With free agent negotiations looming, I was both nervous and excited. I was in for the biggest payday of my life. Real NBA money. The rocky seasons were in the rearview mirror, and I’d proven my worth as one of the most versatile young players in the league.
In June, after my fourth season with the Clippers, Greg, Al Harris, and I were out in Hollywood for a little fun. Nothing big, just blowing off steam. On the drive home, about a mile from my house, my phone rang. It was a New York number. It was late in New York, but I didn’t worry because I was used to people calling me at all hours. But on the other end was my Aunt JaNean. She didn’t mince words.
“Lamar,” she said, “your grandmother has died. You need to come home.”
It was a shock, even though Grandma Mildred was in her eighth decade. It didn’t hit me like a brick . . . more like a fog that hung over me and settled in slowly.
“What happened?” asked Greg.
“My grandmother passed away,” I said, my voice cracking.
The guys fell quiet. Greg turned off the radio. We just sat there at a red light near my home like the world had stopped. When we pulled into the garage at the house several minutes later, I stayed in the car while they went inside. I sat by myself for more than an hour. I didn’t cry. My tears would come in the days and weeks ahead. I just thought about her life and what she had given me.
All those years ago, she moved to New York from a sharecropper’s town in Georgia to find a better life. I believe she did. She bought her very own house on 131st Street. Met and married the only man she’d ever loved. Had three daughters, one of them my mother. She gave me my personality and taught me what it was like to be a man and how to love someone more than you love yourself.
I sat in the car. I didn’t ask why. Never questioned God.
I wore number 7 because it was her lucky number.
Mildred Mercer was eighty.
On July 12, 2003, the Clippers held a press conference announcing the hiring of veteran head coach Mike Dunleavy, who had had stints with the Lakers, Blazers, and Bucks. Meanwhile, I had just arrived in Miami to play in Zo’s Summer Groove, Alonzo Mourning’s charity basketball game.
When we returned to Los Angeles a week later, Greg and I met Dunleavy at the Ritz-Carlton in Marina del Rey. Dunleavy was going to make his initial offer. My agent, Jeff Schwartz, was still on his way to Los Angeles, so Greg and I went alone.
“Don’t be surprised if it’s not what you think it’s going to be,” Jeff had cautioned me. “They’re going to start low. Just hear what they have to say.”
Dunleavy quickly got down to business. It was up to Dunleavy, who was given a role in management decisions as well as his coaching duties, to build a winning team. I could tell he was loving the power. He had this cockiness that caught me off guard.
“We’re prepared to offer you three years and twenty-four million dollars,” said Dunleavy. “That’s the most I can do.”
That was not even one-third of what I felt my market value was, and it wasn’t anything close to a max offer. The Nuggets had just offered our shooting guard Corey Maggette $42 million, and he had put up similar numbers to mine. The Clippers matched the offer without thinking about it.
But more importantly, Elton Brand, our leading scorer and rebounder, was the team’s top priority, and Miami was looking for a cornerstone big who could play power forward and center, so they offered him a six-year, $84 million deal. If the Clippers didn’t match the offer, it all but paved the way for me to return to LA. But we’d have to get those numbers up, and Dunleavy wasn’t playing ball.
Greg and I just looked at each other, stunned. What the fuck was this? It was clear from the jump that I was not a high priority to Dunleavy. I stood up right after hearing the offer.
“Thanks for nothing,” I said to him. I knew for a fact I was not taking that offer. That was the last time I ever spoke to Dunleavy.
The Clippers matched Brand’s deal. Elton was on the beach in Miami, sitting on the sand with his toes in the water when he got the call.
Then I had a stroke of luck, thanks to another agent, Bill Duffy. Anthony Carter, the Heat’s fifth-year point guard, was planning to pick up a $4.1 million player option on the final year of his contract; however, Duffy sent in the paperwork several minutes after the midnight deadline, making Carter a free agent. The Heat were overjoyed and immediately chose not to re-sign him.
They used the additional money to offer me a five-year, $63 million contract. The Clippers had fifteen days to match. They did not . . . largely because the deal that Jeff Schwartz and Heat coach Pat Riley cooked up included a $15 million signing bonus, which Riley gave me on the spot in his office.
I had gotten everything I wanted. I knew after the Dunleavy meeting that I had to leave the Clippers for a fresh start, and it had always been my dream to play for Pat Riley, who was my favorite coach. He was fond of saying I could be the next Magic Johnson, and he was ecstatic about pairing me with his new rookie, Dwyane Wade, who had superstar written all over him.
My happiness didn’t prevent the Clippers from delivering a parting shot when we split.
“In the final analysis, the decision was based on issues of character and other risks involved,” Elgin Baylor said in a statement released by the Clippers. It just confirmed my feeling that I was doing the right thing by leaving the Clippers.
A few days later, Greg, Jeff, and I flew to Miami for the official contract signing and press conference. The night we arrived, we went out to a club in South Beach. Even Jeff went along, and that wasn’t usually his thing.
The press conference was set for 3 pm the next day, so I had Greg call my financial advisor to have a private jet ready for 6 PM so we could head back to LA and celebrate after addressing the media. I’d get my money, say a few words, and then get out clean.
We got to Riley’s office around noon. It was meticulous and full of things that displayed his worldliness and appreciation of culture and the arts. He even had books on African culture. Just before we sat down, he turned to me.
