It's tough at first. You realize in the NBA, it's not easy. Each and every night, you're playing against that player that was the best high school player, that player that was the best player on his college team.
Inch for inch, the 6-foot-3 Westbrook is the NBA's most sensationally talented player, a relentlessly explosive basket-attacker with a deadly pull-up jumper - a top-10 NBA player by any big-picture statistical measure from Player Efficiency Rating to Win Shares.
When we were in the seminary we got a stipend direct from the government and for that stipend we had an obligation to stick to our teaching job for five years.
Even before I made my high school team, I'd say I want to be a NBA player, and people laughed at me with, 'Get out of here, you ain't going to be a NBA player. You don't even play basketball.'
It's a new NBA, man. Guys are playing on a new team every year now, and it has nothing to do with how good of a player you are, it's just how the NBA is.
NBA has a selfish rationale. It saves the owners money by delaying the time a player gets to a second, more lucrative contract. Even the player's union is on board. There are only 450 jobs in the NBA, and the one-and-done protects veterans' jobs.
I think every NBA player is trying to prove himself every day.
Obviously in the NBA, winning is everything; every NBA player will tell you when you are in a winning situation that's what this league is about. That one year in Phoenix when we went to the Western Conference finals was amazing; Portland when we got to the second round was a great year.
My dream was to be in the NBA. I wasn't really focused on being a star player on a team. I just wanted to make it to the NBA. I've been blessed for the opportunities to be in the Finals, been in the playoffs ever since I've been in the NBA.
We buy our way out of jail but we can't buy freedom,
We buy a lot of clothes when we don't really need them,
Things we buy to cover up what's inside.
I never had a massive desire to buy clothes. I liked to customise the clothes I already had or was given when I was younger. If I didn't like them that much, I made them how I wanted them to be.
You can ask all the best players in the NBA - there's not one player in the NBA that guards them like me.
I know I can play in the NBA, and I can be a very good player in the NBA.
Personally, I'm a simple dresser. I usually buy my own clothes. Jeans, T-shirts, summer dresses and track pants. Whenever I get the time or see a shop that catches my fancy, I buy something.
I like clothes that are simple and preferably cheap unless I'm being given it for free.
I'm the NBA's best NFL player, and I've always been the sexiest 7-footer in the NBA - for 12 years running.