Kevin Garnett explains why you never, ever, talk trash to an individual who finds motivation through competition:
Every NBA fan knows former Timberwolves star Kevin Garnett was a legendary trash-talker. However, there was a time when that trash talk came back to burn him. Appearing on Wednesday’s Jimmy Kimmel Live! Garnett revealed that when he was 19 years old, his teammate J.R. Rider got off to a hot start during a game against the Bulls and that got Garnett chirping at Michael Jordan. Garnett says he’s paid for it ever since.
“I was playing great, probably the best I ever played in my life at this point, and it’s against the Bulls and J.R. Rider is having an unbelievable game, too, and I’m feeling 19,” Garnett explained to Kimmel. “I’m like, ‘Yeah, keep going, you’re killing him. Woo!’ In the short form of it, I woke up a sleeping dog. … It just turned bad, Jimmy, it turned really bad. And it turned bad quick.”
Even Rider knew it wasn’t smart to push Jordan’s buttons.
“J.R. told me to calm down,” said Garnett. “He was like, ‘Yeah, we’re having a good game, but chill. He can hear you.’ I was like, ‘Who cares? Keep going!’”
Not only did Jordan then torch the Timberwolves, he continues to let Garnett know about it.
“Whenever I see Jordan he does the same thing every time,” said Garnett. “He palms my head and he says, ‘Remember the game I gave you 40 in three quarters?’ And then he has this sidekick … around him and he’s like, ‘Pull that up.’ And then a guy goes and pulls it up!
I’m like, ‘What is this?’ This is really Jordan Brand. Who walks around with content? Like, tee it up. It was an experience in which I quit talking trash to Michael.”
Michael Jordan is such a psychotic competitor. It’s truly inspiring. He takes the art of dead horse beating to previously unimagined heights.