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      Walter Davis, Basketball Star With a Velvet Touch, Dies at 69

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      “Walter is a good shooter until the fourth period,” one coach said of Davis, a standout in both college and the N.B.A. “Then he becomes a great shooter.”Walter Davis of the University of North Carolina in action against Duke in 1976. He averaged 15.7 points a game over four seasons there.Harold Valentine/Associated PressWalter Davis, whose smooth shooting propelled him to basketball stardom with the University of North Carolina and the Phoenix Suns, but who late in his career struggled with drug addiction, died on Thursday while visiting family in Charlotte, N.C. He was 69.The university announced his death but did not specify a cause.Davis, a 6-foot-6 forward, played at North Carolina from 1973 to 1977 for Dean Smith, one of the most successful coaches in college history. He averaged 15.7 points a game over four seasons on Tar Heels teams that also included Bobby Jones, Phil Ford and Mitch Kupchak.In one of Davis’s signature games, in March 1974, North Carolina was losing to Duke, 86-78, with 17 seconds left. After North Carolina closed the deficit to two points with time expiring, Davis tied it with a shot from a distance estimated at between 30 and 35 feet. (The basket would have counted for three points and won the game today, but the three-point shot was not officially introduced by the N.C.A.A. until 1986.) North Carolina went on to win in overtime, 96-92.“I wasn’t trying to bank it in,” Davis, then a freshman, said afterward. “It wasn’t a desperation shot. I was just trying to do my part, that’s all. I didn’t allow myself to think about anything. I just told myself it could only do two things, go in or come back out.”In 1976 he was a member of the United States team, also coached by Dean Smith, that won a gold medal at the Olympics in Montreal. A year later, he led North Carolina with 20 points — and 10 of his team’s last 12 — when it lost to Marquette, 67-59, in the final game of the N.C.A.A. men’s basketball tournament.He was twice selected for all-Atlantic Coast Conference teams.His nephew Hubert is currently the North Carolina coach.Walter Davis was born on Sept. 9, 1954, in Pineville, N.C. His high school in Charlotte won three state titles in basketball before he left to attend prep school in Delaware. He arrived at North Carolina in 1973.In 1977, Davis had surgery on a broken finger after North Carolina won the A.C.C. tournament in his senior year. “Before they put me out, I remember looking up and Coach Smith was right there,” he told Ken Rosenthal for his book “Dean Smith: A Tribute” (2001). “I remember seeing him and having the screws drilled into my finger.”Davis was drafted by the Phoenix Suns in the first round of the 1977 N.B.A. draft. After averaging 24.2 points a game — the highest average of any season in his career — he was voted the league’s Rookie of the Year. He remained a steady performer throughout his 11 seasons with Phoenix, averaging 20.5 points a game as a small forward and shooting guard.Davis was a steady performer in his 11 seasons with the Phoenix Suns, averaging 20.5 points a game as a small forward and shooting guard.Focus on Sport/Getty ImagesDuring a game in 1983, he set a league record by scoring 34 points (on 15 field goals and four free throws) against Seattle before missing a shot.“I don’t remember a sweeter shot,” Alvan Adams, one of his teammates, told NBA.com in 2015. “He was a feared shooter. The other team knew it, too.”Chuck Daly, then the Detroit Pistons’ coach, told The New York Times in 1987: “Walter is a good shooter until the fourth period. Then he becomes a great shooter.”Davis had two nicknames: Sweet D and Greyhound.In his later years in Phoenix, Davis dealt with drug problems. In 1986, he spent a month in a drug rehabilitation center to treat cocaine and alcohol dependency. Early the next year he told The Times, “The scariest part is knowing that it is a disease that I will have to work on for the rest of my life.”When he relapsed in 1987, Davis was suspended by the league and once again entered a drug rehabilitation facility. He also received immunity from prosecution when he agreed to testify against several current and former Suns teammates, who were indicted on drug charges.In his testimony, The Arizona Republic reported, Davis said that he had first used cocaine in his second season in the league after being introduced to it by a teammate, Gar Heard. When asked by a prosecutor who else was there, he said, “Pretty much the whole team.”Later that year, Davis said that prosecutors had forced him to testify against his teammates.“I had no choice,” he told Sports Illustrated. “The last thing I wanted to do was get my teammates and friends indicted. If I’d known I was going to do that, I’d have probably gone to jail instead.”Davis left the Suns in 1988 to sign as a free agent with the Denver Nuggets. He was traded to the Portland Trail Blazers in 1991 and then re-signed with Denver, where he played in the 1991-92 season before retiring.Davis was honored by the Suns and the Black Chamber of Arizona during a Black History Month celebration in Phoenix in 2016. Barry Gossage/NBAE, via Getty ImagesDavis averaged 18.9 points a game for his career and played in six All-Star Games.After his retirement, he worked as an announcer and community ambassador for the Nuggets and a scout for the Washington Wizards.Information on survivors was not immediately available. More

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      Need a Restaurant Recommendation? Ask an N.B.A. Player.

