I have to thank this man, because without his vision, I promise you, there would be no Hall of Fame Allen Iverson standing at this podium if it wasn't for this guy.
He gave me a vision, man. And you know, you wanna be fast like Isiah, and you wanna shoot like Bird,
you know, rebound like Barkley, pass like Magic, be dominant like Shaq, but man, I wanted to be like Mike. You know what I mean.
I remember the first time I played against him. And I walked out on the court and I looked at him, and for the first time in my life a human being didn't look real to me.
I don't know if y'all watch the Chappelle Show, but he talked about in a certain episode where somebody's seeing Rick James, and, like, I literally saw his aura.
It looked like he was glowing. And I'm sitting there and I'm saying to myself, 'Man, that's Mike. ' And I'm looking at him. I can't stop looking at him. Like, I'm looking at his shoes.
And I'm like, "Man, he got on Air Jordans." You know what I mean. I mean, it was Mike. It was my idol. It was my hero.
And I remember just hating the Knicks so much and the Bad Boys, for beating him up the way they did. I used to watch him and sit on my mom's dress.
And she used to tell me, "Boy, if you don't get back from that TV before you go blind, you'd better." I wanted to be that close to him, just watching him.
Man, my sister, Brandy. I love you the greatest. I love you for all the times. Daddy gave you $100 and you will give me 95 of it.
