‘Know your worth’: NBA legend Webber gives advice to Kings – and Sac State students
Polite and smiling Monday morning, Kings legend Chris Webber made a quick jab at the current state of the NBA while commending the current Sacramento squad and community at large.
“Very honestly, it’s Golden State (Warriors) the next two years anyway,” Webber said. “So anyone that’s upset, trying to make the Kings win a championship this year, it’s probably not the smartest idea if you like long, sustained winning like the Sacramento area does.”
Soon after, a packed student union ballroom watched keynote speaker Webber deliver a passionate and emotional telling of his life story, in a ceremony celebrating Student Academic Success Day at Sacramento State – after playfully ribbing all the students he saw on campus wearing purple and gold LeBron James jerseys, of course.
“Success comes in steps,” Webber said, talking of the first time he played on a basketball team, before high school. “I didn’t play, but success was making the team, because that’s the first step.”
The 6-foot-10 former NBA forward took the captivated crowd of hundreds of students, faculty and others through the step-by-step story of his life journey.
He recalled the childhood of his father, who’d worked on a Southern plantation and had lost his mother at age 12.
Then, Webber progressed through his own life: riding in a “Scooby Doo van” with his mother as he attended a college prep high school he hated at first; his now-infamous timeout game in 1993 which ended in defeat for Michigan in the NCAA Championship game; and being “cheated out of a championship” during the controversial 2001-02 Western Conference Finals against the Lakers.
His message was largely one of making success into a journey and learning to bounce back. The latter lesson may be an apt one for today’s Kings, a team that now owns the league’s longest playoff drought.
Still, he had words of praise for the current roster, a young one, and leadership he knows well.
“My advice to the Kings is to know your worth,” Webber said before his keynote speech, “to know that you have a leader in Vlade (Divac) that’s been there. Not only been there in sports, but been there in life.”
Over a 17-year playing career, Webber spent seven seasons with the Kings and won All-Star honors five times — leaving some fans scratching their heads at the 45-year-old’s absence from the Hall of Fame.
Webber is still active in the NBA world, now a broadcaster and TV analyst. He’s a noted humanitarian who started the Time Out Foundation in 1993, the same year he was drafted.
Webber stressed the importance of NBA players serving as community role models, as well as the importance of basketball in general to youths.
“If you’re a little girl and you love basketball, and you’re only 5-foot-4, I’ll tell you the same things I tell my friends that are 5-foot-4: You’re either gonna be really fast and a great guard and maybe get your shot blocked some, or you could be a coach. You could be a film guy. There’s a lot of room in the business of basketball.”
He lived up to the role model moniker Monday, shaking hands and taking photos with scores of eager college students 20 minutes before he spoke to the crowd.
This story was originally published September 24, 2018 at 2:33 PM.