Ice Cube Talks Big 3 and The Bay

The legendary Ice Cube is in studio with us to talk about his love for the Bay, and his Big 3 basketball tournament. 

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
What's what's what? You're gonna startthis thing off here in Oakland? You
know how happy I am about that. Hey, you know it's been a
minute since we've been back. Youknow, we haven't been on the West
Coast in a couple of years becauseof because of the schedule CBS give us
some times. You know, it'stoo early. You know they would give
us like one o'clock eastern. Yeah, that's nobody at that, no damned

(00:23):
building. So we got later startdates. So now we can play some
West Coast games. And our firstthought was like, we got to go
back to Oakland. Everybody running fromOakland, Well run back to Why you
keep saying that, because because man, these teams keep leaving Oakland. Oh
okay, are they talking about theteams? No? No, no,
no, come about the teams andleave. Maybe I need to be specific.

(00:48):
I'm being specific people. It's cool, But you're right though. People
are leaving over don't you know what. I think it's our just our political
people, like they don't know howto handle business. Yeah that's what it
is. That could that caun thatcould tear it down. Yeah sure.
And board of supervisors, man,you know they keep messing around and fiddling
with the money and it just ain'tmaking right, you know I'm talking about

(01:08):
Yeah, I'm glad you bringing basketballback to Oakland. Yeah, Audio thirty.
Yeah, man, what made youdecide? You know what, I'm
gonna go ahead and just kick thisthing off on my day? Well,
you know, it was a it'sa great day in the world in June
fifteenth, you know, it's anamazing day. So you know, it
all landed on the right time.You know, it was a slot when

(01:30):
when we ask CBS, see,we gotta kind of you know, figure
out what CBS has available as faras a slot for us, you know,
on Saturday or Sunday. So weworked through that out and they was
like, you know, can y'allstart on June fifteenth. I was like,
hell, yep, that'sday, that'stoday, let's start it off.

(01:52):
And it was cool because we waslike, yo, we could do a
West Coast game, right, Soeverybody was hollering, you know, l
A l A. I'm like,nah, we can get to l A,
but we need we need to dowe need to do the Bay and
Oakland. You know, Oakland wasto me, perfect spot, perfect spot,

(02:13):
you know what I mean. It'sgonna bring the energy the city needs.
And I was like, y'all gotsix games lined up for everybody tomorrow,
Man, kick it off early.It's gonna be are your full full
movement. Yeah yeah, you know, six games for the price of one.
You can't beat it. And youget you see the whole league,
yea, everybody that's in the league. You get a chance to see him
play. And so you know,that's what our vision was, like a

(02:36):
rolling All Star game where you know, it's like, you know, we
come in and you know, turnit out. I'm wondering, is the
All Star Game gonna have a MountWestmore performing? I went Snoopers in Canada
right now, and Fody he's somewhere. He probably off that line, you
know, he like, you knowwhat I mean, see off the earl,

(02:59):
off the earl Stevens. So yeah, yeah, but my man too
Short gonna come through, you know, show you know, he had to
bless us. And we have afew special guests to come through, a
few of uh you know, Oakland'sfinest. Put it that way. You
gotta surprise us, then not gonnatell us. I'm not gonna tell you

(03:19):
because they may not show up.On time. You know what I'm saying.
So you know right now they're tellingme they coming, So you know
what I mean when they get therein our brag about it. Okay,
if they say they're coming, theyprobably coming. Yeah, most of the
time they do. But you neverknow, you know, when it comes
to celebrities, some come up anduh, you know, you gotta happened
with me. You know, I'mplanning on going somewhere and doing something.

(03:43):
Some come up and I gotta Igotta switch riels. Be lifing, right,
That's what I'm saying. Yeah,so how we turn it up for
the birthday? Though, you gota special bottles in it that I gotta
get into. Yeah, you know, we got it going down. You
know what's gonna be fun in there. And you know, to me,
my birthday present is the Big Three. It's like I don't had a lot

(04:06):
of birthday parties and I'm glad tobe here in Oakland with the Big Three
and getting a chance to uh,you know, my family's here so I
get a chance to hang out withthem. I got it. I got
a family in Oakland. You know, my cousin Dale deal, his mom's

(04:28):
still live in Oakland. My auntie, Auntie Stella. Yeah, aunt Stella,
she's still living in Oakland and hopefullywe get her out to the game
tomorrow. Yeah. Seven seasons strongwith this thing. Seven seasons man,
you know it's like, uh,I remember when you started it, Like
like that, we almost a decadein. It's really eight seasons for us

(04:50):
because because we didn't have a season, you know, in twenty twenty,
COVID came through. So we've beenon this, you know, eight years
as a league, you know,nine and a half maybe ten, just
planning to get you know, getthere. So you know, we almost

