Caron Butler Tried To Hide His Mountain Dew Addiction From Kobe Bryant
Caron Butler tried to hide his self-proclaimed addiction to Mountain Dew from Kobe Bryant when they played together on the Lakers in 2004-2005.
After the Lakers acquired Butler in part of a deal that sent Shaquille O'Neal to the Miami Heat in 2004, Butler, who was in his third season in the NBA, struck up a friendship with Bryant, who was notorious for pushing his teammates to be the best versions of themselves.
During their first game, Bryant approached Butler with a question.
"He’s just like, 'Man, you look good, your game is sharp, but you be like, getting winded sometimes,'" Butler recalled in a recent appearance on The Lowe Post. "'You’re huffing and puffing a little bit too much. You’re a Mercedes Benz, you’re a hybrid, you’re not supposed to be huffing and puffing like that. What type of fuel you using?’"
Butler claimed he had a healthy diet. But when they were on the team bus later that evening, Bryant caught Butler drinking a large soda.
“I literally had a Mountain Dew, a one-liter or two-liter [bottle], and I immediately tried to hide it and he was like, 'Man, come on, man, you can’t be putting that in your body, what the hell you doing, CB?’" Butler recalled. "And from that moment I was like [expletive], I’m gonna stop drinking Mountain Dew. And I just pivoted away from Mountain Dew for probably about the remainder of the season, which is probably five months, six months. But the second I went to Washington I was back on that [expletive]. I couldn’t stop, man. But I held true to it."
Butler, who went on to play for Washington from 2005-2009, drank Mountain Dew in the third and fourth quarters of games with the Wizards.
“It was in all my Gatorade cups," Butler said. "Everybody else was asking for the Gatorade Tiger and all that [expletive], I was like, 'Go in my locker.’ The ball kid was like, ‘Go in your locker?’ I said, ‘Put two ice cubes and put the Mountain Dew in a Gatorade cup.’ And, hey, 20 [points], every time, buckets."
Bryant proved that unhealthy food didn't negatively impact him early in his career. He famously had a pepperoni pizza and grape soda before scoring a career-high 81 points against Toronto in 2006. But he was vocal about having to change his diet in the twilight of his career before he retired in 2016.
Although Bryant's admonition against soda didn't stick with Butler, many of his other lessons did. Butler went on to become a two-time All-Star in 2007 and 2008 and an NBA champion with Dallas in 2011.
Butler would watch film alongside Bryant on flights as the five-time NBA champion broke down opposing team's defenses.
"He said, 'Caron, this is one of the most important things, knowing the other team's sets so as they prepare for you, you prepare for them,'" Butler said. "He said that's how you make the All-Defensive team."
Butler said Bryant knew other team's schemes so well, he'd sometimes mess with defenders.
"He would be on the court and tell a player, 'Yo, you're in the wrong spot, go over here,'" Butler recalled.
Butler added that Bryant even read referees' manuals so he could find holes in their system.
"He was just different from his learning perspective," Butler said. "And also if you wanted to learn, he would teach you. People were fearful of that, people were afraid and intimidated of going next to him and being held accountable. But I loved it, man. My big brother taught me so much about the game of basketball and also life."
