"He lives south of the city, in a generic complex of drab buildings where men take the trash out in their pajamas, old women walk small dogs in slow circles and a newsletter admonishes residents to "PLEASE dispose of cigarette butts properly."
After a second knock on the door, and a two-minute wait, there is the sound of movement in the ground-floor, two-bedroom apartment, outside of which two yellowed phone books are stacked like ancient, withered paperweights. Finally, the door opens a crack, but whoever opened it retreats quickly to one of the bedrooms.
The air is thick with the smell of smoke. The blinds are drawn. A lighter sits on the coffee table, next to a giant jug of Crystal Geyser water. Unlit incense sticks are nearby. On the TV a game of
NBA 2K12 is paused in the second quarter-the Pacers versus the Spurs. There is a large box of Cheez-Its on the floor and bagged-up cartons of Kentucky Fried Chicken in the corner. Boxes of Corn Pops and Cap'n Crunch line the top of the refrigerator.
In five hours Walker will take the court for the Idaho Stampede of the NBA's Development League. For now he has agreed to talk about how and why he came to be here-
a three-time All-Star living in a $915-a-month apartment he shares with reserve guard Chris Davis, and playing for a salary of less than $25,000. He has no car, subsists mainly on cold cuts and fast food and plays in front of crowds as small as 155."
...
"At 34, Walker should have been in the final years of his NBA prime. Sure, he'd fallen on hard times, declaring personal bankruptcy in May 2010 after blowing the $110 million he made as a player (as well as the unspecified millions he landed in endorsements) due to a lavish lifestyle, a series of disastrous real estate deals, sizeable gambling losses and well-intentioned largesse-at one point he reportedly had between 30 and 70 friends and family members on his payroll. Most players of his stature looking for a payday head overseas, where they can earn seven-figure salaries. But Walker was choosing the NBADL, a place for young dreamers, never-weres and never-will-bes. The league's average age hovers around 25, and the average NBA experience is 33 games. "He's got some balls, you have to give him that," Spurs coach Gregg Popovich told SI recently. "A lot of people, their pride wouldn't allow them to do something like that."
...
"Walker's fall began a year after the championship, when the Heat traded him to the lottery-bound Timberwolves, who in turn shipped him to the Grizzlies, then one of the worst teams in the league. It was no place for a vet. Walker accepted a buyout in December 2008 and, at 32, left the league. A year later, in 2009, he was charged with a DUI. That same year, the Red Rock, Caesars Palace and Planet Hollywood casinos in Vegas filed a complaint after Walker passed bad checks and unsuccessfully tried to bargain for what he calls a "discount" on his gambling losses. Walker pleaded guilty to felony bad check charges and is currently on probation and saddled with a non-interest-bearing debt of roughly $770,000, which he likens to a "student loan or a house note."
To get back in the clear, all he needs is one more one-year NBA contract, but that appears highly unlikely. Ask G.M.'s, coaches and front-office execs about Walker, and they will tell you that he isn't on their radar. He's not a role player, not young enough, not a defender. They worry about his effect on the locker room, about the example he might set. "Let me put it this way," says one Western Conference executive, "if you have the pick of the bunch and could get Ryan Bowen, who was always a model teammate, or Antoine Walker, which one would you take?"
His current teammates and coaches are kinder. To a man, they say they like Walker. He is described as "99% good" and possessing, according to assistant Joel Abelson, "the best basketball IQ in the D-League by far." But they also worry about him. "This is a safe haven for Toine right now," says Livingston, his coach. "When you're done here, no one's going to care that you're an All-Star." Livingston would know. Once considered the best high school point guard in the country, he suffered a run of injuries and became one of the most acclaimed grinders in NBA history, playing for 10 teams in 11 years and setting a record with 19 call-ups from the D-League. The Stampede players now live their days hoping for that call. They invoke the story of
Jeremy Lin and other less renowned cases of 10-day guys who hit pay dirt, the guaranteed contract. "There are a hundred Jeremy Lins in the league," Livingston says. "They just need a shot."
Walker is not one of them, though. Livingston instead sees a man adrift. "I keep telling Toine that you need an exit strategy," the coach continues, "but he can't do anything till he gets that paper. He has one and a half years left for graduation. He could have been doing that these last two years, but he hasn't." Stampede guard
Tony Bobbitt, the former Cincinnati sharpshooter who once played two games with the Lakers, is sitting nearby and chimes in. "Hey, man, we all make mistakes," he says. "People don't understand that with athletes, a lot of us have big hearts, and people take advantage of that. How would you feel if you lost $100 million? Think about that."
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