When it comes to the most "regrettable" players in NBA history, I believe that many people will immediately think of Greg Auden, Blanton Lowy, Derrick Ross and other names, and more senior fans may also think of Maddy, Anfini Hardaway or Ray Bass. They have all briefly demonstrated the talent and momentum of the ruling alliance, making people have unlimited reverie, but for various reasons they quickly stopped at the highest peak, as short and beautiful as fireworks, which is not left to sigh.
The most representative of these is "Mr. Perfect" Grant Hill.
Among the many "Jordan successors", Grant Hill is arguably the one who has the best chance of carrying the NBA flag in the post-Jordan era. With an all-round style, humorous conversation and good image, it quickly swept the league after entering the NBA in 1994, setting off a whirlwind of Grant Hill in the mid-90s. But he injured his ankle at the peak of his career, an injury that plagued him later in his career and made Grant Hill no longer the Grant Hill he had been.
Although the injury changed the direction of his career, Grant Hill still fought in the NBA for 18 seasons, from the absolute main force in the early stages of his career, to the top blue-collar who turned defensive priority after the injury, waiting for Nash balls in the bottom corner, even compared to those who have not been seriously injured, Grant Hill still has a fairly successful and long-lived career.
After his retirement, Grant Hill was not idle, and after his retirement in 2013, he successively played different roles such as program host, narrator and team shareholder, but his most well-known identity now should be the general manager of the US men's basketball team, and even after retirement, he still contributed to the basketball circle.
Although he has often jumped in front of the fluorescent screen in recent years, Grant Hill rarely talks in public about his injuries, during the darkest period of his life. It wasn't until this year, when Grant Hill gave interviews to Podcasts to promote his new book, that we had the opportunity to glimpse his physical or psychological pain and struggles during that time. From the interview, it can be seen that even after many years, Grant Hill is still angry that he can't be the player he should have been because of the injury. Feel that he is obviously the scene of this year's Cleveland Star Game, but he can only watch the NBA 75 stars who should be a member of the audience to receive praise and applause of the indescribable sadness.
Here are a few of the stories that impressed me the most in the interview, so that we can get a glimpse of the challenges and changes in mood that Grant Hill faced at various stages of his career, and also get to know more about the real Grant Hill:
The first time he shot an advertisement with the young Kobe, Kobe directly rewrote the script on the spot
It happened in 1998, when Kobe Bryant had a second season of significant improvement, but Grant Hill was already a first-line star in the league. Therefore, before the advertising cooperation for Sprite, although he did not have a personal relationship with Kobe, Grant Hill, who was older, more famous in the league, would naturally treat Kobe as a younger brother, but he obviously did not know Kobe Bryant too well.
After flying to the set to meet the staff, the ad was delayed, and a staff member came to ask Grant Hill if he could wait a little longer because Kobe was rewriting the script. Grant Hill was stunned at first, but complied with Kobe. It wasn't until the start of filming that he found out that Kobe had changed all the good lines to his side. Grant Hill was not happy at this time, telling the staff that it was not the same as the conditions he had negotiated before he flew in, and if the script was like this, he would not shoot it, and finally coordinated a script that both agreed.
In 1996, the invincible Dream Team actually didn't want anyone to score
The 1996 Atlanta Olympics is the third major international event since the U.S. men's basketball team began to recruit NBA players, compared to the previous two Olympic Games in Barcelona in 1992 and the World Basketball Championships held in Toronto in 1994, this time as a landlord, there is no need to lose the gold medal at home in any case, so the U.S. team can be said to be elite, snaring the 12 NBA momentary choices at that time, a total of five MVPs. In the end, it also lived up to expectations, with a disparity of 20 points per game, not only successfully achieved the mission of defending the gold medal, but also became the classic team of the strongest American team in history alongside the "Dream Team" for many years.
What outsiders don't know is that the dream team that looks like a team in the game, in fact, no one wants to be the one with the highest score in the team, because then they will receive a drug test notification the next day and spend hours waiting for the drug test results. The only player who was notified of the drug test every game was Carl Malone, and Grant Hill said it took them a few games to find out that the highest scorer would be tested with Carl Malone, so in the later games everyone started passing the ball to each other, and in the outside world they were a rather selfless team, in fact, no one wanted to be the one with the highest score.
When asked who would win the 1992 Dream Team against the 1996 Dream Team, Grant Hill thought that deducting the duplicate 6 people did not count, although they did not have MJ, but no one could stop O'Neal, he and Anfinley Hardaway were also a trouble, and there was also Reggie Miller and Mitch Richmond, which should be a fierce duel.
The Orlando Big Three, Duncan joined to break the truth
It may be hard to imagine now, but Duncan almost put on the Orlando Magic jersey. Grant Hill and Duncan had the same agent and they went to Orlando together, and Grant Hill said Duncan was probably more determined than he was because he had New York and other teams thinking about it at the time, but Duncan would have wanted to join the Magic if he had left the Spurs. So they went to Orlando and received a great treat, and the Magic played quite well that year, led by Doug Rivers, and won more than 50%. Everything was pretty good, the conversation went pretty well, and Grant Hill felt like there was a real chance of playing with Maddie and Duncan.
But after a dinner everything changed. Duncan's girlfriend asked Doug Rivers a question: Can a player's wife or girlfriend get on the team plane? Although this is common now, it was not possible at the time. Doug Rivers told her it wasn't going to happen, it was work and he wouldn't allow it. Grant Hill didn't know at the time that the Spurs were already letting the player's wife and girlfriend fly on the team, and thought it was a boring question, not understanding what she was asking to do, but didn't care too much.
