Ever Play Pick Up Basketball with a NBA Pro

[ReaLiez]

Only had the pleasure of meeting Thon and Matur Maker as well as Jamal Magloire. Never played with them tho - I should be lucky I am 5'10 and the Maker brothers looked like they really like dunking on people

[LewisnotMiller]

i just got back from playing pick up basketball with Isaiah Rider. Probably the only time i ver played with a NBA player. HE was a lot shorter than i thought he would be. I think I'm like 6 to 6'1 and he was about the same height.That dunk through the legs is more amazing now knowing he was lot shorter.

anyone else ever play with a nba pro? Maybe pick up or in high school or college??

I've played against a bunch of pros over the years, but never anyone with an NBA pedigree. Some NBL (Aussie league) and some BLNO (Norwegian).
Worth noting, most of them were past their best when I played them, but then again, so am I.

[GSWFan1994]

Just wanted to say I enjoyed reading this thread.

Up for those who want to spend a few minutes doing the same.

[LegendaryLakers]

Nope, but I did play poker with Michael Finley at Casino Arizona about 12 years ago, super nice dude and I actually lost my stack to him , he flopped a wheel from what I remember.

Also gave Gary Payton a high five at Sapphires in Vegas about 13 years ago.

[NyKnicks1714]

I remembered this thread from way back on the Knicks forum, had to do a minute of searching for it. It's worth the read.

viewtopic.php?f=24&t=903535

Here's how my evening went today... I got out of work at 6:00 and I wanted to play some ball. So I went to a local outdoor park in St. Petersburg, which happened to be the USF outdoor park and it was crowded with about 15 people. It was my first time there. I noticed that some big, tall dude was against the fence, but not playing. I go to warm up at a basket that was not being used and start my warm up shots and the big dude and 3 of his friends come over and ask if I wanna run next with them. I guess they saw me make 5 threes in a row (I can shoot it). I was like, sure. Then I recognized the big guy...It was Mareese Speights from the 76'ers...but I didn't say anything. Dude starts warming up with me and shooting bricks from 3. He is easily 6'9" or 6'10", but he's trying crossovers to pull up 3's. He makes 1 and misses 10 and starts blaming it on the double rims. Then he asks me if I had a girl ball...what a dumass. I told him check the label and he said that it was underinflated. I shook my head and his boy says, Dude, don't you know who that is? I was like No, just in case it wasnt him. Then they were like "don't you watch basketball? You don't like UF (Florida)? That's Speights. That's his Audi over there with the 28"s". I was like "So" and they got pissed and he said do I watch the sixers. I was like No. I am a Knick fan and a St. John fan. That's when Speights said eff the Knicks and NY. I said ef Philly and their built for the first round squad and he said that next year that they will be better cuz he's gonna take all of Dally's (Dalembert's) minutes. He also said that if he was on NY he would be their best player...lol.

So the next game starts and he's trying to run the point and takes 5 3's in a row, missing all. He never passed the ball and tries to bounce it off the backboard for a dunk like crawford does and he misses the backboard completely. We're losing cuz he never runs back on D either. What an immature prick. All he's doing is talking to some boys on the sidelines saying "watch this move" or "look at this dunk...like I did against the Kings". He had 1 good dunk and his peeps on the sidelines all run on the court like they won the championship. What effin dumasses. We end up losing cuz he never passed it and there was a dude on the other team that was 6'2" that was taking him to the hole the entire game. Then I pickup with the team that had next and he picks up with the winning team because their best guy left and I have to guard him. Great...I am 6'4" at best. Dude made it easy to guard him tho cuz he wants to try to cross me up and pull up a 3. He's trying to post me later on and I keep hitting the ball down low and he keeps calling a foul. What a puss...the NBA got him calling some weak crap. Then on one possession, he charges through the lane, elbows me and pushes me out the way and dunks it and says "Welcome to the NBA". So then I come down and cross him over, caught him reachin real hard and he grabs my shirt and pulls me down from behind like a horse collar tackle and he had the audacity to say that I lost the ball myself. I didn't want to start anything because I was there for self and I thought that he would be rolling deep with his peeps...but I was wrong. Turns out that he only had 4 guys with him and most of the people there are getting fed up with him too. He starts talking smack to some dude on the fence and the dude says "Next time bring both the Andre's (Miller and Iguadala) so we can get a real game" and we all bust out laughing. The game goes on and I shoot a 3 to win it and Speights grabs the ball and throws it over the fence and he leaves with his boys...but not until he plays his radio at full blast for 2 whole songs in the lot.