(05:11):
got a decade of pig three man. And I saw you just got to
honor as well from the NBA.Bro got your own award, Like,
how was that experience? Yeah,well it's actually from the Natesmith Hall of
Fame out in Springfield, Massachusetts,and so it's you know, it's called
the Ice QB Impact Award. Iwas blown away. You know, I

(05:34):
never thought in a million years thatI would be in the Basketball Hall of
Fame for something. And it's coolbecause it's an award they're gonna give out
every year to a deserving, youknow, person that uses basketball to make
people lives better. So it's gonnabe cool to honor you know, somebody

(05:54):
every year have finalists and you know, kind of get him some shine.
People that you know, you don'tsee. You know, it's the behind
the scenes people that that you don'tsee that still contribute to the game,
to the game, you know,at the highest level, you know,
whether they and I heard of youknow a janitor. Uh it was a

(06:15):
junior high in Louisiana and they didn'thave nobody that wanted to coach the team,
and the janitor up. The janitorstepped up and coached the team and
they won the championship. So it'slike, you know them kind of people
out there like that need they needprops, they need shine, they need

(06:39):
some light on them. So youknow, we're looking for people you know
like that that's you know, doingthe work, nobody watching, you know,
and uh, but we're watching,so hopefully we can put some line
on some cool people. He waswe were talking about the Olympics and how
they like didn't have Caitlin, whichwas like insane to me, Like I

(07:00):
don't even understand, like somebody hassomething against her or you know what I
mean, Like how she's like thebiggest name in the w you know,
in women's basketball in the States,and you don't have her represent the team
like that was crazy. So well, we also know you were trying to
get her on was trying to gether. You know. With the Olympics,
it's a different thing. You know, they're they got there. They're

(07:21):
focused on gold medals. They're focusedon gold medals. You know, I
get like publicity and all that stuffhas come secondary. So if they feel
like they got a team of experiencedplayers, that's that's worked hard to get
there. You know, who doyou pull out to put a rookie end

(07:44):
who hasn't done anything? You know? So uh, I mean, you
know it's it's cool for publicity,but the fact, you know, can't
she play on that level yet?You know, it is the question,
Uh can she contribute to winning agold medal? That's what the Olympics is

(08:05):
thinking of what the little young girlthey put on there though Sabrina there steps
God, how long has she beenpart of the program. I don't even
know she's been in the league.Probably I think it's like her third you
know, he means like Olympics.Yeah, it's like it's like a trial
run thing that you gotta do.But you know that's the issue. Yeah,

(08:26):
that's the issue. Our issue is. I mean, she chose just
to go to the w n bA. You know, it would have
been a major shake up for herto come into Big three and and she
would have had to, you know, play against our athletes, and maybe
she wasn't with it. You know, maybe she was just you know,

(08:48):
wanting to go and in her youknow, the path that she was.
Yeah. Yeah, so this wasthis was something that came from left field.
And but we you know, wewe would have love to have her,
you know, we we think shewould have definitely raised the the the
profile of the league in a lotof ways, opened up a lot of

(09:11):
sponsor dollars for the league for therest of the players. So you know,
it was a big swing, Butwe knew it was a long shot
too, don't That's right. Shecould have she could have been like yep
and been like okay, you know, here comes Nike and everybody else,
and you know, she got themdollars thing god, because they don't get

(09:31):
paid n b A right, right, which was dope. He was really
offering her bag. Yeah, yeah, you know. Yeah, yeah,
we wanted to. We say wechanging the game, we want to change
it for the better. And uhwe wanted to you know, really put
a light on the the salary andcompensation that women are getting in sports that

(09:54):
it needs to be raised. Yeah, yeah, agreed, agree to half
man. Yet it's like a droppingthe bucket to it's nothing really well,
you know, the w n V, the w n b A is not
in profit, so you know,there's still losing money. So you know,

(10:16):
it's kind of like, you know, until your league can stand on
his own feet that those dollars arenot gonna be there. Yeah, the
brands aren't up, the franchises aren'tthey're not selling jerseys out and stuff like
that, like Steph Wood or forthe Warriors or whatever. What's up with
this pose with Jack in the box. You don't get my chicken tato meal,

(10:37):
you know what I mean? Thatmunchy meal meal, Yeah, that
cute bunchie meal. Yeah, youknow, oh man, all kind of
good stuff. You know, youcan get that chicken tater milk, get
yours like me with no hog youknow what I'm saying. The curly fries.
Uh, I think there's a tacklein there and something some Yeah,

(10:58):
man, you know few hungry?What else you're gonna eat? McDonald's that
got everything? Yeah, McDonald's.If it's jacket box man, go to
get that cute much of men?I like. I just like the photo.
I say, you sitting there withJack and Jack got the gangs,
the mug on the my said,oh god, outside with it? You
real? What's the last time youfreestyle? I don't freestyle? Why not?

