Welcome to Pablo Torre Finds Out. I am Pablo Torre. And today we're going to find out what this sound is.

And I'm like, Yo, that was a terrible call. And then a light bulb goes on, Bing. And I'm like, I should become a referee.

Right after this ad. You're listening to Giroff Kings Network. I want to fact-check your Wikipedia page. Okay. Because the explanation for why your name, Smush, has to do with you playing basketball, and you would smush people's faces after they stole the ball and you would be that guy.

I don't know. Wikipedia is wrong in that fact.

Yes, violence was the origin that Wikipedia alleges for your name, but your name is Smush because why?

My mother named me Smush when I was a baby. And it's a name that stuck. I was introduced as a baby as Baby Smush, and I grew up into just being a Smush.

Well, the name, Smush, the way it was meant by your mom, there's a cutesy aspect to that then, the opposite of being real physical.

In a game. Yes. It was a term of endowment given to my dad. And when I was born, again, I became Baby Smush, I am actually William Henry Park of the third, and it's the first time I've actually shared that on air.

Yes, already finding out stuff on Public Worry finds out that I did not know. So I love that we're starting there because I feel, and this is just a theory that I'm going to carry as a through line, I think, through this whole conversation. Okay. The way that your reputation has developed has been a thing that you haven't entirely been in control of. If you went by William Henry Parker III instead of Smush Parker, I feel like your life would not have been exactly the same.

I think you're right. I think I would have became... I don't know. What does William Henry Parker III sound.

Like to you? You sound like an executive at J. P.

Morgan. There you go. I've been an executive at J. P. Morgan.

Part of the reason I'm excited to talk to you is because you are an honest.

And.

You have stories from position and a perspective in the NBA and pro sports that we very rarely get to hear from or inspect because you had an up close and personal view of the people, of the egos, of the business.

Of the- Of the.

Business, yeah. -of the superstars, the big names, the Hall of Famers. And we tell the stories typically from their point of view. We're obsessed with them. We cater to them. The business bends around them. But you're right there in these scenes, in the movie scenes. You're right there off.

To the.

Side, in the middle, in a couple of just crazy scenarios. It's like, we just very rarely ask, What the fuck does that guy think? The other guy on screen as all of this is going down?

I'm not trying to say face. I'm not trying to have a persona that other people think about me. I'm going to tell the truth. I'm going to tell my truth. And whatever opinions that people have on me, that's on them.

Okay, so I just got to say that I have been obsessed with Smush, Parker and his truth for years. And this is not just because he is a native New Yorker, just the latest native New Yorker to come through the publicatory, find out, studios. But because few characters in sports history have been so minor as the annals of the NBA are concerned, and yet so major. Because Smush, Parker, if you did not know, is most infamous for his extremely public beef with the late Kobe Bryant, the consummate winner, the consummate champion who would do stuff like score 81 points in a single game.

And the answer to the trivia question, who was the.

Second leading score of that game is?

I have no idea. Smush, Parker. Oh, it's so good. It's so good. What? You had four? He had 13. He had 13. But it.

Was.

Something that if you.

Were watching it, it just kept building.

Now you know why I had to score 81. Tough days, man.

Listen to that applause as Kobe is wrenching his face to great comedic effect and smushing, smush. It's the sound of people adoring one of the most popular players of all time, a guy who is still a role model today across the world, and also somebody who once called Smush, Parker, quote, The worst. And so that's all people really remember about Smush, that he's synonymous with being a scrup, which I think is a shame. Because as we will find out together on today's show, Smush, Parker has lived a fascinating life, and he's also embarked on a new career path that is both shocking and funny to anyone who has ever met William Henry Parker III. I want to get to where you came from because you're a New Yorker. And I want to bring on local characters, New Yorkers. And not far from here, correct me if I'm wrong, is the place where you became.

The Sumush, Farcker. Yes, sir. Sumush, Parker. Correct.

West Forth? Yep. Explain the cage for people who are not familiar.

Well, I was born in '81, so I'm an '80s baby. My dad played basketball there. My mom played basketball. And back in the '80s, it was my crib growing up. During that era, basketball and just the world in general, we operated in community. The guys who was waiting for next would take care of me. They were watch- Babysitters. Yeah, they became babysitters. They would watch over me, baby smush. So when I literally say that that was my crib growing up, I don't mean my house. It was my crib where I crawled around and I got dirty and I was playing in the playgrounds by myself. And those guys became my uncles and they just nurtured me.