So here is my take...He's an immature prick who made himself look like a dumass on the court. I actually hate him now and I hope the Sixers suck hard next year just because of him. Yeah, he can jump, but he got the basketball IQ of cattle. This ever happen to anyone else?

[GSWFan1994]

I remembered this thread from way back on the Knicks forum, had to do a minute of searching for it. It's worth the read.

That was a great read, I laughed in a few passages... very well written story.

Thanks for posting!

[TheGameWinner]

Semi-pro... but Negus Webster Chan - I played with him in my D2 league (what a guy...) he averaged like 50 PPG... was able to pick any ball handler on our team... it was awful. These guys are a lot better than we think they are.

[GSWFan1994]

From the same thread posted above, here are 2 other great stories from page 2:

When I was growing up in NJ, I played pickup with Tim Thomas and Kevin Freeman at the parks by my house. When TT was a big deal coming out of Paterson Catholic, a lot of guys were on his jock...but the older guys at our park weren't having it.

One pickup game, TT was balling kinda easy, launching 3s from pro range (which outdoors was like half court). One of the dudes called TT soft and said that he could have been D1 too if he stayed behind a couple of grades like Timmy and put in work on short, white 16 year olds as a 19 year old senior.

So Timmy tries laughing it off telling the old dude to D him up the next game and he'll take him to school. Old dude responds he should know all about school because he got left behind yadda yadda...telling everyone Timmy's hooked on Phonics and all this other smack.

So next game comes around and this old guy is bodyin' TT up like mad...pushing, grabbing...but TT just shakes it off and proceeds to score ALL 11 points on him. He was hittin' 3s, fadeaways, and even worked a nice up and under in the high post on him....but the best was game point.

TT had old dude on him on the left wing. TT workin' out of the triple threat pump fakes the old dude up then drives baseline...takes off from the left side of the rim, then double pumps a reverse dunk from the other side. Everyone there is going nuts, TT calls out GAME..GET THE F OFF THE COURT and starts laughing at old dude with his boys...but it was all good, as the Old dude gave him some dap and gave TT his props.

The sad thing is, I had a glimpse of how good TT could have been if he put in the effort and played hard all the time...it sucked as a Knicks fan to have watched him coast and play so easy all the time...

I remember back in the summer of 07, there was this basketball tournament in the city. Smush Parker showed up tried to be all fancy and stuff. The dude ended up bricking every shot.

[prophet_of_rage]

JYD and his brother used to come by the downtown Y in Toronto. JYD not so often but his bro was a regular in the early 2000s. JYD was a different level athlete.

I don't count playing a young RJ at the Y, thpugh.

Sent from my SM-N970W using Tapatalk

[oldshoolballer]

Sam Cassell showed up a couple of times and proceeded to completely destroy us. lol

[Knicksman780]

I remembered this thread from way back on the Knicks forum, had to do a minute of searching for it. It's worth the read.

