June 26, 2025 • 59 mins
Today we’re honored to welcome back to our program Mr. Craig Hodges to get into the nitty gritty when it comes to pure sharp shooting. Not shooting. Sharpshooting! “What’s the difference?,” you ask. One gets the job done while the other puts fear into the hearts and minds of opponents and crowds. It’s the unrelenting surety that once the ball leaves the fingertips of said mercenary, the defense might as well cherry pick into transition offense. It’s a done deal. “Foundation, form, and follow through” are the pillars of the fraternity within the fraternity — as the perennial 3-point champ coaches.
This episode we break down the mechanics, mindsets, and everything in between that constitutes an ice cold assassin from the ‘90’s. Tap in to get some pointers on your jump shot. If you enjoyed this two-parter featuring the multiple world champion and political icon Craig Hodges, check out his book “Long Shot: The Triumphs and Struggles of an NBA Freedom Fighter
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
I don't know any team past or present that could
have beat our ninety one team. And I'm saying that
for the reason, and I'm saying it for this run.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Reason one.
Speaker 3 (00:09):
Nah, everybody talk about ninety one, how good that team.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Was, And the reason I say that, and the reason
I say that is that that's when Michael learned to win.
That's when we had we had a cadre of players
that and people. And so when I'm coaching the Lakers
shooting coach. Right, So Kobe was coming, Man, God, we'd
have got y'all. You know, He's like, well, who to
(00:32):
handle Shack? I was like Bill carry.
Speaker 3 (00:34):
Right, everybody was back again with legend Craig Hodges for
part two, the greatest sharpshooters of the nineteen nineties. So
you won your third Street three Point Contest championship, right right,
And there's this photo of you wearing an NBA jersey.
(00:57):
Can you tell us the backstory on this? Because I
always thought like you were a free agent during this time, right.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Brother, I was. I was no agent, Okay, I was.
It wasn't no chance of me being signed by nobody
in NBA, all right. But what happened was was a
groundswell of people who thought I should have got a
chance to defend my title, so get a chance to
win my fourth right. So one of my boys had
made me a cold jersey man. It was. It was unite.
(01:24):
It was black with my number on the hodges on
the back, and I was ready to roll with that.
But when I got there, they told me I couldn't
wear that. So when I get there and they get me,
I tell people, y'all dressed me up in an American flag,
put me out of it without asking me. Man, if
you if you see my face step, if you see
(01:45):
my face, I was so heated. I'm telling you it
was nowhere. It was no way I was gonna come anywhere.
And if you look at me shooting when I won,
it was, you know what I'm saying. I had a game.
I had my game leg under me. I'm practicing in
the high school gym when I'm going into that one
and I'm heated, I'm mad at the world. And then
(02:06):
when i go in the locker room and I'm putting
on I'm like, oh, now I'm sitting on the bench.
No one, I can't go out to the shoot. I
ain't never shot mad. I don't shoot mad, you know
what I'm saying. No, man, I was so mad. Man,
I was like, all right, y'all got me. I shouldn't
said I wasn't gonna even come, you know. But it
was cool, man, It was cool.
Speaker 2 (02:27):
I got.
Speaker 4 (02:27):
I got some questions for you about the three point
competition while we had them, because I know my household.
I mean, we can talk about all the greatest shooters
they ever do it off the dribble, off the move right,
three point Having that three point contest means something, especially
in my in my household. My dad shot in a
couple of times, never won. I've been in it, didn't win.
(02:49):
So when you're prepared for that, did you practice? You
practice off the racks?
Speaker 1 (02:53):
So did you just test? You know the biggest part
this and you're gonna you're gonna appreciate this, all right.
I lost the first three to Larry Bird. Okay, the
very first one, the very first rack I shot was
record okay. I made twenty five points the very first,
the very first round of contest ever. Okay. Then me
(03:17):
and Della, Me and Dale Ellis, we tied, so we
have to do a shootoff. I beat him in the shootoff.
Now I gotta come back and face Larry in the final.
Larry and I already told us in the locker room,
who coming in second? You know what I'm saying. So
we got to laughing or whatever. So he beat me
three and like I said, when I did finally win,
(03:39):
it was like this I shot probably Cliff Levenston. That
was my geek man, my height, man, come on after practice,
come on, you got it, I say, Cliff, I shoot threes, man,
I don't need to practice that shit like that. Okay,
the day before the day before Ira, I come off
my rack. But for me, it's being able to get
(03:59):
your rhythm right away to it. And once again it's
like when I finally won, I didn't take it as
a competition, all right. What I said was, you know what,
I don't have to guard Isaiah to night. All I
gotta do. All I gotta do is catch and shoot,
you feel me? So every time I took it, it
(04:19):
was like I was catching a pass and going into
my rhythm of it right. And for me it was
one of those things where I'm like, Okay, when Larry
beat me, I should have got him. So I felt
like I should have won about six or seven of
them in real time. But once again, it's getting to
that point where the night before the competition, it was like, oh,
(04:40):
I know I'm gonna win, you know what I'm saying,
But I gotta go shoot these bad boys. I gotta
go out there and shoot this thing. And you know,
one of the things that I'm teaching now in teaching
children and players to shoot, is it was one ball
that I shot in that competition. It was a it
was a moneyball on the last rack, and the ball
(05:01):
went through the hole and when it went through, it
was the same amount of space all the way around it.
And I was like, that's the perfect shot. So I
rewound it and I looked at my mechanics and what
I came up with three parts of my shot foundation,
form and follow through, and that when I go into
my hot, I'm in foundation in the middle. I'm informing
when I say follow through about it and try when
(05:23):
you get to the crib man, when you go into
that two foot jump stopping into your shot, if you
say foundation, form, follow through through each part of it.
When you say follow through, that bad boy coming through
the nets. You know what I'm saying. So it's just
being able, especially in that competition, and then the wild
party is. The night before I won my first one,
I said, you know what, if I don't miss, I
(05:44):
can't lose.
Speaker 3 (05:45):
You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
And then it becomes it becomes a thing where think
about it. If you take if you take the whole
minute and you made nineteen, yeah you're gonna be in
the competition.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
That's good enough.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
What your money and then not the way they got it,
where you got a whole rack of moneyballs, man, and
you can put what you want to come home.
Speaker 4 (06:07):
Man, that competition is different. Man, I've never been like
I practiced. I practiced the couple of times a week
leading that practice before, just trying to get your rhythm
and see now when the lights come on.
Speaker 1 (06:19):
And not even through that month, that money come right.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
Yeah, the point the point, it's not the same. I
mean that right exactly.
Speaker 1 (06:26):
And you should tell them if they want to make
an adjustment to make it a little bit better, go
back to when players both were on each end of
the court and y'all shooting against each other.
Speaker 3 (06:36):
I like that.
Speaker 4 (06:37):
That's what I like that. That's what I was going
to like. I'm out there so I did it. I
was the only one on the floor shoot.
Speaker 3 (06:44):
Man.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
Yeah, It's like I'm a basketball player. I'm always out.
Speaker 4 (06:47):
There with other player, other people, other stuff going on.
It's not aws like just the only show.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
This is another funny part. Okay. So yem Jay decides
that he's gonna shoot in the competition and I'm thinking
we in practice, and they come tell me, yeah, I'm
Jay gonna shooting the three. I was like, what you're
dunk or dude? You got your dunks, you got your
dunch and you scoring every time. Let me have my
little shine over here. Okay, So now they put me
(07:15):
and him against each other in the very first round.
This is the first time I ever wanted down in Miami.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
I didn't know.
Speaker 1 (07:21):
And so, you know, you hear the crowd and I'm shooting,
and I'm feeling like, damn, I'm shooting pretty good. But
I'm hearing the crowd go crazy, right, and I'm like, damn,
Jan must be down there heating it up. Right, horn
goes off.
Speaker 3 (07:34):
Bomb.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
I look up. I'm like, oh, they was cheering for me. Man.
I looked up. He had nine points, man, the Lord's
number ever scored. I said, yeah, boy, goes suit.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
Yes, I didn't even know MJ sh.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
They talked about it. It went viral. Men, it's one of
the one of the worst action.
Speaker 1 (07:52):
I'm telling you that it was. It was sad man,
and I'm like, dude, you know it's certain things. You know,
Like you said, you can think what you think, but
when that thing come up and it's your turn to
get up there, it's a whole different man. Shoot man me.
Speaker 4 (08:09):
And stuff talking like greatest shooter ever they say, gonna
call him. But one of the most happy moments of
his career is one of that first three point contests.
I'm telling you, yeah, it's the man. He knows you
know how hard it is to do. It's not game like.
Speaker 1 (08:21):
You know what I'm saying, and you're able to say
I'm the best shooter.
Speaker 2 (08:25):
On earth exactly. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (08:28):
And that's some real stuff, man, And when I you know,
to be able to do that, it's cool. Man. So yeah,
I'd rather go out there and shoot that thing and
know that you ain't got a sprint back on defense.
Speaker 3 (08:37):
Now, your resume speaks for yourself when it comes to
this three point shooting, and this part of them is
the show's where we talk about some of you know,
the best shooters of your era in the nineteen nineties, right,
and like you mentioned, awesome, but then you also won
and dominated. So how are you usually guarded in normal games?
(09:02):
Knowing that you was like, you know, you had a
reputation for an e lethal shooter.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
One of the things, you know. For me, it was
like I understood our system, all right. And the cool
part about Trago is this, we shoot the same shots
every single day. I know where I'm getting my shots,
and we don't have to make adjustments. So in the
playoffs and people making adjustments again, I'm still gonna get
(09:28):
my shots from the same place. I'm getting my shots
coming off the elbow, I'm getting my shots out the corner,
I'm getting my shots off the wing, I'm getting my
shots from the top of the circle. And it's gonna
develop to naturally to where I can actually practice these
shots before games and that kind of thing. So for me,
it was always working off the defense, all right. I
played with a three foot cushion around. If I wanted
(09:48):
somebody to get within that three foot cushion, I'm coming
off a pick. Other than that, I ain't gonna let
you get close to me, especially when we're talking about
hand checking. I learned my lesson earlier. I'm a down
court with Magic Johnson. I'm getting ready to go ninety
Miles Fou and Jed Bien Man. He put his hand
on my hip. Man. I whoa, Okay, this is another level.
I can't let these brothers get nowhere close to me
(10:09):
when I'm handling this field. I got to keep that
cushion around me. That text, tob you play with that
three foot cushion around you.
Speaker 2 (10:15):
Man.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
Can't nobody block your shot because by the time you
go into it and they react to it, your ball
is already gone. So teams like Isaiah they knew Joe
couldn't handle MJ by himself, so I was always gonna
be one player removed from hm J. So you're gonna
have to go help in Isaiah saying, Man, Joe, you
calling for help. You know I can't leave Hodge Hey,
(10:37):
as soon as you turn your head, I'm gonna be gone,
and he gonna know where I'm gonna be. You know
what I'm saying. Because we didn't did this, so for me,
it was it was cool to be able to know
where I'm getting my shots from. So when teams will
play me a certain kind of way, and that's the
beauty of the triangle. It's a counter punch is a
counter punch offense. So if you're playing me top side,
(10:58):
I got my cut baseline and the way, who my
teammate when he sees you playing that side, you know
where my route is gonna be. So it's that type
of situation to where it takes a lot of the
Oh man, I got to come off the screen and
roll are they gonna double? And that's the dumb part
with me. When I'm watching this job today, I'm like,
and there ain't no dish to the players. It's a
(11:19):
dish to the system, all right, And that nobody is
creative to me when I watch when I watch five
games in a row, I'm watching five teams run the
same shit. Okay, So I'm wondering why I ain't nobody
blowing every picking roll that come off that side. You're
not getting back to no middle? Why am I letting
you get back to the middle. I'm no. You dribble
(11:39):
over there, you stand your ass over there, and whatever
happened over there, we're gonna deal with but y'all ain't
gonna get back to the middle and do all.
Speaker 4 (11:47):
We talk about bag work and having a bag this, that,
but you're using offense to your advantage. You got, you
got your skills, you got your footwork that you work on.
But you're making it easy on yourself. But I like
you said, to work hard with the ball.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
That's it and the garners for everybody to touch. You know,
you got MJ.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Man.
Speaker 1 (12:08):
When we had Doug Collins, it would be Doug was
like this, you know this against him. It was like
if you came down, say you came off a pick
and hit the jumper, that same player is gonna be
run for you the next two trips regardless. Okay, so
people wonder how did m J get on them runs?
All they had to do would be one for two.
(12:28):
He's gonna get two more, get another one of that,
he got two more, come killer. So we you feel me,
We love that. Man. You get on the run with Doug,
you gonna get on the run.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
That's the old school coach mentality, you know. Doc Rivers
was like.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
That, like, man, you stop it, and if you don't
stop it, we're gonna keep coming with it. And that
was Doug's mentality. But if somebody get on the road,
it's gonna be two or three people standing over here.
They ain't touched. They're gonna be mad. But when we
put in triangle, horse got touched, help got batter, you
know what I'm saying. Carwright got touches, and we became
(13:03):
a better basketball team as opposed to uh, you know,
and they still called us Michael and the Jordanaires.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
It might have been Nike, definitely some advertising them force,
no question about it. Shot against a lot of people.
(13:33):
You've watched a lot of people play, some of your peers.
You competed against them in a three point contest. And
on this show we talk about the goats, right, it's
not one goat. It's the greatest of their era. And
you even to get a seat at the table, you
have to have this criteria right. And when we're talking
about criteria and who really shoots the ball like you guys,
both of you guys have competed in a three point
(13:55):
shootout and you say it's a different pressure. That's one thing.
Then both of you guys have uh, the honor of
being leading the league. And you know percentage, So that's
another notch that gets y'all in the conversation, right, I'm
going to name some players and you know, you're you're
(14:15):
the you're you're the one of one of the one
of the go to this of this decade. We want
to know how good of a shooter or was it
just a good narrative? You know what I mean? And
that's not even like a disrespect but it's a it's
a respectful competitiveness. But I want to start with Reggie Miller.
