Expected to receive a massive contract from an NBA team once he hits the free agent market in a few days, the Miami Heat’s mercurial center, Hassan Whiteside, has plenty of skills on the court—as he proved by averaging a double-double last season for the Heat—but he wasn’t always looked at as a stud in the middle.
In a story published by Bleacher Report, Hassan talked about a time he played as himself in the video game NBA 2K, finding out that the general public didn’t think too highly of his game. Per UPROXX:
“He was just so terrible, like terrible,” Whiteside said of the former version of his playable self, in a recent Bleacher Report feature. “He couldn’t make layups. He couldn’t move. He couldn’t do nothing. He was just like a mascot. He couldn’t guard this ketchup bottle. And you’re looking at yourself like, ‘I’m better than this.’”
While most of us would’ve just went to the ‘Edit Player’ page and jacked up the attributes of the player across the board, Whiteside instead focused on developing his real-life skills and putting himself in position for a max deal by this time next week.
Pretty cool to think that a video game could have inspired the late-bloomer to work harder, but it may have been a contributing factor in Hassan Whiteside’s case.