Adreian Payne and Tom Izzo Talk EXTENSIVELY about His Decision to Spurn the NBA to Return to MSU
Adreian Payne and Tom Izzo Talk EXTENSIVELY about His Decision to Spurn the NBA to Return to MSU
A: First of all, we’d like to thank everybody for coming out and just announce that I’m gonna stay my senior year, try to get into a championship. That’s the most important thing. I’ve sat down and thought about it and first of all I wanted to thank you. I wanna apologize for the wait, because it was a hard decision. It was my first time having to make a big decision like this in my life without my grandmother. It was hard. I had help from Coach Izzo and the coaching staff and my high school coaches back at home. Without them I wouldn’t have been able to sit here and tell you how hard it was, because without them I wouldn’t be able to make a decision like this without their support. Any questions?
Q: I was told by somebody I met when I came down and met you in high school that your coaches finally got involved on Friday and really asked you to reconsider this. How much of an impact did the people at home and your high school coaches’ involvement starting Friday to support Coach Izzo with what he was telling you mattered?
A: First of all, I’m 23 years old. I’m old enough to make my own decisions in life. Like I said, this is my first decision without my grandmother. With their support they were able to bring things to my attention that I wouldn’t have been able to see. That’s what you have parents for; unfortunately I didn’t have my grandmother to be able to do that. Without her knowledge…she wouldn’t have been able to handle it anyways. With the knowledge of Coach Izzo and my high school coaches, they were able to bring some things to my attention that I didn’t see. Like I said, it was a big decision.
Q: Can you talk about the relief you feel now or whatever’s inside? Kind of characterize how difficult this was over the last month or two.
A: It was very difficult. Everywhere I went people were asking me what I was gonna do. They wanted me to come back. The support here, the support from the fans, from the Spartan family, Spartan Nation…it’s a family.
Q: The fact that we’re here at 9:00 at a 12:00 deadline tells us that it was a pretty tough decision. Did you in fact change your mind this week and how many times in the last couple of weeks did you change your mind?
A: Oh man, it was going back and forth. I couldn’t even tell you, like those swings going back and forth, like a little kid going back and forth. A big decision like that…I don’t know anybody that had to go through a situation like that. Coach Izzo, he’s here to my right, he gave me his information and told me all the decisions he had to make in life. I just tried to use his examples and things like that from his situation and use them and put it to mine.
Q: So had you decided to leave and changed your mind?
A: I was never 100% on what I should do. Basically when I did declare, or say that I was gonna go out. But…
Izzo: I thought you were really, really, really close when I left.
A: Yeah, Coach did think so. A lot of people did. I had not even talked to my brothers about the situation and told them what I was gonna do. So it was just mind-blowing.
Q: What was it that decided it for you? I know a lot of factors, draft stock, championship… When it came right down to it, what was it?
A: The main factor is I wanna graduate. I promised that to my grandmother and that’s the main thing. I promised that to her and that’s something I’m gonna do.
Q: You said that information came to you that helped tip the scales in this decision. What information came to you down the stretch that helped you make up your mind?
A: It was information that I was gonna be a first round pick. I just used that to weigh things that me coming back I was going to be able to accomplish with the team that we have here at Michigan State. We have a great team with everybody we have coming back. Gary and I, we got a chance to get to a Final Four and win a national championship.
