I also didnвЂ™t grow up with money or connections in the industry I just shot my shot and it went in. I was an awful high school student and I had no idea what the fuck I was doing when I enrolled in classes at community college. I wrote this for the kid struggling in high school, not sure if his non-academic interests can be molded into a career. ThatвЂ™s now why I wrote this long-winded goodbye, though. Words cannot express how excited I am for this next chapter of my career and I hope youвЂ™ll follow along. I owe so much to you all, and the love I have for you will never fade.Д«ut once again, IвЂ™m leaving the hardwood for the pitch, as IвЂ™ll be joining Fox Sports as their soccer editor. Without this community, I wouldnвЂ™t have a career in sports media, I wouldnвЂ™t have been able to live my dream of hosting a successful podcast, and I wouldnвЂ™t have met some of my best friends. But theyвЂ™re also some of the most supportive people in sports. Are Lakers fans as vile as their reputation suggests? At times, sure, and IвЂ™ve definitely been on the wrong side of that. You see, as much as I enjoyed my job covering the Lakers, there were days it sucked - lots of them - and the only thing that kept me going on those days was this community. Harrison could have fired me off into the sun when he returned, and at times IвЂ™m sure there were times he wished he would have, but he didnвЂ™t and for that IвЂ™m eternally grateful, not only because it allowed me to have a platform, but because it gave me this community. Since then, a lot has happened: Drew left, I briefly took over and Harrison came back to run the site with Anthony as his No. I was right, and Drew got me onboarded in a matter of days.

I knew the Lakers had a busy offseason coming up, and I knew Drew was going to need help. The next time I emailed Drew was when Harrison Faigen left SSR to write for Lakers Nation (traitor) and Anthony Irwin followed him out the door. That alone was enough to keep me going, which, in hindsight, was good because I didnвЂ™t hear from him again for a year. To my surprise, Drew replied to me and said that he was familiar with my work. One of the people I emailed was Drew Garrison, the editor-in-chief of Silver Screen and Roll at the time. And by вЂњapplying,вЂќ I mean emailing people begging to let me write for their site for free. Doing it for a living wasnвЂ™t even a thought of mine at the time I just wanted to talk about the Lakers.

I didnвЂ™t miss a single game, even when I probably should have skipped out on a few.Д«ut watching wasnвЂ™t enough to feed my obsession: I needed to read about it, tweet about it and, if I could, write and podcast about it. Prior to the 2021-22 season, the 2012-13 campaign was arguably the worst season in Lakers history (at least in relation to the teamвЂ™s expectations) but for me, it was my first season as an engaged fan and I found every second intoxicating.

That was until the Lakers traded for him in the summer of 2012.ДЄnd thatвЂ™s the story of how I became obsessed with the Lakers. The problem with being a Nash fan in Los Angeles, though, was that Suns games werenвЂ™t as accessible as they are now, so outside of nationally televised games, I was only able to watch YouTube highlights of Nash. That player was Steve Nash, and he quickly became my favorite player. Then one day, as I was scrolling through Facebook, I saw a video of a feathery-haired basketball player juggling a ball at half court. Not only did I play on the weekends, but I spent hours a day on YouTube watching highlight videos of the best players in the world: Ronaldinho, KakГЎ, Zidane, Beckham, Ronaldo, Messi - it would be a while until I thought about basketball again. I was adamantly against it at first because I knew less about soccer than I did basketball, but eventually it became my life. On the final day of my youth basketball season, a teammateвЂ™s parent of mine graciously came up to my mom and told her that I should try out soccer. Sure, I knew who Kobe Bryant was and I casually watched when they were in the playoffs like everyone around me seemingly did, but basketball wasnвЂ™t really my thing: I played for two years, wasnвЂ™t very good and, as a result of my lack of patience, lost interest.

You see me in hindsight