Patrick Beverley is known to have a chip on his shoulder, but a recent interview with Kevin Hart clarified why. Beverley, who began his NBA career in the European leagues, decided to leave his third team, Russia’s Spartak St. Petersburg, to finally enter the NBA, but it came at a hefty cost.
“I get drafted to the Miami Heat, two months later, I get cut,” Beverley said on the “Cold As Balls” show with Kevin Hart. “You know, I’m back depressed again, you know what I’m saying. Okay, cool, s**t, I know I’m going to get there; I just have to see how. The moment I said, ‘You know what? Forget the NBA;’ I’m going to focus on my European career. I’m going to make a ton of money over here. I’m going to break every f**king record. I’m going to take this bum-ass team; we’re going to go to the Euro league. We’re going to do something special.'”
Non-Traditional Route
After he spent between 2008 and 2012 playing in the Ukraine, Greece and finally Russia, Beverley’s dream of becoming an NBA player came at an unexpected cost.
“The moment I thought like that, three days later, I get a call from the NBA,” Beverley continued. “And I had a chance to either join the Cleveland Cavaliers or I had a chance to join the Houston Rockets. I understood at the time that I couldn’t beat Kyrie Irving out of a spot, but I did have to go against J Lin. At that time, Linsanity, I can take that. I had to pay. I signed a no-NBA clause overseas. At the time, the buyout for the NBA is only $250,000.
“I’m 22 years old. I don’t know the business side of it, so I’m thinking like, ‘Oh, they’ll pay the $1.6 million buyout; NBA got that.’ No, agent tells me, ‘No, they can only pay $250,000.’ So I’m looking at him like, ‘So who pays the other $1.4?’ You have to. Look at my Mom. She’s in the corner. ‘Oh, what you think? Your goal, right? Your dream?’ ‘Yes, ma’am. Okay, cool, she pulls out a checkbook, literally, checkbook, out her purse, gives the check to the Russian team. I was able to leave.”
The Dream Check
Hart was visibly surprised at the revelation behind the polarizing NBA player’s journey back to the States. The realities of playing ball in a financial deficit set in for Beverley when he received his first NBA check and realized the dream had a cold, hard truth.
“I put myself in that. I get my first check with the NBA that mother*****r say $11,000. I’m living with my Mom in the NBA. My Mom is going out to do nails, and I’m going to an NBA practice, and I’m coming home like, ‘what we got for dinner?’ That was my life first couple of years in the NBA.”
As the lives of basketball players become mythical from shows like “Basketball Wives” and the self-promoting social stories of the luxuries they can be privy to experience, there exists a thin line between reaching your dream and living in it.