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      The best basketball players on the planet travel regularly, embrace local cultures and have deep pockets — making them very credible reviewers of restaurants across the country.Pick a city, any city, on the National Basketball Association’s 30-team circuit, and Kelly Olynyk, a forward for the Utah Jazz, has deep knowledge of the local restaurant scene.If you are searching for top-tier sushi in Boston, where he spent his first four N.B.A. seasons, he recommends Fuji at Ink Block in the South End. In Charlotte, N.C., he will most likely suggest the smoked wings at Rooster’s Wood-Fired Kitchen. Whether you are craving the best Italian in San Francisco or in pursuit of tasty treats in Indianapolis — Mr. Olynyk knows a place. He is a 6-foot-11 human version of Yelp.“You have spots in each city that you love and know you can count on,” said Mr. Olynyk, 32, after eating at thousands of restaurants over the 10 years he has played professionally on five N.B.A. teams. “But part of having an interest in different cultures and cuisines and restaurants is trying new ones.”In a league that consists of 28 cities, roughly 450 players and 1,230 regular season games each year, N.B.A. business travel is frequent and first-class. Teams fly private and stay in five-star hotel chains like the Four Seasons and the Ritz-Carlton. But they also eat, a lot, and by embracing local culture and institutions with their deep pockets, they have become very credible restaurant authorities.Karl-Anthony Towns, of the Timberwolves, at Fratelli’s Pizza & Cafe in his hometown, Piscataway, N.J. Mr. Towns grew up eating Fratelli’s pizza. When they started dating, he told his girlfriend: “‘All you need is a cheese slice and I promise you it will change your life.”via Karl-Anthony TownsN.B.A. players are larger-than-normal humans (average height is 6-foot-6) with equally large salaries (average annual pay is $8.32 million), a combination that results in voracious appetites and often in reservations at the country’s most renowned restaurants. Each player also receives a $133 food per diem for days on the road.“Sometimes, if we’re only in a city one night, I’ll go to two dinners,” admitted Mr. Olynyk.The 2023-24 N.B.A. season just tipped off on Oct. 24, and in a typical season, each team plays 41 games on the road, visiting each opposing market (that includes 27 U.S. cities and Toronto) at least once. There are additional preseason and playoff games also to consider. The Golden State Warriors, for example, traveled to Los Angeles — home of the Lakers and Clippers — seven times last season. That means many meals and time to bond.“We travel so much around the country that going out to restaurants has always been the greatest way to bring everyone together,” said Karl-Anthony Towns, a three-time N.B.A. All-Star center with the Minnesota Timberwolves.Regardless of which teammates or coaches they choose to dine with, players take notice of the food, service and settings: Word-of-mouth recommendations between players are a major part of N.B.A. restaurant culture.“We’re a brotherhood, so you’re going to definitely have some honest reviews from your 449 brothers,” said Mr. Towns, 27.Rudy Gobert, a Timberwolves teammate, frequent gives Mr. Towns tips on lesser-known eateries with little fanfare on Yelp, Tripadvisor or other recommendation websites. Mr. Olynyk, of the Jazz, enjoys introducing his younger teammates to top restaurants in different cities (and picking up the bill), much as his former teammate Rajon Rondo did for him, treating Mr. Olynyk to Strega Italiano in Boston when Mr. Olynyk was a rookie with the Celtics.“It’s kind of like a rite of passage,” Mr. Olynyk, a native of Toronto, said.Kevin Love, a veteran forward for the Miami Heat, grew up in Portland, Ore., a city known for its creative dining scene. As his basketball career — one that has included five All-Star selections and a championship ring with the Cleveland Cavaliers — has advanced, his food knowledge has improved and his network of fellow food lovers has expanded (The Times documented his passion for travel in 2019).“Having a love for food, as well as wine, has brought me into a number of circles where I’ve made really good friends with restaurateurs, chefs and people who have similar interests,” said Mr. Love, 35, who is a partner (along with his former teammate Channing Frye) in Chosen Family Wines, a wine brand based out of Willamette Valley, Ore. “That’s a fun world to be in.”He has leveraged connections in the restaurant industry to organize team dinners, key to building team camaraderie. Before the Heat visit New York City, Mr. Love will call area restaurants and design unique dining experiences for his teammates.“I’m going to take these guys out and show them great food and introduce them to maybe a different cuisine,” Mr. Love said.He still considers Portland one of his top food destinations, naming Kann and RingSide Steakhouse (he strongly suggests the onion rings) as his hometown favorites. In New York City, where he lived in the off-season before recently moving to Long Island, Mr. Love lists as favorites Carbone, Sadelle’s, Hometown Bar-B-Que, Fini Pizza and Misi (Sean Feeney, the restaurateur, is a good friend of his), and Eleven Madison Park (Daniel Humm, the chef and owner, is also a friend).Kevin Love, a veteran forward for the Miami Heat, has leveraged his connections in the restaurant industry to organize team dinners.Michael Dwyer/Associated Press“It’s one of the most unbelievably beautiful kitchens I’ve ever seen,” Mr. Love said of Eleven Madison Park.For many N.B.A. players, supporting minority-owned businesses can be as important as finding establishments with Michelin stars. Mr. Towns, of the Timberwolves, will also approach local residents to seek restaurant recommendations.“I’ve always been intrigued by people and cultures,” said Mr. Towns, who has Dominican and African American roots. “And the best way to learn about people and cultures is to sit down and enjoy their food.”In Minneapolis, Mr. Towns recommends Soul Bowl, a soul food and Caribbean-inspired restaurant in the city’s North Loop. But it was Fratelli’s Pizza Cafe, in his hometown, Piscataway, N.J., where he took his girlfriend when they first started dating.“‘I got to take you home to a pizzeria that I grew up on,’” Mr. Towns recalled saying. “I said, ‘All you need is a cheese slice and I promise you it will change your life.’”“She agrees with me,” he said with a laugh.Follow New York Times Travel on Instagram and sign up for our weekly Travel Dispatch newsletter to get expert tips on traveling smarter and inspiration for your next vacation. Dreaming up a future getaway or just armchair traveling? Check out our 52 Places to Go in 2023. More

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      Tug-of-War Over N.B.A. Rights Provides Glimpse of Media’s Future

