Your Personal Experiences with Cavs Players

[All4One1ForAll]

Past or present. Good or bad.

I'll start…

Kyrie Irving: Came in contact with him briefly at an autograph signing. Tried to talk to him but he kinda brushed me off.

Anderson Varejao: Visited my elementary school when I was younger because a kid won a radio contest. Also came into a restaurant I worked at 2 summers ago with Danny G. Andy is very nice and personable, and I talked to him about how he was feeling injury wise.

Dion Waiters: Met him at Verizon (or maybe it was Sprint) earlier this year. Really funny dude but made no attempt to enunciate his words so it was hard to understand him at times. Talked about how excited he was to make the playoffs this year.

Anthony Bennett: His 2 nephews (about 10 and 14 years old) came over to play basketball outside with my younger cousin on a day I happened to be over. (They call AB "Uncle Fatty" lol, dead serious, and every time they dunked on the 8 ft hoop they would yell "Bennett" and swing forward after the dunk). I saw him briefly when he came to pick them up. Said hi to him and he seemed nice but that was pretty much it. Funny story. My cousin later told me he said bye to the 2 nephews when Bennett got traded and they were helping him pack up and what not, and they told him that trading for Kevin Love was stupid because Bennett will be better than Love soon anyways as "he actually plays defense."

Matthew Dellavedova: Saw him playing water basketball with Carrick Felix, Bennett (forgot I saw him another time), and Scotty Hopson last year. I mainly spoke about school and such, also telling him how I loved the energy he gives on the court,and he talked about how much he loved Cleveland. Very very down to earth guy.

Tristan Thompson: I actually shot around with him at the gym for about 10 minutes 3 years ago. Saw him there with his trainer and I talked to him a bit. Really funny. The lady at the front desk asked him if he played basketball because of how tall he was and his response was "I dabble in it."

Jarrett Jack: My dad and I talked to him last season before a Cavs game about the playoff push and March Madness. He signed my shoes, too. Really humble and really nice.

So overall mostly good experiences. What about you guys?

 

[Frank Stallone]

Past or present. Good or bad.

I'll start…

Kyrie Irving: Came in contact with him briefly at an autograph signing. Tried to talk to him but he kinda brushed me off.

Anderson Varejao: Visited my elementary school when I was younger because a kid won a radio contest. Also came into a restaurant I worked at 2 summers ago with Danny G. Andy is very nice and personable, and I talked to him about how he was feeling injury wise.

Met LeBron, Love, Delly, Andy and Mozgov at the 2012 Olympics.

My LeBron story is buried around the board. I worked with USA, so I couldn't get too personal but I did mention the Cavs. In short, hated him when I met him, became his biggest fan after. I know he is cold to some who approach him, but I work with celebs on a daily basis, it just comes with the territory some times.

Love was really nice, sort of an awkward fit with Team USA but gave a good interview. Everything he does now in the press is the same as back then. Nice guy behind the scenes as well. Loved winning and playing with stars. Said he was jealous.

Delly I obviously didn't realize would be my boy in a few years! Lol. Had to do interviews with all countries and we just talked about Saint Mary's and his silly mouthguard.

Andy and I chatted for a few minutes about the Cavs and fans, but mostly centered around Rio 2016. Another nice guy, and his eyes lit up when I said I was still a Cavs fan lol.

Mozgov, along with most of Russia, I have no fucking idea what they said.

Team USA in general was pretty solid. When you go to a foreign, especially one with english speakers and are praised like Gods, win a gold medal and do what you want, it is hard to NOT be in a good mood...

Also - best basketball/sports thing I've ever seen in my own life. Beat Usain Bolt's 100m record:

 

[cavsfever]

Met LeBron, Love, Delly, Andy and Mozgov at the 2012 Olympics.

My LeBron story is buried around the board. I worked with USA, so I couldn't get too personal but I did mention the Cavs. In short, hated him when I met him, became his biggest fan after. I know he is cold to some who approach him, but I work with celebs on a daily basis, it just comes with the territory some times.

I haven't seen your Lebron story -- did he brush you off when you guys met? Not a time in his life when he would have been eager to discuss the Cavs I think.

 

[spydy13]

Met Delly as he was flying in for training camp his rookie year. We were both flying Southwest from Vegas and he happened to be standing next to me in the boarding line.

