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Did constantly adjusting to new coaches and teams take more of a mental or physical toll on you, compared to college? Shane Larkin: I mean, yeah. I think I played with the same AAU team. I played two years in college, so I wasn't accustomed to the constant change. I think being able to be comfortable and being able to be truly who you are, and your teammates understand who your coaches are, the training staff, the city, the organization, everything, it allows you to kind of grow and blossom into who you're going to be. I was never able to find that opportunity anywhere in the league or early on in my career. When I finally was able to find that, I think that's when you started seeing my kind of improvement and see what kind of player I could actually turn into. And I think a lot of people go through it. The quote-unquote journeyman is a saying in basketball. And it's difficult. It's not easy. And you see a lot of guys who, especially smaller backup point guards that kind of go through that. Ish Smith played for, I think, half the NBA. So it's just part of the game. It's part of the journey. And it wasn't something that I wanted to continue to do. So when I finally found a home and I felt like this is a place that I could grow and kind of be who I wanted to be and grow into the player that I thought I could become, it just felt really good to find that place. And like I said, once I found that place, it just felt like home, and I didn't want to go anywhere else.
Before Ish Smith signed with the Hornets on the last day of the offseason, he was on the verge of reuniting with the Nuggets in a front office role that he described to The Post as an apprenticeship. He would have been based out of Charlotte but with periodic trips to Denver, where he could shadow various people in basketball operations. “I was gonna do some consulting, and start learning the business a little bit more,” Smith said. “Start transitioning to some front office. Some coaching. Who knows? I didn’t know, but I was just going. … I was gonna watch Calvin (general manager Calvin Booth), and then watch Coach (Michael Malone). Try to help out as much as possible. I just wanted to learn to see what I wanted to do.”
Smith’s playing days were officially prolonged when he signed Oct. 24 to return to the Hornets. “For me it was a situation where, like, how can I help the guys as much as possible?” he said. “I know I’m playing (right now), and dudes have injuries. But for me, it’s more or less, how can I help further a lot of guys’ careers, understand the game, have a long career? Whatever the case is. I’ve always tried to give lessons to people and try to figure out how I can help. So it was a great opportunity. It wasn’t even about playing. Like, if I played, cool, but if not, I was more like, how can I help?”
The future is still on his mind. For now, figuring out what’s next has just been delayed. Asked if he wants to be a general manager someday, Smith laughed. “I want to learn from somebody first,” he said. “That job is crazy. Or maybe be an agent. I think a lot of guys get bad advice coming out of the draft.”
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Reggie Jackson could see the tears beginning to well up in Jeff Green's eyes. DeAndre Jordan and Ish Smith went over to hug Green and stand by him. Smith began choking back tears. A few steps away, Jackson stood toward the end of the Nuggets bench, where he was crying too. With about a minute to go in Game 5 of the NBA Finals, as the Nuggets were nearing their first championship Monday night, the four veterans began to realize that the dream they had been chasing all their basketball lives would finally be realized. It is no coincidence that the first three Nuggets whom Jackson hugged as the confetti began to fall at Ball Arena were Green, Jordan and Smith. Jackson looked at Smith and said, "Man, we champs!"
It doesn't matter that Green was the only one of the four who played meaningful postseason minutes off the bench. All of them played a role in the locker room and on the sideline to help Nikola Jokic, Jamal Murray and the Nuggets vanquish the Miami Heat and become world champions.
Green and Jordan are the first pair of teammates to each play 1,000-plus regular-season games and win their first titles together, according to ESPN Stats & Information research. "It's everything," Green said of what winning a title meant to him before the NBA Finals began. "This is what I play for. For me, I always play for team first, and the ultimate goal was to always win a championship. "With everything I've been through in my career, to win a championship is everything."
In his 10th postseason, he averaged 4.1 points and hit a big 3-pointer midway through the fourth quarter of Game 4 of the Finals to help the Nuggets win at Miami. "I'm proud of myself, from all the obstacles that I've been through in my career," Green said. "The obstacle that I faced 10-plus years ago, not allowing those type of things to hold me back, breaking barriers down, multiple teams, adapting to every circumstance. "With all I've been through, which everybody knows, to be at this point, being productive, giving something on a great team in the Finals, I think it's amazing."
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Tom Haberstroh: NEW: 14% of NBA players that have come into the league since 2010 have been a teammate of Ish Smith. That's NBA champion Ish Smith. On this week's @bballilluminati (at 40:27), I voiced a love letter to Ish and his remarkable climb to the mountaintop. apple.co/43TL8YZ pic.twitter.com/xhm8cERH9U
Denver this season had the chance to move backup point guard Ish Smith, but coaches and players protested when front office officials presented them with the option: Smith was too important to their culture, their practices, their harmony. Everyone agreed to keep Smith, and he has served an important behind-the-scenes role -- including mimicking the Miami Heat's playbook as part of Denver's scout team at practices.
Those quick feet are useful in another way. I’m not sure how to confirm this stat, but, anecdotally speaking, Jokic leads the NBA in kicked-ball violations by about 9,000. That’s no coincidence. They’re calculated and part of his arsenal. “They’re intentional, yes,” Smith says, smiling. “That’s what he wants because, like, kick ball, you got to take the ball back out! If that pocket pass gets there, now maybe somebody comes in from the weak side, and they get a lob. So getting that kick ball, you gotta take it back on the side, reset to 14 seconds, and now you gotta try that offense again or try something different.”
Harrison Wind: Nikola Jokic asked if these playoffs and being in the Finals is the most important moment in his career. He said, yes becuase of the chance to get the Nuggets' veterans -- Jeff Green, DeAndre Jordan, Ish Smith -- to the Finals and a championship: "It's maybe now or never."