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      The league’s longtime television partners, including ESPN and Turner, are undergoing major changes, which could alter how games are watched.The National Basketball Association’s season tipped off on Tuesday with stars like LeBron James and Nikola Jokic beginning the long quest for a title. But the action that will have longer-term ramifications for the league, and the media and entertainment landscape, is happening off the court.The companies holding the rights to show N.B.A. games — Disney, which owns ESPN and ABC, and Warner Bros. Discovery, the parent company of TNT — are collectively paying the league $24 billion over nine years for that privilege. But their contracts expire after next season, and the N.B.A. hopes to more than double the money it receives for rights in the next deal, according to several people familiar with the league’s expectations who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss ongoing negotiations.It won’t get that without a fight. After decades in which sports leagues garnered ever bigger piles of money for the rights to show their games, there are signs that media and technology companies are under increasing pressure to justify the exorbitant amounts they spend on broadcast rights. Interest rates are high, Wall Street is demanding profitability over growth, and streaming has reconfigured the entertainment industry.The result of the N.B.A.’s negotiations will say a lot about the future of broadcast networks, the cable bundle, streaming services and the sports media ambitions of technology companies.“I think in this era that we’re coming out of, this is the last of the big deals,” said John Kosner, who advises sports media and tech start-ups after a two-decade career as an executive at ESPN.The National Football League, the most valuable sports league in the world, did not quite double its rights fees when it signed new agreements in 2021. And that was before the stock market declined, interest rates rose and wars began in Europe and the Middle East.Disney and Warner Bros. Discovery, which have televised N.B.A. games for more than two decades, aren’t necessarily in positions to shell out lots of cash, either.Disney has carried out extreme cost-cutting and layoffs this year, and its chief executive, Robert A. Iger, has said the company is considering “strategic options” to sell equity in ESPN. Warner Bros. Discovery has also cut costs, and said in August that it had a debt load of nearly $50 billion following the merger of the two companies last year.The most likely scenario, according to the people familiar with the negotiations, is that Disney and Warner Bros. Discovery will sign new agreements with the N.B.A. to televise fewer games. The N.B.A. declined to comment for this article.The two companies together show about 160 regular-season games each year, as well as the playoffs and N.B.A. finals. Most games are shown on cable (ESPN and TNT), with a handful on ABC.For both companies, N.B.A. broadcast rights still represent a valuable bargaining chip in negotiations with their biggest customers: cable and satellite companies. Those distributors pay billions of dollars to Disney and Warner Bros. Discovery for the rights to show their cable channels, including TNT and ESPN, based in part on the expectation that those channels will air sports like N.B.A. basketball.An N.B.A. package would also help both companies shift to a streaming future. Warner Bros. Discovery recently added a live sports package to its streaming service, Max, while ESPN has been vocal about having a stand-alone streaming offering for its flagship channel in the near future.Disney and Warner Bros. Discovery are not likely to be the only companies showing N.B.A. games, though. If those companies end up showing fewer games in the new deal, the league may create a third rights package, perhaps even a fourth, of the games no longer included in the first two packages, as well as the league’s new in-season tournament.The most likely buyers for those packages of games are Amazon and NBC, according to the people familiar with the negotiations.Top executives at Fox, CBS and the Google-owned YouTube have said that they are unlikely to put in serious bids for broadcasting rights. The intentions of Netflix and Apple are less clear, but Netflix has long said it is uninterested in paying the kind of prices the N.B.A. is looking for. Apple has largely committed itself to a sports strategy of buying up all of a league’s domestic and international rights, like in its recent deal with Major League Soccer. That isn’t possible with the N.B.A.Amazon and NBC are attractive partners to the N.B.A. for very different reasons.For a generation, most N.B.A. games have been watchable only with a cable package. But the collapse of the cable bundle — from around 100 million households with a cable package a decade ago to around 70 million today — has made old-school broadcast networks, the most widely distributed television channels, more attractive. With CBS and Fox as unlikely bidders, the league could want games to be shown on NBC’s broadcast channel.As for Amazon, it is seen as highly unlikely that the N.B.A. — a league that is proud of being forward-thinking regarding technology — would sign a new rights agreement with only traditional media companies, according to some of the people familiar with the negotiations. Amazon has long been interested in broadcasting the N.B.A., according to a person familiar with the league’s negotiation history, and it has won plaudits for how it has handled Thursday night N.F.L. games.The media and technology companies declined to comment for this article. CNBC, Bloomberg and The Wall Street Journal have all previously reported on parts of the N.B.A.’s media-rights negotiations.The league has a number of other media assets it could leverage. Most N.B.A. games are not shown nationally. Instead, they are broadcast in their local markets, with individual teams controlling the rights to sell those games. Teams have traditionally sold those rights to regional sports networks, but those are collapsing, leaving teams looking for alternatives.If Diamond Sports, which is in bankruptcy proceedings, collapses, the N.B.A. could suddenly regain control of the local rights for about half the teams in the league. If that happens, it might sell some of those rights to a national partner. But that would require the league to work with its team owners — as well as current rights holders — for the complicated task of navigating roughly 30 different local agreements.It would also leave out a number of high-profile teams, like the New York Knicks and the Los Angeles Lakers, which have long-term local rights agreements with successful regional sports networks.The N.B.A. could also sell some international rights. The rights to show N.B.A. games in some basketball-mad countries like China could be extremely valuable, especially as domestic streaming companies seek new markets. But the league — unique in American sports in that it