How good of a three point shooter was Reggie Miller?
Is he more of a mid range or he had
(14:37):
longevity to get to the number, or do you think
that he was close at that at that point in
time when you played enough to be in that consideration.
Speaker 1 (14:47):
Of the nineties, doctor, you know when you some players
when they went behind the three point line? Oh man,
you know, Oh Reggie was one of them. You know
what I'm saying that when Reggie lined up for three,
you thought it was going in. And I think that
as a shooter and as a coach coach shooters, is
that you want you want to be able to shoot
(15:08):
the ball straight. And Reggie shot the ball straight, regardless
of how funky his release might look you know what
I'm saying, hands crossed, you know, hands crossed in front
of him, all that stuff. But hey, he was he
was consistent and it was it was always a threat.
And I think that's you know, one of the main
things is as a shooter, are you carrying a threat?
And is that threat credible? Are you just you know,
(15:31):
when I watched the game sometimes I watched the game
during the regular season, it was like five trips and
it was all threes, and I was like, man, did
none of them looked like it was confident. None of
them looked like they knew it was going in. So,
you know, Reggie was definitely one who you and in
that game in New York showed you when he ran
ran behind the three point line to let this thing
go and knew it was going in.
Speaker 4 (15:51):
Yes, another area of criteria or whatever you can gauge
the shooter off of his variety.
Speaker 2 (15:58):
He shot it going left, going right, an.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
We got to the rack, you know, and you know,
like for me, I look at it is. You know,
like with me once, I played point guard my first
probably four almost five years in the league, and when
I got to don Nelson, he went to point forward
with Paul Pressey. So now it was about me spacing
the court or whatever. Now I went into that specialist
mode of spacing the courd and but I didn't really
(16:25):
handle like I used to or whatever get the chance to.
So it's one of those things where I have, you know,
somewhat of a change. And as far as you have
scores and you have shooters, and you have shooters who
are scorers, and Reggie was a scorer that was who
happened to be a hell of a shooter too. You know,
you have some scores who can't shoot. All they can
do is get to the rack, you know, get to
(16:46):
that mid range and once they stepped behind three, you
can damn the back off of it. But once they
get inside that thing, you better tighten up them screws,
you know. But Reggie could do it off the dribble.
Reggie was a score who could shoot up.
Speaker 3 (17:00):
Now, prior to you know him joining the Bulls, we
mentioned him earlier as a head coach Steve Kirk Cleveland Cavaliers.
How good of a three point shooter was he?
Speaker 1 (17:08):
Steve was cold man, Steve. You know, Steve and I were.
Steve was a rookie with me when I was in Phoenix,
so I got a chance to Steve. See Steve as
a rookie, and you know, he was one of those
players that knew, you know, seth tell you know where
you could shoot, you know, and Steve was one of those.
He had a quiet confidence and he didn't boast about it,
(17:29):
but he would knock down shots and he did it.
He did it consistently and it wasn't any flair about it.
And that's that's another thing I love about, you know,
certain the times that we played that you know, you
had guys who were consistent shooters and it was what
we did and there wasn't any you know, drama about
you know what I'm saying and doing. It was it
(17:50):
was about score and play D. Score and play D
score and play D and that you don't you don't.
We didn't have time to. We didn't have time for.
Speaker 3 (17:58):
That next person you all so competed against. You had to,
you know, go around for a round before you met
Larry bird Dale, Ellis.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
Dal And and dell Is like, uh, he reminds you
of Eric Dickerson how he ran the ball. They will
played the game straight up. So it was one of
those you know, he had, he had that, he had
a heater, but he was so you know, he's six seven,
so he had that. He had a certain ranginess about
him to where he could get his shot off or
(18:28):
off over most people, you know, and if anybody came
that was taller than him, he had enough where he
could give you a jab your head faking and rain
back and let it ride.
Speaker 3 (18:37):
You know.
Speaker 1 (18:37):
He was. Yeah, Dale was, they'll shoot that thing, man.
And there's certain you know, like I said, it's over
years a time, you know. And I think that's another measure,
is that did you do this year after year after
year after year after year and became where people like,
damn he behind the three point line and we ain't
get nobody out to to him.
Speaker 3 (18:56):
Before I continue, I want to talk about when was
how far along in your career before the three point
line was implemented into the league? Was it there yet?
Speaker 1 (19:07):
Well?
Speaker 2 (19:08):
He came in when they had three.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
I can't. I came in the league and they had
they had a three. Okay, okay, I didn't have a
three in college.
Speaker 2 (19:15):
I said. Thing my dad was talking about.
Speaker 3 (19:17):
He said, they experimented with the with the college three.
He said, he played one game and he was like, Oh,
I already shoot long quote unquote twos.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
I could do this thing.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
Yeah, And that's the and that's the beautiful part for
us growing up in that era, that you know, when
they put the line in front of you, you were
shooting from behind that anyway, you know, I have the
game that I got drafted on. We played uh San
Diego State and it was myself and the brothers Zach
John Zach Jones from San Diego State. They San Diego
(19:48):
Clippers were coming to see him and we played in
that afternoon text winner being text he was like, Craig,
let me see if you could shoot these threes. And
I was. They had the three point line the arena,
so I was just standing out there shooting it. And
that night I was thirteen for thirteen. Ball didn't touch
the floor, you know what I'm saying, And I was
just catching and ranging and like that. That would probably
(20:10):
been a shit thirty three point thirty nine point night
or something like that because they were all twenty five
twenty six feet.
Speaker 2 (20:16):
So you sound like my pots right there.
Speaker 4 (20:17):
If if we had a three for all my whole
college career, woul nobody catch me at Virginia Tech.
Speaker 1 (20:22):
That's what it would have been. Big fun, big fun,
big fun man. You know. But and like I and
I look at, you know, the different phases of the
terms of the game. We played in high school basketball.
We played on the fan backboard. We didn't play on schall.
Speaker 5 (20:35):
Oh yeah, man, So shooting and shooting and runner off
of shooting and runner off that glass was, man, man,
you better.
Speaker 1 (20:45):
And that's the cool part that when I got to
college and we got the big backboard, I'm throwing that
thing up, spinning it off off the top.
Speaker 3 (20:53):
You know.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
It was big fun, man, big fun.
Speaker 3 (20:55):
Another player on here rock Mitch Richmond's.
Speaker 1 (20:58):
Oh yes, oh yes, Mitch. And see that. When you
look at Mitch, Tim and Chris, it was it was
almost like who do you are? You know what I'm saying.
And they all had they all had taps, and they
all had heaters. You know. I think Mitch was to me,
Mitch was more of almost like Alexander that's playing in
(21:23):
these series now, mid range, yeah, that mid range cold
that but you know, and he could step behind the
three when I needed three exactly. So Mitch, Mitch was like,
I can go back there and I can shoot with
the best of y'all. But this is what I can do.
I want to do more of this too. You know
what I'm saying. Where some of us will settled, he
wasn't settled. He wasn't settled.
Speaker 3 (21:45):
Dennis Scott, Yes, yeah.
Speaker 1 (21:48):
Yeah, three and never saw a shot he didn't like,
and from any distance. And that's you know, I love
that that he was. He was quick with his trigger.
And when you see somebody that's quick on the trigger,
that's confidence, you know, that's kind of confidence that they've
done it so many times that this is nothing new,
and willing to live and die with the consequence that
I tell you the young shooters that I work with
now is that we as shooters, we understand the reality
(22:12):
of correction. That should my ball and not come through
the bottom of the net? Why you feel me? And
I'm cleaning it up on the very next one. I
ain't got time to oh man, because when I'm knocking
down jumpers, I'm not So why should why should anything
change in my demeanor? On my mindset, It's about if
I do if I do these fundamentals correctly, that's gonna
(22:35):
be ninety nine percent of the time.
Speaker 2 (22:37):
So I was ready.
Speaker 4 (22:37):
Don't miss two the same way. No, that's what you're
saying right there. If you miss one, make the adjustment.
If you make that, just you miss again, it better
be that you overcorrect it.
Speaker 1 (22:47):
There you go, There you go. And my thing is
if your ball hit the rim, the next one better
be on net.
Speaker 3 (22:52):
Okay, this next player willkiel yes.
Speaker 1 (22:58):
And you know certain players, man, that I had fun
playing against. The Mookie was one of them cats because
MOOKI was always sneaky too. You know what I'm saying
that he gon that Mookie made make a layup and
sprint like and you see him like in this mode
and you turn around, he right there. So and it
was one of the things where Mookie could come down
(23:18):
and you swear getting ready to run offense, and he
launching the three and they own and you're like, man,
he got you. He got your on skates. Now you
can't you can't gauge if he's gonna drive because he
had enough tricky stuff off the dribble to get there
whenever he wanted to. And at the same time, he's
gonna knock down jumpers especially, And that's one of the
things that I look at that generation of player, whether
(23:41):
they were big or small, everybody became better shooters over time.
You know what I'm saying, MOOKI didn't come in the
league as a three point shooter, but Mookie became a
very credible and consistent three point shooter over time. To
let you know how much work he put into.
Speaker 3 (23:56):
It, Yeah, he had a thousand plus made. Was kind
of showing to me. It was like, you know what
I mean, because I know him from the video game.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
I watched a couple with a j like that. Yeah,
you're right, Yeah, that's what we're doing.
Speaker 1 (24:09):
And not only that, you think about it, the body
of his work, Man, Mookie got in a lot of
good minutes, man, some quality quality time where he was playing,
you know, thirty five forty minutes a game at summer und.
Speaker 3 (24:21):
All right, this one's personal to dot Man. Tell us
about Dale Curry from.
Speaker 1 (24:25):
Your perspective, man, you know Dale, Dale's release is so cold,
you know what I'm saying That he didn't have to
bend down, so you couldn't gauge it. You couldn't gauge
it off his footwork or his balanced condition.
Speaker 2 (24:38):
It would come and it would be barely jumped tip toes.
Speaker 1 (24:42):
You know it'd be like it'd be gone before you
know it, you know what I'm saying. So for me,
and whenever I played against Dell, I wasn't never more
than two feet away from him if I was guarding,
you know what I'm saying. And I never turned my
head because sooner it's it's over and gone. Oh man.
(25:04):
And like and I think about that when I reguard
Mo Muggsy, I would I would uh, he would laugh
at me because as he's coming down, I would get
in my squat like I was sitting on a on
a on one of the adventures in the locker room
or something, and you come down and just start laughing.
I stand back up. But that's one thing, man. We
had some great, great fun competition Dyl and I. We
(25:26):
always and it was cool back then because we all
really respected one another, because we understood this. We all
worked to get there. It wasn't really maybe Isaiah magic.
It was only a couple of one and Dones man.
You know, everybody had put they put they work in
in college, became respectful of what your work ethic was
(25:47):
to get through to this point and to know that hey,
now that we hear let's just see where this thing falls.
I ain't got a dish you, I ain't gotta You know,
Larry talks and Smack, but when Larry talked to Smack,
he backed it up. But he also understood the reality that, hey,
these these brothers ain't no different to me. You know
what I'm saying. We all we all here, we all capable. Now,
(26:08):
that was just his way of buildings confidence. But for me,
it was one of those things where I wanted to,
you know, see where my skills met up with everybody else's. Man.
So you know, Dale and the rest of us, man,
we we just went out there and played as hard
as we can. And one of the things that you know,
even though the game was physical, it wasn't dirty. Man.
(26:28):
It was like you had the bad Boys, but that
was just a group of thugs at that point in
time and the way they played. But everybody else it
was like, man, you gonna in the playoffs. Even I'm
gonna follow you, but I'm gonna hold you up. You
know what I'm saying. Where some of it now is
that you know, it's it's a lot of it's a
lot of tension in the game, man, You know, a
(26:50):
lot of a lot of personality influence that's coming from
outside the game. And it's cool because it's generational and
it's cyclical and it is is what it is. But
I like the generation before me with Doctor j and
you know, Darryl Dawkins, them doing their thing and being
able to come into that and coming in and see.
(27:11):
One of the things too, is that we're now I
don't know how much influenced veterans have over younger players.
Speaker 4 (27:16):
It's coming back slowly, but it kind of they trying to.
They try to get rid of it for a while,
just it went too young.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
Yeah, I'm like, you know, you have a team, but
what's the You know, when I came to the league,
you had at least three or four guys on the
team that were nine year vets, you know what I'm saying,
And that you came to their team, you know, And
I got the people tell me, yeah, he played with
Michael Jordan. I said, no, Michael played with me because
I'm the oldest.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
So that's how that thing rolled that you can't I
played with you because you was here when I got it.
Speaker 4 (27:46):
And even the young dude like you had to beat
if you wanted to make the roster. You had to
beat the vet out and like you got to beat
them on now, like it's kind of guys get drafted.
You gotta like I was saying earlier, they got to
prove the young guys got to I'm not good enough
instead of I'm better than the guy who's been there.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
They trying to replace you.
Speaker 1 (28:06):
I was talking to uh to NASA's because he was
at that D League. When when when I was in
New York with you guy, it was I was like, man,
how do you get in the lineup. He's like, we
don't practice. I was like, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait,
what you mean you don't practice. I'm like, y'all don't scrimmage.
So there's no time for me to show that. And
(28:29):
this is what he told me. He said, he said,
somebody has to have a run of three or four
or five bad games before somebody get a chance. And
I'm like, it used to be it used to be
somebody struggling. I'm getting apped his ass in practice. I'm
getting apped his ass in practice. I'm getting ready to
(28:51):
get some of these minutes. I'm like what, So basically,
the rosters said this is gonna be the line up
and this is gonna be And then it makes sense
when you see guys now, when they tell me that,
I see why guys sit over there and it looked
like shit, you might as well bring them a box
of popcorn to pizza because they ain't never coming in
(29:11):
the game no.
Speaker 2 (29:12):
Matter what I do, Man, I can't earn the spot.
Speaker 4 (29:16):
It's like it's no more of that, like he always
this guy's been playing well in practice.
