If I had stood at the free-throw line and thought about 10 million people watching me on the other side of the camera lens, I couldn't have made anything. So I mentally tried to put myself in a familiar place. I thought about all those times I shot free throws in practice and went through the same motion, the same technique that I had used thousands of times. You forget about the outcome. You know you are doing the right things. So you relax and perform.

I smoked my first cigar in 1991, when we won the championship. Up to that point, I had never smoked a cigar, never smoked anything.

If you love the game, nobody can take that from you.

It's heavy duty to try to do everything and please everybody . . . My job was to go out there and play the game of basketball as best I can, ... People may not agree with that . . . I can't live with what everyone's impression of what I should or what I shouldn't do.

I don't go out and just try to score. I score because there is an opportunity to score.

I want to be the bridge to the next generation.

I'm all about challenges and seeing if I can go out and see if I can achieve something. If at the end of the day I do it, great. If I don't, I can live with myself.