sells all its international rights directly rather than working with third parties — is seen as more likely to sell those rights country by country to the highest bidder.The real wild card if the N.B.A. looks to do something groundbreaking could be its old stalwart: ESPN.Disney and ESPN executives have spoken in recent months with private equity firms, tech and mobile companies and sports leagues, and have concluded that if they are to give up equity, it should be to a league, or leagues, as part of a long-term partnership, according to two people familiar with ESPN’s plans.Analysts have valued ESPN at $25 billion to $50 billion, meaning a potential partner would have to trade billions in value for even a small stake. While a partner could pay Disney for a stake in ESPN, what the company is really looking for is exclusive content, some of those involved in the negotiations said.Disney executives have spoken with a number of sports leagues, including the N.B.A., about selling them equity in ESPN and what the company would want out of such an arrangement. According to one of the people, the benefits sought by ESPN in a partnership could include more closely integrating a league’s social media operations with the network’s, content like documentary rights and more in-game audio from players, distributing games it does not have the broadcast rights to within its apps and working together on marketing. More

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      Terry Dischinger, College Basketball Star and Olympian, Dies at 82

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      An all-American at Purdue, he was the youngest member of the gold medal-winning 1960 U.S. Olympic team. He later became a top N.B.A. rookie.Terry Dischinger, one of the greatest players in Purdue University basketball history and the youngest member of the U.S. Olympic team that won a gold medal in Rome in 1960, died on Oct. 9 in Lake Oswego, Ore. He was 82.The cause of his death, at a memory care center, was complications of Alzheimer’s disease, said his son, Bill Dischinger.Dischinger (pronounced DISH-ing-er) was an undisputed star at Purdue, in West Lafayette, Ind. A 6-foot-7, 190-pound center, he led the Big Ten in scoring for three straight seasons; was a two-time first-team consensus all-American; and scored at least 40 points in a game nine times, still a Purdue record.After averaging 26.3 points in his sophomore season, Dischinger made the Olympic team, which included several future members of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, among them Oscar Robertson, Jerry West, Jerry Lucas and Walt Bellamy. The U.S. won all eight of its games, including the final against Brazil, to earn the gold medal. Dischinger averaged 11.8 points a game, fourth best on the team.Early the next year, when Dischinger was a junior, a short profile in Sports Illustrated described the skillful fakes, fast first steps and soft jump shots that made him a Big Ten star, and recalled a moment when he vexed Robertson during a practice at the Olympics.According to the profile, Robertson, whom Dischinger idolized, “ended one frustrating Olympic scrimmage in which he was trying to guard Dischinger by shouting, ‘Man, go ahead and score. Who cares!’ as Terry faked him out for the nth time.”Dischinger went on to play in the National Basketball Association, earning Rookie of the Year and All-Star honors. He was inducted into the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame in 2019.Dischinger was inducted into the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame in 2019. He scored 40 points or more in nine games at Purdue University, setting a school record that still stands.Orlin Wagner/Associated PressTerry Gilbert Dischinger was born on Nov. 21, 1940, in Anderson, Ind. His father, Donas, was a high school teacher and football coach. His mother, Clara (Wood) Dischinger, was a physical education teacher.Dischinger was chosen by the Chicago Zephyrs in the first round of the 1962 N.B.A. draft and broke in with them as if he were still at Purdue. Converted to forward, he scored 25.5 points a game in the 1962-63 season, while playing only 57 games on a part-time contract that let him complete his bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering.Despite not playing a full season, he was voted Rookie of the Year over other future Hall of Famers like Dave DeBusschere of the Detroit Pistons and John Havlicek of the Boston Celtics.Dischinger played on All-Star teams in his first three seasons.“He was a very smart player with a great shot,” Bill Bradley, the former New York Knicks forward and U.S. senator, who frequently played against Dischinger, said in a phone interview. “I remember him as much for the 1960 Olympics as for him playing in the N.B.A.”Dischinger remained with the Zephyrs when they relocated to Baltimore and were renamed the Bullets after his rookie year. He averaged 20.8 points a game in 1963-64. After one season in Baltimore, he was traded to Detroit, where he scored an average of 18.2 points a game. After two years of Army service, he returned to the Pistons in 1967.Having played on an Army basketball team, he told The Detroit Free Press in 1971, “I thought I could make the readjustment to the pros again pretty quickly.”But, he added, “it didn’t work out that way.”A knee injury reduced his playing time and his productivity. He never averaged more than 13.1 points a game in his last six seasons, five with the Pistons and his last with the Portland Trail Blazers.By the time his basketball career ended in 1973, he was already planning his next one. A friend in the Army had piqued his interest in a post-basketball career in dentistry, and he began studying at the University of Tennessee College of Dentistry in the summers between N.B.A. seasons.He completed his D.D.S. degree in 1974 and went on to earn a certificate in orthodontics in 1977 from the University of Oregon Health Sciences Center (now Oregon Health & Science University).He held several patents, including one for a version of an appliance to help an underdeveloped jaw grow. He taught orthodontics and had a practice in Lake Oswego, which Bill Dischinger joined 24 years ago and now runs.In addition to his son, Dischinger is survived by his wife, Mary (Dunn) Dischinger, whom he married in 1962; his daughter, Kelly Loomis; his sisters, Nancy Rudolph and Tommy Groth; and nine grandchildren. Another son, Terry, died in 2010.Heading into the final game of his college basketball career against the University of Michigan in March 1962, Dischinger was tied for the Big Ten scoring lead with Jimmy Rayl of Indiana University, which was playing Ohio State.Before the game, he received a telegram from two Ohio State players — Jerry Lucas, who had become a friend during the Olympics, and John Havlicek — “telling me not to worry — get my points and they’d shut down Rayl,” he told The Journal & Courier of Lafayette in 1980.Whatever they and their teammates did seemed to work.Dischinger won the title with 30 points. Rayl scored 25. More

