J-Speaks: Farewell To "The Big Ticket"

Twenty-one years ago, the Minnesota Timberwolves drafted a young man from Mauldin, SC with the No. 5 overall pick in the National Basketball Association (NBA) Draft out of Farragut Career Academy High School on the West Side of Chicago, IL. This relatively unknown would turn a franchise with no direction into a title contender and made himself into a transformative figure through his relentless energy, effort, hard work and dedication. His individual stats do not even come close to explaining what kind of player and champion he was in practice and in games. This past Friday, the guy who was nicknamed, “The Big Ticket” said goodbye to the game he fell in love with as a student at Hillcrest High School.

Kevin Garnett, who played 21 seasons in the NBA averaging 17.8 points, 10.0 rebounds and 3.7 assists on 49.7 shooting from the field with the aforementioned Timberwolves, Boston Celtics and Brooklyn Nets announced his retirement from the NBA this past Friday, which was first reported by the Minneapolis Star Tribune.

According to a report from Jon Krawczynski of The Associated Press, Garnett informed the Timberwolves of his decision at the start of this past weekend as the team is on the verge of starting training camp this Tuesday.

The organization waived their most iconic player, allowing him to collect the entire eight million dollars in salary he was set to make this season.

K.G. posted a video on his Instagram account on Friday where he narrated a short black-and-white piece of him walking through the Target Center by himself with sunglasses on. While his eye could not show it, you could feel the emotion of him saying goodbye to the game that put him and the franchise he represented on the map.

“I’m just thankful. I can’t even put that into words. I’m just thankful. I’m just thankful for everybody and the love,” Garnett said in his viral video on Friday. “I never would have thought that people love me like this. But, for it to be reality is just something else man. Man.”

The 40-year-old Garnett, who also went by the nickname K.G. played 13 of his 21 NBA seasons with the T’Wolves; six seasons with the C’s, who he help to their 17^th NBA title back in 2007-08 and two years with the Nets.

In an ironic way, he finishes his career playing the same number of years as the number as his jersey number with the T’Wolves No. 21 leaving a legacy as one of the most competitive, intense and influential players in NBA history.

Garnett retires as the T’Wolves all-time leader in points, rebounds, assists, blocks and steals.

“I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate and thank Kevin for all of his great accomplishments and contributions to the NBA, the Minnesota Timberwolves organization, and for me personally with the Boston Celtics,” T’Wolves new head coach and president Tom Thibodeau, who as an assistant coach on that 2007-08 Celtics title team.

“Kevin combined great talent with a relentless drive and intelligence. I will always cherish the memories of the way in which he led the Celtics to the 2008 NBA Championship. His willingness to sacrifice and his unselfishness led us to that title. Kevin will always be remembered for the way in which he played the game. His fierce competitiveness, his unequalled passion for the game and the many ways in which he cared about this team was truly special.”  

NBA Commissioner Adam Silver echoed similar words of respect and honor of K.G. by saying, “Kevin Garnett is one of the fiercest competitors our league has ever seen. He held himself to the highest standard of preparation and performance for a remarkable 21 seasons. On behalf of the NBA family, I thank Kevin for his sustained excellence and the enormous impact he’s had on the game.”

In his 21 seasons in the league, K.G. was named an All-Star 15 times; a nine-time All-NBA Team selection (four-time First-Team; three-time Second-Team and two-time Third-Team); a 12-time member on the NBA All-Defensive Team (nine appearances on the First-Team and three on the Second-Team); a member on the 2000 Gold Medal winning USA Olympic team in 2000 in Sydney and a four-time league rebounding champion (2004-07).

“I’m proud of our association with Kevin, just seeing him grow over the years,” T’Wolves owner Glen Tayler told the AP on Friday. “I wish him the very best in the future and want to thank him, along with our fans, for the great memories that he has given us.”

To put a brighter light on the greatness of Garnett, only the recently retired and five-time NBA champion with the Los Angeles Lakers Kobe Bryant, the late great Moses Malone and three-time NBA champion LeBron James have scored more points in NBA history by a player to turn pro right out of high school than the 26,071 points by him.

Garnett also joined Hall of Famers Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Karl Malone as the only players in league history to score 25,000 points, grab 10,000 rebounds and dish out 5,000 assists.

Before the arrival of Garnett, the Timberwolves were a serious mess never making the playoffs in their first six seasons of existence, including K.G.’s rookie season.

