fact we spend more than half of the year thousands of miles away and we don’t want to do that. We want to be able to play in our home country, in front of our friends, in front of our family and fans and be able to make a salary that will allow us to sustain an offseason. The reality for a lot of women is it would make sense to not play in the WNBA and just have the summer off and play overseas. But then we completely eliminate the idea of having a league here if all the best players aren’t playing in it. So we have to fight and give our all and our best to try to grow this league and stay committed to what Nancy Lieberman and Carol Blazejowski and all the players who came before us did and not let that die. They worked so hard for this thing to get going. We all love this game of basketball and we would be doing them, and honestly us, a disservice.”

Comparatively speaking, the WNBA is in its infancy. Twenty-two years into the NBA, boxing and track were still more popular and lucrative sports.

 “It’s not going anyplace. It’s a smaller league and an unusual season. But as the game improved we learned a few things and that it isn’t just about mom and daughter. It is about dad and daughter and dad and son and mom and son going to enjoy a good basketball game. I’m not going to say the WNBA would have had an easy time without the NBA support because that’s not so. So it is something about which I am very proud. I think we did the right thing and we made the choices we had to make. In retrospect some might not have been the best choices, but they were the best choices made with a purpose and desire to provide a place for women to go after they finished college to move onto the next level of a great sport.”

 “Now kids are going to NBA games and seeing female referees, female executives, and they will grow up thinking it was always that way, but it wasn’t,” says Stern. “We came from a more humble place. If you want to engage the world in a single conversation, sports is the way to catalyze that conversation.”

The WNBA has come a long way, and has a long way to go, but they’ve got game.

by Sarah Mellema

25 years ago. Vin Baker, the highly prized prospect out of Hartford, was picked eighth overall in the 1993 NBA Draft by the Milwaukee Bucks. Today, the league is celebrating the legacy of this great man, his incredible career and most importantly, his rise back to the Bucks after finding himself in a low place that many wouldn’t have expected him to bounce back from.

The 6-foot-11 power forward averaged 28.3 points per game at the University of Hartford, fourth in the country, and finished with 2,238 points, a school record that still stands. During his final year, Sports Illustrated named Baker “America’s Best-Kept Secret.”

In 1993, Baker was drafted to the Bucks, and he continued to dominate. He played in four All-Star games, earned an Olympic gold medal and nearly $100 million over the course of his NBA career. But he masked one dark secret: a dependency on drugs and alcohol that eventually cost him his basketball career, his fortune and almost his life.

At first, Baker never let the alcohol interfere with his game. That lasted until around 1996 when he recorded his best game ever as a pro after smoking marijuana before the game, and he quickly convinced himself that he played better under the influence.

He was soon traded to the Seattle SuperSonics where he averaged just under 20 points per game. Not bad considering that while playing for the Sonics, Baker was drinking before, after and sometimes during games. Eventually, he was almost always drunk or hungover during games. Baker was traded to Boston, then to the Knicks, the Rockets and the Clippers. His bank account hit zero, his properties foreclosed, and by 2006, Baker was out of the NBA.

“We all eventually have that moment of truth, when it physically leaves us,” says Baker. “The fans stop cheering. The game goes away. Then we have a moment of reality about what comes next. It eventually goes away for every player. For me, that moment came abruptly. It was ‘what’s next’ before I was ready to be finished.”

His substance abuse continued after retirement as he tried to forget what might have been. Baker’s first few attempts at sobriety centered on the hope of becoming an All-Star again. He’ll tell you now that those attempts failed because he still needed to humble himself. He needed to start over from the beginning and rediscover himself, not just in his career, but in every facet of life.

“Life dealt me a hand, and I had to reinvent myself with it,” Baker says. “I went to Seminary for a few years in New York, and I was able to find comfort in religion. It was interesting being back in school. I had to sit in class and really think about who I wanted to become.”