viewtopic.php?f=24&t=903535

Here's how my evening went today... I got out of work at 6:00 and I wanted to play some ball. So I went to a local outdoor park in St. Petersburg, which happened to be the USF outdoor park and it was crowded with about 15 people. It was my first time there. I noticed that some big, tall dude was against the fence, but not playing. I go to warm up at a basket that was not being used and start my warm up shots and the big dude and 3 of his friends come over and ask if I wanna run next with them. I guess they saw me make 5 threes in a row (I can shoot it). I was like, sure. Then I recognized the big guy...It was Mareese Speights from the 76'ers...but I didn't say anything. Dude starts warming up with me and shooting bricks from 3. He is easily 6'9" or 6'10", but he's trying crossovers to pull up 3's. He makes 1 and misses 10 and starts blaming it on the double rims. Then he asks me if I had a girl ball...what a dumass. I told him check the label and he said that it was underinflated. I shook my head and his boy says, Dude, don't you know who that is? I was like No, just in case it wasnt him. Then they were like "don't you watch basketball? You don't like UF (Florida)? That's Speights. That's his Audi over there with the 28"s". I was like "So" and they got pissed and he said do I watch the sixers. I was like No. I am a Knick fan and a St. John fan. That's when Speights said eff the Knicks and NY. I said ef Philly and their built for the first round squad and he said that next year that they will be better cuz he's gonna take all of Dally's (Dalembert's) minutes. He also said that if he was on NY he would be their best player...lol.

So the next game starts and he's trying to run the point and takes 5 3's in a row, missing all. He never passed the ball and tries to bounce it off the backboard for a dunk like crawford does and he misses the backboard completely. We're losing cuz he never runs back on D either. What an immature prick. All he's doing is talking to some boys on the sidelines saying "watch this move" or "look at this dunk...like I did against the Kings". He had 1 good dunk and his peeps on the sidelines all run on the court like they won the championship. What effin dumasses. We end up losing cuz he never passed it and there was a dude on the other team that was 6'2" that was taking him to the hole the entire game. Then I pickup with the team that had next and he picks up with the winning team because their best guy left and I have to guard him. Great...I am 6'4" at best. Dude made it easy to guard him tho cuz he wants to try to cross me up and pull up a 3. He's trying to post me later on and I keep hitting the ball down low and he keeps calling a foul. What a puss...the NBA got him calling some weak crap. Then on one possession, he charges through the lane, elbows me and pushes me out the way and dunks it and says "Welcome to the NBA". So then I come down and cross him over, caught him reachin real hard and he grabs my shirt and pulls me down from behind like a horse collar tackle and he had the audacity to say that I lost the ball myself. I didn't want to start anything because I was there for self and I thought that he would be rolling deep with his peeps...but I was wrong. Turns out that he only had 4 guys with him and most of the people there are getting fed up with him too. He starts talking smack to some dude on the fence and the dude says "Next time bring both the Andre's (Miller and Iguadala) so we can get a real game" and we all bust out laughing. The game goes on and I shoot a 3 to win it and Speights grabs the ball and throws it over the fence and he leaves with his boys...but not until he plays his radio at full blast for 2 whole songs in the lot.

So here is my take...He's an immature prick who made himself look like a dumass on the court. I actually hate him now and I hope the Sixers suck hard next year just because of him. Yeah, he can jump, but he got the basketball IQ of cattle. This ever happen to anyone else?

Yooo. I forgot about the fact that I posted this LMAO.

So I have an update...

Speights is really good friends with one of my good friends and he happens to be his realtor as well. His house in Clearwater, FL is actually for sale right now. So we've had numerous run ins because we play in a lot of the same leagues in the Tampa Bay area. I got to meet him a few times, even coached him when I added him to a team that I assembled for a tournament in Orlando. He's actually cool, although we went back and forth on Facebook one time when my team beat his in an adult basketball league in Clearwater and someone tried to instigate stuff between myself and another player on his team. We play really competitive basketball here in the Tampa Bay area with a lot of pros in their mid 30's all the way to 50 still playin competitive ball. Some of these tournaments pay up to 50k. I'm in my upper 40s now, so I play in the 45 and up league with some players that played oversees and a couple that played very very limited NBA minutes (Steve Casselberry from 76ers for instance) but my 40 & up team can match up with most teams at any age with a few of this areas best players on it.

I'll bring this up to Speights again when I next see him, although he'll probably say he don't remember it lol.

[Knicksman780]

Sam Cassell showed up a couple of times and proceeded to completely destroy us. lol

True story...

