“I said to get one of these NBA jerseys, it’s not gonna be easy. It’s gonna be a lot of hate, it’s gonna be a lot of people not believing in you but you know J. Cole — he got the right size, he in the gym!” “But, what I told him … this a different time we’re in. They’re going to pick you apart! You’re gonna have to be able to hit every shot and if you don’t hit every shot, they — you know in the NBA, they don’t hit every shot but they believe in them. So, you’re gonna have to go somewhere where the team really believe in you and the players believe in you.” P says Cole won’t get a pass just because he’s famous — in fact, he’ll have to work even harder than everyone else to prove he’s for real.
Tag: Master P
Remember when Master P almost made the …
Remember when Master P almost made the NBA? Sure, it sounds crazy more than two decades removed from his run at the league, especially as his No Limit empire continues to expand into food, footwear and everything in between. But at the height of his rap career, Percy Miller largely stepped away from his blockbuster music career and chased a separate dream. Across two preseasons for two teams in one year, Miller suited up with the goal of making an NBA roster.
“P,” as his teammates called him, wore …
“P,” as his teammates called him, wore the uniform of the Charlotte Hornets ahead of the lockout-shortened 1999 season, before giving his NBA dream another try the following fall for the Toronto Raptors in the 1999-2000 preseason. P’s time on the cusp of the NBA may have been brief, but it was a memorable, unique spectacle, and still resonates with the teammates, coaches and others who were around him during his playing days. (Multiple messages to representatives of P for comment went unreturned.)
Chucky Brown: He was raw as a player. …
Chucky Brown: He was raw as a player. He had game, but he knew more of the playground stuff. For example, I can remember one incident where Bobby Phills was on the low post and P came and set a screen for him when he had the ball. In the NBA, you don’t wanna do that. You wanna space the floor. Bobby told him, “Don’t do that. Don’t come set the screen down here. We wanna keep the space so I can do my work, and if somebody comes and double-teams, then I can get it out and now we’re moving around the perimeter.”
Eldridge Recasner (Hornets guard): One …
Eldridge Recasner (Hornets guard): One day I get up to go downstairs for breakfast and I’m just seeing all these people that I knew from New Orleans, all these guys that I played high school basketball with. Cass Clarke was one guy who played at the University of New Orleans. Kurt Hankton was another guy. I’m like, “What the hell are y’all doing here?” They were all working for Master P. They were like, “Oh man, P’s trying out for the team. He’s gonna make the squad.” So I started laughing. I was like, “Are you guys serious?” But he had his whole entourage with him at the Embassy Suites hotel. Chucky Brown (Hornets forward): When it first happened, I didn’t know P’s past as far as playing went. You really didn’t know what to expect. You have a lot of basketball players that wanna rap. You have a lot of rappers that wanna play basketball. So you didn’t know how it was gonna be.
Chucky Brown: He was raw as a player. …
Chucky Brown: He was raw as a player. He had game, but he knew more of the playground stuff. For example, I can remember one incident where Bobby Phills was on the low post and P came and set a screen for him when he had the ball. In the NBA, you don’t wanna do that. You wanna space the floor. Bobby told him, “Don’t do that. Don’t come set the screen down here. We wanna keep the space so I can do my work, and if somebody comes and double-teams, then I can get it out and now we’re moving around the perimeter.” Recasner: There’s a lot of connection between the hip-hop world and basketball. I would say 50 percent of the league back then was probably listening to his music in their pregame. I know I was. (If) you’re trying to get hyped for a game back in ’99, 2000, you’re listening to Master P.
Dee Brown: (Laughs loudly) That’s not …
Dee Brown: (Laughs loudly) That’s not true. P never beat me in practice. He never beat me in a drill. He never beat me in one-on-one. I told him, “Hey, I don’t try to go and rap. Don’t try to come on the basketball court and shoot jumpers with me. You ain’t got a chance.” I told him that to his face. He tried. He tried hard. And yeah, as a rookie, I’d run him off screens, I’d throw an elbow here, Antonio Davis would give him a little hip-check there. So yeah, he went through it. But as far as me, I was one of the captains, one of the five or six best players on the team. I wasn’t worried about Master P, trust me. I was worried about freaking Greg Anthony and Mookie Blaylock. I wasn’t worried about Master P.
LaVar Ball has HUGE plans for BBB in …
LaVar Ball has HUGE plans for BBB in 2020 — with a new BBB cartoon, new footwear and even a line of custom car rims … and he’s got some powerful supporters behind him. Ball — along with Master P and Metta World Peace — joined the guys from the office for “TMZ Roundtable” … where they talked about everything from getting their sons to the NBA, to how basketball has helped build their businesses off the court.
Metta World Peace says Ball’s youngest …
Metta World Peace says Ball’s youngest son is the real deal — and thinks he’ll be a force to be reckoned with at the top levels. As for Master P, his 2 sons are rising up the ranks too — but P says even if his kids don’t make it to the NBA, he’s setting them up for success in the business world. You gotta hear his plans.