Yeah. And West Fourth Street, The Cage, to be very, very clear about this for non-New Yorkers, this is a world famous.

Basketball court.

And it's the court where imagine a movie and you might imagine something like The Cage insofar as there are 20-foot high Chainlink fences all around. There's a three-point line. But if you shoot at corner three, you might be fading away.

Into that fence. Corner three? There is no corner three. There's no such thing as a Corner Three at West Forge. That's right.

Well, they call it the Cave. So it's like you're.

Playing inside.

Of the zoo. This is the number one.

Streetball court. This is where basketball is at its purest.

The guys.

That play here, they are very aggressive. So no one gives you an inch.

To get an inch, you got to take it. It's the epicenter of competitiveness. Everybody out there is ready to compete. You have the best of the Bronx, the best of Queens, the best of Manhattan, the best of Brooklyn, the best of Staten Island, all congregating at this one small little, what is it? 25 by 15.

It's so small.

But the best of each borough, that's the court that they play in because that's where the best of New York City when they showcase their skills.

Something that makes me laugh whenever I just watch pickup, walking by a court and being like, That guy's wearing jeans. That guy's wearing black Air Force 1s. What does that say about him? Just like, you don't know who's going to be there.

Not at all. People just getting off of work, their construction jobs, their nine to five corporate jobs, and they have their basketball gear in the back of the car. There was one guy who never not played basketball pickup without his Timbs on. He played pickup in Timbs.

That's crazy. That is a New York legend at this point.

Oh, my.

He is a legend. The idea that a guy would play in Timbs.

He would play in Timbs. Timberland.

Based on that fact alone, I just know that I don't want to be foul by that guy.

No, not at all. That guy was tough. Tough as nails.

Literally was working with nails.

During the day. Yes, exactly.

So you bring all of this accumulated toughness from having encountered all these people in this crazy ecosystem of streetball. And when you're there starting organized basketball, when do you get a sense of like, I might be an NBA player. I might make this an actual job.

So I never not believed that I was making it to the NBA. There wasn't ever a doubt. So when I saw when I watched Michael Jordan growing up, and again, this is back in the '80s, early '90s, and I was watching Mike destroy the Knicks.

Yeah, of course.

Several.

Times. Over and.

Over again. Over and over and over again. And I was like, I aspire to be just like Mike. I want to be like Mike. Just like those Gatorade commercials back in the bit.

And.

I had a mindset of that's what I want to do when I grow up.

Well, there's a funny thing about New York Guards, right? The knock on the New York Guard was because these guys can't shoot.

They can't shoot.

Why is that?

Because of how we play basketball. What was the most played game back in the '80s and '90s in the street ball?

Like 21?

Exactly.

Everybody for themselves Melee.

Won against everybody else. Let's just say- Everyone versus the world. Let's just say there wasn't enough to run a full. So let's just leave the number at nine. Nine guys in the park, one in a play, competitive basketball, didn't have enough to run full. So we played 21 and you had to go up against nine players. So naturally, instinctively, we had to create ways of scoring against multiple defenders. In traffic. In traffic. So you learned how.

To dribble. I hadn't thought about this, but you're totally right.

We learned how to dribble and be a playmaker. And that's what we did in the '80s and '90s. We learned how to dribble to basketball. So naturally, we weren't in the gym or outside shooting jump shots. We were learning how to create off the dribble. Yes. And that's the strongest part of a New York City point guard or basketball players game, is being able to create off the dribble.

Okay, so I'm going to fast forward, so I'm here because you need to just explain what it's like to have a draft party where you do not get drafted.

The disappointment was at the highest of my life at that point. Embarrassment. A little confused because I was given word that I would be drafted as high as seven. I won't say the team, I won't say the team who promised that I would be drafted at Seven, and that wasn't the case. So at the time in Times Square, there was a place called ESP Enzo, it was a.

Sports bar. Yeah. That is maybe the saddest place to hold a draft party where you go undrafted, a temple to sports, and you're living a nightmare. The good news is that you're incredibly resilient. The story of your NBA life, which we're now into, is remarkable because you're a guy who had almost zero job security.

Basketball here in America is a business.

No doubt.

No, not a lot of people.

Know that. More and more every day.