Izzo: If I could add in there, then you can ask him some more questions. Mark Hollis’ in the back room, Mark talked to Adrian some. I’ve told you guys a million times that I don’t tell people if somebody’s father dies or mother dies, my parents are still alive, I never tell them I know what you’re going through. I found myself talking to AP and I actually knew what he was going through. As difficult as what I went through a couple years ago, and as mad as some people were, as I look back I understand some of it. I talked to a lot of coaches this past weekend. I think the information I gave him was just, it was so broad. The system’s not fair for these guys. It’s so broad. Yeah, I think most people agree not only was he in the first round but he could play himself even up a little bit more. But what everybody reminded me is now days, with things changing even in the NBA from the number of years, how you stay in the NBA…and to stay in the NBA you gotta be so prepared in the beginning. Three or four years ago they used to take guys and kinda make them better, make them better, make them better. Now they don’t keep you hanging around as long. And so when you look at all that kind of information, it’s not just where you get drafted but whether you’re in a position. And I think the things we talked about and the list that we had, what are your important factors? Graduation…this guy’s gonna graduate. All but graduate at semester; he’s gonna have one class to take 2nd semester. As most of you know, it’s been a well documented story on, what he’s done. It’s remarkable. To sit there next to Mark Hollis, he sat with me for three days, listened to every conversation I had with the GM, listened…AP did some of that. Listened. And I sat with him for times. We met at night until 11 at times. We did different things. It’s very difficult. Mark gave me his opinion on why it would be maybe better to do this or do this. But he listened. It was hard for me. And I think Draymond Green, I read on the text he sent me at 5:00 this morning, talked about Adreian’s grandmother. For me, for 90% you, you might have had your mother there to help you make decisions, and if she wasn’t there you’re grandmother was there. So I can’t appreciate, I can only acknowledge what it’s like to have to make a life changing decision. I felt like the job he did, analyzing it… I think in my mind on Friday he was going. In my mind. That was my mind. I had all the stuff for him left when I left. His high school coaches know him a little better than I do. They all sat down. It’s such a tough decision because when you have, what are you, a late first? Alright, how many guys do you put in a late first? There could be 30 that they say are that. Some are gonna be better, some are gonna be worse. So it really couldn’t come down to trusting the draft. That didn’t bother him. He knew he could play himself up. I think his coaches felt, and he felt when I left, like I gotta call down to Virginia. And that’s what I wanna tell you…talk radio, Twitter, each one of you will analyze it what you think. Unless you’ve walked in those shoes, it is so hard. There was so many people mad at me three years ago because I took my time. The only reason it’s this late, in terms of him, I was flying back and I was trying to get back earlier today and I couldn’t. Otherwise it probably wouldn’t have been the last hour, but it would have been today. It would have been today. I mean he did agonize over it. And I guess the good part about agonizing is what I told him… Because my AP gave me a chance to explore something, I came back with even more passion we went to a Final Four that year. I’m expecting the same. I’m demanding the same. So I don’t know if that helps any as you ask him questions, but try to realize what he’s been through and it’s a little different maybe than what most of us have gone through.
Q: To have the high school coaches step in and be supportive of information you’ve been given, you haven’t always had that. What did that mean to you personally?
Izzo: Well, I’ve always had it with AP. But you’re right, with other players I haven’t. His coaches have been very involved from the recruiting stage right on through to the academic. I had to sit in that dang parking lot while he was getting through this year, and I would wait with the coaches. So I got to know so many cool things with Dr. Gates that happened back then. But Art and Mark have been great. They’ve helped me understand him sometimes. Sometimes I’m hoping that they help him understand me. And I’m sure that did happen. It’s why high school coaches should be involved with more of these kids. Because they understand it, they understood his life, they understood who he was. So I think it helped DJ and myself back then, Mike and Dane now.
Q: AP, someone that’s known Izzo for a long time said they’ve never seen him work harder on anything. What did it mean for you that he worked so diligently?
A: I just felt the support and love that he has for each player, his players, his staff, the program. It shows how hard he works and how good he is at his craft. Without that then this program wouldn’t be as successful as it is.
Q: You said you looked back and forth a lot. When did the decision finally stick to stay?
A: It was right after I got done with my high school coaches. We sat down and came to agreement. We called Coach Izzo and it was in from there.
Q: When was that?
A: It was Saturday.
Izzo: I think… And then finally he said he was gonna sleep on it, right? His coaches told him to wait and call. I was pleasantly surprised, if you want the truth. But don’t take waffling…this isn’t politics. Don’t take waffling as something you didn’t know what you were doing. I think Mark would attest that I too when back and forth on some things. When people say, Why does he really wanna go? I say, and a couple of our guys are in finals studying right now, but as they filter around every guy wants to go. Every single player in football and basketball and hockey and baseball wants to go pro. If they didn’t, I wouldn’t recruit them. Every single one. They wanna go as fast as they can go. That is normal. Thank God he looked at some other factors and other dreams and goals he has, and had to put it all together. You never like hearing things, but he did a phenomenal job of trying to put it all together with people in his ear both ways too. Some telling him to go, some telling him to stay. I’ve been through that so I can appreciate that. Go ahead.
Q: Did you guys talk about the process you both went through? Did you talk about this year or was it just another day?
A: Yeah, we definitely talked. We talked before too about his situation, my situation. Gary’s like my little brother. We have built a relationship. I built a relationship with all the guys on the team. It’s something like that that can bond and make a team really come together. I think with me coming back that’s what it’s gonna do…make us tighter. I think that we have a better chemistry. We’re all in for the same goals. Like OG would say, All in. That’s the main thing. We’ve all got one goal and that is to get to the championship.
Q: What do you want to get better at, Adreian? And how do you see your role shaping up next year?