Speaker 2 (29:20):
I'm gonna give him a shot, right.
Speaker 3 (29:22):
That's how fans look at it. They think that's how
it's supposed to go, not knowing how the pure the
how the businesses ran down way differently.
Speaker 1 (29:32):
And then then I look at that. I look at
that that. Okay, I get to I get thirty days
of too days might be too much. But that year
that I had thirty days of too days, I played
one hundred and ten games, you know what I'm saying,
and that I played straight through, so conditioning on some level.
(29:52):
But also I think a lot of the wear and
tear for your generation is a lot of that shit
that happened in the AU.
Speaker 2 (29:58):
I agree, I agree that a lot.
Speaker 1 (30:01):
And I tell young folks now, I'm like, okay, scrimmage
game and game. You only got so many games in
your body where there's a referee and popcorn. You want
to make sure, you want to make sure you want
those to be at the ladder end from twenty two
(30:22):
thirty five as opposed to Oh I didn't played sixty
five games in the summer.
Speaker 2 (30:27):
What more than that?
Speaker 1 (30:29):
Now, brother, I'm telling you what my sons was coming through.
I told him, man, look y'all got twenty five AAU games,
and you got your thirty games with your high school
or twenty five with your high school. But it ain't
gonna be. We're gonna work on some skills.
Speaker 4 (30:46):
Man, We're gonna work on tell me my popform exact
same way. And I'm gonna try to be like that
my kids when they get older. But like he pulled
both of he pulled us out of AAU for a
year or two, liked.
Speaker 2 (30:58):
Him out again. I was hot. I was trying to play,
trying to compete.
Speaker 4 (31:00):
Like you see all my friends and the god on
compete to get playing games and getting ranked, and they're
saying they're better than me. We're we're skipping tournaments, we're
in the gym, working on skills, getting reps up. And
it like you're saying, that's the long term vision that
we didn't see and it paid off that line.
Speaker 1 (31:19):
That's it because when you stop and look at the
fundamentals of the people around you, that was going to
them things and doing all that I tell them. I said,
you know, when you're in a game, you're making the
play to win, you know what I'm saying. So if
you're on the left side of the court and you're
strong with your right hand, you're gonna try to finish
that with your right hand instead of your left. Let's
be honest, So let us work on those things so
(31:41):
that now when the game develops and I get bigger,
I can I can make those plays. Man. So that's
one of my my pet peeves is what's happening with
au and just the whole you know, the money grab
of it all.
Speaker 3 (31:53):
Oh man, it's a different business.
Speaker 2 (31:56):
Now, that's another part.
Speaker 3 (31:56):
That's a whole nother five. Man, you talk about that.
Speaker 1 (31:59):
I was laughing. I was I was coaching with the Lakers.
I was shooting coaching for the Lakers, and I'm talking
to Trevor and he was telling me about their team
that they had in the him. I think Russell Hard Ye.
Speaker 3 (32:15):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, they year younger than me, but trailed
my year. But I'm from Component by the way. From context,
so you mentioned putting in work at Elbe State, Like
I was being recruited by Olbie State at one point
in time, and your name always used to come up right.
I was a Bulls fan since I was like seven
years old. So yeah, my sign graduated from so I was, yeah,
(32:38):
he's all time. Yeah, no, I'm familiar. I'm familiar because
like anytime i'm you know, I'm in Indiana now, so
I always try to rap any any university that's back
at the crib when they when they make the noise.
But they always said Craig Hodges and I was like, wait,
how I end up at Lob State. But now as
i'm you know, we've been having a conversation and doing
(32:59):
some more research, you end out there with text winners,
you know what I mean?
Speaker 1 (33:02):
Like that, you know, because he was recruiting for Northwestern
when I was in high school and then my senior
year he got the job in.
Speaker 3 (33:08):
Market Now that makes a lot of sense, man, But yeah, no,
you you definitely everybody used to always say, man, we
gotta shoot, like Craig Hodges man and all the confident
like like that. As I said, you made an impact
man all the way man, because.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
It was man we had. We had some good brothers man.
I got that was fun time, man. And it was
during that period of time when snooping and was coming
on capitals and raffers just getting started. Man, it's crazy.
Speaker 3 (33:30):
Absolutely. We got one more player on this list, Glenn Rice.
How good of a shooter was Glenn Rice?
Speaker 1 (33:36):
Glenn was? You know, you have certain shooters that are
quietly confident and you you don't see them, you but
when they come off that pick when they raised Glenn
Glenn's jumped for was pure man. You know what I
mean where it was. It was a pretty excite to
see you except when you was gardening even running at
that thing. But you know he was, uh, he was
(33:56):
consistent with it too, man. And he and I had
that He had that contact with me and Steve Fisher,
so we both had fish like.
Speaker 4 (34:03):
He really used his size too, like he ain't run.
He never rushed this shot then after see and you.
Speaker 1 (34:09):
Think about it him playing him playing that two quasi
three row. A lot of times he had guys my
size on him. Sixty three, no more than sixty four.
And it was like he had turn and be over
the top of your head and there wasn't nothing you
could do about it, you know what I'm saying. And
he gonna go to the line and shooting ninety percent.
So that's you know, tough covering.
Speaker 4 (34:27):
Of the elements of shooting. You shoot free throws, free throws.
I'm a good shooter it.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
Man.
Speaker 3 (34:34):
It used to be, uh you know, if he was,
especially if he was a point guard. Man, you couldn't
shoot under it like eighty five percent, you know what
I'm saying. I know it's changed now.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
And working with young folks, I tell him, I said,
when you are size, when you're going into a training
camp mode or camp mode or being seen, we got
to be ninety five percent of open shots made when
we go to the line. And now and now we're
breaking down like that. When I was a rookie, we
were doing the single double turnouts, right and I'm coming off,
(35:05):
I'm shooting out of a two foot jump stop. Everybody
else is shooting out of one coun stride stap stop, stop, stop,
And they couldn't understand why I was shooting it so quick.
And I'm like, I don't know why y'all want to
shoot it. That's slow. Because when I put this foot
down and it's become bluf pivot foot, if somebody steps
into me, I'm tripped. So I'm coming out and I'm
catching a two foot jump stop. So whatever where the
(35:26):
defense comes, I got an option. And if you ain't here,
I'm gonna let this thing right. So it's one of
those things that you know the fundamentals and being able
to garner it and put it into your own contexts
and then meld it into the system that you got.
It's cold, man. And I think that's the beauty of
our ninety one team that I tell people to me,
(35:47):
I don't know any team pasted or present that could
have beat our ninety one team. And I'm saying that
for the reason and I'm saying it for this run
reason one.
Speaker 3 (35:56):
Nah, everybody talk about ninety one, how good that team.
Speaker 1 (35:59):
Was when I say that, and the reason I say
that is that that's when Michael learned to win. That's
when we had we had a cadre of players that
and people. And so when I'm coaching the Lakers, shooting
coach right, So Kobe was coming, man, we'd have got y'all.
Like you know, He's like, well, who to handle Shack?
(36:21):
I was like Bill Carr, right, you feel me? And
I stand on that today. I don't care how big
Shack could have got. Bill wasn't scared. Okay, So a
lot of people we had a little heartlely damage when
they had to mess with Shaq. We had a we
had a player for every position. Man. So if like
(36:41):
like before we won our championship, Scotty told us this,
He's like, check this out, y'all. Y, I ain't gonna
get nothing from me from the offensive end, but guarantee
you Magic will not get one straight line drive. And
go back and watch that series. He had Magic spinning
like a time, couldn't get into the offense. And that's
and and that's the thing is that when you have
(37:02):
what you have. So I said, I give Bill Russell,
I love you. But I think we were to beat y'all.
I love Stephanum team that was seventy two or whatever
they won. I think we had we had something for it.
And it's and not and it ain't being boastful, but
it's being practical from a standpoint that if you wasn't
up on us by twelve points in the last two
(37:24):
innutes of the game, you weren't gonna beat us because
MJ gonna get at least five buckets and then Scotty
gonna bea fout for that. So it's getting ready to
be y'all better. You better come with some real stuff, man.
But I think we had a we had an.
Speaker 2 (37:39):
Option player, like they talked about that.
Speaker 4 (37:40):
You talk about all the elements to MJ and y'all
winning championships like you see all the positive day, who's
the goat, who's this? It's all individual based skill, but
like you can't win. He wanted to go best to
ever do it, obviously of his era, but he ain't
win until he had all the pieces in place.
Speaker 1 (38:01):
And being able to commit to passing the ball. Yeah,
and that's the part. That's the part of the cis
trying all comes back to trinle ball movement, player movement
in space. We don't break none of them principals, and
you know, and the cole part is to have somebody
like text Winner at that time in MJ's life, who
(38:22):
was one of Dean Smith's best friends. Okay, so MJ
would get out of hand and Texas, Yo, hey, you
wouldn't do that if Dean was in the gym, and
he'd go right back in the mode. And I tell
people that one of the biggest parts of Phil Jackson's
championships was his coaching staff. His staff, every staff he's
(38:44):
had had over one hundred years of experience. Man text
Winner thirty five years, Johnny Box thirty years, Jim Clemens
twenty five years, Frank Hamblin thirty years. What player on
the team is going to back talk any of them?
Speaker 2 (38:58):
Nobody, that's real body, that's knowledge, nobody.
Speaker 1 (39:01):
So so Phil, I tell people field and talk them
to games' great.
Speaker 2 (39:08):
You watched me barely talk in games, and when you watched.
Speaker 1 (39:11):
He didn't say nothing in practice. In practice he text
at the offense, Johnny Boka at the defense. Bil was
sitting over there with his legs crossed. All right. Now
when he may want some subtle adjustments, he'll stand up,
Oh okay, and go sit his ass back down. You know.
But that whole zen Master, it's part of the capitalist
thing that.
Speaker 3 (39:32):
One man market get handle his own.
Speaker 1 (39:35):
Come on, man, come on.
Speaker 3 (39:37):
When we come back from our break, we're gonna give
our goat top five greatest shooters of the nineteen nineties.
(39:58):
All right, Dot, you know it's time to give your goat.
Top five are the greatest shooters of nineteen nineties.
Speaker 2 (40:04):
Let's hear it, all right? My number five I got.
I got Reggie number five.
Speaker 4 (40:09):
We talked about him in that scoring round, but like
you said, when he got behind that line, he could
shoot it all different ways off the dribble. So Reggie
number five, I got number four. I got dal ellis he.
I mean, I don't need to explain that anymore. Then
Craig Craig Guardy did number three. I got my pops
number three. I know he ain't gonna like it, but
(40:30):
I'm number three. He got a number three.
Speaker 2 (40:33):
He ain't doing it. He got the.
Speaker 4 (40:35):
Numbers, the percentages, played sixteen years. And that's another thing
you're talking about, your story and how the excuses you
gave for not teams gave you for not signing you
or not not continue to be in the league.
Speaker 2 (40:48):
I was a taller.
Speaker 4 (40:49):
If you could shoot the ball, you can play for
as long as you want, right, So that so my
dad always told me he played sixteen years. I mean,
you should have been in that realm too. Number two,
I mean two to one A, one B. I got
Craig Hodges and then number one Steve Kerk. You got
them doing it in the playoffs, shooting the heck out
(41:09):
of the ball on at a high level at the
biggest stage. I mean a lot of people can do
it in the regular season or I mean on lesser
teams or whatnot. But when you got that pressure playing
beside MJ when he swing you that ball, you gotta
knock it down. It's a different level. It's a different level.
So that's one A.
Speaker 1 (41:28):
And not only that, the pressure of that moment.
Speaker 2 (41:31):
Yeah, the moment.
Speaker 1 (41:33):
People talking about pressure and checked this out. And before
we go into the the other night, that first game
in Indiana, I felt like Shay Alexander got caught up
in the moment. It was like thirty seconds or something
and he had the ball and Williams came around the
screen at the top and it was like five seconds
(41:54):
left on the shot clock, and he threw it over
there to him. You could see we're it almost surprisedly yep. Man,
I was like, oh man, crazy. But anyway, for me,
I'm gonna go number five, Reggie, number four, Steve number three,
(42:21):
Dye Ellis mm hmm, one A and one be me
and Bertie Oh that man.
Speaker 2 (42:30):
Yeah, Larry Bird got to be in my top five.
I left him out. I left him.
Speaker 1 (42:35):
Bertie, man. And the crazy part with that is I
just respect him because you know, had a chance to
deal with him, you know what I mean. Man, And
he got me. He got me, he got me, and
I had to Hey, brother, you got me, you got me.
But when I got him in Miami, I knew he
was done. I'm like, you ain't gonna be back. You
(42:56):
ain't coming back after that one, brother, I know you not.
So I'm gonna give you a good doubt. You didn't
have your run. Now it's my turn, you know. But yeah, man,
it was and I think the biggest part, and you
know else we got to include in that and just
flat out just shooting.
Speaker 2 (43:10):
The move yeah yeah yeah, and.
Speaker 1 (43:13):
Just shooting, yeah man, and just shooting. And that's one thing,
you know, if if the game was played without a line,
you know what I'm saying, and you like, for instance,
Freddie Brown, Downtown Freddie Brown, guys like that that I
grew up that I just he saitting over there with
his toil around his neck, chilling, yo, Freddie, we need you?
How many y'all need? He would come to the he
(43:35):
would come down the bench and I'm standing on the
sideline as a rookie, and he walking down the sideline
and he asked Lenny Wilkins, how many do you need?
And he's like, we need you A three? All right?
I got you, and and sure enough they thought everything
and he knew it was going in. And that's the
part where I love the era that I played in
because you had some characters man world be free, you
(43:58):
know what I'm saying, and guys like that that were man.
When you had to guard him, it was like an experience,
you know what I'm saying, because they didn't know what
they were gonna do, so you couldn't have tried to
figure it out because but when they got it, they
knew they was gonna figure it out how to score.