With a newfound humility, Baker was able to put his pride aside and make a phone call that would change the direction of his life once again. His former boss, Howard Schultz, who had owned the Sonics when Baker played in Seattle, not only took his call, but he helped Baker come up with a plan. Part of that plan was for Baker to serve coffee at another business Schultz managed: Starbucks.

“From school, to seminary, to Starbucks, I was slowly reinventing who I was,” Baker explains. “My identity from college and more than a decade after was all about the game of basketball. I was forced into a place where I had to think about my life as opposed to just basketball because it was taken away from me. At some point, we all will have that. Life will deal us something, big or small, where it’s not just about basketball, and the priorities in our lives will test us. The priority for me became life, and focusing on things that I needed to improve on as a human being.

What really got him through that time was humility. Baker didn’t have any real agenda other than working on himself. He went into the management training program at Starbucks, which not only forced him to show up to work dependably, but it also meant — just like with his job in basketball — that he put on a uniform.

He was forced into a life outside of basketball, and he’ll tell you now, it was the best thing that could have happened to him.

Humbling himself enough to serve coffee to his former teammates and fans was just the beginning for Baker. He also had to regain his financial freedom, and watch every dime he spent.

“Working at Starbucks, my paychecks looked very different than with the NBA,” Baker says. “The interesting part is, I didn’t really watch my paychecks with the Sonics, but as soon as I got a $900 check a week working full-time at Starbucks, I started paying attention. I was starting over in all aspects of life, and watching every dime I spent was part of that. A $100 million lesson was a hard one to learn. But the awesome part about it? It was a lesson!”

Baker’s path back to the Bucks didn’t just end there. The NBA didn’t just “let” him back in. Even as a former All-Star and Olympian, he had to work for it, which humbled him even more. That path for him included working for FOX Sports Wisconsin, volunteer coaching, then assistant coaching with the Texas Legends of the NBA G League.

“I had to get to a humble place and find myself, and once I experienced that humility, getting back around other players was the easy part,” reflects Baker.

While he was working for the G League, Baker started to notice a different style of basketball. The game had changed in just a handful of years, but his newfound humility helped him continue to move forward.

“I had to learn the game through a different lens,” Baker explains. “Not only was the game different from my playing days, but I also had to see basketball from the perspective of a coach. I had to work hard to get to where I knew I could be, and it wasn’t easy.”

This meant setting aside his pride day after day, in big ways and small. In coaches meetings, he pays close attention because a lot has changed, and he’s ready and willing to learn from the other coaches. If a player Googles his story, he sees it as a beacon of light.

“They know the struggle I’ve overcome,” Baker says. “They see that I was an All-Star, but they also find out what I’ve been through. It’s important for me to lead by example and be the best person I can be. If I see a player struggling, it’s my duty to help him through it and tell him exactly what he needs to do on or off the court. If I’ve overcome what I’ve overcome, someone else can certainly overcome his free-throw slump. We can consistently have hope in any aspect of life.”

Baker considers it a miracle that he’s back in the NBA. He’ll tell you now that when he was serving Grandes, Talls and Ventis, he was not expecting to ever make it back. He was there to make a living. And it made him appreciate every step.

“I’m better as a person now than I was when I played in the NBA,” Baker says. “Obviously I’m not the athlete, like the kids remind me every day, but I’m better as a person. I have tremendous opportunity here. It’s incredible. Being a coach happened as soon as I realized and accepted that basketball was over for me.”

Baker has shared his story across different platforms, including writing his own book titled, “God and Starbucks.” He now lives to inspire people who may have lost a bit of life along the way.

“Life is all about lessons,” Baker shares. “Some of them are about ethics, some are big, some are large. My big life lesson hurt. It was expensive, but I learned it. Now I want to share it with other players so they don’t go down the same path. The problem isn’t when people make mistakes — it’s when we make mistakes and we don’t share our lessons. Or when we see other people making mistakes, and we’re too embarrassed to reach out and help them.

