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"Me as a backup center? Hell no."
- Dikembe Mutombo, on possibly coming off the bench for the Nets
during the playoffs.
"I still have my quickness, but I turn it on and off. I don't want to
fail in anything I do and that's why I'm hard on myself."
- Kenny Anderson.
"It's very hard. You have to prepare for it. A lot of people say, 'I
can do this, I can do that.' But that's hard. You're looking into a
camera and you're not seeing anybody. You've got to talk to people that
you can't see. That's the toughest part."
- Tim Hardaway, on his work as an ESPN studio analyst.
"I never said that San Antonio had all these fat women. That has been
bothering me. All these women who think I said they were fat, I apologize.
Then when I go to Dallas people tell me that I have nothing good to
say about Dallas. First of all I think Dallas has a good team. I feel
bad they think that. You think LA has the best-looking women in the
crowd... they do, but they are not real ... they are made out of plastic.
For normal women, who have their own God given bodies, Dallas has the
best looking women in the NBA. Unfortunately, I am not going to get
to see anymore of them in Dallas."
- Barkley.
"Look at my teeth. While I was growing up, I was unable to get the work
on my teeth done that I needed. So the goal is to take care of kids
who can't afford to go to the dentist."
- Eric Williams, on why he's starting a charity foundation.
"It was fabricated by someone in the media. It was very convenient it
came out the day of the game. It was a...comment started by someone
in the Pistons' organization to get them fired up. I heard I said it
on TV. I heard I said it on the radio. I heard I said it in a Houston
newspaper. There hasn't been anybody that can tell me where it came
from."
- Richard Jefferson, after being played a tape of him saying
that Detroit is the most overrated team in the Eastern Conference.
"Not being able to rebound better was a thorn in our foot."
- Gary Payton.
"When Boston and Orlando told me they were going to pick me at 21 and
22, I figured I don't need to do a workout for a second -round team.
Boston and Orlando never drafted me because they said I was too skinny
and no European point guard will make it in the League."
- Tony Parker.
"I kind of knew Cleveland was going to get the No. 1 pick. I think they
rigged it. No, don't quote me on that."
- Carmelo Anthony.
"Sometimes I look like I was under interrogation. Some people just don't
look good in clothes. In New York, Armani and all those clothing people
used to call me up and tried to pay me not to wear their clothes. This
is as good as it's going to get...and then it's all downhill. I'll be
fine. I never feel as bad as I look."
- Jeff Van Gundy.
"[LeBron] was banging those little boys around in high school, but once
he goes against the men, they're going to beat his butt and make him
cry."
- Charley Rosen.
"From a business perspective, it's great for the NBA. It's reality television,
people love train-wreck television and you hate to admit it, but that
is the truth, that's the reality today."
- Mark Cuban, on Kobe Bryant being on trial.
"I'd probably hire me."
- George Karl, on who he'd hire to replace him in Milwaukee.
"Anybody who plays in this league and hasn't won a championship is the
same. Charles Barkley? He's the same player as I am, because he didn't
win it all. The guys who have won it all, and I don't care who they
are, are two steps above the rest of us."
- Grant Long.
"I make teams win."
- Scot Pollard.
"We call those people player-haters."
- Jalen Rose, on critics who say that he and Scottie Pippen can't
co-exist.
"I wouldn't have been scared to go to the West. Nobody scares me."
- Jason Kidd, who decided not to go to the West.
"He was in a golf outfit, but I think he looks very lean."
- Jim O'Brien, Celtics coach, on seeing Vin Baker over the summer.
"Have you seen the And 1 Tour on TV? That's ruining the game for a generation
of kids by convincing them that's basketball. It's not basketball. It's
pure entertainment. It's not bad for what it is. But it's not going
to help the U.S. reclaim its spot at the top of the basketball world.
It's not going to help advance the game."
- Calvin Murphy, Hall of Famer.
"I wasn't like, I really want to stop this guy. There are some guys
on my team that said, 'I want to guard him. I want to guard him.' I
let them if they wanted to do it."
- Boris Diaw, Hawks guard, on playing against LeBron James in
a summer league game.
"None"
- Gary Payton, on his experience running the triangle offense.
"You need me, I need you. You come to L.A., we rule that world."
- Shaq, to Karl Malone, convincing him to sign with the Lakers.
"Even if you score 57 points against the Sisters of the Poor, you're
still doing pretty good. I'm happy Ricky is playing, and I'm looking
forward to him come back and being a part of this thing."
- Paul Silas, after Ricky Davis went off while playing for the
SLAM team in the LA Summer Pro League.
"I didn't want to be like some of these other guys to jump on another
team's bandwagon just to get a ring. That's never been my style."
- Reggie Miller, on re-signing with the Indiana Pacers.