Back at the hotel, Grant Hill's wife told Grant Hill that Duncan wouldn't be coming. Grant Hill asked her what she meant? She told Grant Hill that when Duncan's girlfriend asked the question, the answer changed her whole body language, and Grant Hill still didn't care. I can't imagine that the end sentence will become a slur.
After experiencing a major injury, the state of mind changed from anger to relief
Around 1996, Grant Hill considered himself the best player in the league at the time, adding that as long as you're a star or a role player, no matter who your opponent is, every time you step on the field, you have to think of yourself as the best player in the league. But during the four years (2000-2004) when he was injured, he lost that mentality.
Grant Hill says that when a player of his rank spends four years recuperating from injury, you can naturally start to doubt yourself, and that time has led him from thinking of himself as "the best player in the league" to "being grateful to play." Although it was quite a beautiful thing to be able to continue to fight on the field, at that time, his body, mind and soul were severely damaged, and he could not go back to his previous state.
In the fall of 2004, just after a full season absence, Grant Hill returned to his alma mater, Duke University, to find his mentor, Coach K, who asked him, "Who are the top five stars in the league today?" ”
Grant Hill replied, "O'Neill, Kobe, AI..."
Coach K asked him again, "Who are the next five?" ”
He went on like this, and then Coach K told him: You listed about 20 people, but you didn't mention yourself. That's where he was at the time, when he came back from injury, he just wanted to be a part of the team, and while he was grateful to continue playing, looking back now, he had completely lost that attitude of dominating the league in his mind.
After the Detroit injury, he thought there might have been some miscalculation of the situation at the time, allowing him to bring the injury into the battle, which led to the accumulation and worsening of the injury, which exploded in the last season of the live team, and then underwent surgery. Although injured, he is still the object of pursuit by many teams, and it was not a big deal to open the knife, but after coming to the Magic team, he was originally expected to return in December, but because of some communication problems, he made an early comeback in September. As a result, it took an additional three years to recover, during which time there were three more surgeries, and Grant Hill admits that if he had followed the pace step by step, the results might have been completely different.
The experience of the past few years has changed his mentality and made him feel extremely precious that he can still play.
At the age of 27, at the peak of his prime, this kind of thing happened, and although Grant Hill often advocated living in the moment, he could not do it physically or psychologically at the time, he always had to constantly find a way to get back on the field to continue to fight, he was only angry at the time, why only give him six years, and no longer give him more time to see what he can achieve. As a player, he couldn't let go, he was always fighting to get back on the field, and he didn't have time to look back and see what he had achieved.
Returning from injury and playing nine more seasons, Grant Hill thinks it's more than anything he's accomplished in his previous career, because he knows what he's been through, but he never realizes how much the injury affected him psychologically, he hasn't been able to let go, it's too difficult to put it down and look back at the experience, Grant Hill had a chance to write his own legend, and although he has a great career, he instinctively has a more legendary, special career.
At the Cleveland Star Game, when watching Maddy, Vince Carter and others become members of the NBA's 75 stars, he persuaded himself and to protect himself, thinking: I understand, my career has been injured, my college achievements have helped me enter the Hall of Fame, I have not accumulated enough results, and so on... That night he worked late, he had to prepare the pre-Star Game report and so on, until late at night, a complex emotion suddenly came to his mind, he was surprised that he would have this emotion, how to pretend, protect himself, the real feeling in his heart was: "He X! I should be selected too! ”
At the 50 star recognition ceremony 25 years ago, he was also a member of the star game, and he made up his mind at the time: the next time they want to choose again, I will definitely be on the list! But this time when he saw players from the same generation as him on the scene like Ray Allen and Reggie Miller, Grant Hill thought he had beaten these people before, and it stung him deeply.
After more than 20 years, by writing a book looking back on his own experiences during this period, many heavy things Grant Hill finally let go.
"Everyone has a hurdle that they can't get over themselves, someone has encountered worse things in their lives than me, sometimes we suppress it, sometimes you suppress it in order to continue a normal life, but in the end you will still recognize its existence and face it, deal with it, and finally let go." 」 - Grant Hill
Biggest regret of his career, missing Phil Jackson's call
When Grant Hill became a free agent in 2007, "Zen Master" Phil Jackson called Grant Hill and dialed the three-way Grant Hill without calling back, he thought the Lakers had finished playing, and finally chose to stay healthy and joined the Suns with a top medical team.
Grant Hill later looked back and saw that compared to when he was with the Suns, the ball was in Nash's hands, and he had to stay in the bottom corner as a non-good shooter. Phil Jackson might have used Grant Hill more to give him more possession. Because his system suits Grant Hill, Phil Jackson also likes forwards who can control the ball. Grant Hill thinks Phil Jackson might have recruited him to the Lakers as point guard, whether it was or not, more useful than keeping him crouched in the bottom corner. Although he still played this role in the Suns, it was not his true style.
While the Suns became the first seed in the West, the Lakers traded Paul Gasol and changed the entire Western Conference. Failing to join the Lakers with Kobe and Phil Jackson became the most regrettable decision in Grant Hill's career.
In addition, there are the bullfights that led Duke to the championship, the choice of Fila instead of Nike, the bullfight with Jordan on the "Slam Dunk in the Air" set, why O'Neill left Orlando, teamed up with T-Mac, went out with Scotty Pippen when he was young, the story behind the 2000 Star Game, the strongest opponent ever met in the international game, almost died during surgery, the funny story of being a teammate with O'Neal, and becoming a shareholder of the Eagles.