“Is this your whole crew?” he asked, looking over at Greg, Jeff, and my trainer, Robbie Davis. “I need to know who’s who.”
“This is us,” I replied.
Riley paused as if to feel me out. The look on his face said, “You better be telling the truth.” Right away I knew I wasn’t in Clipper Land anymore.
“You want a soda?” he asked me.
“No thank you,” I replied.
“You want a soda? ” he repeated, only more firmly, without so much as blinking.
“Okay, I’ll take a Pepsi,” I said quickly.
It was a test. He wanted to gauge my reaction. See if I had solid convictions and could make a simple, quick decision. Or maybe he just thought I was thirsty. Was it about the soda? I wondered later on. I was still trying to feel him out, too.
From there, he began to break down Miami Heat culture and what was expected of every man who put on the uniform. It was the beginning of my indoctrination to the world of Pat Riley.
He wanted me to change out of my street clothes and get dressed in their brand-new practice uniforms for the press conference. When I got out to the practice court, I was surprised to see three of my new teammates, Caron Butler, Eddie Jones, and Brian Grant, dressed in practice gear and shooting around. Riley wanted as many members of the team as possible present to promote a family-like culture. He sat down and got the press conference started with a few opening remarks.
It’s been a long summer, but a good summer. We were very fortunate to draft Dwyane Wade. In July, I was over with [Heat owner] Mr. Arison in the Mediterranean, and then I went to Hawaii with my wife and family. And I’ve been to seven Bruce Springsteen concerts. So that’s been my summer. Today is the best day of all of them.
So, without any further ado, I would like to introduce a player I have a lot of respect for from a basketball standpoint. He is a talented player and has overcome some things that we all know about and are behind him and one of the reasons why we didn’t talk much about those things is because we believe they are behind. I’ve been around basketball for about thirty-seven years, and there’s only been one other player that I’ve coached that has ever had this much versatility as a player and able to play four different positions. That player was Magic Johnson . . . So I want to introduce the newest member of the Miami Heat as we move on into the millennium: Lamar Odom.
After the press conference, we headed back to the locker room to get changed. I was feeling great that the formalities were out of the way and I could head back to Los Angeles for a bit.
“See you at seven AM tomorrow,” Riley called out as we were leaving.
“Actually, I have a flight in an hour. I’ll be back in a few weeks.”
“No, I don’t think you understand me,” he replied. “We’re working out tomorrow.”
There was nothing I could say. He just gave me $15 million. I had to quickly get used to how things were going to be. And that meant early-morning workouts until Riley let me leave Miami. He was the boss now.
Riley taught me discipline. For all my gifts, I didn’t have a clue about hard work and discipline. Pat loved my game but hated the way I went about the business of becoming a better basketball player. That was a hard pill for me to swallow. I wanted to be great, but I wasn’t ready for the way Riley taught the game. When I arrived in Miami, I was a poodle. When I left I was a pit bull. It started the very moment he asked me if I wanted a soda.
I got set up for an indefinite stay at one of our favorite hotels, bought some clothes, and in between Riley’s grueling workouts, learned the night scene.
One night we hit a club called Prive, which had three floors and was popular with celebrities and athletes. When we showed up, Eddie Jones and Brian Grant were already there. There were women everywhere. On the table in the booth were ten to fifteen $500 bottles of Louis Roederer Cristal champagne.
The bill came at four in the morning. The server set it on the table and Eddie picked it up and tossed it to me without even looking at it.
“Take care of that for me, young fella,” he said as he got up to leave with his group.
I was afraid to look at it, but it wasn’t going to pay itself. I opened the leather folder—$19,000. I was stunned. But I just ate it. I pulled out my American Express Black Card and reluctantly handed it over.
Two days later, I arrived at the arena for another workout, still miffed about getting stuck with such an exceptionally large bill. Sitting in my locker was an envelope containing a check for $15,000. Eddie walked out of the trainer’s room with nothing on but his practice shorts. He looked at me with a huge grin. “Congratulations, you passed.”
Welcome to Miami.
I thought I had found my true NBA home, and I needed a castle to call my own. After a quick search, I settled on a six-bedroom, nine-bathroom home in Pinecrest, Florida, which was about thirty miles from the arena and a twenty-minute jaunt from South Beach. It was perfect. Greg and I set up shop and outfitted it to be the perfect bachelor paradise.
We entertained often. Friends flew in from New York or Los Angeles, and I put them up in one of the extra bedrooms for as long as they wanted to stay. My favorite thing about my new crib was the backyard, which had a pool, Jacuzzi, and barbecue pit. The pool was where everything went down. To christen my new home, I invited about ten of my good friends over for a nighttime barbecue pool party. We worked the phones for a couple days, calling every stripper, groupie, and side piece we knew to come over around six. They were more than welcome to bring a friend or three.
All in all, there were about forty women there, and it didn’t take long for half of them to get naked. It escalated quickly into a full-blown orgy. There’s really no other way to describe it. People were having sex in the pool, the Jacuzzi, on the lawn, in chairs, standing up against a heat lamp. Everywhere. I met a pair of twenty-year-old twins who had zero problem with any request. For most of the night, I kept them to myself.
This was crazy, even for us. As the drugs and alcohol flowed, day disappeared into night, more girls arrived, and the party stretched into the wee hours, until every last fantasy had been fulfilled and every desire met.