Girvin was the best of I got a Girvin as
a rookie man, and he got his back to the
(44:20):
basket and he looks at me and say, you're ready, rook,
And you're ready, rook, and he takes a runner and
just spends it off the glass. And I didn't even
see him. Look at the basket man on the rail
and he took off front of down court and the
fans are going crazy. And then he looks at me.
Did he go in like, come on, bro, you know
what we're in. Then we get on the other end,
(44:41):
he tell me, hurry up, man, hurry yup, man, I
ain't gonna guard you. Hurry up and shoot it. I
want to get down here and score. I'm like, wow,
you playing. He playing against me all night and he
ain't gonna guard me. And I'm telling my guy, man
passed me the ball. Man, I'm gonna be wide open
every time. You know. Yeah, man, it was a great
area to playing.
Speaker 2 (44:58):
Man, you got your far all right man?
Speaker 3 (45:01):
For five A, I got Deal Curry for five B.
I got Mookie Blaylock.
Speaker 2 (45:06):
So you went six.
Speaker 3 (45:07):
Okay, for four, I got Steve Kerr at three, I
got dal Ellis, at two, I got Craig Hodges and
at one Larry Bird.
Speaker 2 (45:21):
Yeah, I messed up.
Speaker 1 (45:23):
And see like with Larry, Like with Larry, we almost
got to get Larry that because he did what he
did in the start of the competition. You know what
I'm saying, And that carried some weight, and that was
the part where it would be like all I would
hear the first three years like a jump shooter would
never win it. A jump shooter would never win it.
A jump shooter would never win it. Larry got ranged,
(45:44):
Harry got leverage. I'm like, man, I know I can shoot,
however many balls. It takes so many winners things because
I just shot this many balls and I ain't got
tired during the summertime, So why can't I do it now?
You know what's the same thing is it's being there
to make sure you're ready. But like st have to
tell you that night, when you got to go out
there and do it, gotta be rapped kind to tight.
Speaker 2 (46:08):
It's different. It's hard to explain nless you on that stage.
Speaker 1 (46:12):
And you know the coldest part two is when you
don't win it, and that the.
Speaker 2 (46:17):
Hurtest it goes. It go by so quick too.
Speaker 1 (46:21):
So when I love man, when I lost it was
like man, it felt like, oh man, I can't shoot man.
I know I can shoot me.
Speaker 4 (46:29):
To me, it was like a drug. I wanted to
go back so bad. I wanted to You got to
wait a whole nother year. You gotta wait a whole
other year. Man.
Speaker 3 (46:38):
That's why, that's why it's the best competition man. I mean,
you know, when you really think about it, it ates.
Speaker 2 (46:43):
So well man standing to test of time that fallen
off a little bit, and you.
Speaker 1 (46:48):
Know it's so crazy. It's like, okay, you know the
forty they doing football? You know that used to be
a match rates. Ah so back in the day when
it first started racing two players run again, run against
each other. Oh wow, same thing with the same thing
with three pointing individual. Man, bring all of it back
(47:09):
and see you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (47:11):
Those forty times might go down a competition, come.
Speaker 1 (47:14):
On, and that's it. Yeah. Man, So a lot of
this stuff that you know we didn't we went through
it were cyclical and we just have to, Hey, do
the best that you can during the time that you
in it.
Speaker 2 (47:24):
Brother, that's what we need. Man, Google, can't you know
what I'm saying.
Speaker 3 (47:26):
Yeah, we've got real life libraries, like walking libraries that
have lived it can tell you. That's what I said.
Every time we do this show and we have a
guest on our eyes lie to us a lot, and
when you actually had to guard that person, are you
seeing and you know, like obviously the Internet get disrespectful
and try to be funny about you guys playing era.
(47:49):
You guys tell us about you know, like his pop
told us about how good Joe Dumars was and how
strong he was. You get what I'm saying. And it's
just like it's night and day because you can't personally
fill the strength as possible.
Speaker 1 (48:01):
Jeff Malone, Jeff Malone, you talk, Jeff, Jeff Malone, Washington.
Speaker 3 (48:06):
Oh, Washington, Okay.
Speaker 1 (48:08):
Hey, hey, Jeff Malone, Washington.
Speaker 2 (48:11):
Probably yeah.
Speaker 1 (48:13):
And and I tell you two people used to give
him the fits. And they was both Washington, Jeff Malone
and Ladell eccles. Okay, that's right, them them brothers. I
hadn't seen it to where it's like. And the one
thing like even in practice, me and m JA we
would we would go at it all the time. And
I would tell him, I say, hey, man, smaller people
(48:33):
give you fits, Okay, somebody six five sixty six you
can deal with. But us guards running around your ass.
You you don't like that ship, you don't like running
out there and to go the other way on you
and pull you feel me? Yeah, dude, But Jeff Malone. Man.
Now that's another shooting brother that we could throw in
that too, man, Jeff.
Speaker 3 (48:56):
As far as I can know, I only only had
Jeff Malone trading cards, you know what I'm saying. So
like a lot of it went past me. So the
idea that you even get to just tell us that,
and it's just you know, raise a whole another wall.
Speaker 1 (49:08):
And then we throw another one in there.
Speaker 3 (49:10):
Michael Adams, Michael Adams, Denver Nuggets man.
Speaker 1 (49:14):
He had the cannon shot.
Speaker 2 (49:18):
Shoot you yeah, shooting master, what you do?
Speaker 3 (49:21):
Yes, yes, yeah, absolutely. All right, we're gonna take one
more break and when we come back, we're gonna do
our favorite segment. Born in the Wrong Era. All right,
(49:44):
We're gonna start this off with mister Hodges, born in
the Wrong Era. Who do you got from your era
that could that could do numbers in this current era?
Speaker 4 (49:53):
Besides me, you could do you you could say you're
you can do you definitely can say you'd be good.
Speaker 2 (49:58):
It's style of play with more.
Speaker 1 (50:00):
Yeah, and you know the biggest part to me in
this era is you know, if you can dribble and
shoot it's ugly, you can get you can get you
can get reps So when I think about, you know,
even to the point where Nate Archibald during this time,
it would be off the chain because it's yes more space.
And you know, when I think about the stuff that
(50:21):
Jalen is doing in New York, that reminds me somewhat
of tiny Nate, you know what I'm saying. But who
else when I think about somebody like a Connie Hawkins
in a day like in this era, you know what
I mean. So for me, it's like to see, you know,
how this generation talks about how that generation didn't have
what you have now. But I think one of the
(50:41):
things that they have, uh, you know, fifties was they
had natural athletes. I think it's a lot of guys
that could play in this era and a lot of
guys that couldn't play in our era. You know, I
would have loved to see I would have loved to
see how Steve Nashwall have stood up in our era
with a handcheck, you know what I'm saying, and not
(51:03):
being able to run around. And you know, he's no
dish against Steve, but I call it when he come
through there delivering pizzas and doing all that in the eighties,
man I'm telling you got one time to come through here, bro,
And somebody likes Maurice Lucas to let you know that, dude,
come through here like that again and try to embarrast me.
When one of them finger rolls, you're gonna be picking
(51:23):
your teeth up off the ground. And it was like that,
and you knew, like with Don Nelson, don Nelson, take Craig,
anybody penetrate your paint. That's fifty dollars. So every time
Maurice cheeks to turn the corner, I'm taking a file, bro,
and I'm picking you up, saying, hey, man, go Baseline
Nelly finding me fifty dollars. Every truck coming win next time? Yo, Man,
(51:45):
you making more than me. Man, I'm gonna file out
this piece before I give him fifty dollars. Okay, I'm
filing out. Everyone's gonna be harder than the last, but
I'm gonna help you up, you know. So it's one
of the things, man, You know that could you imagine
Will Chamberlain in this era and he just running basket
to basket. He't looking for no threes.
Speaker 3 (52:04):
Can you elaborate a little bit more on this, because
like I feel like Obviously the legend is respected, but
there's also a lot of disrespect because they talk about
the one hundred point game never being shown.
Speaker 1 (52:15):
And the type of things it definitely and that's the
thing with that, that when you if these young folks
take a look at if they watch some tapele Will
being able to get the ball off the backboard, come
down and bring it up and go behind his back
and make a pass and and that kind of job.
And to see, man, just the stuff that he was
(52:37):
able to do as somebody that big. Come on, man,
you know he's probably you know, we see Shack, but
I would love to see him deal with Shaq, especially
in his later years when he got he wasn't skinny
no more. He was giving Kareem trips down there, man,
So how could y'all deal with that on the block?
If y'all had to, could y'all have done? That could
have been, you know, been a thing where hey man,
(52:58):
Spencer Haywood Spencer. Spencer is almost probably one of the
best young players to ever play in the game. You know,
come in at eighteen, nineteen years old, thirty points and
twenty rebounds, that type of game. Come on, man, it's incredible.
I love the fact that you know. The one thing
that's different I think from that separated the generation from
(53:19):
the eighties to the nineties was that generation eighty m
before we grew up playing basketball with people who taught
us how to play. After that, it was more a
whole thing of we got to make this thing so
specific that I need a trainer, I need this, I
need that, And the game start to take that vein
as opposed to we going out here in the game
(53:40):
becomes organic and you learn to play at the park
with older people, you learn to grow up and go
through contact and all of that. Where a lot of
that is lost.
Speaker 4 (53:49):
Now we are teaching more skill than winning how to
play the like you said, learning how to play.
Speaker 2 (53:56):
Teach you how to dribble, shoot, pass, just some skill.
Speaker 4 (54:00):
When I was at Duke and Coach k was we
have scrimmages in practice, and his whole thing was about
what what are you doing to win the game. Well,
let them throw the ball in, let some time off
the clock. What's you know what I'm saying, The little
tricks when when you drive the ball, the goal not
always to finish, make a layup, finish a layup, do
(54:20):
a tough layup, create some contact, get foul, get to
the line.
Speaker 2 (54:24):
You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 4 (54:25):
He teaches us how to win the game, not how
to up it under a layup, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (54:29):
So that's kind of getting lost a little bit.
Speaker 1 (54:31):
And that's the part that I loved about the Triangle
text taught us that we're not running plays, man, We're
not trying to run those plays. Anybody, a team that
run plays against us, we're gonna beat them automatically because
we know they plays better than them. What we're doing
is we're running the numbers first, and then if our
numbers aren't there, we're flowing in the triangle. Total different system, man.
(54:53):
And that's the part that so many players will be
so much better in their games if they had such
a s you know what I'm saying. So it's a
it's a throwback, all right.
Speaker 4 (55:04):
I'm gonna going too my Born in the Wrong Era segment,
which I mean yours, kind of led me in the mind.
As far as style of play, well, we don't. That's
why this part is here. We don't like comparing players
some different eras because style of play rules just the
overall culture and that's bringing me to like Larry Bird
so obviously one of the best shooters to ever play
the game, but why I didn't think him as as
(55:26):
we're talking three point shooters, I didn't think it was
a three point shooter because he didn't really love to
shoot the three when it came to game, he was
find with shooting mid ranges. And if that was the
culture back then, like what like it is now to
get up as many three point attempts as possible, he
could have done just find doing that. I mean yourself,
any any of the great shooters in that day. If
the culture was I want to get up seven, eight, nine,
(55:49):
three is a game, I could have done it and
been just fine for me.
Speaker 3 (55:52):
I'm gonna go with Glenn Rice. I think Glen Rice
has a size. I think he'd be able to get
a shot off yall variety, three levels, score, physical, and
I just think it to just translate and obviously with
the more space and he gonna eat, he gonna show
it's gonna be barbecue chicken out there. So that's why
I'm rolling with.
Speaker 2 (56:12):
Okay, Okay, all right.
Speaker 3 (56:15):
Man, well this this man, this is one of them,
This one of the ones. Dot I might put this
one at the top one one.
Speaker 2 (56:21):
Of my favorite episodes.
Speaker 1 (56:23):
Big fun. Man, I appreciate y'all.
Speaker 3 (56:24):
Man, Yeah, we learned a lot. Yeah so, uh, mister Hodges,
where can they find you? On social media?
Speaker 1 (56:31):
The real Craig Hodges on Instagram Craig Hodges on Facebook.
I don't somebody else does it, but I'm there, you know,
I'm I'm a pining paper cat catching up to the technology.
But I totally respect it because I understand that's what
it has to be. But I'm still pinning paper cad
(56:52):
and you know, let somebody else do the typing for me.
Speaker 3 (56:56):
Dot where can they find you?
Speaker 4 (56:58):
Let's not curry, I know what it is. That's dlt
curry on all socials. I want to thank mister Hodges
for coming on again. Yes, sir, I learned a lot.
Speaker 2 (57:06):
I know I learned a lot.
Speaker 4 (57:07):
So I know y'all learned a lot about the game,
about the culture.
Speaker 3 (57:10):
You can find me at Trebonne and at Trey on Instagram. Man,
I'm kind of jealous. I don't hoop no more because
I definitely would have would have been practicing worker though
about three now. Man, I learned so much sitting here
for you know, listening to both of y'all, you know
talk about a three point competition and just you know
what I mean, just different ways to shoot the rocker.
(57:30):
All right, listeners, thank you for tuning in. We encourage
feedback as always, tell a friend to tell a friend
to subscribe, rate and review. Leave us those comments. Let
us know who had the greatest top five. Even you
can pick mister Hodges if you want too, because he
definitely woke us up on Larry Bird, so I think
he got us both on this one. But yeah, follow Goat.
(57:51):
Make sure that you show us some love.
Speaker 2 (57:53):
Go go go.
Speaker 3 (58:02):
If you enjoyed this two parter featuring the multiple world
champion political icon Craig Hodgson, check out his book Long Shot,
The Triumphs and Struggles of an NBA Freedom Fighter. This
has been a Unanimous Media original. Goat was produced by
iHeart Podcasts and Unanimous Media. It was hosted by me
Trevon Edwards and Steph Curry. Executive produced by Stephen Curry
(58:23):
and Eric Payton. Co executive producer Kelenna Maria Cutney. The
executive producers at iHeart Podcasts are Sean Titone and Jason English.
