dpThis story is part of Peak, The Athletic’s desk covering the mental side of sports. Sign up for Peak’s newsletter here.
Kendrick Perkins played 14 years in the NBA. He is now an NBA analyst for ESPN. These are the three best leaders he played with.
Kevin Garnett, Boston Celtics forward
Emotionally, his energy was contagious. He showed young guys like myself, Rajon Rondo, “Big Baby” Glen Davis what we needed to do. He showed us how to have a routine, how to get mentally prepared and, most importantly, he showed us how to lock in and limit distractions.
And obviously we know about his damn passion. I’ll put it in PG terms. His thinking was: Forget everybody. If you didn’t have Celtics across your chest, you were an enemy.
When you walked inside the locker room, it was quiet. There wasn’t talking. He taught us on the day of a game you needed to be locked in. It wasn’t just that you needed to get locked in at the arena on game night. It actually started at shootaround.
Throughout the regular season, when we would be walking through plays, he would say to the coaches: “Hold on real quick, y’all. Stop playing around, man. Lock in, man.”
We knew right then what it was, so we never had that problem again.
It was all about the team.
In 2008, we don’t win the championship that year without Kevin Garnett coming to the first day of training camp and saying: “Hey, Doc. Before we start practice, I want to say this: We’re going to run the offense through Paul Pierce and Ray Allen. I’m going to put myself behind those guys, and I’m going to focus on the defensive side.”
Right there set the temperature and the tone for the season and for the team.
Jalen Brunson and the “underdog effect”
Elise Devlin
Nick Collison, Oklahoma City Thunder forward
Best teammate I ever had.
When you talk about losing yourself in the team, he was the true definition of that. The best thing about Nick was that he never switched up.
A lot of guys would change throughout the course of the season. When the team was doing well but you weren’t doing well individually, you caught a lot of guys, including myself, with an attitude. That was never Nick. Whether he was getting 20 minutes or zero minutes, he never changed.
Always positive. Always hardworking. Always looking out for the betterment of the team.
And when he did hold you accountable, it wasn’t in an aggressive manner. It was just like: “Hey, man, we need you, but you’ve got to do better here. I’ve got your back 1,000 percent.”
“My bad, Nick, I’ve got you. I apologize.”
“No, no, no. No need to be sorry. We’re in this together.”
He would run through a wall for you. After I got traded to Oklahoma City in 2011, we matched up against the Lakers in the playoffs in 2012.
My points weren’t there in game five, but I think I had 13 or 14 rebounds. I remember after the game Nick said: “You won that damn game for us. Those rebounds didn’t go unnoticed. You played your f—ing ass off, boy. Proud of you.”
I was somewhat the leader of that squad with Nick, but right then he didn’t even know what that did for me. I was like: Dang, Nick just gave me props. That felt good coming from Nick.
LeBron James, Cleveland Cavaliers forward
When I got to Cleveland toward the end of my career, I was able to witness greatness at the next level.
LeBron didn’t do a lot of talking; he barely talked at all, except when we were in the film room. LeBron led by his actions.
I watched him train at his house before practice, be one of the first people at practice, train again, get shots up before the practice with teammates, be involved with the film session, go ice up after practice, go shoot a commercial and then call me up to come over to his house to watch a game. I watched him get more treatment, and in the fourth quarter, he would tell me, “Hey man, I’m going to have my driver take you home,” because he was getting ready for bed.
Watching him get treatment at the dinner table of a five-star restaurant, I said, OK, this is why he’s different.
You could never break his routine. His day was already planned; his week was planned.
All of a sudden, you started to see guys like Kevin Love and Kyrie Irving start to follow suit. Remember, when Kevin Love got to Cleveland, he was a little chubby. He got in shape and learned about his body when he got around LeBron James.
In 2018, we tied the series up against Boston in the Eastern Conference Finals. We had to go into Boston and win Game 7. I remember Bron said this and he didn’t ever say nothing: “Listen, if you don’t believe and you’re not with us, don’t get your ass on this f—ing plane.”
We usually had a card game on the plane with me, LeBron, J.R. Smith. Well, that plane ride, LeBron didn’t play.
He sat there with his headphones on and was in complete silence. That was leadership because he set the tone.
— As told to Jayson Jenks