"If I was coming in here and playing 10 minutes a night, that's riding
a coattail. I'll tell you what, I wasn't pulling against the Lakers,
but it made my decision a lot easier when they didn't win. When I heard
Reggie make his decision, I like Reggie and I won't elaborate, but I'll
say this: He had opportunity to do what I did and take less money. But
he chose to make more money and stay where he was at. So, God bless
him and God bless me. At some point, somebody had to make some statement
to say it's not all about the money all the time. Now, I don't want
to hide the fact it wouldn't have been nice to make $10 million a year.
Don't get me wrong. But how is that to the regular fan now? But, Reggie,
Reggie stayed in Indiana for the money. He stayed for the money, I didn't.
So let him keep talking. I did hear, 'I'm just glad to end my career
where I started.' Reggie, just say you stayed for the money."
- Karl Malone, responding to Reggie Miller's claim that he was
riding Shaq's coattails in L.A.
"When people talk about Katharine Hepburn, she's called an icon. She
had an affair for 20 years, but Kobe is called a slut. And what about
Rudolph Giuliani? He had two women fighting to get into the (New York)
mayor's mansion. But Kobe is a slut."
- Charles Barkley.
"I didn't know I had this many fans in Puerto Rico. I'm going to carry
this memory to my grave."
- Allen Iverson.
"Take that juice and you're clear."
- Lamar Odom, on how to beat the NBA's drug tests.
"I love Lamar. But at some point in time he's got to make the decision
over what's more important, getting high or his career that's going
to get him a $70 million contract."
- Alvin Gentry, former Clippers coach, on Lamar Odom.
"That's my peripheral."
- Vince Carter, after narrowly ducking out of the way of a mini-basketball
fired at his head by a kid in the stands in Puerto Rico during Olympic
qualifying.
"It was hot, and when I got my ice cream, I had a big cup that I couldn't
wait to get to. But the first scoop tasted terrible. It spoiled my day."
- Allen Iverson, on how he endured the blackout in New York City.
"I tried to call the guys in the city to come out to my home, but cellphones
weren't working. Yeah, I guess I had it good, sitting there with the
A/C watching the flatscreen TV and taking a warm shower."
- Elton Brand, who stayed with his family in Westchester and
had power within one hour of the blackout.
"I'm never compared to the Mailman -- but I can deliver."
- Keon Clark.
"I started despising him. We sat down a lot, but it always ended up
being him talking and me listening."
- Ray Allen, on George Karl.
"It sucks. It really does."
- Doc Rivers, on the Nets signing Alonzo Mourning.
"It's good that I became a pro early, too, because I was doing some
real stupid things as a kid growing up in Compton, Calif. I remember
me and my cousins walking across a rusty metal pipe that spanned across
a ditch that was 50 to 75 feet deep. Pipes like that ran from mountain
to mountain. I walked part of the way, stopped because I'm scared of
heights and crawled the rest of the way. The pipe was about 50 yards
long and 24 inches in diameter. But if I had slipped and fallen off
that pipe, I could have gotten killed. So maybe turning pro saved me
because it took me away from doing silly, dangerous stuff like that."
- Tyson Chandler, on why it's good that he went pro after high
school.
"If I had a player out of line, I would bench him. That's all you can
do, bench him. You don't kiss nobody's rear end, because it stinks."
- Ron Artest.
Kobe: "I definitely don't need any advice on how to play my game."
Shaq: "As we start this new season we want (stuff) done right,
(stuff) has to get done right. If you don't like it then you can opt
out next year. As long as it's my team I'll voice my opinion. If you
don't like it, opt out. Yeah (it's my team). Everybody knows that. You
guys [the media] may give it to (Bryant) like you've given him everything
else his whole lifetime, but this is The Diesel's ship."
"(Kobe) and I didn't let it become so public. There is always a couple
of guys always trying to the extra story. We were told not to say anything,
but (ESPN's) Mr. Jim Gray, trying to be Mr. Enquirer, like he always
does, got something that probably wasn't supposed to be repeated and
he wanted to be a hero, so he printed it. But nothing is going to break
me ... no one is going to break me. I'm going to be me and I'm going
to do what I do. Right now we are 1-0 and we just want to stay focused
and continue to win."
- Shaq, on the Kobe situation.
"I think the stuff that was said is a little personal, and let me say
this, if y'all ever call me fat on the air I'm going to beat the hell
out of you. There is going to be some hell breaking loose on this set."
- Charles Barkley, on the comments by Bryant and O'Neal.
"You're not paying me enough for this [stuff]."
- Karl Malone, on what he told Shaq and Kobe during their feud.
"I like my fish fried, died and laid to the side."
- Keyon Dooling, on eating sushi.
"They make teriyaki here?"
- Chris Kaman, on visiting Japan.
