My role models in the business were the older guys on my team when I first got there: Gray Scott, Adrian Smith, Roland Taylor. These were the guys who took me under their wing, and really schooled me in terms of what the business was about.
I started playing professional basketball in 1971, and I played professionally for five seasons before going to Philadelphia.
I think that my God-given physical attributes, big hands, and big feet, the way that I'm built, proportion-wise, just made basketball the most inviting sport for me to play.
I didn't want to become a reserve player, or a bench player, and it was time to move on and take on another challenge.
Teachers are sort of faced with a thankless task, because no matter how good they are, unless they find a way to personally rationalize the rewards of their effort, nobody else is really going to do it for them en masse.
Because of the makeup of the NBA, it cannot afford for the public to turn on them.
I live my life trying to never appear to be a small man.
You know, we always tried to rationalize by saying you take the good, you take the upside, you got to deal with the downside, you've to take the downside.
You know, just in terms of having to have a life on the road, you know, having the celebrity aspect be a burden for my family, friends and extended family.
Every team that I've played on, I've either been the captain or co-captain.
Being a typical Pisces, I might have experienced mood shifts, but I don't remember any depression, or needing to do anything, or to have someone bring me out of being depressed.
I pulled the plug on it at a time that I thought was right for me to exit.
At age 31, in 1981, I was voted the best player in basketball, and the most valuable player in the league.
One of the commitments that I personally have now is to a diverse approach to buying businesses, and the operation of those businesses.
When handling the ball, I always would look for daylight, wherever there was daylight.
So much of becoming a good athlete involves bringing other things to the table, other than physical skills. It involves intelligence, it involves many of the things that you learn during the process of being educated. How to analyze, how to assess, how to equate, how to reason.
The biggest thing that I felt basketball could do for me was help me get a good education.