I learned that late. I learned that when I was 36 years old. I learned at 36 years old that basketball here in America is a business. So when I didn't get drafted, I was like, you know what? I'm good enough. There's nothing that's going to stop me from making the NBA. Let me get back to work. I went back to work, earned a spot, a walk on spot on the Team of the Cavaliers, non-guarantee contract. Every day I came in with that worker's mentality, that blue-collar mentality that I need to work and earn my spot on this team because at any point, they could let me go.

And it's not just any rookie season. It's not just any season, right? This is 2003. This is the year before LeBron James gets drafted. One of my favorite videos.

Oh, my God. Are you talking about all the other players? Yeah. And I say other players who hated on this high school player coming in to the organization. I get lumped into that.

It's a local news report in Cleveland.

And.

You remember this vividly. It's all of you guys getting interviewed, Carlos, Booser, Darius, Miles. Because the team is, of course, on track to get the number one draft. Yes, the number one draft. And here is-.

I know.

What I said. You know what the listeners thought. Is the 18-year-old from Akron truly the savior?

We have better players than him and his position already on our team, as well. His potential is probably the sky is the limit for him, though. And he will come in and make an immediate impact like a Karon Butler, no dead for the Miami Heat. I don't think you can really just bring a high school player in and really just think your team going to really turn around like that.

What people were laughing at was, of course, everybody being like, this LeBron James kid. When he shows up, he can join our bandwagon. But yeah, you compared him to Karon Butler, which in your mind you're saying for Clariti was a compliment.

Yeah, at that time, Karon Butler, when he became a rookie for Miami, he came in and made an immediate impact and was averaging double figures at that time as a rookie. I was like, yeah, this kid would come in and make an immediate impact like a Karon Butler did for the Miami Heat. I didn't just limit him to a Karon Butler.

You look by far the least crazy out of everybody in.

That video. But do you know I still get people almost every day who say I hated on LeBron. I actually got tagged on LeBron's page saying that these are my haters.

So this is what I love about your life in basketball is that you're like this Forrest Gump character who winds up in places and you're dealing with all of the consequences of what it means to be in the future shadow of LeBron James. So we should go then to your time in Detroit.

That's what happens next.

You join the defending champion Detroit Pistons. Yes. Larry Brown is the coach.

Which was a great cast of guys. Great cast.

Of guys. Yes. Rasheed Wallace, Tonsy Billow. Yes.

Ben Wallace. Ben Wallace.

Of course.

Tashon Pritz. Tashon Pritz. Derek Kahlman, Lindsay Hannah, Darwin. It was a team full of veterans.

And here you are again, young point guard who is now on his second team in two years in the NBA. And there's a game at the Palace at Auburn Hills. Yes. And you might remember it.

I remember it vividly.

Because this happens.

The Malice of the Palace.

Ben Wallace's baseline inbounding the ball to.

Smush, Parker. To smush, Parker. Yeah, I'm the one with the ball right now.

And this is the part that I love because no one plays this video from 15 seconds before it. And Jackson with 12. Setting up the action, passed rip Hamilton, down to Ben Wallace. There's the run or test hard foul. And while the malice of the post is beginning.

I.

Just want to point out where you are.

Yeah, I'm just watching, taking it all out.

And just for people who can't see this on the DraftKings network or YouTube, everybody else is in the Scrum. And you are literally, you're calm, you're observing everything. What is going through your mind as you were standing what, 10 feet as the most infamous, notorious brawl in sports history is happening?

You want to really know what was going... I was trying to think of my mind at that time? So I was playing for the returning champs, Detroit Pistons, who was being led by the great Chanti Billups. So you can imagine I wasn't getting no playing time. And you can see here is the fourth quarter.

It's less than a minute left.

Yeah, I probably just got in. I'm hungry. I'm like, Yo, I'm on the floor. I'm excited. And then this breaks out. I'm standing there like, yo, I just want to play basketball. What's going on? I'm just trying to get a sweat.

So just to be very clear about this, your perspective as the malice at the palace is unfolding is, I was about to do something with this basketball and everything got in the way.

Exactly. I was like, damn it, guys, can we just play? I'm trying to dunk on somebody.

I only have so many minutes that I'm going to have as a Detroit Piston.

To earn my minutes.

