Blake Griffin On “7PM In Brooklyn”

Blake Griffin joins Carmelo Anthony to talk Jimmy Butler trade demands, his new NBA analyst role, retirement, and more on “7PM in Brooklyn”.

We share this week’s episode of “7PM in Brooklyn”, a Wave Sports + Entertainment Original, hosted by NBA legend, Carmelo Anthony.

As part of the new season, the newest team members of the “7PM in Brooklyn” family join the show, as Rudy Gay, Monica McNutt, The Kid Mero, and Kazeem Famuyide chop it up with Carmelo Anthony on a variety of topics.

Blake joins Melo, Mero, and Monica to celebrate Melo’s recent Hall of Fame nomination.

Later in the episode, Blake dives deeper into his recently announced NBA Analyst position with Amazon Prime Video, playing for the Celtics, handling criticism prior to his retirement, as well as his thoughts on Jimmy Butler’s approach to getting traded.

EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS

• (05:49): MELO ON HOW HE FOUND OUT ABOUT HIS HALL OF FAME NOMINATION AND KIYAN ANTHONY’S REACTION

MELO: “People like us don’t make that type of shit. That’s not even something I thought about for one, I didn’t even think about making the NBA so better yet–Hall of Fame is like Hall of Fame…my business partner [Asani Swann] was blowing my phone up and I’m like, she don’t call. If she called twice, it is important. If she called three, four times, it’s an emergency. Somebody is dying so she called back to back to back and she was like yelling and started screaming in the phone and I’m like, what’s going on? She was like, you Hall of Fame and I was like, it ain’t there yet. I was my typical self like nah, it is just a nomination. I didn’t have a chance to process it. You know what I mean but when I got home, it is out there talking to people and family and then my son was like yo that’s tough.”

• (11:36/12:44): BLAKE OPENS UP ABOUT HIS NEW NBA ANALYST POSITION FOR AMAZON PRIME

BLAKE: “That’s what I love about football, watching football watching Tony Romo, Tom Brady, Peyton Manning, you’re really getting insight into how hard it is and what these guys are thinking and all the decisions they have to make. I feel like that’s sort of missing from basketball a little bit…First of all, I think the TNT show Shaq, Chuck, and those guys, they are probably one of the best sports shows of all time. To me, they are just talking shit. There is not a lot of analysis. I mean that– it’s a great show–I’m not talking shit. It’s a great show….But what I’m excited to do is just, I’m pretty fresh out. There’s always a new wrinkle that comes into the game every single year you come back and the coaches are like, Hey, we’re not doubling from the wing anymore, we’re doubling across. There’s always a new wrinkle. So for me, just bringing analysis that’s current is a thing that I’m excited about and also being pro-player. You know how hard it is to go out every single night. You have off days, you have off games so to be able to just sort of bridge the gap between NBA fans and players and say, listen, did he have a bad game? Yeah. He’ll be the first one to tell you he had a bad game and then to not do this thing where it’s like, oh, he was dogging, it’s tonight. Just explain what’s going on. They played four and five. That’s not easy, right? You’re tired sometimes you miss your first”

• (16:55): BLAKE ON MANAGING CRITICISM AND SOCIAL MEDIA

BLAKE: “I mean to be honest, as you get more years in the league, at the beginning of my career, I would hear something about myself and I’d be like, I wanted to prove them wrong so bad and as I got older, I became very comfortable with who I was as a player and the same thing goes for social media. There’s times where I’m comfortable, I’m good, I know who I am and I can hear a critique and I can be like, all right, that’s fair. The Amazon thing leaked and there was a post and somebody was like, man, Blake’s is about as interesting as a number two pencil. I’m like… So that to me it is easy to read that and be like, alright, well I disagree– I get it, but I disagree. There’s just things where now I’m just like, nah, that doesn’t affect me as much right? But I do like that it keeps you on your toes and you got to bring it.”

• (34:11): BLAKE ON WHY HE DIDN’T CONTINUE WITH THE CELTICS AND ADJUSTING HIS GAME

BLAKE: “No, I thought about it, man. I had nine surgeries in my career. Every surgery it takes a little bit longer to get back from. My last one was, it was a noticeable– I step on the court, I can’t do the things that I want to do. I can see it happening. I can’t do the things that I want to do. It takes a toll and basketball is the thing that I love the most in this world, love doing the most and when you can’t do it at the same level or even to a fraction of the level that you want to do it at, it becomes harder. It was a thing that I had to get over and I wouldn’t say I struggled with it, but it was always top of mind for me. I just can’t play the game the same way I wanted to and I always kind of thought in the back of my mind, once I get to that point, it’s time.”

BLAKE: “I mean that was when I talked earlier about hearing criticism. Early on in my career, the thing that ate at me the most was I love basketball and I worked as hard as I possibly could. I hired a shooting coach after my first season completely retooled my shot. It took time but I put that time in and it ate at me that people just labeled me as this and this and I care. We all know there’s certain guys that they’re talented, they don’t really work and it’s fine. They’re able to go out and contribute and be a good player but to me, I was always sort of envious of that mindset because I felt like I cared too much and it crippled me sometimes. So for me, transitioning my game it started day one where people saw me shooting threes at the end of my career, that started my first season. You know what I mean? You can’t wait til I can’t jump as high anymore, now I got to work on my shot. That started years, years before and hundreds and thousands of misses and gyms and it was frustrating but looking back, I’m glad I did it. I’m glad I started then because otherwise I would’ve gotten to that point where everybody’s–they want to power forward. Who can shoot threes and I’m left behind. I would’ve probably been forced out five years earlier if I couldn’t. I had to work at it. I got better at it but no, I wasn’t in the bag.”

• (01:02:02): BLAKE TALKS ABOUT PLAYING FOR BOSTON VERSUS LA OR NEW YORK

BLAKE: “Boston though, man, I loved Boston. I love those guys. I was so happy for them when they won. That is a different experience when you’re playing as an opponent, there is one thing you go play there, all those people are rocking with you who used to just be yelling crazy shit. It’s wild. All these people are rocking with you. You got to understand that dude, I played in LA for the Clippers. I played in New York for the Nets. It’s a Lakers town. It’s a Knicks town. That was the first time I really played for a team where it was like, everybody in that city is rocking with you. I went out to dinner 10 times, no check, you know what I mean? In Boston, like I said, I’m paying every five.”

• (01:03:34): BLAKE ON HOW HE CHOSE HIS JERSEY NUMBER 91

BLAKE: “So I couldn’t figure out a number in Brooklyn. I’m like, all right, 2. I’m going through all the numbers. What number can I be and then you got whatever, 15 guys who already have their numbers. Clippers, I was 32 in Detroit, 32 is taken, all these numbers are retired so I’m scrambling for numbers and I don’t know, somebody was like, what about 91? I’m like, you know what f*ck it. I stand by 91. The one I don’t love is number 2 in Brooklyn. I don’t love that one. I’ll stand by the Boston 91.”

• (01:08:11): BLAKE SAYS JIMMY BUTLERS APPROACH TO GETTING TRADED OUT OF MIAMI WAS ENTERTAINING

BLAKE: “I wouldn’t do it that way so I can’t say that I fuck with it, but I do think it’s hilarious. It’s entertaining. I just think because now it has happened multiple times, right? If this is the first time he wants out of Miami, cool. I get it. No problem with that but remember Minnesota. Philly, remember Philly? Yeah. Now in Chicago. You only have a certain amount of times you can do that, right? It’s entertaining but I think if it was the NBA, he probably would’ve had to play it a different way.”