This series was produced by Derek Jennings and Peter Kutter,
Co producer Kurt Redman. Original music by Jesse Woodard. Special
thanks to Stephen Curry and Will Pearson. Special shout out
(58:44):
to Scott Rochelle and the NBRPA for preserving our walking
libraries by granting access to their stories. Additional thanks to
Philip Alexander for his booking assistance on this episode. Gold
is a production of Unanimous Media and iHeart Podcasts. One
more podcasts from iHeartRadio visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
(59:05):
or wherever you get your podcasts.
I don't know any team past or present that could
have beat our ninety one team. And I'm saying that
for the reason, and I'm saying it for this run.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Reason one.
Speaker 3 (00:09):
Nah, everybody talk about ninety one, how good that team.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Was, And the reason I say that, and the reason
I say that is that that's when Michael learned to win.
That's when we had we had a cadre of players
that and people. And so when I'm coaching the Lakers
shooting coach. Right, So Kobe was coming, Man, God, we'd
have got y'all. You know, He's like, well, who to
(00:32):
handle Shack? I was like Bill carry.
Speaker 3 (00:34):
Right, everybody was back again with legend Craig Hodges for
part two, the greatest sharpshooters of the nineteen nineties. So
you won your third Street three Point Contest championship, right right,
And there's this photo of you wearing an NBA jersey.
(00:57):
Can you tell us the backstory on this? Because I
always thought like you were a free agent during this time, right.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Brother, I was. I was no agent, Okay, I was.
It wasn't no chance of me being signed by nobody
in NBA, all right. But what happened was was a
groundswell of people who thought I should have got a
chance to defend my title, so get a chance to
win my fourth right. So one of my boys had
made me a cold jersey man. It was. It was unite.
(01:24):
It was black with my number on the hodges on
the back, and I was ready to roll with that.
But when I got there, they told me I couldn't
wear that. So when I get there and they get me,
I tell people, y'all dressed me up in an American flag,
put me out of it without asking me. Man, if
you if you see my face step, if you see
(01:45):
my face, I was so heated. I'm telling you it
was nowhere. It was no way I was gonna come anywhere.
And if you look at me shooting when I won,
it was, you know what I'm saying. I had a game.
I had my game leg under me. I'm practicing in
the high school gym when I'm going into that one
and I'm heated, I'm mad at the world. And then
(02:06):
when i go in the locker room and I'm putting
on I'm like, oh, now I'm sitting on the bench.
No one, I can't go out to the shoot. I
ain't never shot mad. I don't shoot mad, you know
what I'm saying. No, man, I was so mad. Man,
I was like, all right, y'all got me. I shouldn't
said I wasn't gonna even come, you know. But it
was cool, man, It was cool.
Speaker 2 (02:27):
I got.
Speaker 4 (02:27):
I got some questions for you about the three point
competition while we had them, because I know my household.
I mean, we can talk about all the greatest shooters
they ever do it off the dribble, off the move right,
three point Having that three point contest means something, especially
in my in my household. My dad shot in a
couple of times, never won. I've been in it, didn't win.
(02:49):
So when you're prepared for that, did you practice? You
practice off the racks?
Speaker 1 (02:53):
So did you just test? You know the biggest part
this and you're gonna you're gonna appreciate this, all right.
I lost the first three to Larry Bird. Okay, the
very first one, the very first rack I shot was
record okay. I made twenty five points the very first,
the very first round of contest ever. Okay. Then me
(03:17):
and Della, Me and Dale Ellis, we tied, so we
have to do a shootoff. I beat him in the shootoff.
Now I gotta come back and face Larry in the final.
Larry and I already told us in the locker room,
who coming in second? You know what I'm saying. So
we got to laughing or whatever. So he beat me
three and like I said, when I did finally win,
(03:39):
it was like this I shot probably Cliff Levenston. That
was my geek man, my height, man, come on after practice,
come on, you got it, I say, Cliff, I shoot threes, man,
I don't need to practice that shit like that. Okay,
the day before the day before Ira, I come off
my rack. But for me, it's being able to get
(03:59):
your rhythm right away to it. And once again it's
like when I finally won, I didn't take it as
a competition, all right. What I said was, you know what,
I don't have to guard Isaiah to night. All I
gotta do. All I gotta do is catch and shoot,
you feel me? So every time I took it, it
(04:19):
was like I was catching a pass and going into
my rhythm of it right. And for me it was
one of those things where I'm like, Okay, when Larry
beat me, I should have got him. So I felt
like I should have won about six or seven of
them in real time. But once again, it's getting to
that point where the night before the competition, it was like, oh,
(04:40):
I know I'm gonna win, you know what I'm saying,
But I gotta go shoot these bad boys. I gotta
go out there and shoot this thing. And you know,
one of the things that I'm teaching now in teaching
children and players to shoot, is it was one ball
that I shot in that competition. It was a it
was a moneyball on the last rack, and the ball
(05:01):
went through the hole and when it went through, it
was the same amount of space all the way around it.
And I was like, that's the perfect shot. So I
rewound it and I looked at my mechanics and what
I came up with three parts of my shot foundation,
form and follow through, and that when I go into
my hot, I'm in foundation in the middle. I'm informing
when I say follow through about it and try when
(05:23):
you get to the crib man, when you go into
that two foot jump stopping into your shot, if you
say foundation, form, follow through through each part of it.
When you say follow through, that bad boy coming through
the nets. You know what I'm saying. So it's just
being able, especially in that competition, and then the wild
party is. The night before I won my first one,
I said, you know what, if I don't miss, I
(05:44):
can't lose.
Speaker 3 (05:45):
You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
And then it becomes it becomes a thing where think
about it. If you take if you take the whole
minute and you made nineteen, yeah you're gonna be in
the competition.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
That's good enough.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
What your money and then not the way they got it,
where you got a whole rack of moneyballs, man, and
you can put what you want to come home.
Speaker 4 (06:07):
Man, that competition is different. Man, I've never been like
I practiced. I practiced the couple of times a week
leading that practice before, just trying to get your rhythm
and see now when the lights come on.
Speaker 1 (06:19):
And not even through that month, that money come right.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
Yeah, the point the point, it's not the same. I
mean that right exactly.
Speaker 1 (06:26):
And you should tell them if they want to make
an adjustment to make it a little bit better, go
back to when players both were on each end of
the court and y'all shooting against each other.
Speaker 3 (06:36):
I like that.
Speaker 4 (06:37):
That's what I like that. That's what I was going
to like. I'm out there so I did it. I
was the only one on the floor shoot.
Speaker 3 (06:44):
Man.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
Yeah, It's like I'm a basketball player. I'm always out.
Speaker 4 (06:47):
There with other player, other people, other stuff going on.
It's not aws like just the only show.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
This is another funny part. Okay. So yem Jay decides
that he's gonna shoot in the competition and I'm thinking
we in practice, and they come tell me, yeah, I'm
Jay gonna shooting the three. I was like, what you're
dunk or dude? You got your dunks, you got your
dunch and you scoring every time. Let me have my
little shine over here. Okay, So now they put me
(07:15):
and him against each other in the very first round.
This is the first time I ever wanted down in Miami.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
I didn't know.
Speaker 1 (07:21):
And so, you know, you hear the crowd and I'm shooting,
and I'm feeling like, damn, I'm shooting pretty good. But
I'm hearing the crowd go crazy, right, and I'm like, damn,
Jan must be down there heating it up. Right, horn
goes off.
Speaker 3 (07:34):
Bomb.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
I look up. I'm like, oh, they was cheering for me. Man.
I looked up. He had nine points, man, the Lord's
number ever scored. I said, yeah, boy, goes suit.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
Yes, I didn't even know MJ sh.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
They talked about it. It went viral. Men, it's one of
the one of the worst action.
Speaker 1 (07:52):
I'm telling you that it was. It was sad man,
and I'm like, dude, you know it's certain things. You know,
Like you said, you can think what you think, but
when that thing come up and it's your turn to
get up there, it's a whole different man. Shoot man me.
Speaker 4 (08:09):
And stuff talking like greatest shooter ever they say, gonna
call him. But one of the most happy moments of
his career is one of that first three point contests.
I'm telling you, yeah, it's the man. He knows you
know how hard it is to do. It's not game like.
Speaker 1 (08:21):
You know what I'm saying, and you're able to say
I'm the best shooter.
Speaker 2 (08:25):
On earth exactly. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (08:28):
And that's some real stuff, man, And when I you know,
to be able to do that, it's cool. Man. So yeah,
I'd rather go out there and shoot that thing and
know that you ain't got a sprint back on defense.
Speaker 3 (08:37):
Now, your resume speaks for yourself when it comes to
this three point shooting, and this part of them is
the show's where we talk about some of you know,
the best shooters of your era in the nineteen nineties, right,
and like you mentioned, awesome, but then you also won
and dominated. So how are you usually guarded in normal games?
(09:02):
Knowing that you was like, you know, you had a
reputation for an e lethal shooter.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
One of the things, you know. For me, it was
like I understood our system, all right. And the cool
part about Trago is this, we shoot the same shots
every single day. I know where I'm getting my shots,
and we don't have to make adjustments. So in the
playoffs and people making adjustments again, I'm still gonna get
(09:28):
my shots from the same place. I'm getting my shots
coming off the elbow, I'm getting my shots out the corner,
I'm getting my shots off the wing, I'm getting my
shots from the top of the circle. And it's gonna
develop to naturally to where I can actually practice these
shots before games and that kind of thing. So for me,
it was always working off the defense, all right. I
played with a three foot cushion around. If I wanted
(09:48):
somebody to get within that three foot cushion, I'm coming
off a pick. Other than that, I ain't gonna let
you get close to me, especially when we're talking about
hand checking. I learned my lesson earlier. I'm a down
court with Magic Johnson. I'm getting ready to go ninety
Miles Fou and Jed Bien Man. He put his hand
on my hip. Man. I whoa, Okay, this is another level.
I can't let these brothers get nowhere close to me
(10:09):
when I'm handling this field. I got to keep that
cushion around me. That text, tob you play with that
three foot cushion around you.
Speaker 2 (10:15):
Man.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
Can't nobody block your shot because by the time you
go into it and they react to it, your ball
is already gone. So teams like Isaiah they knew Joe
couldn't handle MJ by himself, so I was always gonna
be one player removed from hm J. So you're gonna
have to go help in Isaiah saying, Man, Joe, you
calling for help. You know I can't leave Hodge Hey,
(10:37):
as soon as you turn your head, I'm gonna be gone,
and he gonna know where I'm gonna be. You know
what I'm saying. Because we didn't did this, so for me,
it was it was cool to be able to know
where I'm getting my shots from. So when teams will
play me a certain kind of way, and that's the
beauty of the triangle. It's a counter punch is a
counter punch offense. So if you're playing me top side,
(10:58):
I got my cut baseline and the way, who my
teammate when he sees you playing that side, you know
where my route is gonna be. So it's that type
of situation to where it takes a lot of the
Oh man, I got to come off the screen and
roll are they gonna double? And that's the dumb part
with me. When I'm watching this job today, I'm like,
and there ain't no dish to the players. It's a
(11:19):
dish to the system, all right, And that nobody is
creative to me when I watch when I watch five
games in a row, I'm watching five teams run the
same shit. Okay, So I'm wondering why I ain't nobody
blowing every picking roll that come off that side. You're
not getting back to no middle? Why am I letting
you get back to the middle. I'm no. You dribble
(11:39):
over there, you stand your ass over there, and whatever
happened over there, we're gonna deal with but y'all ain't
gonna get back to the middle and do all.
Speaker 4 (11:47):
We talk about bag work and having a bag this, that,
but you're using offense to your advantage. You got, you
got your skills, you got your footwork that you work on.
But you're making it easy on yourself. But I like
you said, to work hard with the ball.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
That's it and the garners for everybody to touch. You know,
you got MJ.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Man.
Speaker 1 (12:08):
When we had Doug Collins, it would be Doug was
like this, you know this against him. It was like
if you came down, say you came off a pick
and hit the jumper, that same player is gonna be
run for you the next two trips regardless. Okay, so
people wonder how did m J get on them runs?
All they had to do would be one for two.
(12:28):
He's gonna get two more, get another one of that,
he got two more, come killer. So we you feel me,
We love that. Man. You get on the run with Doug,
you gonna get on the run.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
That's the old school coach mentality, you know. Doc Rivers
was like.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
That, like, man, you stop it, and if you don't
stop it, we're gonna keep coming with it. And that
was Doug's mentality. But if somebody get on the road,
it's gonna be two or three people standing over here.
They ain't touched. They're gonna be mad. But when we
put in triangle, horse got touched, help got batter, you
know what I'm saying. Carwright got touches, and we became
(13:03):
a better basketball team as opposed to uh, you know,
and they still called us Michael and the Jordanaires.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
It might have been Nike, definitely some advertising them force,
no question about it. Shot against a lot of people.
(13:33):
You've watched a lot of people play, some of your peers.
You competed against them in a three point contest. And
on this show we talk about the goats, right, it's
not one goat. It's the greatest of their era. And
you even to get a seat at the table, you
have to have this criteria right. And when we're talking
about criteria and who really shoots the ball like you guys,
both of you guys have competed in a three point
(13:55):
shootout and you say it's a different pressure. That's one thing.
Then both of you guys have uh, the honor of
being leading the league. And you know percentage, So that's
another notch that gets y'all in the conversation, right, I'm
going to name some players and you know, you're you're
(14:15):
the you're you're the one of one of the one
of the go to this of this decade. We want
to know how good of a shooter or was it
just a good narrative? You know what I mean? And
that's not even like a disrespect but it's a it's
a respectful competitiveness. But I want to start with Reggie Miller.
How good of a three point shooter was Reggie Miller?
Is he more of a mid range or he had
(14:37):
longevity to get to the number, or do you think
that he was close at that at that point in
time when you played enough to be in that consideration.
