A Quote by Shaquille O'Neal
It's hard to get up for a good high-school team like the Chicago Bulls.
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When I got started, the Bulls weren't even that popular in Chicago. The Chicago Sting, the indoor soccer team, was outdrawing the Bulls. Now you can travel all over the world - Europe, Far East, Africa, wherever - and you see people with Bulls memorabilia or merchandise. It's incredible and the one thing I never could imagined accomplishing.
I've been interested in basketball since I was a little kid - like, 3. The Bulls were my team. If you grew up in Gary, the Bulls were everybody's team.
When I bought the team, I wasn't thinking about a new arena. But obviously I'm very proud of the contributions that the Bulls franchise has made to the community between Chicago Bulls Charities and the re-development of the West Side with the United Center being the catalyst.
I'm from Chicago. And I was an actor in high school and college, and I wanted to see if I could make a run of it in this job. So, I went downtown in Chicago, and I went up on a stand-up stage and did an open mic. It went well, so I'm like, 'Alright, I'll give it another try.'
It's hard to win in the league, because every team is good, they got players on their team. A lot harder than high school. It's competitive, and that's what I most love about it.
I grew up in Cleveland and started doing plays in high school. And I went to the University of Illinois, and I majored in drama. And after school, I went up to Chicago, because I didn't really know anybody in New York or Los Angeles, and I knew people who were doing plays in Chicago.
I'm a Chicago kid. So, of course, I'm open to playing for the Chicago Bulls if that's a team that's interested in me. At the same time, any decision that is made, it's never personal. It's always business. I have to make the right decision for me and my family.
As much as I want to stay on the team -- I love Chicago, I love the Bulls -- at the same time, I know the business part of it. Sooner or later, all the rumors are going to come up.
I know that James Brown recording where he sings about Chicago. I think he sings, like, 'Chicago, my hometown!' That's what I think of when I think of Chicago. And I think of Chicago Bulls.
When I grew up on the south side of Chicago, it was kind of a rough neighborhood, and when my parents saw the prospect of my older sister going to middle school, high school, they decided that we would move to the north side of Chicago, Highland Park, and for me, that was a whole new ballgame.
I couldn't make it on the swimming team in high school. In fact, I got thrown off the swimming team and was forced to audition for the school play because they had at the audition about 35 girls show up and no boys, so my swimming coach suggested that I might be able to do the drama department more good than I was doing the swimming team.
When I grew up I was a huge Michael Jordan fan. That's not very unusual for people to like him, but I just liked reading his books, especially where he came from, getting cut from his high school team. I thought he was a good person, a good role model to look up to.
I have really fond memories of growing up in Chicago, and I always love going back. I still have a lot of really good friends from high school that I go to dinner with. It's kind of become a tradition when I go out there to do a show to give a few friends a call, tell some funny stories about high school and walk down memory lane.
I know from my own personal experience. I was bullied in middle school and high school and went through my fair share of hard times thereafter. Also, one of my really good friends committed suicide when I was in high school.
I had never dreamed about the NBA like some guys did. I was a non-scholarship player at an NAIA college. I played on the Boys and Girls Club team in my freshman and sophomore years of high school before I made the high school team. I was our backup center in college.
I wish all high schools could offer students the outside activities that were available at the old Harrison High on Chicago's West Side in the late '20s. They enabled me to become part of a school newspaper, drama group, football team and student government.
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