The glorious days of an NBA player’s career are not the only things they remember after retirement. A lot of times, players feel lost after retirement as they no longer have a purpose in life. This leads them down possibly the lowest and darkest points of their lives. One such player was the Heat veteran Shane Battier, who won two championships with Miami.
In a recent interview with Pablo Torre, Battier revealed his struggles with depression right after retiring from the Heat. He also spoke about the humiliating moment he realized that his time in Miami was over. He initially spoke about his last days with the Miami Heat in 2014 when he faced his most humiliating moment in his NBA career.
“Nothing was worse to me than sitting me in crunch time,” admitted Battier. “That was my identity. It hurt me to my core. That’s when I knew I was done. I was embarrassed, and I checked out. And so when I retired, I was very cynical. And I was so sad, but I was also very cynical.”
“I shut people out. I was probably battling depression. I didn’t know what depression was. I never had this feeling before. But feeling very isolated. I didn’t feel anyone understood what I was going through. I felt very alone, and I pushed people away. I pushed my wife away; I pushed my kids away. And I was just a jerk. And I wasn’t like doing destructive things, it wasn’t like I was drinking every night. But I was emotionally unavailable. And I was hurt, and I was pissed off. I had all these emotions I had never associated with basketball.”
Shane Battier played 13 seasons in the NBA, which included playing for the Grizzlies, Rockets, and Heat. He averaged 8.6 points and 4.2 rebounds in 977 regular-season games. During his “glory days” with the Heat, Battier averaged 5.1 points, 2.2 rebounds, and 1.0 assists in 210 games. While his numbers may not indicate that he was crucial to the Heat’s back-to-back championships, the players on that team can certainly testify that he was indeed pivotal in the Heat’s historic run.
What LeBron James And Other Teammates Thought About Shane Battier
Despite being a role player on a championship team, Battier’s teammates held him in high regard. Dwyane Wade holds his basketball knowledge in such high regard that he even offered him a job to work with him at the Utah Jazz after retirement. Back in 2012, LeBron James spoke to Fox Sports about Battier’s basketball IQ.
“He’s probably the No. 1 smartest basketball player and person I’ve been around,” said James. “He knows everything.”
When Sporting News ranked Battier as the 7th smartest player in the NBA in 2012, his teammate Joel Anthony spoke to SLAM about it.
“That is no surprise,” Anthony said of Battier’s ranking. “His basketball IQ is off the charts in terms of understanding situations and being able to analyze all the different situations on the court. Even off the court. If there’s like a general question, everybody will look to Shane like, ‘You know the answer to this?'”
Battier was one of the most respected players in the league despite not producing at high volumes like superstars. He almost every night guarded the best players on the opposing teams like Kevin Garnett and Kobe Bryant. It is pleasing to see that he is no longer in a dark place like he was right after retirement.
