𝙉𝙖𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣𝙖𝙡 𝘽𝙖𝙨𝙠𝙚𝙩𝙗𝙖𝙡𝙡 𝘿𝙖𝙮 𝙍𝙚𝙛𝙡𝙚𝙘𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣

Sorry I’m a little late…my daughter’s basketball schedule was intense this weekend. And as a father, her dreams will always be prioritized over mine.

National Basketball Day for the OG’s is about reflecting…

I think about where I started.
I think about where I ended up.
And I think about how none of it looked the way I pictured it when I was a kid.

My career was my career. I’m not rewriting it or pretending it was something else. I lived the overseas version of the dream with random experiences in random countries. The feeling of being the guy one night…then feeling invisible the next morning when you’re back to regular life things.

Overseas athletes are dealing with the same emotional whiplash right now. The same frustrations. The same, what the hell is going on moments. And also the same unbelievable highs that make you feel like you’re in a movie.

Back then, I started trying to tell that story while I was still living it.

In 2008, I started a blog called Waiting For Godunk. I was still in the middle of my career and I just wanted to document what it felt like to chase a job across the globe, while everybody back home thought you were living in some permanent highlight reel.

Then SLAM Magazine gave me a space and I documented my journey with them for two years. That felt like the beginning of the next chapter. Like I had found the thing I was meant to do when the playing stopped.

Then the playing stopped…and post career life beat the shit out of me.

I really believed it would be easy. And worse, I really believed my ego when it told me, You already did the hard part.

My ego fucking lied.

I wasn’t prepared for the silence, the loss of structure, or the weird shame that shows up when the world stops giving a shit that you USED TO do something cool.

I fell into pitfalls and I struggled. And then I got embarrassed…because the story I was telling myself didn’t match what was happening in real life.

I wasn’t living some extravagant post career lifestyle. I was writing, trying to keep the momentum going, and subbing at a local high school. And in my head, that felt like falling off a cliff.

That was a really low point.

And not because there’s anything wrong with teaching or because there’s anything wrong with rebuilding. It was low because I was hiding it. I was comparing it to the version of myself I thought I was supposed to be.

I wanted to be the major author with people dying to read these overseas stories. I wanted the outside world to look at my life and go, Yeah…he made it.

Instead, I was sitting with a laptop and a bruised identity, trying to force the next chapter to happen…while pretending I wasn’t bleeding in the process.

This photo I’m sharing…that was me full of hope.

But I started hiding the bad parts and dodging the real story, and that decision almost broke me. Because the story I needed to tell was the only one that could actually somebody.

The polished version gets likes, while the real version reaches the person who feels stuck in their own kitchen at 2:00am wondering why they feel lost when they should be fine.

I had to learn that the hard way.

And that’s why I’m still fucking here. That’s why OverseasX exists. That’s why I keep talking to current overseas athletes like I’m talking to the younger me.

Because I’ve seen the other side. I’ve lived the part nobody posts because of how bad it sucks. I know how fast things can get weird when you retire and don’t have a plan for who you are without it.

So on National Basketball Day…or belated, I’m grateful.
For the game.
For the chaos.
For the countries.
For the wins.
For the nights I felt ten feet tall.
And even for the embarrassing chapters that humbled me into finally telling the truth.

If you’re still playing…keep going. If you’re done playing…you’re not done. If you’re in that in between purgatory…you’re not crazy…you’re adjusting.

And if you’ve been hiding the real story because you’re worried what people will think…trust me, that hiding part is the thing that eats you alive.

I’m not doing that shit anymore.