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Former Miami Heat teammates Bam Adebayo and Tyler Herro were involved in a physical altercation in Las Vegas on Friday morning, the Heat confirmed to The Athletic. The incident took place at a gym inside the Resorts World Casino in front of Herro’s AAU team. According to multiple source who witnessed the incident and were granted anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter, Adebayo walked onto the courts and Herro said something to him. Adebayo proceed to walk over to Herro and, without hesitation, punch him. Herro’s AAU coach confronted Adebayo, and Herro yelled at his former teammate while being escorted out by security personnel.
Varun Shankar: - Bruce Thornton says he watched a lot of Fred VanVleet last season with OSU - He and Jabari Smith Jr. were AAU teammates back in elementary school (both are from Georgia). (x/x)
“Looking at the landscape of summer basketball I felt like we were getting away from traditionally how camps need to be ran,” McGrady told FOS. “You had to earn your right to be at ABCD. And nowadays it’s a lot of relationship-based, a lot is just handed to these kids instead of making them work…This property is missed from what is going on in summer AAU basketball. Had some conversations with Sonny, he agreed to that and I was just like, ‘let me take it over.’”
JR Smith on 2020 ring with Lakers: We won it now. It felt great. It just felt weird in The Bubble. It wasn't the same. There was no parade, no fans, people wearing masks, you get the echoes coming through the thing. It was kind of weird, but winning a chip in general is just amazing. So, I'm very fortunate to have two. Living in The Bubble, it was actually one of the dopest situations coming from somebody who played AAU ball growing up and going to these top 100 camps and stuff like that. Cuz you have all of the top guys in one area. You just see dudes that you normally wouldn't see on a regular basis where you can pick each other's brains.
Oh No He Didn't: KAT: "I just felt a calm and a peace that had to be come from the woman above (his mom). I felt like a kid. It was just fun out here. It felt like I was a kid getting ready to go play my Saturday AAU games and Sunday AAU games. In a way I felt like I was seeing her in the stands"
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Raymond Felton: "Kids are doing it not because of some fucking SGA. Kids are doing it because that's the game now. If you watch AAU, I bet you he ain't going to no goddamn AAU games. I'm coaching in AAU. I see this. These kids are doing that now. That's part of the game."
For Curry and Durant, the start of a new postseason isn’t just a new opportunity to play on the game’s biggest stage, it’s a reminder of just how long they’ve been here — and how rare it is to still be playing at all. “I bet you everybody has a different take on that,” Curry told The Athletic when asked what it’s been like to be in the rarefied air that he has occupied with Durant and LeBron James for so long. “Mine is I played against KD in AAU when I was 9. I was in Charlotte and he was in the DMV (Washington, D.C., Maryland and Virginia metropolitan region). There’s always that joke, he thought I was a little White kid because he didn’t know who I was, just a little shooter. That’s his favorite joke. “And that was, what, ’97, ’98? So think about how long that is. I don’t know how to wax poetic any more than that.”
Which NCAA prospect impresses you the most so far? Scout #2: “With Dybantsa, Peterson, and Boozer, I don’t think you can go wrong with any of those guys. Boozer surprised me the most. I saw him last summer in an AAU tournament. He was awesome. Depending on a team’s need, if you needed someone like him, I could see him going one. I don’t think people would think you’re crazy. He’s pretty damn good. He’s better than what I thought he would be. He’s able to impose his will on the game. He’s super competitive. His shot is going to improve. He’s not very athletic. But he gets a lot of things done. He’s a good player. As a freshman, I thought his athleticism would be an issue. But he has proven that he knows how to win.”
James told a story about playing in an AAU tournament with Kendrick Perkins when he was 14 and how some players were sitting in the stands eating fast food. “They were eating McDonald’s,” James said, smiling, “and I was eating fruits.”
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Ian Begley: Harlem native and Cavs forward Nae’Qwan Tomlin spent time with kids in Harlem before the Cavs played the Knicks on Christmas Day. It’s important for Tomlin to be involved with & mentor kids in his hometown of Harlem. Tomlin has made it to NBA despite never playing HS or AAU ball
Nick DePaula: Paolo Banchero debuted the Air Jordan 4028 tonight at MSG — in a PE colorway inspired by his childhood team in Seattle. “This color is a shout to the AAU club that I grew up playing with, Seattle Rotary,” he told me of his series of PEs.
But former 14-year NBA veteran guard Raymond Felton doesn't buy into the idea that nationality determines a player's professionalism or coachability. "I'm in the AAU space. I'm an AAU coach. Some of these kids are not coachable, but then it's a lot of these kids that are coachable. F**k that overseas shit, overseas is better, this and that. No, overseas ain't better," Felton stated on To The Baha podcast. "I'm sorry, f**k that, they not. As a whole, they're not," the 41-year-old added. "Are they getting better? Yes, of course. They making kids play pros at 14 years old. 14-year-old kids are still playing AAU over here, they ain't playing against grown men, you know what I'm saying."
Months ago, Damian Lillard tipped Duft off to an under-recruited point guard from Oakland — sound familiar? — who Lillard thought would be a good fit for Weber State. ArDarius Grayson committed in March, and is scheduled to play his first game on Nov. 3. “I don’t know what Dame told them,” Grayson said, “but it worked.” None of the NBA players listed in this story are taking a salary from their schools, though Weber State is toying with the idea of paying Lillard a nominal fee. “We’ve talked with our administration about, what are the rules exactly?” Duft said. “Could he go on the road? If there’s a summer AAU tournament he wants to be at, can he go and wear a Weber State shirt? I can see him wanting to get into it. We might have to pay him something so he could officially be an employee. Maybe like, $1 annually?”