"Going through the whole process of negotiation was a little stressful.
It goes back and forth, back and forth."
- Desmond Mason, telling us what we already know.
"If he had been at The Alamo, they might have won. He would have convinced
them they were better than the other guys."
- Doc Rivers, on Drew Gooden's confidence.
"I don't want to clarify. Listen, we've all been here seven years, I
say sh*t. I'll never clarify it. That's your job to figure it out...I'm
not going to elaborate why two plus two is four. That's just the answer.
You figure out why two plus two is four."
- Shaq, after saying that Phil Jackson is no longer part of his
life.
"Even last year I was watching the Celtics and I could see the offense
was disheveled."
- Kenny Anderson.
"That's happens in practice all the time. He knows it, too. You can
ask him."
- Bostjan Nachbar, after making a tough dunk while having to
go around his teammate Yao Ming.
"I will make him shut up."
- Yao Ming.
"When he took the job, he said in the press conference that we could
work together. Then he fired me after one phone call and one meeting
because he said we could not work together. Is that telling the truth?
I don't want to get into a tit-for-tat debate with Larry. But I have
to defend my work ethic when somebody challenges it."
- Isiah Thomas, on Larry Bird.
"He's not bad."
- Ron Artest, on Carmelo Anthony.
"I don't like baseball, but I love Sammy Sosa, and he deserves a championship.
Baseball's too boring. I went out one day when I was a kid to play baseball
and never came back. I was in the outfield bored out of my mind. And
I'll never let my kids play. It's too boring. I want something up and
down, like football or track or basketball. Baseball guys sure get a
lot of money for standing in the outfield."
- Bobby Jackson.
"The AI offense...get the ball to AI and clear out."
- Kevin Ollie, on the offense they ran when he was playing in
Philly.
"I haven't returned a phone call since I've been in the league. Whether
it's Mark Cuban or Jerry West."
- Nick Van Exel.
"I just cut the hair to get off to a fresh start, to start over. We're
going into a new arena. We have a new coach. I wanted to start over
and just be done with last year. I just thought cutting my hair off
was just me changing."
- Moochie Norris, on cutting off his hair.
"Right now, he thinks he's Toni Kukoc. I want him to play like Bill
Russell but I don't think he knows who Bill Russell is."
- Larry Brown, on Darko Milicic.
"Y'all nosy."
- LeBron James, after reporters insisted on asking him about
Ricky Davis.
"And one thing I know we miss is his passing. He made some great passes.
He hit guys who were open. He was a great passer."
- Don Chaney, waxing poetic about Latrell Sprewell.
"It's not like he is playing a blind man or a guy with an English accent.
It should come naturally."
- Calvin Andrews, Carmelo Anthony's agent, on 'Melo making his
acting debut playing a basketball star from a gritty background.
"[We're] running on bloody stumps because we are shooting ourselves
in the foot repeatedly."
- Jeff Van Gundy, on the Rockets effort.
"He was basically like Ron Artest from last season. He's got his Super
Bowl ring, right? They gave him all his money, right? Now he can use
the time off to go get his attitude right."
- Ron Artest, on Keyshawn Johnson getting deactivated by the
Buccaneers.
"I don't give a [expletive] about trade rumors. As long as somebody
CTC at the end of the day, I'm with them."
- Rasheed Wallace (CTC stands for "Cuts The Check").
"Before this year I knew he was one of the best centers in the NBA.
Now I have to find out if he's a good teacher. We've only just started
so I'll have to tell you later."
- Yao Ming, on Rockets assistant coach Patrick Ewing.
"You guys are driving me [bleeping] crazy. It's not about Dikembe. I'm
coaching the team. I'm telling you if there's a matchup problem, and
you still don't understand it. Why should I waste my breath?"
- Don Chaney, after the Knicks beat writers asked why he benched
Mutombo in back-to-back games.
"I'm trying to help you guys out. You write about the game but evidently
you don't know the game. You ask me questions. I'm trying to give you
an idea of what it's about and you still don't listen to me. I don't
like wasting my time. If you ask me something, you should listen to
me or you should watch the game. That's all I want you to do."
- Don Chaney, again.
"There are nights when I can see his warts, his deficiencies. Sometimes
you want him to not take the gambles with the pass that he does. Maybe
too many turnovers. Sometimes you say, 'What in the world is he thinking?'
or 'Is he thinking at all?'"
- Don Nelson, on Antoine Walker.
"There's a whole lot of crunching numbers that, quote-unquote, me as
an athlete and me as an NBA player should know. In my opinion, they
just want to draft n*ggers who are dumb and dumber -- straight out of
high school. That's why they're drafting all these high school cats,
because they come into the league and they don't know no better. They
don't know no better, and they don't know the real business, and they
don't see behind the charade."
