![]() I remember when I first got there, the first day we worked out as a team, we played pickup. Speedy Claxton (Spurs teammate 2002-3): Everybody knows Tim was a great guy, but he’s a funny guy as well, and likes to have fun. That day, the way he made me feel welcomed and comfortable in his space, in his facility, that’s when I knew he was different. He puts me in a game to play five-on-five with the group. He just knows I’ve been hired to be in the video room. We’re coming back, he doesn’t know my name. ![]() James Borrego (Spurs video coordinator/ assistant coach, 2003-18, Current head coach of the Charlotte Hornets): What was so surprising to me was one of the first few days of that summer, he invites me to play pickup. He was willing to learn from everybody, and guys can sense that in the locker room. He wasn’t coming in like he was a big shot. Timmy came in with a lot of humility too. “I always thought I was kind of quiet, and Tim made me feel like I was loud.” “Tim, he’s a humble guy,” Robinson told TNT’s Ernie Johnson. Tim Duncan and David Robinson blended harmoniously, guiding the Spurs to the franchise’s first two titles in 19. So what struck me about him is that it has been proven time and time again, he’s the type of guy, you can be doing it your entire life and you show it to him and in five or 10 minutes, he’s actually better than you are. Outwardly, I was very gracious, but in my mind, I couldn’t believe it. And it was the first time he had played the game and I just could not understand it. He proceeded to thoroughly annihilate me. I said, “Oh, yeah, come on over here,” thinking I was going to give him a whooping. Tim, he came in and he’s like, “Oh, what’s this?” I used to beat up on the neighborhood kids. I had these big video games there that I used to play, it was Mortal Kombat. The Spurs also landed the top overall pick in the draft lottery.Įlliott: The first time I met Tim, he came over to the house. He says, “Yeah, I’ve got a research methods lab report due tomorrow.”Īs a senior, Duncan won the men’s basketball John Wooden Award, given to the nation’s most outstanding player. Who is in there? I leaned in and it was Tim. This was back in the day when we had computer labs and I had to walk past the computer lab and the door was opened and I thought, Oh. Later that evening, I had to go into our building to get something out of my office. And it was at that point, I’m talking to my staff, I’m saying, “We might want to look at this kid a little more closely and let’s see which way this thing takes us.”ĭeborah Best (chairman of the Wake Forest psychology department and Duncan’s academic adviser): They were playing on a Sunday afternoon game, and my son and husband and I sat and watched the game on television and there was Tim playing. He scored something like 9 points and had five or six blocks and probably almost 10 rebounds. The New York Times asked a group of his friends, teachers, teammates and coaches to speak about his journey. He started playing basketball in the ninth grade, setting him on a path to Wake Forest University, San Antonio and, now, Springfield, Mass. Croix and left the sport when Hurricane Hugo devastated the island in 1989, destroying the pool where he competed. “Honestly, I don’t think there’s a change I would do differently.”ĭuncan’s journey was one of happenstance and perseverance. ![]() “You always get the question: What would you change? What would you do differently?” Duncan said in a video released by the Hall of Fame after his selection was announced last year. And this week, he’ll be inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in a heralded class alongside Kevin Garnett and the late Kobe Bryant. Five total Most Valuable Player Awards, three in the finals, two in the regular season. Tim Duncan stoically spent 19 fundamentally sound seasons allowing his play to speak for him. ![]()
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