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      Rich Paul, N.B.A. Power Broker, Growing Up and Finding Peace

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      When Rich Paul considers his life now, he sometimes thinks how far it seems from his childhood, growing up Black in a particularly dangerous part of Cleveland.For the past two decades, Mr. Paul, 42, has been a polarizing force in basketball. A power broker in a specialized world, he is slim, 5-foot-8 and sharply dressed, often appearing on the margins of photos snapped at marquee events.Many saw him as LeBron James’s confidant, and later as his agent. But as he built a sports agency, Klutch Sports Group, that rivaled and irritated more established companies, he has worked to separate his identity from that of Mr. James’s.Mr. Paul is now a courtside fixture at N.B.A. games. He collects art. He lives in Beverly Hills. And he is in a yearslong relationship with the Grammy-winning singer-songwriter Adele. Mr. Paul has helped N.B.A. players shift power away from teams and to themselves, like when he maneuvered a 2019 trade that sent Anthony Davis to the Los Angeles Lakers to join Mr. James.On Tuesday, Roc Lit 101, an imprint of Random House, will publish his memoir, “Lucky Me.” It is a bid by Mr. Paul to both own his past — growing up with a mother who battled addiction and acknowledging his own drug dealing — and celebrate the way his difficult upbringing, and in particular his father, prepared him for his future.Recently, at a restaurant in a five-star hotel in Midtown Manhattan, with sculptures of tropical birds in the light fixtures, Mr. Paul mused about his hope that athletes would focus on the peace of mind that can come with real financial security, not the fleeting pleasure of social media attention and the temporary financial windfalls that come with it. The idea of finding peace set off another thought.“I come from a place where every day is chaotic. Every. Day,” Mr. Paul said, his voice rising as he began tapping hard on the table to emphasize his words. “Sirens, all day long. You have to wear headphones. I should have been the inventor of Beats, as many sirens as I had to listen to, and yells and cussing outs and everything.”After a moment, he returned to his original point.“These kids, they just want clout,” Mr. Paul said. “I don’t understand it.”One of the main themes of the memoir is the influence Mr. Paul’s father had on him.Sinna Nasseri for The New York TimesIt’s why, he said, he was so passionate about becoming an agent. He had heard so much about players being broke despite initially getting lucrative contracts.“There’s no line down the street to get to knowledge,” Mr. Paul said. “It tells you a lot.”In thinking about Mr. Paul’s memoir, Chris Jackson, the publisher and editor in chief of Roc Lit 101, said he was interested in Mr. Paul as part of a generation of Black men “whose formative experiences were during that period that was defined by crack cocaine and the post-civil rights cocktail of white flight, urban abandonment and families that really struggled to stay together.“And how out of that kind of experience of survival, so much was created, and how the entire country was shifted by people who were kind of forged in that.”The broad strokes of Mr. Paul’s back story have been recounted before, the way his mother had struggled with drug addiction and his father, who had another family, raised him in the family’s corner store. How a chance meeting with Mr. James at an airport in Akron, Ohio, turned into a partnership that changed the course of his life.In the memoir, which was written with the journalist Jesse Washington and features a foreword by Mr. James, Mr. Paul goes further than ever before. He depicts in heartbreaking detail the ways his mother’s absences forced her children to act older than their ages, contrasting those stories with her energy and charisma when she was clean.“It was therapeutic for me, but at the same time I wanted to make sure that people understood it wasn’t all bad,” Mr. Paul said.He writes that his father taught him discipline and how to run a business. Not all of his father’s business dealings were strictly legal, but Mr. Paul said he always ran them with honor. His father’s advice is sprinkled throughout the memoir, as are the ways Mr. Paul learned to make money and earn respect. Dressing well was always a big part of that.He writes of the devastation he felt at losing his father, whom he calls his “moral compass,” in 2000, which led to him selling cocaine for the first time. He shares his unease at selling hard drugs, which had shattered his mother, but said that he was swept up by a desire to compete and win.During lunch in Manhattan, Mr. Paul said he hadn’t felt comfortable publicly sharing stories about selling drugs before, though he knew drugs weren’t exclusive to his community.“I’ve talked about it with clients, just in conversation, and they resonate with it because when you grew up how we grew up it’s in your family,” he said. Two days later, on a rainy Sunday afternoon in Brooklyn, a car picked Mr. Paul up outside a townhouse to take him from one podcast taping to another. (Near the end of the first show, Mr. Paul had been asked to name his favorite Adele song, but, having some editorial control, he requested a different question.)“I try to keep it as private as I possibly can,” Mr. Paul said of his relationship with Adele.Lauren Bacho/NBAE, via Getty ImagesDuring the drive, Mr. Paul made phone calls. He pitched a client to a shoe company, and then called a friend to plan where they would watch the Cleveland Browns game later that day.Suddenly his eyes widened in happiness as he looked at his phone.“A couple got married in my shoes!” he said. Mr. Paul, who has a shoe collaboration with New Balance, showed a photo to a Klutch employee acting as his chief of staff.He FaceTimed with Adele to see how her morning had gone. Then he chose a different watch and different Klutch Athletics sweatshirt, the clothing brand he has created with New Balance, for the next taping.Asked if he has a stylist, Mr. Paul proudly said no.“I used to style LeBron his rookie year,” he said, adding: “I could be anything. I could be a stylist, music executive, coach.”Mr. James was a teenager when he met Mr. Paul, who had a jersey resale business sometimes run out of the trunk of his car. Soon, Mr. James was paying him $48,000 a year, confident Mr. Paul was worth the investment. Mr. Paul watched Mr. James’s career unfold. Then, when Mr. James hired Creative Artists Agency, one of the most powerful agencies in sports and entertainment, Mr. Paul began working for the agency. He helped recruit clients, saying he knew most agents “couldn’t do it.” Mr. Paul was dismissed by some who believed his success came solely because of his friendship with LeBron James.Jim Poorten/NBAE, via Getty ImagesHe met business moguls, from Warren Buffett to Jay-Z, and asked plenty of questions. His friendly boldness attracted people.“Flawlessly confident,” said Rich Kleiman, the longtime manager for the N.B.A. star Kevin Durant, and a founder of Mr. Durant’s media company, Boardroom. Mr. Kleiman was working with Jay-Z when he met Mr. Paul, and saw in him hints of Jay-Z’s self assurance. “There’s a way to be confident where you can make anyone believe you.”When Mr. Paul started Klutch Sports in 2012, nine years after Mr. James’s N.B.A. career began, Mr. James and three other players immediately became clients.Chatter quickly followed — in the news media, primarily anonymous — from other agents questioning Mr. Paul’s qualifications. He had never received a college degree and they viewed him as a lucky member of a star athlete’s entourage.Maverick Carter understands. He grew up in Akron with Mr. James, has handled his business affairs for years and is the chief executive of The SpringHill Company, an entertainment and production company he founded with Mr. James. For a while, he said, it could seem like his “first name was ‘LeBron’s’ and my last name was ‘friend.’” “It’s straight-up disrespectful when they say, ‘Rich Paul is only successful because he’s doing this with LeBron,’” Mr. James wrote in the foreword to Mr. Paul’s memoir. “That’s like saying I don’t demand the same excellence from my partners that I demand of myself, or that Rich’s other clients don’t think for themselves.”Mr. Paul doesn’t argue that he didn’t benefit from his friendship with Mr. James. He just thinks that if he hadn’t been a young Black man getting career help from a powerful friend, and an athlete at that, his story would have been framed differently.Still, Mr. James is entering his 21st N.B.A. season, which means life after LeBron James is in the not-too-distant future for Klutch Sports Group.The agency now has 198 clients between the N.B.A., W.N.B.A., N.F.L. and athletes looking for deals related to their name, image and likeness. Klutch has partnered with United Talent Agency, and Mr. Paul is the co-head of UTA’s sports division.The agency still attracts defectors from other agencies, but it experiences ebbs and flows. Three prominent players’ relationships with Klutch ended this year — Ben Simmons of the Brooklyn Nets, Anthony Edwards of the Minnesota Timberwolves and OG Anunoby of the Toronto Raptors.Some N.B.A. agents have quietly admired what Mr. Paul has accomplished, while others find him too aggressive in pursuing clients from other agencies.Mr. Paul said he was proud that many of his clients began their careers with other agents. He sees it as a sign of his superior ability to connect with players.“This is one thing my dad always taught us: No matter what somebody else is doing to you or done to you, that don’t mean you follow suit,” Mr. Paul said. “You stay the course. You do what you know is right.”There are those who don’t like the credit he gets for fostering an era of player empowerment in the N.B.A. Mr. Paul is known for aggressively advocating for his clients’ interests, even if that means demanding a trade while they are under contract, but he doesn’t shy away from telling them to pull back when he finds their wishes unrealistic.Mr. Paul’s Klutch Sports Group has nearly 200 clients.Sinna Nasseri for The New York TimesAs he navigates the current landscape of athlete management, he worries about the way players and their parents think about branding.“There’s nothing wrong with being a great basketball player and make all the money you can being a great basketball player,” Mr. Paul said. “Because I look at it this way: Being a great basketball player, being able to make four or five, $600 million playing a game of basketball is no different than building a business and selling it.”Mr. Paul’s career has kept him close to superstardom. But recently, his relationship with Adele has thrust him into a spotlight that isn’t always comfortable.“I try to keep it as private as I possibly can,” he said. When he and Adele began attending N.B.A. games together, dozens of search engine optimized headlines followed, asking: “Who is Adele’s boyfriend, Rich Paul?” Last month she even referred to Mr. Paul as her husband while speaking to a fan.“I’m in a place now where I’d rather she be happy than me,” Mr. Paul said. “Not that I don’t want to be happy, I want it to sound the right way. Just understanding the importance of someone that you are involved with, that you’re dating and that you’re spending your time with, that you may love. You understand the importance of them and their happiness.”Love has never been an easy subject for him. His parents never told him they loved him, though he says he has no doubt they did.Now, he said, he makes a point to tell his three children he loves them. It is one lesson he didn’t learn from his father because vulnerability was dangerous when he was growing up.It is one illustration of how different his life is from the one he lived growing up. But he doesn’t want anyone to forget how it started. More