“At first, I said ‘why me?’ Now I say, ‘why not me?’ It’s my story, and it’s my duty to share it.”

by Ben Ladner

For many young National Basketball Association (NBA) players, a rookie contract represents an immediate flow of cash into bank accounts that might once have been empty. The allure of a second contract, and a third, opens up a theoretical wellspring of disposable income to be spent, lent and flaunted. But if not managed properly, that wellspring can dry up — often faster than players could have ever anticipated.

Some, however, like Caron Butler, saw those contracts as investments from day one. While many of his peers blew money on cars and clubs, he took a longer view of his career and the rest of his life. Having come into the league with two young children and a family to consider, Butler mostly eschewed night life and frivolous spending in order to take care of more important matters. “My perspective on life was just so much different,” Butler said. “Whereas guys went out and did certain things, I wasn’t trying to spend that type of capital on having fun because I was already thinking about, ‘I’ve got two mouths to feed forever, and I have to make sure they attend college.’”

During his youth in Racine, Wisconsin, Butler experienced firsthand the consequences of hanging with the wrong crowd. He began selling drugs as a teenager, had the first of five kids at the age of 14 and was arrested more than a dozen times before being incarcerated at 16. “I embraced the wrong things,” Butler said [on the Ballers With Babies podcast] in 2018. “But I was what I was exposed to.”

To position himself for a more stable future, Butler surrounded himself with people who could help him make responsible financial decisions and plan for the future when he came into the league. “I just had really smart people around me,” Butler said. “People that just exposed me to the right things and the right people.”

That group included Butler’s agent and lawyer, Raymond Brothers, his financial adviser and his business partner. They helped him maximize his earning power in the NBA and protect his money throughout his career. As a player, Butler attended financial literacy classes offered by the NBA Players Association and took advantage of relationships with active and retired players alike. Today, he’s reaping the rewards. Butler has curated a wide range of investments, including stakes in Graduate Hotels and Juice Budz, which have a combined 18 locations. Additionally, he and fellow NBA players Anthony Tolliver and Steve Blake were among the first high-profile people to invest in the social media app Arbit, and Butler invested in DeltaHawk Engines, an aircraft engine manufacturer based in Racine, last year.

Butler also remains active in both his home community in Racine and the NBA fraternity. He, Grant Hill and Jerome Williams were recently named to the NBA Retired Players Association’s Board of Directors, where Butler helps empower current players and assists them in planning for their post-playing careers. As a recently-retired, former NBA All-Star who transitioned smoothly from the court to the media, Butler is a recognizable model for players on how to remain active after retiring and a resource for players like Bradley Beal, Eric Bledsoe and Spencer Dinwiddie, who have reached out to him for advice on managing careers and their wealth after retirement. “The NBA is an amazing platform to be on,” Butler said. “But at some point, everyone will be a retired player, or an ex-player. And you have to have some type of strategic plan about how you want to exit and go on to the next phase of your life, because you will say goodbye to the game at some point.”

In today’s age of heightened player agency and athlete-controlled media endeavors, many of the NBA’s brightest stars aren’t waiting to retire before entering the media field. Players have begun exerting more influence over their perception among fans, often via independent entities that give them complete autonomy over their message. LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, Kevin Durant and Steph Curry all have their own media companies, while an increasing number of players are speaking through The Players’ Tribune or Uninterrupted. “Guys are starting to try to control their content as much as possible and tell their own stories,” Butler said. “I think that’s the new wave.”

Butler has joined that wave, too, getting involved in a variety of platforms and mediums to share his perspective on topics inside and outside the realm of basketball. He has worked as a sideline reporter and studio host for Turner Sports for the last two years while regularly co-hosting a radio show and a podcast. Mark Wahlberg is soon to produce a movie based on Butler’s memoir, while Butler himself is heading up a documentary titled “The Green Dream” on racial inequality in the cannabis industry and justice system. He has taken full advantage of his platform and his voice, and like so many NBA players in 2019, he’s doing it from a perspective only he has. “I think it’s important that if you’re going to tell a story,” Butler said, “you should be able to tell your story the way you want to.”