C. J. McCollum

I like Zach Lowe.

I take a lot of pride in being flexible, preserving my body. After a workout, I ice both feet, my calves, knees and stretch.

I do a good job of taking care of my body.

To graduate in four years as a student-athlete with no summer school is quite a feat.

Growing up in the inner city, you might not see a lot of different career paths and different jobs.

Growing up in the inner city, a lot of kids didn't think reading was cool. I'm trying to show them that it is cool and the importance of growing and learning outside of their everyday lives, which is a lot of times sports.

When you're smaller, you kind of learn how to do other things. You have to work a little bit harder.

Nothing really comes easy to you when you're under-recruited, you're undersized, you're undervalued. It's a situation where you have to be better than the bigger guys.

Other people need to be forward thinkers. Not just basketball players. Not just people in the sports world. But people in general.

Life happens fast. You have to have a Plan B, a backup plan and really figure out a way to have different avenues of income and just avenues of happiness. That is what is really important, being at peace and having that happiness.

It's crazy, I almost quit basketball when I was younger.

My parents have done a tremendous job, over the course of my career. They try to make every game and I think my rookie year, my mom made every game... They've been really consistent and it's all you can ask for as a kid.

It's important that we take care of our future generations and expose them to some new things.

As players we're held accountable for poor performance, I think the same should be said for journalists.

Being able to go to someone's house and have dinner with them and their family, being able to go see a movie with them, or go shopping, it makes you really care for someone and hope that they succeed. That means a lot in an on-court relationship. It creates trust.

As you get more experience out there, as you get more comfortable with the NBA system, the offense, the schemes, you begin to understand where you're going to get your looks from. And I think a big part of playing well is not having to look over your shoulder and just understanding that you're consistently be counted on.

I ended up switching over to journalism in college. A few weeks into freshman year, I realized that business school wasn't for me. And writing stories and reading and talking to people is something that I just enjoy doing, so I figured why not try to build up a post-basketball career with that.

Competitive people, especially in sports, want to learn about everything. So when you're interested in something, you become a bit obsessive. You start to research it and ask questions about it, and before you know it, you have a serious hobby because of how you're programmed.

When I started playing professionally, it made me realize that I had a voice in the league, one that gave me the chance to share a different side of our day-to-day life and the things that were happening on and off the court.

People think because there's only 24 hours in a day, we're just supposed to play our sport and then go home and think some more about our sport. They don't think that we should care about other things, but the reality is that you can be really good at what you do for a living and have other hobbies.

I think sometimes there's this perception that players are supposed to be robots.

When you're in the playoffs, you have to get easy baskets and you have to limit their easy baskets.

Yea, I wrote my college thesis on why college athletes should get paid. I think there's a way to do it based on the amount of revenue they generate.

Sometimes recruiters and scouts are missing on players. Going after the guys who are really hyped, five-star players and guys that are playing in grassroots and are seen all the time. Then there are the players that developed internally. They go to small schools and they continue to work on their games and they blow up later.

At the combine we went through medical exams from every team, the most extensive physicals I've ever had: blood tests, MRIs, heart monitors, everything. Because of my injury teams really paid attention to my lower body.

Even since I've been in the NBA, a lot has changed with the game.

As a competitor, you always want to receive the best rewards. But you understand that it is a team sport, and you understand the better your team plays, the more you are rewarded.

Over the course of my life, there have been so many people who have invested in me and provided me with opportunities to grow.

We need to play like somebody took our lunch money, like somebody disrespected your mother. I think that's the type of anger you need have and the aggression you need to have on the court. That doesn't mean making mad faces or mean faces but it means attacking the glass, strongly attacking the rim when you have the ball on offense.

You get better by playing, honestly. That's where you develop as a player is to play through mistakes in game action.

I always say, it's not the shoes; it's the player. If you can hoop, you can hoop.

As a kid growing up in Canton, Ohio, you never see yourself in a position to play in the NBA, much less have somebody pay you to wear shoes.

Canton has meant a lot to me.

It's been a tough 2020, honestly, for me personally, for a lot of people in the world in general.

I think that's the biggest thing in this sport is when you prepare, you have extra confidence.

My mother, my father, my brother, they've done a tremendous job of preparing me and helping me get right in having confidence.

I work really hard on my craft.

I spend a lot of time in the gym working on moves, working on difficult shots, figuring out ways to create space, becoming a tough-shot taker and a tough shot maker, especially down the stretch.

I've won league championships, and I helped pull off a massive NCAA tournament upset - our 15-versus-2 win over Duke in 2012.

I've been a guy who's never really been satisfied. Work hard, try to figure out ways to improve, try to figure out ways to sustain a certain level of play.

I think, when you get to know somebody on a personal level were you truly understand what makes them tick, what they play for, things they like to do in their spare time, you're around their families, I think you're kind of able to kind of coexist more when you have a relationship.

I wanted to do a lot of things in wine, but I didn't know how to do it. So before I invested in anything, before I really put my dollars into it, I put my whole heart, soul, mind into it so that I really understand the severity of each outcome, the severity of success and the severity of failure.

I think I'm the first player in NBA history to average 20 points a game and shoot two free throws per game.

I think you should look at it as a blessing that other people would think you're valuable enough to be mentioned in a trade. It could be worse. No one could want you.

In order for us to have changes in society, we have to do a better job with listening to each other, listening to stories, listening to experiences and sharing things. That's the way you're able to come to a better understanding of people in general. We have to do a better job in society. It starts at the top.

I'm not just a dumb basketball player who got lucky and graduated from college. My ratio for professor to student was nine-to-one so it wasn't like I wasn't going to class. I was going to class every day.

There's a whole world out there. And it's huge.

I accept who I am. Rapping is not my forte.

I like Malcolm Gladwell.

Writing and speaking and communicating, it's something important to me, and something I want to get better at.