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      Jamal Murray Is Learning to Unwind After Winning NBA Championship

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      It was a Sunday afternoon in early July, and Jamal Murray had been in Las Vegas for a few days — enough time for the city to wear out anyone.“I’m a little hung over,” he said, smiling in apology as he tried — unsuccessfully — to remember some details of the post-championship interactions he’d had with Denver Nuggets fans. Murray, the Nuggets’ star point guard, was less than a month removed from helping the franchise win its first N.B.A. championship.He had spent the previous night feting his friend Alexander Volkanovski, U.F.C.’s featherweight champion, after Volkanovski won U.F.C. 290 to remain undefeated in the 145-pound weight class. Murray had joined him for several hours before the fight and had been struck by how at ease Volkanovski was. The fighter had been happy to laugh and joke with Murray despite an important bout awaiting him later that evening.“This is like a championship belt for him, right?” Murray said. “He was just so loose about it. It kind of brought me back to, like, I don’t have to take my routine as serious as long as I know how to flip a switch, turn it on and bring it when I need it.”Alexander Volkanovski celebrated his win over Yair Rodriguez at U.F.C. 290 in Las Vegas in July.Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC, via Getty ImagesThe lesson could come in handy for Murray as he prepares for his next N.B.A. season, with training camps beginning in about a month. Last week, he went to Sydney to attend U.F.C. 293, where Israel Adesanya lost his middleweight belt to Sean Strickland. Murray planned to spend some time training with Volkanovski while there.Murray befriended Volkanovski during a visit to Australia last August. They shot a video together, with each one going through the other’s training routines. Murray hit a heavy bag. Volkanovski shot some free throws.There are superficial differences between the two — Murray is nearly a foot taller than the 5-foot-6 Volkanovski, and Volkanovski is eight years older — but in Murray, Volkanovski saw someone who shared the work ethic and discipline on which he prided himself. Volkanovski instantly took to Murray.“I’m a Nuggets guy now purely because of our connection,” Volkanovski said in late July, a few weeks after Murray joined him for U.F.C. 290.Their friendship grew at a challenging time for Murray.Murray had missed the 2021-22 N.B.A. season as he recovered from a torn anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee. He had to teach himself how to walk again, and he spent days wondering about his basketball future.Nuggets Coach Michael Malone later recalled that Murray, with tears in his eyes, had asked if the Nuggets were going to trade him because of his injury.In the fall of 2022, Murray began playing N.B.A. basketball again.Denver had the best record in the Western Conference for most of the season. As Murray grew more comfortable, he and Nikola Jokic, the team’s star center, became a fearsome tandem. During the playoffs, they became the first teammates to have triple-doubles with at least 30 points in the same game.“I’m still coming back, though,” Murray said in July. “I didn’t have a full off-season to recover. Or train on what I wanted to. My whole last summer was just working on my strength here.”He patted his knee.“And that was it. I didn’t get to work on my game.”He had thrown himself into his return, and he had also been gravely serious about his pregame routine, leaving no time for levity.The Nuggets won the N.B.A. championship in June, beating the Miami Heat in five games. That final night, as Murray left the arena in Denver, he sat in the passenger seat of a black car and occasionally rolled down his window to greet anyone who wanted to say hello. At one stoplight around 1 a.m., a fan spotted Murray as she was crossing the street. She sprinted over to Murray and hugged him through the car window. Rather than recoil at contact from a stranger, Murray returned the hug, smiling.“Everybody’s just trying to be a part of the moment, which is really cool,” Murray said.Murray bested his career averages in points and assists per game during the 2022-23 season, his return to play from a serious knee injury in April 2021.Bridget Bennett for The New York TimesAbout four weeks later, he joined Volkanovski for his own championship bout.There, Murray saw a different style of preparation than the one he’d employed during the season.“I’ll definitely have my moment throughout my car ride, ‘There’s no way that they’re taking this belt away from me.’ But I’m usually pretty chill,” Volkanovski said. “I’m happy to have a little laugh.”Volkanovski said he wondered if the violent nature of mixed martial arts might have made Murray more interested in his relaxed demeanor before the fight.“Probably he could look at that, I mean, like, ‘This guy’s about to go to war and he literally treats it as, like, you know, this is his job, he knows he’ll be fine,’” Volkanovski said. “‘He’s obviously confident in his preparation and all that.’”While Volkanovski appreciated hearing that Murray sought inspiration from his process, he respects Murray’s process as well.“Everyone has their own way of preparing for their — whatever they do,” Volkanovski said. “And you can never knock it, because obviously he’s playing some good basketball, so you don’t want to change much.”In July, Murray stayed for Volkanovski’s post-fight media appearances, then celebrated afterward at a gathering that Shaquille O’Neal also attended. The summer, at least, afforded a chance to unwind. More

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      Giannis Antetokounmpo’s Future in Milwaukee Is Uncertain