That all changed in his second season as the team led by him, rookie lead guard Stephon Marbury and Tom Gugliotta led the T’Wolves to a 40-42 record and their first playoff appearance in franchise history. It was short lived as they were swept by the eventual Western Conference runners-up the Houston Rockets led by Hall of Famers Hakeem Olajuwon, Clyde Drexler and current NBATV/NBA on TNT studio analyst Charles Barkley 3-0. Garnett improved his numbers going from 10.4 points, 6.3 boards per game as a rookie to 17.0 points, eight rebounds, 3.1 assists and 2.1 blocks in his second season. K.G. and Gugliotta made their first All-Star appearances.

The T’Wolves would be a participant in the postseason garnering then franchise records of 50 wins in 1999-00 and 2001-02 and then 51 victories in 2002-03, but were ousted in the opening round each time.

Things changed in the 2003-04 NBA campaign with the off-season additions of seasoned two-time champion with the Rockets in the middle of the 1990s Sam Cassell; very talented, but volatile five-time All-Star Latrell Sprewell and defensive center Ervin Johnson.

Surrounded by the best supporting cast he ever had in his career to that point, Garnett averaged career-highs of 24.2 points, a league-leading 13.9 boards, five assists, 2.2 blocks and 1.5 steals and led the T’Wolves to 58 regular season wins and garnering his only Most Valuable Player Award.

In the playoffs, the team finally got the monkey off their back winning their first playoff series in franchise history defeating the Denver Nuggets in the opening round 4-1.

They withstood and knockout drag out Semifinals outlasting All-Stars Chris Webber, Vlade Divac, Peja Stojakovic and the Sacramento Kings defeating them in seven games. In Game 7 at home, Garnett had a game to remember with 22 points and 21 boards.

The team would fall short of the NBA Finals as they were defeated in six games by Bryant, Shaquille O’Neal and the Los Angeles Lakers 4-2 in the Western Conference Finals.

This high moment was not only the T’Wolves only appearance in the Conference Finals, but their last appearance in the postseason.

Over the next three seasons, the team’s win totals went from 44 to 33 to 32.

The fall of the team was not on the feet of Garnett as he garnered All-NBA Second and Third team honors during this time.

In the 2007 offseason, Taylor admitted that it was time to take the team in a different direction and look to trade its most valuable piece Garnett.

On July 31, 2007, K.G. was dealt to the Boston Celtics for Al Jefferson, Ryan Gomes, Sebastian Telfair, Gerald Green, Theo Ratliff, cash considerations, the Celtic’s 2009 first-round pick (a top three protected) and the 2009 first-round pick that the T’Wolves acquired from the C’s in the Ricky Davis-Wally Szcerbiak trade three years prior.

At that time, the seven for one trade constituted the largest number of players sent to a single team in NBA history. On the day the trade took place, Garnett signed a three-year $60 million contract extension.

Alongside fellow perennial All-Stars and future Hall of Famers Ray Allen, who was acquired from the then Seattle Supersonics, Paul Pierce and head coach Glenn “Doc” Rivers, the Celtics started fast and never looked back winning 66 games that season, the best record in the Eastern Conference and the entire NBA and Garnett was named NBA Defensive Player of the Year for the 2007-08 season and made history as the first Celtic to win that particular award.

Despite their dominance during the regular season, the C’s struggled in the first two rounds of the postseason beating the Atlanta Hawks and the Cleveland Cavaliers in seven games. They got past the Detroit Pistons in six games in the Conference Finals and earned the franchises 17 title by defeating the arch rival Lakers in six games.

In that Game 6 that put them back on top of the NBA mountain top, K.G. had 26 points and 14 rebounds and during his interview with then ESPN sideline reporter Michelle Tafoya were he let out a whole lot of emotion, which included him saying, “Anything is possible!!!”

“He literally changed our culture,” currently head coach of the Los Angeles Clippers Glenn “Doc” Rivers, who coached K.G. in Boston. “You look at all the things he stands for. He follows through on all of them.”

After being bounced in the Semifinals by the Orlando Magic in six games in the 2009 playoffs, the Celtics made it back to The Finals in the 2009-10 season and faced the Lakers again. The two teams battled it out this time to the limit, but the Lakers and Bryant stole victory in Game 7 83-79 on June 17, 2010 to win their 16^th NBA title. Garnett in the loss had 17 points going 8 for 13 from the field.

The Celtics had another shot at making it back to The Finals two seasons later, but they lost in seven games to the Miami Heat and the “Big Three” of LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh in the Eastern Conference Finals.

