From Michael Jordan to NBA bubble mayhem: Kemba Walker reflects on his experience

LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. — You have to see Kemba Walker in public at least once to realize how — quote-unquote — normal he is.

It’s not just the barely-six-feet stature, though that is certainly part of it. It’s the demeanor, too.

The smiles toward strangers. The eye contact. The refusal to big-time anyone despite the fact that he has done some very big-time things in his basketball career.

Even at a crowded, loud NBA 2K event in Brooklyn where anyone would be excused from turning anti-social.

On that early September night in 2018 when I interacted with Walker in a non-media-scrum setting for the first time, you could barely see him among the masses of folks on hand at the Greenpoint Terminal Warehouse. The then-Charlotte point guard weaved our way, going out of his way to say hello to a mutual friend (an NBA renaissance man of sorts named Burton Chawla) while politely introducing himself to myself and longtime NBA scribe and friend Howard Beck. And then he headed for the exits.

It was 30 seconds, tops.

So when I decided to use that moment as the opener for our conversation on Monday night, not long after his Boston Celtics had routed Toronto in Game 5 of the East semifinals to take a 3-2 series lead and Walker finished with 21 points, seven assists and a plus-23 rating, it was safe to assume there was no chance he would remember. The 30-year-old, four-time All-Star had granted my media relations request to chat in the Field House hallway, and this was just a way to tip it off. Or so I thought.

“No, I remember,” he said with a nod before I even finished my sentence. “It was at that 2K event in Brooklyn.”

This is why people root for this guy.

Chawla, the shoe industry/content executive who Walker said would be getting a phone call from him very soon just for the sake of catching up, tells the story of the first time they met with similar disbelief. Walker was 16 then, a prep star from Rice High in New York who was at a Nike event that day. When it ended, Chawla and a photographer had all kinds of gear to lug back to a rental car. Walker, not surprisingly, grabbed a few bags just for the sake of helping out.

This might all sound corny or basic, but it’s these sorts of Walker qualities that Celtics folks say has made this season so much fun after he signed that four-year, $141 million deal last offseason. And when you take a moment to remember what took place before, when the Kyrie Irving experience fell so flat in so many unenjoyable ways, it’s not hard to understand why Walker’s ethos is appreciated.

“The crazy thing about Kemba is that he might be the most normal person superstar in the NBA,” Celtics assistant general manager Mike Zarren said on the latest episode of the ‘Tampering’ podcast. “Kemba is just a regular guy who hoops at a level that the rest of us could never dream of, and it’s neat to see.

“To get to be an elite, elite player in any sport, but particularly ours, you have to be dedicated to your craft in a way that really lends itself to extreme personalities. If you’re not so, so dedicated and so, so focused on something, you’re sort of a more normal person. You’re not likely to be successful at this level. (But) Kemba is just a regular guy who loves what he does.

I know he’s been so, so happy to have some playoff success because that had eluded him earlier in his career. He’s certainly said it a number of times in the locker room after games how thankful he is to be on this team. … He’s shown up. He’s embraced the leadership role on this team. But … he isn’t the aloof, superstar, demanding of everything around him. He’s just a normal guy who is a really, really incredible basketball player. I think that lends an air of humility to our whole team, because he just exudes that every day. It’s been neat getting to know him. He’s just such a good dude.”

As our Celtics beat writer, Jay King, put it in a late Monday text message, “He’s the least All-Star, All-Star who ever lived.”

Walker, who spent so many years wanting more out of his NBA experience while in Charlotte but who remains close with the Hornets’ iconic owner, Michael Jordan, was nice enough to discuss these playoffs and why they mean so much to him after Game 5.

So you talked the other day about appreciating this journey, and this experience. And I looked at it today: You now have nine playoff games under your belt this postseason, after having 11 total in those eight years. It’s crazy, right?

It’s nuts. (But) you know what, man? It’s just basketball at the end of the day. I love the game. I love basketball. I love getting my teammates excited to play the game. Those two losses were pretty hard on us, I think, so I just think that my job was to keep the energy high, keep my guys’ heads high. I just didn’t feel like we had nothing to put our heads down for. We won two games straight. They won two games straight. It’s just playoff basketball. I just love to play basketball. So yeah man, I just love to play basketball.

The intensity part that you mentioned (in his group media session) is simple but true, right? We overcomplicate it sometimes.

Yeah, that’s what it was. I thought tonight, we came out and we set the tone (the Celtics led 25-11 after the first quarter).

I was reading some old material on you, and you’ve talked before about how the main MJ message he would always give you was, “Don’t get comfortable.”

(Walker nods)

It made me wonder: Did you guys get comfortable after the first two games (when Boston was up 2-0)?

Um, I think human nature set in a little bit. I also think fatigue might have set in a bit as well. I think those two things set in, and you know, I think after the shot they made with point-five seconds, I think that kind of — we were so mad about that shot that we just wanted to come into the next game and win the game in one possession, you know? So that hurt us. But after that loss, we kind of had to watch film, learn from our mistakes and come back more poised and play the game how we know we want to play.

So Game 3 – I’ve been covering the league since ’05 and can’t remember a crazier sequence. You find Daniel (Theis) what that incredible pass, and then they hit that shot (O.G. Anunoby’s game-winner after that insane Kyle Lowry inbounds pass over 7-foot-5 Tacko Fall). That had to be a hell of a below-the-belt hit there.

Yes (laughs). It was tough, man. It really was. But that’s just the way it goes.

(At this point, Raptors forward Serge Ibaka walks by and decides to interrupt.)

Ibaka: Ask him why he flops so much.

Walker: You’d better ask your teammates that…

(Walker continues as a smiling Ibaka departs.)

Yeah man, that was a crazy, crazy sequence. It really was.

It made me wonder, too, if any of this takes you back at all to March Madness. I know it’s been nine years (since he led UConn’s national title run, but there are some parallels there.

No, I can’t say it does. Like you said, it’s just so long ago. Yeah, it just — when it gets down to the nitty gritty, man, that’s what I love. I love to compete. I love to play at the highest level. And that’s what we’re doing. Right now, we’re playing against the defending champs. These guys are incredible basketball players. They’re an incredible team. They’re gonna give us their best shot and we just have to be prepared and be ready for it.

What about the flip side of that? When you went through that (college) experience, you probably thought that’s what it’d be like every year in the league. But you learn the hard way that it’s tough to get to this point.

Oh my goodness. Oh, I learned the hard way for sure. That’s why for me, now man, I don’t take it for granted. Every possession is huge. Every play is huge. So, yeah man, I definitely learned the hard way and I’m happy to be here for sure.

You and (Jordan) keep in touch?

Yeah, we do (keep in touch). But he’s not gonna write me on anything right now, here in the playoffs. But we speak, yeah. That’s my guy — forever, forever.

From Michael Jordan to NBA bubble mayhem: Kemba Walker reflects on his experience

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