Kevin Garnett - An Uncensored Encyclopedia of Life, Basketball, and Everything in Between

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I dedicate this book to my beautiful children and family.

He who angers you, owns you.

KG

It was 2008, and after thirteen seasons, I had finally won the muthafuckin finals and helped bring the Celtics their first championship in more than twenty years.

When the horn went off and the game was over, time froze. My mind froze. I had halfway been expecting a buzzer-beater; but it was a blowout. We beat down the Lakers by thirty-nine points. Confetti was coming down as I was going up. Id never been that high or felt so hyped.

I was in the bliss: people grabbing at me, hugging, kissing, crying. I looked over at my wife, saw my kids, my family, my friends, my fans, and then, like a movie, my brain went on rewind, replaying scenes, rushing at me at once: hooping in Billys driveway when I barely knew how to shoot; waking up the neighborhood at five in the Carolina morning cause I couldnt stop working on my dribbling; a country kid, then a teenager trying to download those badass Chicago streets; wins, losses, bumps, bruises, a million memories, a million hours on the grind, hacking, scraping, clawing to get where I needed to go; and there I was at last. Reporter Michele Tafoya holding up a mic in front of my face. The Boston crowd wildin out. She gotta shout for me to hear.

League MVP. Defensive Player of the Year. Now its time to add NBA champion to your rsum. How does that sound?

I put my hand to the fresh-out-the-box championship hat on my head.

Man, Im so hyped right now.

I take a second to gather myself.

Another rush of images flashing in front of me: sitting at Ruths Chris Steak House during a family dinner; watching D-Wade playing Chauncey in the Eastern finals; my struggles in Greenville, AAU tournaments, endless games in endless parks in endless neighborhoods, going, growing, never stopping, learning, burning with an energy that gets more intense year by year, wanting this thing, wanting it for all my twelve years in Minneapolis, wanting it for the T-Wolves fans, wanting it for the Celtics fans, wanting this ultimate win, this championship that Ive desired more than anythingmore than money or fame or sex. And now the reality clicks in my brain, runs down my spine, enters my soul, and Im taking off my hat and tilting my head straight back and screaming like a madman.

Anything is possible!

A few moments later, I add, Top of the world! Top of the world! Im certified! Im certified!

Im yelling so loud that my voice can be heard beyond those sixteensoon to be seventeenchampionship banners hanging from the rafters all the way up to heaven. Yellin up there to Malik Sealy and Eldrick Leamon and everyone I loved and lost. Everyone who got me to this moment.

In the middle of the mad scramble I see Kobean. I call him Kobean or Bean cause his dad is Jellybean. Bean knows what I was going through. Id been chasing him, been chasing Shaq, been chasing Timmy, been chasing all the legacies, and now the moment is mine.

Congratulations, man, says Bean. Enjoy this, cause there aint gonna be too many more. Ill see yo bitch ass next year.

I have to get in my blows, have to say, We activated now. This aint that Minnesota shit.

Well see.

Say hi to Vanessa and the kids, I say. Love you, my brotha.

Love you too, dawg.

Then I give him one of those gorilla hugs around the neck and ask, Bean, yall out tonight?

Hell, yes, said Kob, we getting the fuck outta this bitch.

Its beautiful because I know how pissed he isBean hates losing more than anyonebut I also know that he has to be a little happy for his OG.

Like me, Bean believes in the unstoppable human spirit. Its that spirit that makes anything possible. Those words come from my heart, from my guts, from the life Ive lived. Those words apply to right now, this very second, because here I am, a dude who has ADD and ADHD, and as a result doesnt read a lot of books, sitting down to write my own book. Aint that a trip?

Attention deficit disorder and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. I got em both. I also have dyslexia, meaning I see shit backwards. I see things in vision. For a long time, I was believing that I was mentally disabled, until a great friend of mineshout-out to Torey Austinsaid, Hey, man, maybe that means you have superpowers. Toreys words arrived right on time. Before that, I was dealing with feelings of heavy inferiority, cause my teachers were on me for not reading right. The formal diagnosis happened later in life when I was already an adult. As a country kid in South Carolina, I didnt have access to sophisticated professionals who could figure out what was wrong. I struggled with words on the page.

Yet here I am, writing words on a page.

Thats one of the reasons I decided to structure the book this way, like an encyclopedia, with little bite-sized entries. Because of my reading problems and my limited attention span, Im not the kind of dude whos gonna kick back on the couch with a book for an hour or two. Im gonna pick up a book, read a page or two, and then bounce. So I wanna write the kind of book that Id wanna read. I want to change it up, do it differently. Ive never been much of a rule follower. I didnt follow the rules when I skipped college and went straight to the draft. Didnt follow the rules when I negotiated what was at the time the biggest contract in professional sports. Didnt follow the rules when Id bring up the ball or play on the wing rather than plant myself down low like every other big man. So I sure as hell aint gonna follow the rules here. Im writing a book that, like hoop, is filled with suspense, surprises, high drama, and big fun.

Celebrating the 2008 NBA championship.

There are a bunch of words and names and phrases that start with the letter A that have been important in my life and come before Anything Is Possible! Like AAU or Alpha or AI. Trust me, well get into all that eventually. But I have to start with Anything Is Possible! because thats the most important. Thats what everything youre gonna read about adds up to. Heres one more: Agenda. Let me say it straight-up: my agenda is to show you how negatives can turn into positives and how positives can change your life for the better. And the only way Im gonna be able to do that is if Im fully honest about those negatives. About the mistakes Ive made. About the hardship Ive experienced. About the pain. I know being honest isnt always comfortable. This is the first time Ive ever said anything about my learning disabilities. I never even told Kobean, and he was dyslexic too. And if Im really being honest, then I also have to say that right now Im wondering if this is such a good idea. Im starting to feel doubt creep in.