As players many years his junior fight for minimum-salary contracts, Grant Hill can look forward to his 40th birthday on October 5th having signed with the Clippers for the $1.957MM biannual exception two months ago. He still isn't the oldest player in the league, since Kurt Thomas, who edges him out for the distinction by one day, will be back with the Knicks this season, but Hill is nonetheless a testament to endurance and the wizardry of the Suns training staff. He won't have the luxury of that medical knowledge this year, but he'll have a much better shot at tracking down his first NBA championship. He spoke with Dan Bickley and Mike Jurecki on KGME-AM radio about a number of topics related to his offseason change of address, and we've got the highlights of the conversation here, as transcribed by Paul Coro of the Arizona Republic:
On how the Clippers came into the picture:
“It’s interesting. I had dinner with Chauncey (Billups) when I was in town in Vegas covering the Olympic team and we didn’t even talk about the Clippers. It didn’t even come up. We hung out and talked about other things. And then I met with (coach) Vinny (Del Negro) really almost as a favor, just because I had known him, played against him and he had worked for the Suns my first year. I just really liked what he was saying. They really weren’t the team that I was looking at.”
On the difference between this year and his previous experiences as a free agent:
“The previous times that I went through the whole free agent period, there was still a feeling that we could be good or there was that sort of sentiment that we’d try to keep that core together, if you will, and go for it. Now, I guess that team and sort of era has run its course.”
On leaving the Suns:
“Obviously these last two years were very difficult. Because at this point, with any point, particularly at this point I know in my career, you want to be able to feel like you have a chance. We went out and competed and gave our all and had some good, hard fights and had some wins maybe the last two years that we weren’t supposed to have. But I think if you’re being objective, if we did our best, we would’ve been an eighth seed. So that’s tough. That’s a bitter pill to swallow, particularly after coming off the high we had back two years ago. It would’ve been nice to keep that core together. I understand why that didn’t happen.”
Grant Hill is confused and should just shut up and play. He has the nerve to question Nash at least Steve has an idea of who will win next season Hill needs to retire or play quietly.