Speaker 1 (14:47):
Of the nineties, doctor, you know when you some players
when they went behind the three point line? Oh man,
you know, Oh Reggie was one of them. You know
what I'm saying that when Reggie lined up for three,
you thought it was going in. And I think that
as a shooter and as a coach coach shooters, is
that you want you want to be able to shoot
(15:08):
the ball straight. And Reggie shot the ball straight, regardless
of how funky his release might look you know what
I'm saying, hands crossed, you know, hands crossed in front
of him, all that stuff. But hey, he was he
was consistent and it was it was always a threat.
And I think that's you know, one of the main
things is as a shooter, are you carrying a threat?
And is that threat credible? Are you just you know,
(15:31):
when I watched the game sometimes I watched the game
during the regular season, it was like five trips and
it was all threes, and I was like, man, did
none of them looked like it was confident. None of
them looked like they knew it was going in. So,
you know, Reggie was definitely one who you and in
that game in New York showed you when he ran
ran behind the three point line to let this thing
go and knew it was going in.
Speaker 4 (15:51):
Yes, another area of criteria or whatever you can gauge
the shooter off of his variety.
Speaker 2 (15:58):
He shot it going left, going right, an.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
We got to the rack, you know, and you know,
like for me, I look at it is. You know,
like with me once, I played point guard my first
probably four almost five years in the league, and when
I got to don Nelson, he went to point forward
with Paul Pressey. So now it was about me spacing
the court or whatever. Now I went into that specialist
mode of spacing the courd and but I didn't really
(16:25):
handle like I used to or whatever get the chance to.
So it's one of those things where I have, you know,
somewhat of a change. And as far as you have
scores and you have shooters, and you have shooters who
are scorers, and Reggie was a scorer that was who
happened to be a hell of a shooter too. You know,
you have some scores who can't shoot. All they can
do is get to the rack, you know, get to
(16:46):
that mid range and once they stepped behind three, you
can damn the back off of it. But once they
get inside that thing, you better tighten up them screws,
you know. But Reggie could do it off the dribble.
Reggie was a score who could shoot up.
Speaker 3 (17:00):
Now, prior to you know him joining the Bulls, we
mentioned him earlier as a head coach Steve Kirk Cleveland Cavaliers.
How good of a three point shooter was he?
Speaker 1 (17:08):
Steve was cold man, Steve. You know, Steve and I were.
Steve was a rookie with me when I was in Phoenix,
so I got a chance to Steve. See Steve as
a rookie, and you know, he was one of those
players that knew, you know, seth tell you know where
you could shoot, you know, and Steve was one of those.
He had a quiet confidence and he didn't boast about it,
(17:29):
but he would knock down shots and he did it.
He did it consistently and it wasn't any flair about it.
And that's that's another thing I love about, you know,
certain the times that we played that you know, you
had guys who were consistent shooters and it was what
we did and there wasn't any you know, drama about
you know what I'm saying and doing. It was it
(17:50):
was about score and play D. Score and play D
score and play D and that you don't you don't.
We didn't have time to. We didn't have time for.
Speaker 3 (17:58):
That next person you all so competed against. You had to,
you know, go around for a round before you met
Larry bird Dale, Ellis.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
Dal And and dell Is like, uh, he reminds you
of Eric Dickerson how he ran the ball. They will
played the game straight up. So it was one of
those you know, he had, he had that, he had
a heater, but he was so you know, he's six seven,
so he had that. He had a certain ranginess about
him to where he could get his shot off or
(18:28):
off over most people, you know, and if anybody came
that was taller than him, he had enough where he
could give you a jab your head faking and rain
back and let it ride.
Speaker 3 (18:37):
You know.
Speaker 1 (18:37):
He was. Yeah, Dale was, they'll shoot that thing, man.
And there's certain you know, like I said, it's over
years a time, you know. And I think that's another measure,
is that did you do this year after year after
year after year after year and became where people like,
damn he behind the three point line and we ain't
get nobody out to to him.
Speaker 3 (18:56):
Before I continue, I want to talk about when was
how far along in your career before the three point
line was implemented into the league? Was it there yet?
Speaker 1 (19:07):
Well?
Speaker 2 (19:08):
He came in when they had three.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
I can't. I came in the league and they had
they had a three. Okay, okay, I didn't have a
three in college.
Speaker 2 (19:15):
I said. Thing my dad was talking about.
Speaker 3 (19:17):
He said, they experimented with the with the college three.
He said, he played one game and he was like, Oh,
I already shoot long quote unquote twos.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
I could do this thing.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
Yeah, And that's the and that's the beautiful part for
us growing up in that era, that you know, when
they put the line in front of you, you were
shooting from behind that anyway, you know, I have the
game that I got drafted on. We played uh San
Diego State and it was myself and the brothers Zach
John Zach Jones from San Diego State. They San Diego
(19:48):
Clippers were coming to see him and we played in
that afternoon text winner being text he was like, Craig,
let me see if you could shoot these threes. And
I was. They had the three point line the arena,
so I was just standing out there shooting it. And
that night I was thirteen for thirteen. Ball didn't touch
the floor, you know what I'm saying, And I was
just catching and ranging and like that. That would probably
(20:10):
been a shit thirty three point thirty nine point night
or something like that because they were all twenty five
twenty six feet.
Speaker 2 (20:16):
So you sound like my pots right there.
Speaker 4 (20:17):
If if we had a three for all my whole
college career, woul nobody catch me at Virginia Tech.
Speaker 1 (20:22):
That's what it would have been. Big fun, big fun,
big fun man. You know. But and like I and
I look at, you know, the different phases of the
terms of the game. We played in high school basketball.
We played on the fan backboard. We didn't play on schall.
Speaker 5 (20:35):
Oh yeah, man, So shooting and shooting and runner off
of shooting and runner off that glass was, man, man,
you better.
Speaker 1 (20:45):
And that's the cool part that when I got to
college and we got the big backboard, I'm throwing that
thing up, spinning it off off the top.
Speaker 3 (20:53):
You know.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
It was big fun, man, big fun.
Speaker 3 (20:55):
Another player on here rock Mitch Richmond's.
Speaker 1 (20:58):
Oh yes, oh yes, Mitch. And see that. When you
look at Mitch, Tim and Chris, it was it was
almost like who do you are? You know what I'm saying.
And they all had they all had taps, and they
all had heaters. You know. I think Mitch was to me,
Mitch was more of almost like Alexander that's playing in
(21:23):
these series now, mid range, yeah, that mid range cold
that but you know, and he could step behind the
three when I needed three exactly. So Mitch, Mitch was like,
I can go back there and I can shoot with
the best of y'all. But this is what I can do.
I want to do more of this too. You know
what I'm saying. Where some of us will settled, he
wasn't settled. He wasn't settled.
Speaker 3 (21:45):
Dennis Scott, Yes, yeah.
Speaker 1 (21:48):
Yeah, three and never saw a shot he didn't like,
and from any distance. And that's you know, I love
that that he was. He was quick with his trigger.
And when you see somebody that's quick on the trigger,
that's confidence, you know, that's kind of confidence that they've
done it so many times that this is nothing new,
and willing to live and die with the consequence that
I tell you the young shooters that I work with
now is that we as shooters, we understand the reality
(22:12):
of correction. That should my ball and not come through
the bottom of the net? Why you feel me? And
I'm cleaning it up on the very next one. I
ain't got time to oh man, because when I'm knocking
down jumpers, I'm not So why should why should anything
change in my demeanor? On my mindset, It's about if
I do if I do these fundamentals correctly, that's gonna
(22:35):
be ninety nine percent of the time.
Speaker 2 (22:37):
So I was ready.
Speaker 4 (22:37):
Don't miss two the same way. No, that's what you're
saying right there. If you miss one, make the adjustment.
If you make that, just you miss again, it better
be that you overcorrect it.
Speaker 1 (22:47):
There you go, There you go. And my thing is
if your ball hit the rim, the next one better
be on net.
Speaker 3 (22:52):
Okay, this next player willkiel yes.
Speaker 1 (22:58):
And you know certain players, man, that I had fun
playing against. The Mookie was one of them cats because
MOOKI was always sneaky too. You know what I'm saying
that he gon that Mookie made make a layup and
sprint like and you see him like in this mode
and you turn around, he right there. So and it
was one of the things where Mookie could come down
(23:18):
and you swear getting ready to run offense, and he
launching the three and they own and you're like, man,
he got you. He got your on skates. Now you
can't you can't gauge if he's gonna drive because he
had enough tricky stuff off the dribble to get there
whenever he wanted to. And at the same time, he's
gonna knock down jumpers especially, And that's one of the
things that I look at that generation of player, whether
(23:41):
they were big or small, everybody became better shooters over time.
You know what I'm saying, MOOKI didn't come in the
league as a three point shooter, but Mookie became a
very credible and consistent three point shooter over time. To
let you know how much work he put into.
Speaker 3 (23:56):
It, Yeah, he had a thousand plus made. Was kind
of showing to me. It was like, you know what
I mean, because I know him from the video game.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
I watched a couple with a j like that. Yeah,
you're right, Yeah, that's what we're doing.
Speaker 1 (24:09):
And not only that, you think about it, the body
of his work, Man, Mookie got in a lot of
good minutes, man, some quality quality time where he was playing,
you know, thirty five forty minutes a game at summer und.
Speaker 3 (24:21):
All right, this one's personal to dot Man. Tell us
about Dale Curry from.
Speaker 1 (24:25):
Your perspective, man, you know Dale, Dale's release is so cold,
you know what I'm saying That he didn't have to
bend down, so you couldn't gauge it. You couldn't gauge
it off his footwork or his balanced condition.
Speaker 2 (24:38):
It would come and it would be barely jumped tip toes.
Speaker 1 (24:42):
You know it'd be like it'd be gone before you
know it, you know what I'm saying. So for me,
and whenever I played against Dell, I wasn't never more
than two feet away from him if I was guarding,
you know what I'm saying. And I never turned my
head because sooner it's it's over and gone. Oh man.
(25:04):
And like and I think about that when I reguard
Mo Muggsy, I would I would uh, he would laugh
at me because as he's coming down, I would get
in my squat like I was sitting on a on
a on one of the adventures in the locker room
or something, and you come down and just start laughing.
I stand back up. But that's one thing, man. We
had some great, great fun competition Dyl and I. We
(25:26):
always and it was cool back then because we all
really respected one another, because we understood this. We all
worked to get there. It wasn't really maybe Isaiah magic.
It was only a couple of one and Dones man.
You know, everybody had put they put they work in
in college, became respectful of what your work ethic was
(25:47):
to get through to this point and to know that hey,
now that we hear let's just see where this thing falls.
I ain't got a dish you, I ain't gotta You know,
Larry talks and Smack, but when Larry talked to Smack,
he backed it up. But he also understood the reality that, hey,
these these brothers ain't no different to me. You know
what I'm saying. We all we all here, we all capable. Now,
(26:08):
that was just his way of buildings confidence. But for me,
it was one of those things where I wanted to,
you know, see where my skills met up with everybody else's. Man.
So you know, Dale and the rest of us, man,
we we just went out there and played as hard
as we can. And one of the things that you know,
even though the game was physical, it wasn't dirty. Man.
(26:28):
It was like you had the bad Boys, but that
was just a group of thugs at that point in
time and the way they played. But everybody else it
was like, man, you gonna in the playoffs. Even I'm
gonna follow you, but I'm gonna hold you up. You
know what I'm saying. Where some of it now is
that you know, it's it's a lot of it's a
lot of tension in the game, man, You know, a
(26:50):
lot of a lot of personality influence that's coming from
outside the game. And it's cool because it's generational and
it's cyclical and it is is what it is. But
I like the generation before me with Doctor j and
you know, Darryl Dawkins, them doing their thing and being
able to come into that and coming in and see.
(27:11):
One of the things too, is that we're now I
don't know how much influenced veterans have over younger players.
Speaker 4 (27:16):
It's coming back slowly, but it kind of they trying to.
They try to get rid of it for a while,
just it went too young.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
Yeah, I'm like, you know, you have a team, but
what's the You know, when I came to the league,
you had at least three or four guys on the
team that were nine year vets, you know what I'm saying,
And that you came to their team, you know, And
I got the people tell me, yeah, he played with
Michael Jordan. I said, no, Michael played with me because
I'm the oldest.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
So that's how that thing rolled that you can't I
played with you because you was here when I got it.
Speaker 4 (27:46):
And even the young dude like you had to beat
if you wanted to make the roster. You had to
beat the vet out and like you got to beat
them on now, like it's kind of guys get drafted.
You gotta like I was saying earlier, they got to
prove the young guys got to I'm not good enough
instead of I'm better than the guy who's been there.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
They trying to replace you.
Speaker 1 (28:06):
I was talking to uh to NASA's because he was
at that D League. When when when I was in
New York with you guy, it was I was like, man,
how do you get in the lineup. He's like, we
don't practice. I was like, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait,
what you mean you don't practice. I'm like, y'all don't scrimmage.
So there's no time for me to show that. And
(28:29):
this is what he told me. He said, he said,
somebody has to have a run of three or four
or five bad games before somebody get a chance. And
I'm like, it used to be it used to be
somebody struggling. I'm getting apped his ass in practice. I'm
getting apped his ass in practice. I'm getting ready to
(28:51):
get some of these minutes. I'm like what, So basically,
the rosters said this is gonna be the line up
and this is gonna be And then it makes sense
when you see guys now, when they tell me that,
I see why guys sit over there and it looked
like shit, you might as well bring them a box
of popcorn to pizza because they ain't never coming in
(29:11):
the game no.
Speaker 2 (29:12):
Matter what I do, Man, I can't earn the spot.
Speaker 4 (29:16):
It's like it's no more of that, like he always
this guy's been playing well in practice.
Speaker 2 (29:20):
I'm gonna give him a shot, right.
Speaker 3 (29:22):
That's how fans look at it. They think that's how
it's supposed to go, not knowing how the pure the
how the businesses ran down way differently.
Speaker 1 (29:32):
And then then I look at that. I look at
that that. Okay, I get to I get thirty days
of too days might be too much. But that year
that I had thirty days of too days, I played
one hundred and ten games, you know what I'm saying,
and that I played straight through, so conditioning on some level.