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      Giannis Antetokounmpo carried around a small, black portable fan, which looked minuscule as it whirred in his 12-inch-wide hands. He was trying to counteract the hot sun at a hillside mansion as he watched his youngest brother, Alex Antetokounmpo, pose for photos near a basketball hoop overlooking Los Angeles for an ad campaign.“Alex, the eyes,” Giannis said. “Eyes of the tiger right there, and then you mix it in with a smile.”Giannis turned and grinned at a group of about a dozen people watching. He has been coaching Alex for most of his life. When Giannis began his N.B.A. career with the Milwaukee Bucks at 18, he soon brought his family out of poverty in Greece to live with him. Alex was 12 years old.“Sometimes I think I get annoying to him,” Giannis, 28, said later, though Alex, 21, shows no signs that that might be true. Giannis added: “He could be doing idiotic stuff, stupid stuff, but he’s going through a path that I’m really proud of him.”As Giannis ascended to N.B.A. superstardom — he’s won the Most Valuable Player Award twice and is the best player on a championship team — he strove to bring his family along for his journey. Three of his four brothers have played professionally in the United States.But over the past three years, he has brought them along for what he hopes can be a more lasting endeavor: taking ownership of their money and his future. A few months ago, Antetokounmpo launched Ante, Inc. to house the brothers’ projects and investments. It’s about Giannis’s life beyond basketball, though basketball still matters to him — a lot. In a few weeks, he will be eligible for a three-year extension worth about $173 million, but he doesn’t plan to sign one just yet.“The real question’s not going to be this year — numbers-wise it doesn’t make sense,” Antetokounmpo said. “But next year, next summer it would make more sense for both parties. Even then, I don’t know.”He added: “I would not be the best version of myself if I don’t know that everybody’s on the same page, everybody’s going for a championship, everybody’s going to sacrifice time away from their family like I do. And if I don’t feel that, I’m not signing.”Giannis Antetokounmpo has begun focusing more on business endeavors over the past three years as he’s become a bigger basketball star.Mark Abramson for The New York TimesThis approach and an increased focus on business investments with his brothers are part of Antetokounmpo’s evolution as he has begun to understand his own ambitions and goals more deeply.“From 2020 to 2023, people think I’ve taken a large jump on the basketball court, but I think I’ve taken 10X jump off the court,” he said.‘I gave everything.’It started in the spring of 2020 when the world shut down because of the coronavirus pandemic. It wasn’t clear what would happen to players’ salaries or endorsement deals with the season in flux. He began to think of ways to diversify his sources of income.“We were sitting in the house. OK, now what?” Antetokounmpo said. “Basketball is taken away, what do I have?” He downloaded a stock trading app and started investing on his own for the first time. He began to reach out to successful people from other industries for advice and mentorship.It was an eventful year for him, which may have contributed to his interest in growing his income. His oldest child, Liam, had been born that February, and he had won his second M.V.P. Award, for the 2019-20 season, which the Bucks finished by losing in the Eastern Conference semifinals at the N.B.A.’s quarantined campus at Disney World.A few months later, Antetokounmpo signed a five-year, $228 million extension with the Bucks. But something was not right. He felt numb, and did not know why. He told the Bucks that he did not want to play basketball anymore.He had felt that way before. During his rookie year, he missed his family so much that he had insisted that the Bucks figure out a way to get them to Milwaukee, even threatening to go back to Greece if the team would not do it. He and his brothers had shared beds growing up. When Antetokounmpo left Greece for the N.B.A. draft in 2013, he said his father, Charles, told him: “No matter where you go in this world, doesn’t matter, don’t worry about that, I’ll find you. I love you, my son. Go have a great season.”“And I remember my mom was crying,” Giannis said. “I left. And then when I came here it wasn’t the same. I was in the hotel. It was the first time I felt lonely in my life.”Alex said the siblings are “pretty much each other’s best friends.”When Giannis thought about quitting basketball in the 2020-21 season, his brother Thanasis, right, reassured him.Elsa/Getty ImagesWhen Giannis felt down during the 2020-21 season, he was reassured when he told his older brother Thanasis about his doubts. By then, Thanasis was playing for the Bucks, too, and said that if Giannis was not happy he would leave with him.“I would have walked away in 2020,” Giannis said. “I care about joy and happiness. I care about my kids.”The Bucks recommended he speak to a sports psychologist, so Antetokounmpo tried it. Doing so helped him find ways to cope with the stress and pressure he felt. He rediscovered joy in playing basketball, and the Bucks won a championship that season.“I think it’s the best feeling that I’ve felt so far in basketball,” he said.He wants it again.The Bucks lost in the first round of last season’s playoffs, winning only one game against the Miami Heat as Giannis worked through injuries.Milwaukee fired its coach, Mike Budenholzer, and hired Adrian Griffin, who had been an assistant coach for the Toronto Raptors. That change, Antetokounmpo said, is part of why he is unsure if he’ll sign an extension.“You’ve got to see the dynamics,” he said. “How the coach is going to be, how we’re going to be together. At the end of the day, I feel like all my teammates know and the organization knows that I want to win a championship. As long as we’re on the same page with that and you show me and we go together to win a championship, I’m all for it. The moment I feel like, oh, yeah, we’re trying to rebuild —”He paused briefly before continuing.“There will never be hard feelings with the Milwaukee Bucks,” he said. “I believe that we’ve had 10 unbelievable years, and there’s no doubt I gave everything for the city of Milwaukee. Everything. Every single night, even when I’m hurt. I am a Milwaukee Buck. I bleed green. I know this.“This is my team, and it’s going to forever be my team. I don’t forget people that were there for me and allowed me to be great and to showcase who I am to the world and gave me the platform. But we have to win another one.”He is halfway to his goal of playing 20 N.B.A. seasons, and he said he would like to spend them with one team, the way Dirk Nowitzki, Kobe Bryant and Tim Duncan did.“But at the end of the day, being a winner, it’s over that goal,” he said. “Winning a championship comes first. I don’t want to be 20 years on the same team and don’t win another championship.”He didn’t mention any motivation for winning another championship outside of his competitive fire. But the cultural relevance that comes with winning can also elevate his growing off-court profile.‘We came from nothing.’Giannis couldn’t help but launch into a sales pitch as he sat in the living room of the home where he and Alex were doing the photo shoot. He was hyping a pain-relieving balm made by a company called Flexpower, which the Antetokounmpo brothers partially own. He has always considered himself to be a great salesman, back to when he was a child trying to help his parents sell sunglasses on the street in Athens.During the photo shoot, Giannis flitted around like a proud mother hen, beaming at Alex. Working with the company was Alex’s idea.“I knew you when you were a baby!” Giannis said, holding his hands out as if rocking a baby.Later, Giannis pondered when it was that he started thinking of Alex as an adult.“Might be today,” he said.Giannis and Alex shot photos for an ad campaign at the home of Jimmy Goldstein, an N.B.A. superfan, in the Beverly Crest neighborhood of Los Angeles.Mark Abramson for The New York TimesFour of the brothers are listed as co-founders on the Ante, Inc. website, but Giannis is the chairman. They have different roles, by virtue of their personalities. Alex describes Thanasis, 31, as very driven and bold in his style. Kostas, 25, has a quieter personality, but Alex said he excels at brainstorming.Giannis involved his brothers in discussions about his new Nike contract, which he said he negotiated himself this summer. One of his earliest investments was in the Milwaukee Brewers, in 2021. The brothers have invested in a candy company, a nutritional company and a golf team co-owned by Venus and Serena Williams and Serena’s husband, Alexis Ohanian. They have a production company in the works, like so many other N.B.A. players do.This year, Giannis became a co-owner of some funds with Calamos Investments, whose chief executive, John Koudounis, is of Greek descent. The joint venture donates 10 percent of its profits to financial literacy organizations.“He spent a lot of time talking about how he wishes that he had known about investing earlier,” said Jessica Fernandez, Calamos’s chief marketing officer. Antetokounmpo doesn’t manage the portfolios, but he does pepper those who do with questions about why and how they choose certain stocks.Earlier this year, the Antetokounmpo brothers joined the ownership group of Major League Soccer’s Nashville SC.“We came from nothing,” Antetokounmpo said. “And sitting in the owners’ suite with the other owners and enjoy the game, cheering for our team. Our team. Not just a team — our team. It’s insane.”Soccer was their first love; their father, who died in 2017, briefly played professionally. Their foundation, the Charles Antetokounmpo Family Foundation, seeks to help disadvantaged people in Greece, the United States and Nigeria, where their parents grew up.‘Protect the family.’The idea that someone with Giannis’s salary would worry about money might strain credulity, but he is thrifty — cheap, he’ll admit.“I need my kids to spend my money,” he said, smiling.He said he wants six children, and is almost halfway there. He and his fiancée, Mariah Riddlesprigger, have two sons, Liam and Maverick, and Riddlesprigger is pregnant with their third child, a girl.Antetokounmpo gets concerned when his children are pulled into the spotlight with him. In the United States, his fame is perhaps not as overwhelming as it would be were he playing in a bigger city. But in Greece things are different.“The way LeBron James is or Michael Jordan is for the States, the same way I am for Greece,” he said. “Maybe larger.”He has noticed people filming his children in their stroller and at a birthday party. He wants his children to be able to decide whether they want to live lives in the public. On social media, he typically covers their faces.When he thinks about growing his wealth, he is thinking about his children’s futures, too.The brothers try to make business decisions as a group, often on a messaging thread titled “Antetokounbros” (which is also the name of a store they have in Athens; they’re opening one in Milwaukee soon). They save personal texts for a different thread titled “F.O.E.,” which stands for family over everything.Giannis, left, with his brothers, left to right, Kostas, Thanasis and Alex in 2019 when Giannis won the Most Valuable Player Award.Jennifer Pottheiser/NBAE, via Getty ImagesHe said he has felt taken advantage of in the past by some of the people hired to handle his life, money or off-court interests, and was confident that will never happen with his family.“I see it with my teammates, some of my teammates,” Antetokounmpo said. “‘Oh, my cousin did this. My mom did this.’ You see it. It’s public. Moms arguing with their sons, suing one another for property that doesn’t belong to them. You see it every day.”He added: “The way we were raised in Greece and the things that we went through every single day to provide for our family, all those moments brought us close. They knew that at all costs I would protect the family, take care of my brothers. And I did.”Mark Abramson for The New York Times More

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      Dwyane Wade Talks Hall of Fame Induction and a Political Hopes