Exactly. And everybody decided to start fighting. Now, Artest is jumped over the score's table and is trying to get down to the bench. This is awful. Fans are getting involved. Jermaine O'Neal is punching a guy in the face. Stephen Jackson is running around. You see Stephen.

Jackson in there taking shot.

At the stands. And Swish Parker is where?

Halfcourt watching it all because Halfcourt is the safest place to be.

I just like how the guy who grew up playing streetball in the cage gets to professional basketball and is like, you guys are out of control. You're the guy. I'm like, I'm not getting involved in this.

I had no job security. Maybe if I had a five-year contract and I could afford to get suspended, I might have been in the middle of that. I might have been in the middle.

That's a great point. Okay, so you go from there, you go to Phoenix. And again, itsays you just happen to wind up on the Seven Seconds or Less Phoenix Suns as Steve Nash's backup. Steve Nash, he's in the midst of an MVP, and you're on a 10-day.

So I wasn't getting any playing time again, but I was in practice working hard, trying to let these guys know that I belong here. Now I'm excited to be here, but I wasn't getting no.

Playing time. Yeah, this makes sense to me. What makes less sense is how you end up being in the starting point guard of the Los Angeles Lakers the next season.

No, it makes perfect sense. When I explain it to you like this, when I was in Detroit, who was I playing behind? Tonsy Billups. When I was in Phoenix, who was I playing behind?

Steve Nash.

When I got to LA, who was there?

I don't.

Even remember. Exactly.

Seriously, who was there?

I don't even remember. They brought in Aaron McKee from the Philadelphia 76ers to beat up a starting point guard. Because remember, Phil Jackson like big guards. He was a 6'5 point guard who could come down and run the triangle offense. He was the big name. They gave him all that money to come there to beat a starting point guard. That's right. And I was a hungry smush in Detroit, but getting no minutes behind Chanty Billups. I was a hungry smush behind Steve Nash and Phoenix. Those guys deserved the playing time. I got it. I was learning while I was there. When I got to L. A, it was just Aaron McKie. And not to say he wasn't a good.

Player, but- But at this point in his career- He was.

On his- Yes.

He was old. You're sensing this could be my job.

Yes. And listen, I went in there with the same mentality I went in in Detroit and Cleveland and Phoenix. I'm going to work to earn my spot.

So Phil Jackson is the coach. Yes, Phil Jackson. Kobe Bryant is a superstar, of course. How do you learn that Smush, Parker is now going to be the starting point guard of the most Marquee franchise in the NBA?

So they never told me I was going to be the starting point guard. I just shot up every day and I wasn't fired. No, literally, I went there to training camp. I fought and clawed my way to training camp, earned my way on a non-guarantee contract again. So two years this time. I guess I played better than most. Matter of fact, I won't be humble now. I did play better than most in the preseason. And when the start of the season came, I was still on the team. I didn't get fired, so I showed up the next day. In the first game in the season, Phil Jackson walks into the locker room maybe 10 minutes before the game, says, Smush, you're starting tonight. And walks out of the locker room. And that's how I found out I was starting.

That was it.

That was the first time. I didn't start in the preseason. I didn't start in training camp. I was never on the first team in the practice squad.

So just for context here, okay, so Phil Jackson, of course, one of the greatest coaches of all time, the Zen Master, Hall of Fameer, or Master Motivator, what was your relationship like with him before then?

Never had a conversation with him. We had training camp in Hawaii. And for, I want to say training camp is about a month and a half, I was everything but smush. He never called me smush. He always called me smack, smooch, smuck. Everything, everything but smush. Hey, smack. Get back on defense. Hey, smack. Run the triangle. Smooch. Everything but smush. And it was just hazing. I guess I need to earn his respect like everybody else.

Testing.

You? Yes. Yes.

For people who don't know NBA history, this is after Shaquille O'Neal has gone. This is Kobe Bryant in I'm about to win MVP mode. This is Kobe Bryant without Shaq going on to... I mean, that first year, man, he averaged 35 a game, 41 minutes a night for Phil Jackson, this is before Paul Gasol gets there. And so my understanding of your time in LA, of course, really only clicked in after you were gone. And when you Google Smush, Parker, what comes up 99 % of the time?

The few that I have with Kobe, unfortunately.

But it's an incredibly rich text that I want to unpack with you because I don't feel like it's been presented in a way that totally makes sense.

It does it.