A: The main thing I would like to work on my post game, pin the ball on the board, shooting, dribble pull up, my strength. The main thing is my legs, conditioning. And being a leader.
Q: Can you talk about how good this team could be next year with everybody coming back except for Nix. And how motivated you are to keep the streak alive of every recruit that stays four years with Izzo goes to the Final four?
A: That’s very important. I think we’re very motivated, Keith and I leading the team to a Final Four and a national championship. I think we’ve got a great team. We’ve got the pieces, we just gotta come together and I think once we do that we’ll be on the road.
Q: In this process you did meet with some agents. What kind of information did you get from them and was it a lot different, getting different kinds of things from different people?
A: No, we weren’t getting anything different. Coach Izzo did a great job, like he said. He was up working day and night. He wasn’t gonna let anything slip past his fingers. Once we met with the agents, compared their information to his, that’s what we did. Helped me come up with my conclusion of coming back.
Q: Do you remember how many you talked to and when?
A: I think I talked to five, and that was all last week. My coaches came up and sat in the meetings.
Izzo: Thursday, Friday and Saturday I think it was.
Q: Alot of people believe that this was a case where maybe another year of him doing progressive playing like he did late last year could move him up even higher than a first round pick?
Izzo: One thing most of them said to me… He’s gonna be a higher pick than a lot of people. But one thing they said to me is, Some guys the needle’s going up and some guys have plateaued. And if you plateau you shouldn’t be coming out. If your needle is going up… Te’ve got some goals of where we want to get him. He’s pointing at BJ back there. You think of another guy. We’re gonna have other guys that are in this situation. I think one thing Adreian and I are gonna do is once they’re done with finals, sit down with our team and talk about how the information we gathered from players, agents… I was really impressed that people aren’t quite as crazy about everybody just getting out for no reason anymore. They want you to really take a good look at it. There’s this big deal now where only two years guaranteed of kids getting there when they’re ready to go, and so they’re getting to that second contract. Seems to be a lot of guys that aren’t getting to that second contract. I think all those little things… But I wouldn’t underestimate his needle going up means I can tell all of you here, BJ would agree in the back, I had meetings this year…January, February…and I say in the meetings, Who’s playing the best? And most times they’d say Adreian. I’d say, Who spent the most time in here watching film? The most time downstairs shooting and all those things? Very, very seldom do you say that about a big guy. Most of the time that’s the little guards you’re talking about. I think that makes me feel that he comes back, he’ll have both feet and long arms and every other part of his body will be in. I’m glad he added some, because I think…talk about growing as a person. When he said I wanna be a better leader, that is gonna be very important for this team. We have great chemistry but we needed more leadership, I think. I think he did something else that maybe he forgot to say, but he had told me. He called Kelser and Smith and Richardson and Cleaves and Day Day and who am I missing? He took long, long guys ago…Gregory called them. He took medium guys and Steve Smith and guys like that. He took the new guys. Nobody that I know of gave him the, Don’t go or go for sure. That’s what makes it hard. When I had to make my decision everybody’s afraid to tell you that they don’t wanna get blamed. Well, for me, I think he could have gone. I had literally thought, for his best interests, of achieving all his other goals, winning a championship, graduating, I knew his grandmother. He thinks it would have been easier with his grandmother here? He’s right. It would have been over about a month ago. She would have grabbed him and me by the back of the hair. Am I right on that? Don’t think his grandmother would have helped him leave. His grandmother would have helped in another way. I just think it’s about a variety of goals, not one goal. And that’s what I think his high school coaches and he must have talked about after I left.
Q: As close as you were to your grandma, was there a time when you talked to her about this? If she were here right now, what would she be saying?
A: I really never talked about leaving early to her. That never crossed my mind. She would have…you wouldn’t even wanna know. She would support me. She definitely would be happy and proud of me. She would definitely want me to graduate.
Q: Could you just touch on the educational aspect a little bit more and how important that degree is going to be for you?
A: I definitely…I like doing things the right way. With me graduating I’m able to set a standard and be a role model for kids that look up to me. Look up to not just me, but athletes in general. So I can be a hope to another child that may have the same situation, or be in the same situation as me. Let them know that it’s possible. You got LeBron and you know how great he is. You don’t have to be like that. You don’t have to look like that, you don’t have to put up big numbers or do anything like that. Everybody’s different. I just like to give hope to other kids that may not have it.
Q: I’m wondering how you slept the last couple of weeks and how you’ll sleep tonight.
A: I think I’m gonna sleep much better. It was crazy, sleeping. I was up, waking up in the middle of the night thinking about everything. I was going to sleep, waking up in the middle of the night, sometimes just laying in bed thinking. 2:00 in the afternoon I’d still be in the bed, thinking about what I wanna do. It was crazy.