The road for the Celtics “Big Three” of Garnett, Paul Pierce and Ray Allen came to a conclusion in 2012-13 when they lost in the opening round to the New York Knicks 4-2.

In his six seasons with the Celtics, Garnett helped the team to five straight Atlantic Division titles and 248-145 record in the regular season.  

On June 28, 2013 the day of the draft, the Celtics and Brooklyn Nets reached a deal where the C’s traded Garnett, Pierce and Jason Terry to their Atlantic Division rivals for first-round picks in 2014, 2016 and 2018 in exchange for Kris Humphries, Gerald Wallace, Kris Joseph, MarShon Brooks and Keith Bogans.

Unfortunately the Nets and K.G. had a subpar regular season going just 44-38 and while they defeated the Division champion Toronto Raptors in the opening round of the playoffs in seven games, they fell to James and Heat 4-1 in the Semis.

The next season, Garnett waived his no-trade clause and was dealt back to the Timberwolves in exchange for Thaddeus Young.

In his second tour of duty with the team, Garnett served as a mentor to the future of the team in last year’s Rookie of the Year in No. 1 overall pick Karl-Anthony Towns, Andrew Wiggins, Zach LaVine and Gorgui Dieng.

“They looked at him like three kids looking at Santa Claus coming down the chimney,” the late former head coach of the team Flip Saunders said a year ago recounting a session with K.G. and the three core members of the Timberwolves. “There eyes were wide open and they looked at him in disbelief. He was just telling them about his experience of 20 years being in the league.”

Garnett had been contemplating about returning to the team for his 22^nd season in “The Association,” which no player had ever done. Unfortunately knee issues had limited the future Hall of Famer to just 85 games played the last two seasons. Losing the person he trusted the most in the whole organization and who turned the team into a perennial playoff team in Saunders, who passed away before the start of last season due to Hodgkin’s lymphoma did not help either.

K.G. often spoked about his desire to get into owning of the T’Wolves one day, but with the aforementioned passing of Saunders, Thibodeau being not just the team’s new head coach but president of basketball operations and veteran personnel guy Scott Layden being the organization’s new general manager, that dream may be just that.

Thibodeau was still very complimentary of K.G. and what he has meant to the organization when he stated over the weekend, “KG is without question the all-time best player to wear a Minnesota Timberwolves jersey and he is also one of the best to ever play this game.”

This great career almost got stalled in the summer before Garnett’s senior year of high school when back in Mauldin, SC he was in the area of a fight between African-American and Caucasian students. While Garnett was not involved in the fight directly, he was one of three students that were arrested by authorities and charged for second degree lynching. The charge was expunged through a pre-trial intervention. It was then that Garnett transferred from Mauldin High School to Farragut Career Academy and the rest is history.

He had a career that paved the way for the likes of James, Bryant, Tracy McGrady, Tyson Chandler and Dwight Howard to name a few to jump to the pros straight from high school. He earned over $330 million, the most by any player in league history and his six-year $126 million deal back he signed at the age of 21 back in 1997 stoked league owners and they stood firm in instituting the lengthy lockout a year later.

Kevin Garnett proved to his teammates and coaches he had during his career that he was worth every penny and then some.

His intensity was felt leading up to the opening tip-off from hitting his head on the support of the basket; muttering to himself to working up a major sweat. His trademark blocking the shot of an opposing player on the other team trying to get a free shot after a foul was called.

Kevin Garnett was a leader who became a champion. He was loved and respected from the ownerships of the teams he played for to the coaches and players he went to battle with each night.

The basketball world has said goodbye to three of the best this summer in him, Kobe Bryant and Tim Duncan who played 21, 20 and 19 seasons respectably and the hope is we see all three of them again in 2020 or 2021 in Springfield, OH as they are first ballot inductees into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame.  

Information, statistics and quotations are courtesy of 9/23/16 5:30 p.m., 7:30 p.m. and 8 p.m. bottom line new crawl on ESPN; 9/23/16 8 p.m. edition of NBATV’s “Gametime,” with Vince Cellini and Dennis Scott; 9/23/16 www.nba.com article “Garnett Says ‘Farewell’ To the NBA After 21 Seasons,” by Jon Krawczynski; 9/24/16 www.businessinsider.com article “Kevin Garnett Announces Retirement With a Short and Emotional Video,” by Cork Gaines; 924/16 9 p.m. news crawl from NBATV; http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kevin_Garnett; http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Boston_Celtics_seasons; http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Brooklyn_Nets_seasons; http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Minnesota_Timberwolves_seasons.