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      When the Miami Heat selected Dwyane Wade with the fifth pick of the 2003 N.B.A. draft, the league was in dire need of star players to carry it out of the Michael Jordan era.Wade’s draft class — which also featured LeBron James, Chris Bosh and Carmelo Anthony — ended up fitting the bill and then some. Wade immediately became one of the league’s most popular players, and his Miami teammate Shaquille O’Neal gave him the catchy nickname Flash. It was apt — Wade routinely attacked the rim with snazzy spin moves and finished with highlight-reel dunks and layups on his way to winning three championships.This weekend, Wade will be inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, a feat that seemed inevitable as he piled up accolades over a 16-year career. He made 13 All-Star teams, led the league in scoring once and was named the most valuable player of the 2006 N.B.A. finals, which Miami won over Dallas.“To be able to be one of those select few out of an entire generation of people who have tried to play the game of basketball and to be able to walk into the Hall of Fame, it doesn’t matter if I knew 10 years ago or I just got the call yesterday — it all feels surreal,” Wade said in a recent interview.Since retiring in 2019, Wade has acquired an ownership stake in the Utah Jazz and the W.N.B.A. team in his hometown Chicago, the Sky. In the spring, Wade revealed that he had moved his family out of Florida to California because of state laws that negatively affect the L.G.B.T.Q. community. Wade’s teenage daughter, Zaya, is transgender, and Wade has been outspoken on her behalf.Wade recently spoke to The New York Times about his basketball career and potentially running for political office.This conversation has been edited for clarity and length.Dwyane Wade’s jersey is lifted into the rafters during his jersey retirement ceremony at American Airlines Arena in 2020.Michael Reaves/Getty ImagesYou grew up in the South Side of Chicago without very much. When you retired, the former President Barack Obama taped a tribute video to you. How do you reflect on that journey?My dad and I talk about it. We still can’t believe it. We still can’t believe the N.B.A. career happened and it’s gone by. I got a call from President Obama on my birthday when I turned 40, and it was like: “Hey, pick up the phone at this time. There’s going to be a call coming.” I’m like, “OK.” Once I got on, I heard, “You’re waiting for the president of the United States.” I was like: “What? This is my life, right?”Your first N.B.A. game was against Allen Iverson. You’re having a bit of a full-circle moment this weekend by having him induct you. Why did you pick him?Michael Jordan was my favorite player. But as I was growing up as a kid, as Michael Jordan decided to retire from the game, Allen Iverson became the hero of our culture. I think a lot of people know I wear No. 3, but a lot of people don’t know why I wear No. 3. And so I just wanted to take this moment as an opportunity that is supposed to be about me, and I wanted to be able to shine light and give flowers to individuals that allow me and help me get here. My family, of course. My coaches, of course. My teammates, of course.But what about those individuals that gave you the image of what it looks like and how it can be done? And Allen Iverson gave me the image of how it looks like, how it could be done coming from the broken community that I came from. So I want to give him his flowers in front of the world because he deserves it.Wade and Allen Iverson attend the Stance and Dwyane Wade’s Spade Tournament at The One Eighty in Toronto in 2016.George Pimentel/WireImage, via Getty ImagesYou’re being inducted alongside Dirk Nowitzki, with whom you had, let’s call it a tense relationship at points. What’s your relationship with him like now?I respect Dirk as one of the greatest players that ever played this game of basketball. It’s funny to have something with someone and we’ve never guarded each other. We played totally different positions, but as I’ve always said, if I’m going to have any words with anyone, I want them to come in the finals.Dirk and I have played in the finals against each other twice. His team won once. My team won one. So I call it a wash. And I’m thankful to be able to be a part of the class that I’m a part of. And Dirk to me — and there’s no shade on anybody who’s ever played — but I think Dirk will probably be looked at as the greatest international player that we’ve ever seen.You’ve talked at length about your advocacy on behalf of the transgender community, especially with your own child. What was your reaction to the Orlando Magic donating $50,000 to the super PAC affiliated with Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida? (DeSantis has supported legislation such as what opponents deemed the “Don’t Say Gay” bill, a law signed last year that limits what instructors can teach about sexuality and gender in classrooms. The Magic’s donation was dated May 19, just days before DeSantis announced a run for the Republican presidential nomination in 2024.)I have so many things that I’m focused on and there’s so many, so many battles to fight, in a sense. That’s one that I’m not choosing to fight, with so many other things where my voice is needed. People are going to do what people want to do. And there’s nothing that you’re going to be able to do to stop them, per se. And so I’m trying to help where the need is and where I can.There were some reports in the spring that Florida Democrats were recruiting you to run for Senate.[Laughter] I heard that.Have you ever been approached to run for office?Yes.“I’ve been able to be a star,” Wade said. “I’ve been able to be Robin.”Ike Abakah for The New York TimesSo describe to me what that approach was like.I mean, it’s just conversation. “Hey, you would be good for,” “Hey, we can see you in,” “We would love to have you in.”It’s things that I’m passionate about that I will speak out on and speak up for. And so I don’t play the politician games. I don’t know a lot about it.But I also understand that I have a role as an American citizen and as a known person to be able to highlight and speak on things that other people may not be able to because they don’t have the opportunity to do this.So you’re running.[Laughter]Let me see if I can get you to be a little spicy. I’m sure you’ve seen some of the comments Paul Pierce has made comparing the two of you. He’s said a couple of different things. But one of the things he said — I’ll read the quote — “Put Shaq on my team. Put LeBron and Bosh with me. I’m not going to win one? You don’t think me, LeBron and Bosh, we’re not going to win one? We’re not going to win a couple?”What was your reaction to seeing what Paul said about you?I’m living rent-free right now.I got so many things going on in my life. Comparing myself to someone who’s not playing or someone who is playing is definitely not on my to-do list. Listen, Paul Pierce was one of the greatest players that we’ve had in our game. And I think, you know, when you are a great player and you don’t get the attention that you feel like your game deserved, sometimes you’ve got to grab whatever attention where those straws are. And Paul believes he’s a better player than me. He should believe that. That’s why he was great. That’s not my argument, and I didn’t play the game to be better than Paul Pierce. I played the game the way I played it, and I made the sacrifices that I made. Everybody doesn’t want to sacrifice.Wade shot against Paul Pierce in 2012 in Miami.Scott Cunningham/NBAE, via Getty ImagesI’ve been able to be a star. I’ve been able to be Robin. I’ve been able to be part of the Larry, Curly and Moe, like, whatever. I’ve been able to be successful and great in all those areas.It’s easy to say what you would do if you have a certain talent on your team, but you have to play with that talent. And that’s the hardest thing to do — to play with talent in different generations and different styles, which I was able to do.What is it like to watch old highlights of yourself now that you’re 41?I just got done watching a 2005-2006 edit. I think it was 45 minutes. I watched about 15 minutes. I walked away from that edit, and I was just looking at the way I played the game and I hooped.Nowadays, we’ve got the kids. And I love what development is going on, but kids are working on their moves. I just reacted to defenders. My moves came from just reacting, and those are the moves that are being worked on and are being highlighted now. I just played the game of basketball just like I was back in Chicago playing with my uncles and my dad and my family.So I love watching old highlights of myself because, just being honest, I haven’t seen a lot of people with my game and with my style. And so it was unique. And I’m thankful to have one of those games that no one can really understand how good I really was.Ike Abakah for The New York Times More