Because the way that it comes into the public view, this is in October 2012. This is years after you're out of LA. And he says a quote that I'm sure you are unfortunately being reminded of by me, the millionth person, he says this. He's talking to Steve Nash, by the way. This is him telling the story. I tell Steve, You won MVP, but I was playing with Smush, Parker. He's playing with Leandro Barbosa. I'm playing with Smush and Kwame Brown. My goodness, Smush, Parker was the worst. He shouldn't have been in the NBA, but we were too cheap to pay for a point guard. We let him walk on. And that's the quote. And when he says it, of course, there's like, Ha ha ha. It's funny. He's whatever, talking trash on his old teammates. That's amusing to people. But at the same time, it was like, where is this coming from? What is your understanding of what sparked his comment seemingly out of nowhere?

So that spark has been there for years. It was something that a snowball that I created. I did a small, like little interview outside of West Forge Street. At the cage? At the cage, somebody was holding a recorder and a little camera. And this was, I want to say, the summer of 2007, my years after LA. And they asked me about my time in the NBA, my time as a Laker, my time playing with Kobe Bryant. And when I got to answering about my time with Kobe Bryant, as normal, I answered it honestly, my truth, what my experiences were. And I said it was an overrated experience. Playing with Kobe. Playing with Kobe Bryant. And now everybody who's a fan of Kobe's, including the interview was like, explain, what do you mean by overrated experience? And because I have inside information, because I dealt with this man for two seasons. My locker was here. His locker was here for two seasons. Right next to him. I watched this man put on his shoes every day for work. He watched me put on my shoes every day for work.

Starting back court together, you two. Yeah. Okay.

So I was speaking from my experience. It was overrated because the man never spoke to me.

I.

Wasn't the 12 man on the bench. I wasn't the call up from the G League who was trying to just fill a roster spot. I started with this man. I was his coworker. We shared a cubicle side by side. How do you do that for two seasons and never hold the conversation? Never, what's up? Good morning. Do you need anything? Can I get you a cup of coffee? How's the family? Nothing. Two seasons side by side. And that's what I said. My next comments hurt his feelings, and therefore, he had to retaliate.

So what did you say next?

I shared a story about how I did try to talk to him. I'm like, I'm just starting point guard with him in the starting point guard. Let me just try to talk to him. And I said, Did you happen to catch the football game last night? And he looked at me honestly, looked at me and said, You can't talk to me. You need more accolades under your belt before you come talk to me. He was dead serious.

I'm.

Not even going to get to know how that's disrespectful as a man. Man to man just- Self-evident. Yeah. So that set the tone, never spoke to him again or tried to for two years as a starting point guard.

By the way, you had your best years.

In L. A. In L. A. Yes.

Right? It's not-.

And anybody who watches those Laker years saw that we worked well together. It was a chemistry.

So when I say that you had your best years, I'm not saying, Yo, you got to know, Smush, Parker was an all-star. I'm saying that Smush, Parker playing off of Kobe Bryant, scoring 35 a night was getting steals. You were moving the ball. You were running the triangle as best you could with a guy who.

Didn't want to- And I was double-digit points with going with six to seven shots per game.

And to your point, right? You had some big moments. I remember you jammed it on Andre Miller at one point. Yes.

Good.

Job. Lakers have.

The numbers on three on two. Smush with the right-hand.

Smush, Parker's throw to the ring. You had that big steal on Steve Nash in that series against the Suns. They'd love to get into.

Nash's hands, and they do.

They do. They're all knocked away, stolen by Parker. Oh, there he is. Here comes George to Coby. Ryan. Ryan is tied. It's gold. It's gold. Tied game. Seven-tenths of a second remaining. In retrospect, it was the back and forth that carried on.

No, it was this comment that actually, I'm sure, set those wheels in motion. I said, the problems in L. A. And in start with Kobe Bryant. And I felt that way because as the leader, as the captain, as the star of the team, if you don't communicate with your teammates, how is the team supposed to be successful?

And so this is where it gets to 2012 now. And Kobe is talking about how- I gave him his.

Little 30 minutes of fame again.

It's all good.

How's the show? I wish him the best of luck. I'm just playing in China right now, right? I'm just going over there. I'm coming from. I wish him the best of luck, man. Maybe we get back to the game one day and see what it's like, real close.

There's the interview that he gave where he's being asked, you know who was the second leading score when you scored 81? I have no idea. Smush, Parker.

