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Sexy Moderator
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Brooklyn, NY
Posts: 12,235
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Nate Robinson: "I Can Never Imagine Playing Anywhere Else"
Quote:
Nate: "I can never imagine playing anywhere else."
As I said earlier this week, I caught up with Nate Robinson at his basketball camp up in Mt. Kisco. We've got a story running in the Sunday edition with the good stuff (be sure to check it out). But here I'll share with you what fell onto the cutting room floor....
On his MVP at the Las Vegas Summer League: “Summer league, it was my team. I was the point guard. It was different.”
On being the next starting PG of the Knicks, once Marbury does his Italian Beckham thing: “I just want to play. Period. Regardless if I’m going to be out there playing point guard or the two . . . Whoever’s out there, I just want to play. I want to be part of the team that is going to make the playoffs and send New York on a wonderful ride.”
On hearing his name come up in trade rumors: “I couldn’t imagine seeing me in another uniform. I love the Knicks. I love the colors, they’re my high school colors – orange and blue – I don’t know what else to say. I couldn’t see myself on another team.”
On playing at the Garden: "I can never imagine playing anywhere else."
On how a long offseason feels: “When you go home early, you have too much time on your hands. Watching all these teams playing, you think ‘We should be playing right now.’ It hurts inside knowing that our team, on paper, is ridiculous.”
On the Knick players getting together over the past few weeks at the MSG Training Center to work out: “My rookie year, guys didn’t come in. To be real, guys didn’t come in. My sophomore year, guys didn’t come in . . . Now, it’s like, guys are serious. Everybody that came in and worked out and played and been here. And that’s a good thing.”
The print edition story obviously goes much deeper. I was pretty up front with him about how I felt about his game. I told him I was one of his toughest critics (he nodded, nice to know he's reading!), but I explained why: You've got so much ability. God-given ability. Million dollar tools in a 10-cent toolbox.
Ya 5-foot nuthin. A-hundred an' nuthin . . .
Nate took it all in and gave good replies.
I can't get too excited, however. Training camp is still 5 weeks away. I need to see it to believe it. Sorry, my Daddy made me that way.
You know the class-clown is still there inside him, probably always will be. And he's good at running his game with the media. He knows what answers you are looking for. He plays the role. But if some of the things we talked about, things he's doing this offseason, are all legit, then Nate might have finally started growing up.
Might. Not having Steve Francis around will help things. Francis was known to mock the role as a bench player and get Nate to lose his focus on the bench, which always seemed to land him in Isiah's doghouse. I'll never forget Francis and Nate goofing off on the bench in Toronto when Isiah called Nate's number and Nate didn't hear him.
He heard him the second time, though.
"Nate! Stop f---ing around!"
There were those awful pregame practices, such as scoffing down greasy fast food, messing around on the court and focus-less catch-and-shoot routines that, for all intents and purposes, were nothing more than throwing balls into the air. I wrote about it during the season. Sure, the guy loves to have fun. I appreciate his ability to enjoy the moment and his love for interacting with kids.
But when it's time to get down to business and you don't take yourself seriously, who else is going to?
One Knick player approached me after the story ran and said, "Damn, you were rough on little Nate."
I replied, "But was it accurate?"
The player smiled. "I'm just saying you were a little rough. But you were also dead-on."
With all this still fresh in my memory, I closed the conversation with Nate this way:
"So you still shooting those half-court shots?"
"Always," he said without hesitation.
"C'mon, why?"
"I end my workouts that way," he said. "Gotta leave on a make. You can't walk off the court with a miss."
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http://weblogs.newsday.com/sports/ba...ine_playi.html
I can see Nate in another uniform, if he continues to act like an immature child. Let's see if he can show us that he has matured this season, but I won't hold my breath.
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"Behind every successful woman there is an astonished man." - Four Star General Ann E. Dunwoody
"Everyone is entitled to be stupid, but some abuse the privilege."
"Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity."
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Nate Robinson: "I Can Never Imagine Playing Anywhere Else"
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