- Rasheed Wallace.
"That must be an Ohio thing. They would laugh at me back home if I wore
a mink coat. But LeBron looked good in it. It sure made him look like
he has a lot of money."
- Darius Miles, on LeBron wearing a white mink coat on Monday
Night football.
"I play using everybody, but most of the time I play with Atlanta [quarterback]
Mike Vick. He's a Nike player. Make sure you note that."
- LeBron James, on playing Madden 2004.
"He was having a great game, and before that I told him that he was
a gutsy player. But this time, I don't know what made me say it, but
I just told him 'I love you.' I just said it to him. I don't know what
makes me say those things, but I told him I love him, because I could
see it in him that he was doing whatever it took for us to win that
basketball game."
- Mo Cheeks, on Damon Stoudamire.
"Dennis Rodman may be incoherent for much of ESPN's reality side show
about his life, but you still have a better chance of understanding
him than Stephen A. Smith."
- Peter Vecsey.
"I'll bet that if you have a meal in the ESPN cafeteria it would feature
stale rolls and two-day-old coffee."
- Dr. Z, Sports Illustrated columnist.
"They're not so happy because I don't find Krispy Kreme. They want Krispy
Kreme. I like the Dunkin' Donuts. What's wrong with them? I don't know
where the Krispy Kreme store is. I have to find one."
- Boris Diaw, on disappointing his Hawks teammates by not doing
his rookie duties correctly.
"It's laughable, but it's not funny"
- Damon Stoudamire, on Zach Randolph getting arrested on marijuana
charges.
"Getting elbows in the face - I've missed that."
- Elton Brand, after Melvin Ely busted his lip in his first practice
back from injury.
"That was cold-blooded."
- Paul Pierce, on Kenyon Martin making fun of Alonzo Mourning's
kidney disease.
"We'll put it in our scouting report, maybe it'll help us next
time."
- Jalen Rose after Kobe dropped 81 points on the Raptors.
"I'm not going to argue with you, Ernie. I'll hit you in the left
eye."
- Charles Barkley to Ernie Johnson during halftime of the Cleveland-Houston
game on TNT
"People touching me. On our team we got a lot of young guys and
they always want to poke at you and tickle you and stuff and I really
hate that."
- Eddy Curry on his pet peeves
"I'm not the best rapper in the NBA. Elton Brand is better than
me. Stephen Jackson is better than me. Troy Hudson is nice. Troy Hudson
has fire."
- Ron Artest
"Anytime you bring Michael Olowokandi on to your team, disaster
is soon to follow."
- Bill Walton
"I've been clean since I've been in the league, I've been clean
since I've been in college, I've been clean since I've been in high
school, middle school, elementary school. I'm just cleaner than clean.
I'm cleaner than Pine-Sol."
- Sonics F Reggie Evans in response to the drug test he was required
to take at halftime
"Honestly, this is probably going to strike a nerve with a lot
of people. But my most memorable Christmas memory was having all of
my uncles and aunties out of prison for one Christmas, and that includes
me. We had a lot of run-ins with the law, and to have us all out at
one time was great."
- Wizards forward Caron Butler
"By the time we got [to Detroit], it was almost 2 in the morning,
because ain't nothing open but hospitals, jails and legs."
- Jalen Rose
"I'm telling you, Darko is a Serbian gangster. Darko's got some
bodies back there [in Serbia-Montenegro]. He can go psycho on guys."
- Rasheed Wallace on teammate Darko Milicic
"I cherished getting kicked out of school. It was a great thing.
I became a millionaire."
- Heat G Jason Williams on what he cherishes about his days at
the University of Florida
"He's not 20 years old. No way. I'm going to have to see a birth
certificate or something."
- Antawn Jamison, on LeBron James of the Cleveland Cavaliers
"I don't see it happening unless every NBA player is given a stipend
to buy clothes."
- Marcus Camby (who will make $7.15 million this season) on the
NBA invoking a new dress code
"We don't know where the cutoff is, maybe if you earn less than
$8 million, you'll get a scholarship from the commissioner."
- David Stern's answer to Marcus Camby's request for a clothing
stipend
"I don't think it's too likely, because I'm not a very good basketball
player."
- Mark Pope on his chances of making the Nuggets' roster
"You want me to take the time to count 'em? No comment."
- Jalen Rose, when asked how many of his Raptors teammates are
question marks
"This is my first summer [with] no trouble. I ain't go to jail
for speeding. Didn't go to jail for DUI. I didn't break my foot. I didn't
break my other foot. I'm one step ahead of the game already."
- Kwame Brown
"The one thing I've noticed about our new uniforms is the players
aren't complaining too much. If they're happy, we're happy. Even Stephen
Jackson looks good."
- Larry Bird on the Pacers' new uniforms
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