This Iman, and I blew a bag.
You may know me from playing basketball, from seeing me rap.
Check me I'm so poking the chests
of these people next to me
You may know me from being Junie's dad.
You may know me from the reality show and my wife.
His boo is my boo.
Let me get the grilled lemon caper chicken.
What is that? Steak.
My first real job was campus delivery man.
Filing and scheduling, make sure people got their checks.
I would deliver packages.
I think I was getting paid like maybe ten dollars an hour.
I thought it was the most money I ever saw.
I used to max out my hours every week.
I would go around campus and be on my golf cart
and see my teammates, give them rides to class.
The first check, I might have thought
I was balling a little bit.
I might have did a little number out there with it,
but I got smart and started saving at least one check.
I would buy two pairs of Jordans when they came out.
My transition was move, to go to the League
because right when I made my decision, I got drafted.
I probably celebrated for a few days
and then the lockout here.
So I guess I didn't see a real check until two weeks,
maybe three weeks after Christmas day,
which was our first game after the lockout ended,
and it was in a hundred thousands.
I think that one was a physical check.
I didn't get it direct deposit
until maybe like my third paycheck,
so I had a physical check, so I got to take it to the bank.
I bought a Challenger. I had no [inaudible 00:01:40].
Luckily, I had driven it a ton and nothing like - it was loud.
That was loud. That was before I really was into like -
I didn't know about like wrapping cars,
and doing all that,
but I felt like I had just picked a bad color.
It didn't feel like me. I felt like everybody else
because it was just a Challenger,
and I just - I felt lame, and I took it back.
After that, I rented a Camaro, didn't like that,
took that right back. And then I bought a Range,
didn't like the Range, took the Range back.
Finally, I ended up getting a Jeep.
I got a Jeep with like a rhino skin coloring on it.
And that was hot, but it was like a third of the other cars
that I kept trying to buy that would end up
really just being trash. It just wasn't me.
I got my college [inaudible 00:02:23],
and a lot of people got their college
[inaudible 00:02:24] first car, man.
All the memories, I paid a thousand dollars for that car,
a Ninety-Eight Chevy Blazer. This shut down twice.
I just called my dad and talked to my dad
for a long time about it.
Felt like a good time and having a man to man.
So I talked to my dad for a while about,
you know, like what he did when he felt like,
"All right, I can take care of everything."
I don't know, I felt like I could finally talk to my dad
about the stuff he used to stress himself out about.
You know what I mean? I felt like, damn,
finally we got this like super grown man connection thing
going on, like I could sit down
and having a beer with the guys and understand
like what they're going through now.
They can't hit me with the, "Wait 'til you got bills,"
you know what I mean?
I felt like all of my life, I kept hearing that.
Like man, I can't wait two years,
like finally I got money, so now we can have that conversation.
First thing I bought was...
I think I bought like clothes and backpacks.
I think I bought like two Louis backpacks,
a Gucci backpack, and the belt, something like that.
I didn't really do much. I just was so excited
to go into all these designer stores and spend money.
I think that money, it gives you responsibility
and it gives you power, but it's kind of scary,
the other side of people you get to see,
and not in like a mean way,
just like you hear people's like dark, dark...
like you hear their darkest hour.
People are comfortable telling you that
because they need whatever they need,
so they'll tell you their whole,
everything they're going through and then just...
it was just scary to unveil that of each person
and have that responsibility of knowing that,
and that was a transition period for me.
That was very strange, and it was overwhelming.
I had a cousin that like gave me a reminiscent story.
It took me back,
and I'm thinking we're just like on the phone,
like all the way down.
He took me all the way down to the light,
the little spray can that you had.
You remember it was like sour, like you know what I mean?
They made me think about like all the times at home
and the first time I had it with my other cousin.
I'm like damn, that spray can,
but come to find out he took me all the way back to all of this
to tell me that that day, he bought me like a shirt.
I think I spilled something on my shirt, something happened.
He bought me a shirt, and he basically wanted me
to loan him some money to go out and do something.
I think he had like a birthday coming up.
He basically wanted to do the shopping to get it right
for his birthday, or something like that,
but like he took me all the way back to
when he bought me something, which was...
it wasn't comparable by a long stretch,
but it's like I said, with the money thing,
what money will flip people's brains to do.
I bought my wife her apartment,
so she had this apartment in Miami.
When I met her, she always like loved going there.
She always had good energy. Going to this place in Miami,
she'd always talk about her skin glowing,
how she got her tan, and she's bronze now,
and she watching Sex and the City a lot,
and Mr. Big got a girl... Got her the
[inaudible 00:05:27], and she knows, she was all happy
[inaudible 00:05:32].
She's thinking she's going there to check it out
and it was just hers, and I thought it was just dope.
I wanted her to have a [inaudible 00:05:38],
so I bought that.
I bought something else that day,
which is why I made it the most expensive day,
but it was kind of strange
to buy something with cash up front like that,
like I think that was the first -
second time that I had ever bought something like that.
I guess with music, I always wrote music,
and did music on my own. I just like to write,
like even if I wasn't doing it to like put it out myself,
I would do it to like sell songs to people, whatever it is,
because the dream always was for me to like,
I just want to be able to do shows.
I want to be able to go to a show -
I think shows are so cool, like go to a rap concert.
I remember going to a Ludacris concert
when he dropped back for the first time.
We literally went just to hear him
do Southern Hospitality and What's Your Fantasy.
That's what everybody wanted to hear.
So when I went to the show, I always wanted to be up there
and be like,
damn I just want to say something a certain way
to where everybody in here say it,
like everybody's got that song that they do all that,
that chant that they got going.
The whole crowd would take over and sing it for him,
and I was like, damn, I want to have that moment.
Just because I feel like even as an athlete,
I go through so much stuff that yeah,
I'm going to go through a lot of stuff
that a lot of people can't relate to,
but a lot more people relate to me than,
like a lot of people probably think, "Oh he hoops,"
so they got this problem or that problem.
A lot of us is super regular,
just people put on a front to do that,
but we go through a lot of the same stuff.
I just want to have that moment where everybody's like,
"Man, I all the way feel you.
I all the way understand. I love that part."
Or "I love that song. I like - I love that song.
That song gets me through the day,"
or "That song helped me through this situation."
I just love that moment or that connection.
I think that connection is special.
Even with basketball, you get that same moment
every once in a while where you got a series of plays
that you do that lead to a timeout,
and before you go to that timeout,
you take a look at the crowd,
and people are standing on their feet.
Literally like that's the only reason I came to this game,
was to see somebody do that.
My problem is every time I start liking stuff,
I [inaudible 00:07:37]
record something else, and then I start pushing this stuff over.
I need to just start putting stuff out,
so I don't know and I can't tell you,
like when the days come,
and I might just start dropping stuff on the regular
when I plan to release a lot more music,
especially now that I released a couple of projects.
Even though they were short,
putting together a collection of work for people to write to,
I think it's cool now for me to jump into doing singles,
and just dropping stuff so that people can have
a bigger portfolio of music. I did some features finally,
like I don't usually do features a lot.
A lot of times I get into a certain style
that I like to make. I have a certain tone,
a certain sound that I really resonate with,
and I've tried to jump outside of that
and hops into the worlds of other people,
just so that it appeals to more people when we put it out.
I'm Iman, and I blew a bag.