I wasn't sure it was him at first until I read the boarding pass he was holding , but we talked about how I was excited they picked him up and thought he would be a good addition (turned out to be right!).

After we got off the plane, I waited outside the bathroom to grab an autograph from him in my inflight mag (which you can see in my profile pic), and wished him the best of luck.

 

[Jon]

8 Pages of fans discussing their interactions with LeBron

 

[brownindian]

Can you guys also tell us the name of the place where u met them so that we can creep stalk those places?

 

[Simon]

Won a contest to go to Cavs media day in 2013. Met all the players except for a couple. Not sure if I met Bynum. All of them were pretty nice.

Jarrett Jack kept asking a question about how many syllables there are in Delly's name . He counted himself, can't remember the number he said.

 

[cavsfever]

8 Pages of fans discussion their interactions with LeBron

LOL -- this thread reads exactly how you would expect considering the first post is two days after 'The Decision'/'I'm taking my talents to South Beach'

 

[natedagg]

I met Andy in a club in Barcelona what, 6 or 7 years ago. It was loud, we were both hammered (or at least I was), and he was really cool. And tall. I told him that us fans loved him because he played with heart. He was pleased.

 

[Jon]

LOL -- this thread reads exactly how you would expect considering the first post is two days after 'The Decision'/'I'm taking my talents to South Beach'

It wouldn't surprise me if some people embellished or even made up their stories as a means to express their new found hate for James; but I always took it more as a demonstration of how much he was protected by the fans and local media who didn't want to trash the guy as long as he was our guy.

The size of LeBron's ego has never been in doubt, and nothing that was said would surprise me in the least if it was true, but as long as he isn't hurting anybody or committing any crimes, I really don't care.

 

[czvo]

8 Pages of fans discussion their interactions with LeBron

This is a particularly interesting read now that the tables have flipped once again. I remember reading this 5 years ago and thinking, "this guy sucks."

Now? None of it seems so bad. The tipping is still terrible, and he, as well as many other athletes need to work on that. But I completely understand denying autograph requests. You start signing for one person when you're out in public just trying to mind your business, and then you get a whole crowd of people swamping you with requests.

I used to work at footlocker in Beldan village and when he was in high school he would come in and one time we asked him to sign the backboard and he said no. After we basicaly shut the store down for him to come in. He is a dick

This one was pretty good. Pretty sure this could be viewed as a violation and cost him eligibility. I don't know, but it could be viewed as erring on the side of caution. Some of the other stuff sounds like things you'd hear about any high school kid. "He was a jerk because he wanted to get free cokes when we restocked the vending machines." What kid wouldn't try to do that?

You could tell that the viewpoints of the posters were coming through in a lot of these stories. Especially the second-hand ones.

 

[Igo2XS]

Met Z about a year ago at the airport. He was gigantic. Wanted to take a picture but he (I think) was with his family and you could tell wanted nothing more than to be left alone.

 

[Xearoii]

Can you imagine playing 82 games a year, times 15 years. Then add in 10-15 appearances a year at random events, times 15 years. That's 4500 chances for autographs. Each time you take out a pen to sign one, 5-10 others want autographs. So now you're close to signing 45000 times before you even add in all the times people see you during your personal life you have!

Not including possibility of before or after game. Now imagine all the autographs being asked for during your personal time you want to spend with your wife and family at dinner.

Autographing stuff would get old quick. It'd drive me nuts that is for sure!

 

[Simmy]

Met Kyrie when he visited Australia in June of 2013 (ala my profile picture).

Stood in line from about 8am and was one of the first to get in there, shake his hand, take a photo and get my jersey signed. His dad was beside him as well. I actually decided to wear my "216" hoodie, with the intention of coming across as more than a clueless NBA fan (as most others in line were) and I've actually got a couple of pictures of him staring and reading my hoodie while I'm looking back at him - I guess he noticed!

Funny finish though: as I was walking away, I turned around and shouted "Kyrie!" And he looked up at me. "Don't leave us, Cleveland loves you - even down here!"

He chuckled and smiled and gave me the thumbs up

Oh, the paranoia at that time!

 

[Otsego Mar]

Met AV, D-Goody, & Martynas Andriuškevičius at a club once.