Oh, it's so good. What are you at? Four? It's a jab.

It's very clear. And then in 2019, he's talking about how if he's being triple teams.

Well, it depends who's on the team. If I got Smush, Parker, Lack, or I'm going to shoot you. You best believe I'm shooting that. If I got D-Fish back there, I'm kicking that shit back. One hundred %. Still, 2019.

And so the thing about your name, it almost was a verb for what he was trying to do to you. He was like trying to smush you like a buck. And it became.

This joke. And it became a joke that everybody used. But if you check the numbers, just check the numbers. I was a third leader of that team, third and score behind him a little more older, which I should have been as a walk-on player.

What does it mean to be the other guy in the picture? The other guy without the job security, the other who's scrapping for everything, the other guy who is trying to prove himself at a point at which he's encountering one of the greatest superstars of all time, considers to be leadership. Hes the leader. I think even Kobe later on, not ever specifically addressing you, because he never likes anything about you that was positive on the record. But what he did say, I think, referring to this time was like, that wasn't him at his best as a leader.

People didn't realize the teammate that Kobe really was. One thing that Kobe was a master of was putting on a face for the world to see. Yes, as the ultimate- I'm not talking negatively about the deceased.

Of course. And I think something I want to make clear here, too, is that at a certain point, when you are a historical figure like Kobe Bryant or Michael Jordan or Will Chamberlain or Kareem or whoever it is, I believe that we should talk honestly because we look to those people as role models. And so when someone is like, this is what it was like behind the scenes.

I.

Actually think it's important for us to not mythologize beyond what is deserved, even as we are diplomatic and respectful.

And again, I'm not taking away from the player.

Kobe White. No, indisputably, an all-time great.

Yeah, he's one of the greatest. No question. One of the most decorated athletes to ever play this game. I was there.

You just rarely hear someone be like, it was overrated because? And fill in all of the blanks in a way that'll make people be like, No, you're wrong. I don't believe you. People don't believe you, Smush. They don't.

As players who play with them, we have our own conversations in our own stories, and we share the same experiences. But when we get on this right here, when we get in front of the cameras, they say something different or they don't speak on it at all. I've been the only one.

Who've actually been the only one. Literally the only person who's been brave enough. And this is, of course, before he passed and then after he passed. And I just want to be very, again, I want to be sensitive to this insofar as the tributes, the love. I am not saying do not feel that way if that was your favorite player. And he was, of course, a tremendous player.

Yeah, of course.

Did you ever try to reach out to Kobe Bryant?

I did try to reach out to Kobe Bryant. It was after the 2012 comments, but before everything else, like 2019.

'18- Oh, so this is in the middle of it.

I started to attend this church led by Pastor Louis Stryker Jr. And he's the hugest Laker fan.

Which means he is a Kobe fan.

I thought it might be a cool thing to do to reach out to Kobe to see if I get him to sign a basketball and maybe a picture to give to present to my pastor for Christmas.

So.

I wrote Kobe a letter and I.

Don't remember the word for it.

Yeah, paraphrasing. Yeah, paraphrasing. But what I do remember saying was, Young mind, young thoughts, young words. And I said, I'm sorry for what I said in the past. And the letter went unanswered. I don't get a response back from Kobe, but he did sign basketball. He did.

Sign the picture. Well, what happened from there was he continued to talk.

Yeah, exactly.

Exactly. Exactly.

And so for you, I mean, from there, it's just crazy where you go next.

It's crazy.

Because you end up playing with the Miami Heat. And the way you get that job.

Is.

Incredible.

How.

Do you get this job with the Miami Heat?

So you want to talk about polar opposites? I'm hanging out in New York. I'm watching the Roy Jones fight at 40-40 by myself. And who comes strolling in 40-40 by himself also? Shaquille O'Neal.

Now, naturally.

So we end up in the same VIP suite, just watching the fights as me and him. And we are sharing Laker, Kobe moments.

Now that is a TV show. I mean, just you and Shaq, reminiscing about what it was like.

Yeah. Bonding. Just Bonding. Just no. He's the coolest guy you ever meet.

By the way. Totally opposite. And had his own, of course, very.

Famous.

Entity. Yeah, you couldn't do without me. Kobe, you couldn't do without me. Kobe, you.

Can't do without me. Everybody, Kobe, tell me how my ass taste. Yeah, you.