A few years back when Mike Woodson (Woody) was an assistant coach with the Clippers he invited me to stay with the team at the hotel in Orlando. They landed late the day before the game around 8pm, but Doc Rivers had scheduled a shoot around at a church gym right next to the Amway arena for that night so I met up with Woody there instead of the hotel. There he introduced me to Lawrence Frank, Doc, and Sam Cassell. It was Cassell's birthday (he made sure to let EVERYONE know) so for his birthday he challenged everyone in the gym to a shootout for money. Dude is a jokester and class clown. Everybody was ignoring him. So Woody tells him, probably just for jokes, that I can shoot so Cassell spends 20 minutes talking smack to me on the sidelines while I was just watching. The players are wondering who the hell I was that I was getting so much attention and Woody is laughing his ass off for setting me up. So Sam tells me to "step on the court" and challenges me to a shootout. I take off my jacket (it was chilly) and dammit, I'm wearing a Knicks shirt (totally forgot since I was supposed to go to the hotel first and I was gonna change before I met up with anyone)...Talk about ridicule. Doc tells me to get out of the gym and change lmao. Woody gave me his Clippers compression shirt and I put it on and it's a little tight on my dad-bod and Cassell tells everyone I'm wearing a sports bra now . I held my own for 2 rounds of shooting, but then he waxes me the 3rd round. Made a lot of friends that night though. Blake Griffin gave me the most crap. He's a comedian. So afterwards we go to dinner - Woody, Cassell, Steve Giles (a Cavs scout in town) and Cassell tells us lots of stories about Hakeem and their Champoinship years in Houston (probably to rub in the NYK thing we had going on)...then he leaves to meet up for someone for his birthday. Woody looked at me and says "Room xxxx (I don't remember the number but it was Sam Cassell's room). He knew I'm good with pranks lol. He just says "Whatever you do, don't get arrested" lol. So of course I order a dozen cheesecakes (because he said he liked them) and a dozen sports bras and have them delivered to his room for his birthday. Next morning when he saw me, he just shook his head and went the other way
They waxed the Magic by 30+ and were leaving right after the game before a storm came in, so I haven't been able to talk to Sam Cassell since.

[Ein Sof]

Yeah. I bet he still remembers it.

[Joker]

Joe Johnson used to come work out at the GoldCoast FFC - I would always play like super early at 8am and we got to shoot around. He was swacking threes, but he was only a good inch or two taller than me and i'm 6'0. He did look pretty jacked compared to me though, and I'm fairly athletic.

Trolling? lol @ Joe Johnson being 6'2"

[GunnerWRX]

All the time. Alot of Wizards hoop on Pentagon base in VA. Arenas used to play at a gym in N.Va out here called "Hoop Magic". Never played again him there, but did at the Pentagon. Nick Young as well. I have a ton of stories, but its an online forum, and I could be making it all up. But NBA cats and even D1 ballers with no pro prospects, are legit. Rim is just way too low. Always felt it should be like 10 1/2 feet or slightly less.

How did he go through the metal detector...

[JRoy]

I’m old.

I played with a cba guy back in the 90s in a leg brace, he was coming back from injury and playing himself into shape, hoped to get called up to the nba.

I was beating him one on one and got cocky and said something and he went to a gear that I don’t have and kicked my ass.

Can’t remember his name, it was 30 years ago, but I do remember the lesson.

[Kent]

I've shot hoops with Darrell Armstrong and another time with Nick Anderson and Bo Outlaw.

[Jamaaliver]

I once played one on one with Ed Gray in Marietta, GA back in 1998.

He was rehabbing a minor injury at the time and wasn't supposed to play full contact. I was 17 years old and lost 21-0...twice.

One of the greatest days of my young life.

[Dubnation]

Had a few runs with Gary Payton and Jason Kidd at Mosswood. The funny thing is Demetrius 'Hook' Mitchell was considered the best at that point. He was unstoppable and reminded me of Dominique Wilkins.

[Revived]

Played against Udonis Haslem in a pickup game at the UF rec center. He single handily shredded our team while basically playing SG. He was handling the ball and shooting threes

How many years ago was this?