Q: And tonight?
A: Tonight I’m definitely gonna sleep well. I might have a little party in my room.
Q: Coach talked about having people in your ear talking both ways. What was that part like for you in terms of dealing with people saying you should do this or you shouldn’t do that? And how was it for you to make the decision on your own?
A: Really, I think I’m mentally tough. I listened to people, I don’t like being disrespectful and things like that. So I listened to them and showed courtesy. But at the end of the day it is my decision and I made it.
Q: Grandma told us that she refused to let basketball use you, you were gonna use basketball. If you didn’t get a degree she would kill you. Did you remember those comments from her and did it impact you?
A: That’s why I chose Michigan State, another reason. Greg, Jim, they helped me so much, in so many ways. Without them I wouldn’t be here. That’s another reason why I chose Michigan State because I wanted to graduate and they had the best plan for me to…give me a plan, I’m gonna do it.
Q: Of the five agents you met with last week, did they all advise you to go?
A: They didn’t advise me to do anything. They were respectful, good men and they said that they would want to represent me if I came on this year or next year.
Q: Tom, on Adreian’s role next year, obviously Derrick leaving… How do you envision his role changing from this year to next year?
Izzo: It’s funny because I’ve listened to different people that called me, the ones that were pro and con; why he should come out; one of the reasons, well you’ve got Keith, Gary, AP, Brandon, they’re all pro prospects. I said, Yeah and I remember getting beat by the North Carolina Celtics. They had five of them and they were all that way. What I’m hoping that we can do is even run more. He’s gotta be a go-to-guy with the way he can score inside and outside. And that’s why I was so excited this year when he really started spending alto more time watching film, because I think that’s an area he can really grow in as far as decision making and to be able to play through somebody. Day Day and I talked a lot about that with him because he’s gonna have other guys…there’s a lot of guys now that…the last one was Travis Walton, wanted to keep this streak alive. If it means something to you, it means you have ownership in the program. So I guess I’m blessed that I’ve got some guys it means something to. I don’t think it’s gonna define me or not define me, whether that happens. But I do think it’s a pretty incredible feat, and a pretty incredible goal to be part of. So I think he’s gonna be a guy we’re gonna be able to go through a lot. I think you saw his confidence grow. I’m still mesmerized by the midseason turnaround of his conditioning. I think that goes with confidence. We all know he struggled to play a lot of minutes. And yet we all know that from midway on he just seemed to find a different gear. Sometimes that goes when you’re nervous and you’re comfortable and different things like that because it wasn’t even a factor. So that’s gonna be very important. We’re gonna need him as a leader because he does put alot into the game now. I can tell you some great big guys I had that just did not love the game. He loves the game. I think he’s gonna be a real gem for somebody next year because of that.
Q: If you keep us until midnight he can’t change his mind.
Izzo: Let me say this, because I did want to close it up on this. I was fortunate…his high school coaches really are special and there’s something you get out of this. Here’s a kid who’s going back to school to get a degree because of, we say his grandmother, but it’s a lot more than his grandmother. I think it’s himself, I think it’s… Adreian, there’s no secrets that he’s been very close to a lot of young kids. Some that have been underprivileged, some that have gone through certain illnesses. Being a role model, you don’t get to walk part of the steps…you gotta walk all of the steps. And this is gonna be a big thing to him. Back in Dayton his coaches tell me that there are kids walking around school with those Michigan State camp shirts on, some of his long shirts. He gives his stuff away. It’s amazing. He’s gonna be a role model back there. I just got a feeling that I know how hard it’s been. No fooling, nobody’s kidding you up here. It doesn’t matter that there was one time you were kinda out the door. What matters is you made the decision to come back inside. And when you do that the commitment is gonna be a 12-month commitment now. The commitment goes both ways…it goes Adreian to his teammates and his coaching staff, and it goes from his teammates and his coaching staff to Adreian. You know what, he’s earned the right now, not because he came back, he’s earned the right from halfway through this year that he’s made basketball incredibly important. He’s probably one of the more accountable guys I’ve ever coached here. We’re gonna take all those pluses and some day when he does interview with an NBA team he’s gonna have a hell of a resume to put in from of them. And he’s gonna be more prepared physically, even more mentally, and I think even more skilled. Let’s hope that we get this team and go somewhere special next year. I do think when Gary Harris sat in the room after he had gone down to Atlanta…I told you that day when you and I and him were sitting there…we gotta get there. I think that was part of the spark too.