Can't do without me. And then later reconciliation with Kobe. Yeah.

My favorite moment that we ever was on the bus leaving the arena, leaving Arco Arena, what we do. When we got there, people were moaning us. So after the game, all of.

Us put our ass.

On the window and we.

Mooned.

Them. The guy was like, Oh, my God.

It just looks like...

Thank God they didn't have cameras back then. That was my favorite moment, man. And I'm a free agent at this point. So he asked me where I was playing at next. And I said, I'm a free agent, still shopping around. And he makes a phone call. Long story short, the very next day, the very next day, my agent had a two-year contract with the Miami Heat. I'm guaranteed this time. My first guaranteed contract. I did a six-year career that I had in the NBA before I decided to leave.

Well, hold on. Hold on. So why did you decide to leave the NBA?

It was stealing the love and the joy from me out of the game. The game that I love so much that I grew up playing. I love basketball. Love playing basketball. It was fun.

Yes.

I was good at it. I knew I was good at it. I proved that I was good at it. That part of the game for me at that level just became unfun. So I decided to leave the NBA and go travel the world.

So when you say travel the world, you mean this quite literally. Yeah. Give me the list of countries that Smush, Parker, played in.

Two seasons, two years in Greece, won a championship in Greece, played two years in China, won two championships in China, played in Russia, Croatia, Lebanon, Dominican Republic, Venezuela, Mongolia, Tunisia, and Morocco.

That's Carmen San Diego shit, man.

Yeah.

Where in the world is Mudge, Parker? Exactly. And the treatment that you experienced abroad versus what it was like in the NBA was how different?

Oh, man. I was the Kobe Bryant and Michael Jordan on the teams that I played on.

Part of the movie of your life, and I believe it is a movie, by the way, is you go from being the other other guy in these photos, in this game film, in this viral clip to now being a guy who was treated as the center of attention. And that must have just felt incredibly, profoundly fulfilling after being deprived of that.

I was never in the game of basketball to be notarized or to be held up on a pedestal. I just want to play basketball. And I was able to do that overseas. It wasn't worry of, I'm not going to be here tomorrow, or I have a non-guarantee contract, or I could be released, or This guy is... He's making $15 million a year, but he can't hold my gym shock. So he's getting the playing time because he's being paid this. None of that was just basketball. And that's what I loved about playing overseas.

It's funny, right? In the world of NBA Fandom, it's like, oh, you played overseas, you're a scrup.

Go.

To the world of real life. And it's like, I have three passports because I travel the world being paid to play basketball- Talk about it. -in some of the most beautiful countries on the planet- Yes, sir. -is literally a dream.

Yes. I have a world of experience and worldly knowledge that I wouldn't have gotten if I just stayed here playing basketball here in the States.

And that, too, is the beauty of basketball. Yes, sir. It's a global game. You actually got to feel like what it's like to to win a championship in Greece, in China.

Do you know that in Greece, when we won this championship, they literally turned the city upside down? And as far as the eye can see, was just fans in the street. I'm up there holding the trophy and I can hear the chats from 30 stories up. It was an incredible feeling.

What I imagine must be frustrating at the center of this, as you have been portrayed by all of these people now collectively following Kobe's lead, is that you just didn't love the game. You didn't want it bad enough. The Mamba mentality idea is I want it more than everybody. I'm the hardest worker. I love the game. You don't get on my level or go for it yourself.

And.

What you're doing now, what you're trying to do now is maybe the most undeniable way to express how much you love basketball.

Yeah.

Because Smush, Parker today is trying to do what?

Become an NBA official.

I laugh a laugh of just like, this movie is crazy, right? Because how did you get the idea to be a ref?

It was a seed planted back when I was 13. Every Saturday morning, I would wake up 5:30 AM religiously to get to the gym by 8:00. And the guy who ran the gym, he was like, Listen, you're here every day. You know how to play basketball. Do you want to ref these eight, nine-year-old youth games for $15, $20 a game? So that's what a seed was planted. Didn't have any dreams of being a referee when I grew up. That's just what I did. That was my first job.

And so when does the thought enter your mind as an adult? I want to do that.

Going into my mid-30s, my body is not reacting the same way. It's not healing as fast. I'm traveling the world, but now I want to be more at home here in the States. So I'm thinking, what can I do with life after playing basketball? What am I going to do for the next 40 years of my life? I think I was watching that NBA game, and I'm like, That was a terrible call. And then a light bulb goes off, bing. I'm like, I should become a referee.