(29:52):
But also I think a lot of the wear and
tear for your generation is a lot of that shit
that happened in the AU.
Speaker 2 (29:58):
I agree, I agree that a lot.
Speaker 1 (30:01):
And I tell young folks now, I'm like, okay, scrimmage
game and game. You only got so many games in
your body where there's a referee and popcorn. You want
to make sure, you want to make sure you want
those to be at the ladder end from twenty two
(30:22):
thirty five as opposed to Oh I didn't played sixty
five games in the summer.
Speaker 2 (30:27):
What more than that?
Speaker 1 (30:29):
Now, brother, I'm telling you what my sons was coming through.
I told him, man, look y'all got twenty five AAU games,
and you got your thirty games with your high school
or twenty five with your high school. But it ain't
gonna be. We're gonna work on some skills.
Speaker 4 (30:46):
Man, We're gonna work on tell me my popform exact
same way. And I'm gonna try to be like that
my kids when they get older. But like he pulled
both of he pulled us out of AAU for a
year or two, liked.
Speaker 2 (30:58):
Him out again. I was hot. I was trying to play,
trying to compete.
Speaker 4 (31:00):
Like you see all my friends and the god on
compete to get playing games and getting ranked, and they're
saying they're better than me. We're we're skipping tournaments, we're
in the gym, working on skills, getting reps up. And
it like you're saying, that's the long term vision that
we didn't see and it paid off that line.
Speaker 1 (31:19):
That's it because when you stop and look at the
fundamentals of the people around you, that was going to
them things and doing all that I tell them. I said,
you know, when you're in a game, you're making the
play to win, you know what I'm saying. So if
you're on the left side of the court and you're
strong with your right hand, you're gonna try to finish
that with your right hand instead of your left. Let's
be honest, So let us work on those things so
(31:41):
that now when the game develops and I get bigger,
I can I can make those plays. Man. So that's
one of my my pet peeves is what's happening with
au and just the whole you know, the money grab
of it all.
Speaker 3 (31:53):
Oh man, it's a different business.
Speaker 2 (31:56):
Now, that's another part.
Speaker 3 (31:56):
That's a whole nother five. Man, you talk about that.
Speaker 1 (31:59):
I was laughing. I was I was coaching with the Lakers.
I was shooting coaching for the Lakers, and I'm talking
to Trevor and he was telling me about their team
that they had in the him. I think Russell Hard Ye.
Speaker 3 (32:15):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, they year younger than me, but trailed
my year. But I'm from Component by the way. From context,
so you mentioned putting in work at Elbe State, Like
I was being recruited by Olbie State at one point
in time, and your name always used to come up right.
I was a Bulls fan since I was like seven
years old. So yeah, my sign graduated from so I was, yeah,
(32:38):
he's all time. Yeah, no, I'm familiar. I'm familiar because
like anytime i'm you know, I'm in Indiana now, so
I always try to rap any any university that's back
at the crib when they when they make the noise.
But they always said Craig Hodges and I was like, wait,
how I end up at Lob State. But now as
i'm you know, we've been having a conversation and doing
(32:59):
some more research, you end out there with text winners,
you know what I mean?
Speaker 1 (33:02):
Like that, you know, because he was recruiting for Northwestern
when I was in high school and then my senior
year he got the job in.
Speaker 3 (33:08):
Market Now that makes a lot of sense, man, But yeah, no,
you you definitely everybody used to always say, man, we
gotta shoot, like Craig Hodges man and all the confident
like like that. As I said, you made an impact
man all the way man, because.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
It was man we had. We had some good brothers man.
I got that was fun time, man. And it was
during that period of time when snooping and was coming
on capitals and raffers just getting started. Man, it's crazy.
Speaker 3 (33:30):
Absolutely. We got one more player on this list, Glenn Rice.
How good of a shooter was Glenn Rice?
Speaker 1 (33:36):
Glenn was? You know, you have certain shooters that are
quietly confident and you you don't see them, you but
when they come off that pick when they raised Glenn
Glenn's jumped for was pure man. You know what I
mean where it was. It was a pretty excite to
see you except when you was gardening even running at
that thing. But you know he was, uh, he was
(33:56):
consistent with it too, man. And he and I had
that He had that contact with me and Steve Fisher,
so we both had fish like.
Speaker 4 (34:03):
He really used his size too, like he ain't run.
He never rushed this shot then after see and you.
Speaker 1 (34:09):
Think about it him playing him playing that two quasi
three row. A lot of times he had guys my
size on him. Sixty three, no more than sixty four.
And it was like he had turn and be over
the top of your head and there wasn't nothing you
could do about it, you know what I'm saying. And
he gonna go to the line and shooting ninety percent.
So that's you know, tough covering.
Speaker 4 (34:27):
Of the elements of shooting. You shoot free throws, free throws.
I'm a good shooter it.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
Man.
Speaker 3 (34:34):
It used to be, uh you know, if he was,
especially if he was a point guard. Man, you couldn't
shoot under it like eighty five percent, you know what
I'm saying. I know it's changed now.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
And working with young folks, I tell him, I said,
when you are size, when you're going into a training
camp mode or camp mode or being seen, we got
to be ninety five percent of open shots made when
we go to the line. And now and now we're
breaking down like that. When I was a rookie, we
were doing the single double turnouts, right and I'm coming off,
(35:05):
I'm shooting out of a two foot jump stop. Everybody
else is shooting out of one coun stride stap stop, stop, stop,
And they couldn't understand why I was shooting it so quick.
And I'm like, I don't know why y'all want to
shoot it. That's slow. Because when I put this foot
down and it's become bluf pivot foot, if somebody steps
into me, I'm tripped. So I'm coming out and I'm
catching a two foot jump stop. So whatever where the
(35:26):
defense comes, I got an option. And if you ain't here,
I'm gonna let this thing right. So it's one of
those things that you know the fundamentals and being able
to garner it and put it into your own contexts
and then meld it into the system that you got.
It's cold, man. And I think that's the beauty of
our ninety one team that I tell people to me,
(35:47):
I don't know any team pasted or present that could
have beat our ninety one team. And I'm saying that
for the reason and I'm saying it for this run
reason one.
Speaker 3 (35:56):
Nah, everybody talk about ninety one, how good that team.
Speaker 1 (35:59):
Was when I say that, and the reason I say
that is that that's when Michael learned to win. That's
when we had we had a cadre of players that
and people. And so when I'm coaching the Lakers, shooting
coach right, So Kobe was coming, man, we'd have got y'all.
Like you know, He's like, well, who to handle Shack?
(36:21):
I was like Bill Carr, right, you feel me? And
I stand on that today. I don't care how big
Shack could have got. Bill wasn't scared. Okay, So a
lot of people we had a little heartlely damage when
they had to mess with Shaq. We had a we
had a player for every position. Man. So if like
(36:41):
like before we won our championship, Scotty told us this,
He's like, check this out, y'all. Y, I ain't gonna
get nothing from me from the offensive end, but guarantee
you Magic will not get one straight line drive. And
go back and watch that series. He had Magic spinning
like a time, couldn't get into the offense. And that's
and and that's the thing is that when you have
(37:02):
what you have. So I said, I give Bill Russell,
I love you. But I think we were to beat y'all.
I love Stephanum team that was seventy two or whatever
they won. I think we had we had something for it.
And it's and not and it ain't being boastful, but
it's being practical from a standpoint that if you wasn't
up on us by twelve points in the last two
(37:24):
innutes of the game, you weren't gonna beat us because
MJ gonna get at least five buckets and then Scotty
gonna bea fout for that. So it's getting ready to
be y'all better. You better come with some real stuff, man.
But I think we had a we had an.
Speaker 2 (37:39):
Option player, like they talked about that.
Speaker 4 (37:40):
You talk about all the elements to MJ and y'all
winning championships like you see all the positive day, who's
the goat, who's this? It's all individual based skill, but
like you can't win. He wanted to go best to
ever do it, obviously of his era, but he ain't
win until he had all the pieces in place.
Speaker 1 (38:01):
And being able to commit to passing the ball. Yeah,
and that's the part. That's the part of the cis
trying all comes back to trinle ball movement, player movement
in space. We don't break none of them principals, and
you know, and the cole part is to have somebody
like text Winner at that time in MJ's life, who
(38:22):
was one of Dean Smith's best friends. Okay, so MJ
would get out of hand and Texas, Yo, hey, you
wouldn't do that if Dean was in the gym, and
he'd go right back in the mode. And I tell
people that one of the biggest parts of Phil Jackson's
championships was his coaching staff. His staff, every staff he's
(38:44):
had had over one hundred years of experience. Man text
Winner thirty five years, Johnny Box thirty years, Jim Clemens
twenty five years, Frank Hamblin thirty years. What player on
the team is going to back talk any of them?
Speaker 2 (38:58):
Nobody, that's real body, that's knowledge, nobody.
Speaker 1 (39:01):
So so Phil, I tell people field and talk them
to games' great.
Speaker 2 (39:08):
You watched me barely talk in games, and when you watched.
Speaker 1 (39:11):
He didn't say nothing in practice. In practice he text
at the offense, Johnny Boka at the defense. Bil was
sitting over there with his legs crossed. All right. Now
when he may want some subtle adjustments, he'll stand up,
Oh okay, and go sit his ass back down. You know.
But that whole zen Master, it's part of the capitalist
thing that.
Speaker 3 (39:32):
One man market get handle his own.
Speaker 1 (39:35):
Come on, man, come on.
Speaker 3 (39:37):
When we come back from our break, we're gonna give
our goat top five greatest shooters of the nineteen nineties.
(39:58):
All right, Dot, you know it's time to give your goat.
Top five are the greatest shooters of nineteen nineties.
Speaker 2 (40:04):
Let's hear it, all right? My number five I got.
I got Reggie number five.
Speaker 4 (40:09):
We talked about him in that scoring round, but like
you said, when he got behind that line, he could
shoot it all different ways off the dribble. So Reggie
number five, I got number four. I got dal ellis he.
I mean, I don't need to explain that anymore. Then
Craig Craig Guardy did number three. I got my pops
number three. I know he ain't gonna like it, but
(40:30):
I'm number three. He got a number three.
Speaker 2 (40:33):
He ain't doing it. He got the.
Speaker 4 (40:35):
Numbers, the percentages, played sixteen years. And that's another thing
you're talking about, your story and how the excuses you
gave for not teams gave you for not signing you
or not not continue to be in the league.
Speaker 2 (40:48):
I was a taller.
Speaker 4 (40:49):
If you could shoot the ball, you can play for
as long as you want, right, So that so my
dad always told me he played sixteen years. I mean,
you should have been in that realm too. Number two,
I mean two to one A, one B. I got
Craig Hodges and then number one Steve Kerk. You got
them doing it in the playoffs, shooting the heck out
(41:09):
of the ball on at a high level at the
biggest stage. I mean a lot of people can do
it in the regular season or I mean on lesser
teams or whatnot. But when you got that pressure playing
beside MJ when he swing you that ball, you gotta
knock it down. It's a different level. It's a different level.
So that's one A.
Speaker 1 (41:28):
And not only that, the pressure of that moment.
Speaker 2 (41:31):
Yeah, the moment.
Speaker 1 (41:33):
People talking about pressure and checked this out. And before
we go into the the other night, that first game
in Indiana, I felt like Shay Alexander got caught up
in the moment. It was like thirty seconds or something
and he had the ball and Williams came around the
screen at the top and it was like five seconds
(41:54):
left on the shot clock, and he threw it over
there to him. You could see we're it almost surprisedly yep. Man,
I was like, oh man, crazy. But anyway, for me,
I'm gonna go number five, Reggie, number four, Steve number three,
(42:21):
Dye Ellis mm hmm, one A and one be me
and Bertie Oh that man.
Speaker 2 (42:30):
Yeah, Larry Bird got to be in my top five.
I left him out. I left him.
Speaker 1 (42:35):
Bertie, man. And the crazy part with that is I
just respect him because you know, had a chance to
deal with him, you know what I mean. Man, And
he got me. He got me, he got me, and
I had to Hey, brother, you got me, you got me.
But when I got him in Miami, I knew he
was done. I'm like, you ain't gonna be back. You
(42:56):
ain't coming back after that one, brother, I know you not.
So I'm gonna give you a good doubt. You didn't
have your run. Now it's my turn, you know. But yeah, man,
it was and I think the biggest part, and you
know else we got to include in that and just
flat out just shooting.
Speaker 2 (43:10):
The move yeah yeah yeah, and.
Speaker 1 (43:13):
Just shooting, yeah man, and just shooting. And that's one thing,
you know, if if the game was played without a line,
you know what I'm saying, and you like, for instance,
Freddie Brown, Downtown Freddie Brown, guys like that that I
grew up that I just he saitting over there with
his toil around his neck, chilling, yo, Freddie, we need you?
How many y'all need? He would come to the he
(43:35):
would come down the bench and I'm standing on the
sideline as a rookie, and he walking down the sideline
and he asked Lenny Wilkins, how many do you need?
And he's like, we need you A three? All right?
I got you, and and sure enough they thought everything
and he knew it was going in. And that's the
part where I love the era that I played in
because you had some characters man world be free, you
(43:58):
know what I'm saying, and guys like that that were man.
When you had to guard him, it was like an experience,
you know what I'm saying, because they didn't know what
they were gonna do, so you couldn't have tried to
figure it out because but when they got it, they
knew they was gonna figure it out how to score.
Girvin was the best of I got a Girvin as
a rookie man, and he got his back to the
(44:20):
basket and he looks at me and say, you're ready, rook,
And you're ready, rook, and he takes a runner and
just spends it off the glass. And I didn't even
see him. Look at the basket man on the rail
and he took off front of down court and the
fans are going crazy. And then he looks at me.
Did he go in like, come on, bro, you know
what we're in. Then we get on the other end,
(44:41):
he tell me, hurry up, man, hurry yup, man, I
ain't gonna guard you. Hurry up and shoot it. I
want to get down here and score. I'm like, wow,
you playing. He playing against me all night and he
ain't gonna guard me. And I'm telling my guy, man
passed me the ball. Man, I'm gonna be wide open
every time. You know. Yeah, man, it was a great
area to playing.
