Gilbert Arenas on why he hated playing Dwyane Wade
"I hated playing against him. After the 2004 Olympics, coming into the 2004-05 season, everybody was talking about the Heat. Shaq went over there and I said, 'We'll just treat D-Wade like they did in the Olympics, just play him off the ball.' Didn't think nothing of it."
"Then I'm looking at the scoreboards and Miami is coming close. D-Wade is putting up 40, 45, 45. I called the hotel. 'Hey, is this Dwyane? Hey man, this is Gil. That stuff I said a couple weeks ago, I don't know if you saw it.' Just to let you know, you know, trying to smooth it over."
"I don't know if that phone call helped because he did not look like it helped. At halftime Larry Hughes looks at me and says, 'If you're going to talk about players, you guard them. Because what he's doing out there to you, he's taking it personal.' That was the last time I ever said anything about a player."
J.R. Smith says he got benched 9 seconds into guarding Kobe Bryant as an NBA rookie
“Crazy because in shootaround, we going through walkthroughs, doing plays and shit. Bryon Scott is trying to explain the triangle and where Kobe going to be at and his moves and shit”
“He was like, ‘He's going to go two dribbles right baseline. He gonna pump fake, stay down. He's going to pump fake again. Stay down.’ I'm like, ‘All right’”
“We go through another play. He tell me, ‘He going to go two dribbles right, pump fake, stay down, pump fake, stay down, and then make him pass it out. Worst case, he'll take a tough shot over top of you. We can live with that.’ I’m like, ‘All right’”
“We go over another play. I was like, ‘Yo, bro, if you tell me he about to go two dribbles right and pump fake and then pump fake... I got it. All right.’ ‘He do it and your ass go for it, I'm taking you out’”
“I get in the game. I swear to God bro. I wasn't in the game nine seconds. When I tell you this man went two dribbles right. But the way he took his two dribbles, I'm thinking he going to the cup for sure”
“This motherfucker pump fake. Jump. Boop. Swish. Beep. Sub. He took me right out”