And so when the light bulb goes off, do you know how many NBA players had attempted this before? No. You didn't know any of that?

I didn't know any of that.

No. Because the list.

Is short. Very short. Extremely short.

Haywood Workman, Bernie Freier, Leon Wood, and you're trying to be number four.

I'm trying to be number four.

Have you talked to those guys? Because the transition from player to ref is, I hope, self-evidently, fascinating and crazy in a way to be on both sides of that aisle.

I actually have Haywood Workman's number on speed dial. He's devoted himself in helping me in this process.

But the back room structure of how to become one of those guys with the whistle, we're talking about 70 to 80 full-time NBA refs. There are 450 to 500 roster spots for players. So the math, the statistics, actually harder to be an NBA ref.

I've said that. I said it might be harder for me to make the NBA as a referee than it was as a player.

So you're trying to shoot the moon twice?

I'm trying to do the impossible twice.

But to be a ref, like there are what? Tests? There are... There's a ladder. There's the equivalent of a hierarchy you got to climb on.

Yes, that ladder is very vast. That information that you need to know is very vast. And what a lot of people don't know is the rules are different.

Which.

Is shocking to even me. Why is high school rules different than college rules and college rules different than NBA rules when it's all the same game? It doesn't make sense to me, but...

But now you got to learn all of it. Yeah.

Even down to the mechanics, the way you make calls are different on each level.

So when you say the mechanics, you mean actually how you.

Raise your arm? Yeah. They want us to... This is very structured. They want us to look.

A certain way. When I watch the game, I'm like, oh, a ref is going to call something in the first quarter differently than they would in the last minute. And so there's an art to how to control a game.

So there's a thing that they call at the pro level, advantage, disadvantage. Let's just get this on air right now because everybody thinks that contact is a foul. People think that basketball is a non-contact sport and that if there's contact is an automatic foul. No, basketball is a contact sport. There's legal contact and then there's illegal contact. But not all contact means it's a foul. Let's just address that part.

Let's just address that. I love that ref smush has finally.

Gotten into the building. Let's address that. Now we take that illegal contact and we add advantage, disadvantage. So if you're strong enough to play through certain contact that then affect you, we let it go at the NBA level.

So in terms of the thing that opened your eyes the most in terms of like, oh, I, as a player, had this totally wrong, what's the thing that you now appreciate that you didn't before?

The entire game. I didn't know the entire game of basketball. You're shaking your head. Ruthfully. The entire game of basketball has changed in my eyes. I knew how to play basketball. Did I know the rules? Not at all. Nobody outside of the referees knows the rules of basketball.

No, it seems simple.

It seems simple. There's a level of this game that I didn't know. And I'm almost ashamed that I actually spoke to referees when I played. I know, for real, I'm ashamed. And when people, when players talk to me now as a referee, just laugh. I chuckle because they are just as ignorant as ours. If they knew what we know as referees, they would approach the game of basketball differently.

I genuinely love that you use we now because you're a ref. And I want to know what your colleagues, when you were a player, what do they... What do they think about you crossing to the other side?

They laugh at me. They laugh because I know what person I was. Put it this way. I used to show up to tournaments and put my tech money on the table. I'm getting attacked.

This game. You were the problem.

I challenged the referees to show up. Amazing. That's what I did. If I was going to be on my best game, I want you to be on your best game, too. I'm going to put my first tech money up right now because I already know that you're going to be falling asleep that these guys are out here just for a hobby and a paycheck and some extra and they're not taking this game seriously. They're walking up and down the court. No, no, no, no. If I'm putting my best foot forward, you have to put your best foot forward. I'm going to call you out on not seeing a foul call. I'm going to challenge you and I'm going to say some things to wake you up, but not disrespectfully.

Of course, you would go from that guy to hopefully the fourth player to ever become a ref.

Exactly. I say it all the time, God has a sense of humor. God has a sense of humor. I say to myself all day, every day, Here I am a referee. I really can't believe I'm a referee. I really can't believe it.

Right. William Henry Parker III, thank you for being Smush.

Thank you, PT. I appreciate you for having me.

No, thank you for being around your old neighborhood a little bit. This has been Pablo Torrey Finds Out, a Meta Lark media production. And I'll talk to you next time.