Speaker 2 (44:58):
Man, you got your far all right man?
Speaker 3 (45:01):
For five A, I got Deal Curry for five B.
I got Mookie Blaylock.
Speaker 2 (45:06):
So you went six.
Speaker 3 (45:07):
Okay, for four, I got Steve Kerr at three, I
got dal Ellis, at two, I got Craig Hodges and
at one Larry Bird.
Speaker 2 (45:21):
Yeah, I messed up.
Speaker 1 (45:23):
And see like with Larry, Like with Larry, we almost
got to get Larry that because he did what he
did in the start of the competition. You know what
I'm saying, And that carried some weight, and that was
the part where it would be like all I would
hear the first three years like a jump shooter would
never win it. A jump shooter would never win it.
A jump shooter would never win it. Larry got ranged,
(45:44):
Harry got leverage. I'm like, man, I know I can shoot,
however many balls. It takes so many winners things because
I just shot this many balls and I ain't got
tired during the summertime, So why can't I do it now?
You know what's the same thing is it's being there
to make sure you're ready. But like st have to
tell you that night, when you got to go out
there and do it, gotta be rapped kind to tight.
Speaker 2 (46:08):
It's different. It's hard to explain nless you on that stage.
Speaker 1 (46:12):
And you know the coldest part two is when you
don't win it, and that the.
Speaker 2 (46:17):
Hurtest it goes. It go by so quick too.
Speaker 1 (46:21):
So when I love man, when I lost it was
like man, it felt like, oh man, I can't shoot man.
I know I can shoot me.
Speaker 4 (46:29):
To me, it was like a drug. I wanted to
go back so bad. I wanted to You got to
wait a whole nother year. You gotta wait a whole
other year. Man.
Speaker 3 (46:38):
That's why, that's why it's the best competition man. I mean,
you know, when you really think about it, it ates.
Speaker 2 (46:43):
So well man standing to test of time that fallen
off a little bit, and you.
Speaker 1 (46:48):
Know it's so crazy. It's like, okay, you know the
forty they doing football? You know that used to be
a match rates. Ah so back in the day when
it first started racing two players run again, run against
each other. Oh wow, same thing with the same thing
with three pointing individual. Man, bring all of it back
(47:09):
and see you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (47:11):
Those forty times might go down a competition, come.
Speaker 1 (47:14):
On, and that's it. Yeah. Man, So a lot of
this stuff that you know we didn't we went through
it were cyclical and we just have to, Hey, do
the best that you can during the time that you
in it.
Speaker 2 (47:24):
Brother, that's what we need. Man, Google, can't you know
what I'm saying.
Speaker 3 (47:26):
Yeah, we've got real life libraries, like walking libraries that
have lived it can tell you. That's what I said.
Every time we do this show and we have a
guest on our eyes lie to us a lot, and
when you actually had to guard that person, are you
seeing and you know, like obviously the Internet get disrespectful
and try to be funny about you guys playing era.
(47:49):
You guys tell us about you know, like his pop
told us about how good Joe Dumars was and how
strong he was. You get what I'm saying. And it's
just like it's night and day because you can't personally
fill the strength as possible.
Speaker 1 (48:01):
Jeff Malone, Jeff Malone, you talk, Jeff, Jeff Malone, Washington.
Speaker 3 (48:06):
Oh, Washington, Okay.
Speaker 1 (48:08):
Hey, hey, Jeff Malone, Washington.
Speaker 2 (48:11):
Probably yeah.
Speaker 1 (48:13):
And and I tell you two people used to give
him the fits. And they was both Washington, Jeff Malone
and Ladell eccles. Okay, that's right, them them brothers. I
hadn't seen it to where it's like. And the one
thing like even in practice, me and m JA we
would we would go at it all the time. And
I would tell him, I say, hey, man, smaller people
(48:33):
give you fits, Okay, somebody six five sixty six you
can deal with. But us guards running around your ass.
You you don't like that ship, you don't like running
out there and to go the other way on you
and pull you feel me? Yeah, dude, But Jeff Malone. Man.
Now that's another shooting brother that we could throw in
that too, man, Jeff.
Speaker 3 (48:56):
As far as I can know, I only only had
Jeff Malone trading cards, you know what I'm saying. So
like a lot of it went past me. So the
idea that you even get to just tell us that,
and it's just you know, raise a whole another wall.
Speaker 1 (49:08):
And then we throw another one in there.
Speaker 3 (49:10):
Michael Adams, Michael Adams, Denver Nuggets man.
Speaker 1 (49:14):
He had the cannon shot.
Speaker 2 (49:18):
Shoot you yeah, shooting master, what you do?
Speaker 3 (49:21):
Yes, yes, yeah, absolutely. All right, we're gonna take one
more break and when we come back, we're gonna do
our favorite segment. Born in the Wrong Era. All right,
(49:44):
We're gonna start this off with mister Hodges, born in
the Wrong Era. Who do you got from your era
that could that could do numbers in this current era?
Speaker 4 (49:53):
Besides me, you could do you you could say you're
you can do you definitely can say you'd be good.
Speaker 2 (49:58):
It's style of play with more.
Speaker 1 (50:00):
Yeah, and you know the biggest part to me in
this era is you know, if you can dribble and
shoot it's ugly, you can get you can get you
can get reps So when I think about, you know,
even to the point where Nate Archibald during this time,
it would be off the chain because it's yes more space.
And you know, when I think about the stuff that
(50:21):
Jalen is doing in New York, that reminds me somewhat
of tiny Nate, you know what I'm saying. But who
else when I think about somebody like a Connie Hawkins
in a day like in this era, you know what
I mean. So for me, it's like to see, you know,
how this generation talks about how that generation didn't have
what you have now. But I think one of the
(50:41):
things that they have, uh, you know, fifties was they
had natural athletes. I think it's a lot of guys
that could play in this era and a lot of
guys that couldn't play in our era. You know, I
would have loved to see I would have loved to
see how Steve Nashwall have stood up in our era
with a handcheck, you know what I'm saying, and not
(51:03):
being able to run around. And you know, he's no
dish against Steve, but I call it when he come
through there delivering pizzas and doing all that in the eighties,
man I'm telling you got one time to come through here, bro,
And somebody likes Maurice Lucas to let you know that, dude,
come through here like that again and try to embarrast me.
When one of them finger rolls, you're gonna be picking
(51:23):
your teeth up off the ground. And it was like that,
and you knew, like with Don Nelson, don Nelson, take Craig,
anybody penetrate your paint. That's fifty dollars. So every time
Maurice cheeks to turn the corner, I'm taking a file, bro,
and I'm picking you up, saying, hey, man, go Baseline
Nelly finding me fifty dollars. Every truck coming win next time? Yo, Man,
(51:45):
you making more than me. Man, I'm gonna file out
this piece before I give him fifty dollars. Okay, I'm
filing out. Everyone's gonna be harder than the last, but
I'm gonna help you up, you know. So it's one
of the things, man, You know that could you imagine
Will Chamberlain in this era and he just running basket
to basket. He't looking for no threes.
Speaker 3 (52:04):
Can you elaborate a little bit more on this, because
like I feel like Obviously the legend is respected, but
there's also a lot of disrespect because they talk about
the one hundred point game never being shown.
Speaker 1 (52:15):
And the type of things it definitely and that's the
thing with that, that when you if these young folks
take a look at if they watch some tapele Will
being able to get the ball off the backboard, come
down and bring it up and go behind his back
and make a pass and and that kind of job.
And to see, man, just the stuff that he was
(52:37):
able to do as somebody that big. Come on, man,
you know he's probably you know, we see Shack, but
I would love to see him deal with Shaq, especially
in his later years when he got he wasn't skinny
no more. He was giving Kareem trips down there, man,
So how could y'all deal with that on the block?
If y'all had to, could y'all have done? That could
have been, you know, been a thing where hey man,
(52:58):
Spencer Haywood Spencer. Spencer is almost probably one of the
best young players to ever play in the game. You know,
come in at eighteen, nineteen years old, thirty points and
twenty rebounds, that type of game. Come on, man, it's incredible.
I love the fact that you know. The one thing
that's different I think from that separated the generation from
(53:19):
the eighties to the nineties was that generation eighty m
before we grew up playing basketball with people who taught
us how to play. After that, it was more a
whole thing of we got to make this thing so
specific that I need a trainer, I need this, I
need that, And the game start to take that vein
as opposed to we going out here in the game
(53:40):
becomes organic and you learn to play at the park
with older people, you learn to grow up and go
through contact and all of that. Where a lot of
that is lost.
Speaker 4 (53:49):
Now we are teaching more skill than winning how to
play the like you said, learning how to play.
Speaker 2 (53:56):
Teach you how to dribble, shoot, pass, just some skill.
Speaker 4 (54:00):
When I was at Duke and Coach k was we
have scrimmages in practice, and his whole thing was about
what what are you doing to win the game. Well,
let them throw the ball in, let some time off
the clock. What's you know what I'm saying, The little
tricks when when you drive the ball, the goal not
always to finish, make a layup, finish a layup, do
(54:20):
a tough layup, create some contact, get foul, get to
the line.
Speaker 2 (54:24):
You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 4 (54:25):
He teaches us how to win the game, not how
to up it under a layup, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (54:29):
So that's kind of getting lost a little bit.
Speaker 1 (54:31):
And that's the part that I loved about the Triangle
text taught us that we're not running plays, man, We're
not trying to run those plays. Anybody, a team that
run plays against us, we're gonna beat them automatically because
we know they plays better than them. What we're doing
is we're running the numbers first, and then if our
numbers aren't there, we're flowing in the triangle. Total different system, man.
(54:53):
And that's the part that so many players will be
so much better in their games if they had such
a s you know what I'm saying. So it's a
it's a throwback, all right.
Speaker 4 (55:04):
I'm gonna going too my Born in the Wrong Era segment,
which I mean yours, kind of led me in the mind.
As far as style of play, well, we don't. That's
why this part is here. We don't like comparing players
some different eras because style of play rules just the
overall culture and that's bringing me to like Larry Bird
so obviously one of the best shooters to ever play
the game, but why I didn't think him as as
(55:26):
we're talking three point shooters, I didn't think it was
a three point shooter because he didn't really love to
shoot the three when it came to game, he was
find with shooting mid ranges. And if that was the
culture back then, like what like it is now to
get up as many three point attempts as possible, he
could have done just find doing that. I mean yourself,
any any of the great shooters in that day. If
the culture was I want to get up seven, eight, nine,
(55:49):
three is a game, I could have done it and
been just fine for me.
Speaker 3 (55:52):
I'm gonna go with Glenn Rice. I think Glen Rice
has a size. I think he'd be able to get
a shot off yall variety, three levels, score, physical, and
I just think it to just translate and obviously with
the more space and he gonna eat, he gonna show
it's gonna be barbecue chicken out there. So that's why
I'm rolling with.
Speaker 2 (56:12):
Okay, Okay, all right.
Speaker 3 (56:15):
Man, well this this man, this is one of them,
This one of the ones. Dot I might put this
one at the top one one.
Speaker 2 (56:21):
Of my favorite episodes.
Speaker 1 (56:23):
Big fun. Man, I appreciate y'all.
Speaker 3 (56:24):
Man, Yeah, we learned a lot. Yeah so, uh, mister Hodges,
where can they find you? On social media?
Speaker 1 (56:31):
The real Craig Hodges on Instagram Craig Hodges on Facebook.
I don't somebody else does it, but I'm there, you know,
I'm I'm a pining paper cat catching up to the technology.
But I totally respect it because I understand that's what
it has to be. But I'm still pinning paper cad
(56:52):
and you know, let somebody else do the typing for me.
Speaker 3 (56:56):
Dot where can they find you?
Speaker 4 (56:58):
Let's not curry, I know what it is. That's dlt
curry on all socials. I want to thank mister Hodges
for coming on again. Yes, sir, I learned a lot.
Speaker 2 (57:06):
I know I learned a lot.
Speaker 4 (57:07):
So I know y'all learned a lot about the game,
about the culture.
Speaker 3 (57:10):
You can find me at Trebonne and at Trey on Instagram. Man,
I'm kind of jealous. I don't hoop no more because
I definitely would have would have been practicing worker though
about three now. Man, I learned so much sitting here
for you know, listening to both of y'all, you know
talk about a three point competition and just you know
what I mean, just different ways to shoot the rocker.
(57:30):
All right, listeners, thank you for tuning in. We encourage
feedback as always, tell a friend to tell a friend
to subscribe, rate and review. Leave us those comments. Let
us know who had the greatest top five. Even you
can pick mister Hodges if you want too, because he
definitely woke us up on Larry Bird, so I think
he got us both on this one. But yeah, follow Goat.
(57:51):
Make sure that you show us some love.
Speaker 2 (57:53):
Go go go.
Speaker 3 (58:02):
If you enjoyed this two parter featuring the multiple world
champion political icon Craig Hodgson, check out his book Long Shot,
The Triumphs and Struggles of an NBA Freedom Fighter. This
has been a Unanimous Media original. Goat was produced by
iHeart Podcasts and Unanimous Media. It was hosted by me
Trevon Edwards and Steph Curry. Executive produced by Stephen Curry
(58:23):
and Eric Payton. Co executive producer Kelenna Maria Cutney. The
executive producers at iHeart Podcasts are Sean Titone and Jason English.
This series was produced by Derek Jennings and Peter Kutter,
Co producer Kurt Redman. Original music by Jesse Woodard. Special
thanks to Stephen Curry and Will Pearson. Special shout out
(58:44):
to Scott Rochelle and the NBRPA for preserving our walking
libraries by granting access to their stories. Additional thanks to
Philip Alexander for his booking assistance on this episode. Gold
is a production of Unanimous Media and iHeart Podcasts. One
more podcasts from iHeartRadio visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
(59:05):
or wherever you get your podcasts.
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