(11:22):
I'm not a free styler. Okay, I was gonna try to drop
not like us and see if youspi something. No, I'm not a
free styler, man. I meanyou know, everybody got their different skill
sets. You know what I mean. I'm a writer, So okay,
how come how come every time youcome up here, bro drake in a
in a rap beat? I knowevery time, uh twice. You know,

(11:45):
when you're on top everybody going thatyou. You know what I'm saying,
When you're on top of everybody goingat you and me, it's ahead.
But people are saying that Kendrick didthe smartest thing, like just you
know, they're not like us.Who's who's Drake ripping Canada? Yeah?
I mean, I mean you know, Kendrick West Coast, we got the

(12:05):
rude with the West Coast, andyou know he came with like he got
about folk bangers, you know whatI mean. And so you can't beat
that with a stick. You know, it's like it's almost overkilled. Yeah,
yeah, so you were you wereyou proud of the product that the
that the young La boy put outthough, at least yeah, definitely proud

(12:28):
of you know, anybody that canhandle theirs and the beef. Yeah,
you know, you got a salute. You know, it's long as it
don't go to the streets. Aslong as it you know, because there's
rap and then there's just crime.So as long as it don't go into
crime and it's just staying wax,you know, it's great. It's part

(12:48):
of the tradition of the game.You know, goes back to the early
days with Busy B and c OD and l L and Kumo and carras
one. So you know, it'sit's really part of the tradition of the
game. And you know, ifyou're in it long enough, sooner or

(13:09):
later, you know what I mean, somebody gonna call your number. I
have to show them what you goton the mic, So you're gonna put
that out like us, like justover no vassaline over nothing, nothing is
better than you know what I mean. It's one EMC myself, I took
out four of them and the manageryou can't be Yeah, so funny.

(13:37):
So what's next. I know we'regonna keep Big Three going, Big three
rolling, gonna drop my new albumMan down really yeah, yeah, Now
I'm coming this summer. What wetalk about on that, what I talk
about, you know what I mean? You know West Coast, Uh,
living in life and life in general, and you know, observing what's going

(14:01):
on out here nowadays. So youknow, I dig it. It's a
nice record. Yeah, it's anice record. Yeah, but it's all
about the Big Three tomorrow. It'sall about the Big Three. Everybody needs
to show up, come hang outwith us, you know what I mean.
Doors open at noon, man,you better be Everybody up here,

(14:22):
better be up in there. Weneed the whole town there because I don't
we don't know when we're coming backto Oakland. It took us four or
five years to get back from thefirst time we came. So man,
see it in person for sure.If you can't get there at least check
us out on CBS or X.Yeah, exactly. You ain't got nothing

(14:46):
to do it. We got gamesall day. Like I said, we're
gonna be on X, which wasTwitter. You know when when the games
are now on CBS, man,check us out on X. You know
what I'm saying, go to theBig three channel right there? Yeah,
I think I'm rooting for that threeheaded monster. Last time they was bawling
out. Yeah, three headed monsters. They they revamped their squad. Now

(15:09):
now Rashard Lewis is the coach.He was he was you know, he
was our twenty seventeen MVP and theymade it to the championship three times but
didn't win. So he's coaching.Now. We got Jeff tg as the
player captain and he's playing with hisbrother. Uh. They bringing in a

(15:31):
couple of other guys. That gotGreg Monroe, who's doing the league too,
So they got us. You know, they revamped their squad. We'll
see what they do. You know, usually takes it takes guys about three
games to really understand how to planthe Big Three, you know, so
we'll see. I'm here for Yeah, I'm excited, man, about to
go down. So so we gothim playing the Aliens. So you got

(15:54):
the Tigue brother playing Paul Millsap andhis brother. So so you got the
t Brothers versus the Millsap brothers tomorrow, and we got to rematch her the
championship. We got the Enemies playingJoe Johnson, who's the three time MVP.
He playing the Triplets tomorrow. Imean he playing Enemies tomorrow. They

(16:15):
lost, and they lost the championshipin London last year, so they want
some revenge. Let's go. Yeah, take it out on the court,
and we're gonna honor Rick Berry,you know, a Hall of Famer,
and Gary Payton even though he playedfor the SuperSonics. Yeah, but he's
still from Okland, you know whatI mean. Salute, Salute the Hall

(16:37):
of Famers tomorrow, Great Dead,Big Three Action. Yeah, bringing Jay
Rich back to Oakland. I'm herefor Yeah, come on through, man.
You know it's an affordable ticket.You can you can bring the whole
family. It ain't like you know, NBA game. You can. Yeah,
you can take one buddy, youknow, maybe, but here you

(16:57):
can get to kids and neighbor kids, kids from down the street. Bring
them off. Come on, youdidn't say bad ass kids. Yeah,
bring on, bring bad ass kidson that man, you ain't got nothing
better to do. Get them outthe house.