Few individuals on the planet have enjoyed as much success on the basketball court as Ray Allen.
The two-time NBA champion and Olympic gold medalist is a 10-time All-Star who was recently named as one of the NBA’s 75 greatest players of all time. Allen held the NBA’s record for most 3-pointers made in a career with 2,973 until Stephen Curry broke surpassed him in 2021.
During his time in the pros, Allen saw a little bit of everything and was able to offer some of his insights about his experience during the NBA’s Rookie Transition Program back in July.
For The Win caught up with Allen to discuss the program, the state of college basketball and more.
This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.
What do you think the NIL package would have looked like for you?
Ray Allen: I’m glad I didn’t have to deal with that. I didn’t need money for anything. Once you start receiving it, you think you need it. For me, it was so much more of an innocence, but you learn to make do with the small things that you have. Forty dollars goes a long way when you are in college. You learn how to manage that. It was a much more simplistic existence for me. Now, you have to teach more and make sure you help out as much as you can because kids deal with that at such a young age. It can be so much more complicated being on campus with that type of money involved.
What was the hardest part about your own transition to the NBA?
Ray Allen: There is so much you don’t know yet. You don’t know what you’re getting yourself into with an 82-game schedule. That’s a lot of basketball. You have to navigate finances and understand that off-the-court stuff needs to work, so that basketball can be what it needs to be, so you can continue to be successful and continue to grow and be productive. You’re just going through that stuff, and there is no playbook other than talking to people and asking questions so you continue to learn.
What was your involvement with the NBA’s Rookie Transition Program?
Ray Allen: I tried to put myself in their shoes. I tried to think about what they needed to hear, which is basically the setup. They think they know it all because they’ve made it this far, but I’m sure they have a lot of questions. So how can I help them propel themselves from the summer to the first year? We had to navigate the pitfalls, so if they see them, they can recognize them and avoid distraction and adversity as much as possible.
If you go back and look at draft classes over the last 20 years and the guys picked later in the draft that had great careers, it’s really such a one-off situation for each player to figure out. Sometimes, getting drafted in the wrong city can lead to a player’s demise. It is about the parts of a player that we don’t see on display until three or four years down the line when guys start to blossom and take advantage of the good stuff or the bad stuff.
What advice would you give to the Nuggets about how to respond after winning a title?
Ray Allen: You can’t change when you win a championship. You have to go back to that next year and build and go back to being that role player that the team needed. Just because you won doesn’t mean you can go from being the fourth guy to the second guy. The fifth, the sixth and the seventh guy help win games in the NBA Finals, and they go home and they celebrate, and they think they’re going to get their money and be the man next year. But they need to go back and be the guy that helped their team win the championship. If you can do that, that team has a chance to repeat. But most teams don’t because role players tend to want more coming into that next year.
What would it mean to welcome back the Sonics to Seattle?
Ray Allen: It would be great not only for the city but also for the league. It is an international city. We have a pipeline into the Asian market through Seattle. For the NBA market, it’s such a great fan base there. I miss traveling there. For the city itself, any team you have an NBA team and then you lose it, it’s a significant blow to the people. It’s a resource. As much as it rains out there, to walk out of a game in Seattle does wonders for the economy. Every bar and restaurant people go to after games, you lose that economic impact. Buildup would be welcome.
