Four Time Gold Medalist. First Ballot Hall of Famer.
Tamika Catchings on Her Legendary Career and Exceeding Even Her Own Expectations
Today’s conversation is with a living WNBA legend. If we were to list all the awards and accolades Tamika Catchings has won, you’d spend the rest of your day reading that list, so instead, you should just start listening…
In addition to being WNBA Champion and 4-Time Olympic Gold Medalist, Tamika also has experience as a coach and now general manager. She shared her basketball journey, as well as her faith journey, and what it’s like moving from player to coach to basketball administration.
As always, thanks for listening.
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Episode Transcript
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Henry Kaestner: Welcome back to the Faith Driven Athlete podcast. This is probably our first episode with a Hall of Famer. Super cool to have Tamika with us on the show to make a thank you very, very much for joining us.
Tamika Catchings: Thank you. Thanks for having me.
Henry Kaestner: So tell us, what was it like growing up in the Catchings household? When were you introduced to faith? When were you introduced to basketball?
Tamika Catchings: So my father played in the NBA for 11 years. The Milwaukee Buck, New Jersey Nets, Philadelphia 76ers and the Los Angeles Clippers. So needless to say, we moved around a lot. But I you know, I just remember early on having a basketball in my hand. That's pretty much what our family did. And, you know, we just moved and bounced around my dad. So I think along his journey and along the fact of just kind of moving around, my mom did a great job of just kind of keeping all of us connected. And, you know, we had the family dinners and church was a huge part of pretty much every aspect of our life. And now I just remember as a young girl, my older brother, my older sister, just kind of being toted around everywhere. I would have to say from a faith standpoint, we were like pretty much a lot of African-American families in general like faith. And there's going to church and being in church all day and being a part of every single church program that you could possibly think of and imagine we were a part of it.
And I remember that early going to church, my sister, my brother and I would always make sure that I sat next to my sister because she had all the good snacks and a little purse. And, you know, between the two of us, I always carry a little notebook and a pen and pass that back and forth. So I think from a faith standpoint, as a little girl, the seed was planted. I would honestly have to say, as far as my own personal story and my own personal journey to really knowing God came my sophomore year in college.
Henry Kaestner: Tell me about that.
Tamika Catchings: So my mom and dad got divorced and I was in seventh grade, but church was a huge part of our family. And what we did and even as we got older through junior high, through high school, my mom would always say, if you don't go to church on Sunday, you can't participate in anything.
So we always made sure we were in church. We always made sure, you know, we had snacks and we were somewhat attentive. But I remember when I graduated from high school and got to the University of Tennessee with Pat Summitt. I just though oh man, I can make my own schedule. If I don't go to church, I can still play basketball. I can still do whatever I wanted to. And I would have to say that, you know, basketball really became my god and it became a thing that I lived for.
And that was like the focus. Of course, I went to class and we had to make good grades. And Pat was very instrumental in making sure that all of us were always in the classroom. But I would say for me, you know, we went undefeated freshman year, 39-0, and we won a national championship. And I remember like after like, man, this is how the next three years is going to be. I'm in for the ride of my life.
And then sophomore year came and our first loss. It's funny that I live in Indiana now. But our first loss in my collegiate career was to the Purdue Boilermakers. We came out here, we lost and that was my first loss. After that, we had a couple more losses and you would have thought like the world had come to an end. I think that whole season we ended up losing 10 games. But you would have thought like us losing those few games. It changed everything. And randomly. I just remember driving home one day and I passed by a billboard.
And on the billboard, this church had advertised the guest speaker coming to town and I don't know what it was. I went back to campus and we had come in as the Fab Four: Shamika Randall, Taressa Jeter, Kirsten, and myself. And so I went back to the dorms and I was like, Hey, guys, I don't know what it is. I saw this billboard I probably have passed, but who knows how many times. But like, I just feel like. There's guest speaker coming at the church. Let's just go check it out, and all of us have grown up in our faith with the big part of the four of us.
And so we ended up going to this revival. And it was Pastor Freeman. Pastor Cam Freeman. And I just remember he had preached about who's your daddy and talked about. You know, it's not about your earthly fathers, it's about your heavenly father, no matter what your relationship with your earthly father, that your heavenly father always takes over and provides all you need. You know, he went through the whole thingl, the whole sermon. And you know how like in a church you go to at the end when they kind of have, you know, if anybody wants to come back to God and want to rededicate their life and all of that.
And I swear, like all four of us, we rushed down, we rededicated our lives. And it was just really cool because we were all in different parts of life with our fathers. You know, like I said, my mom and dad had gotten divorced earlier when I was in seventh grade. And one of them hadn't seen their dad since like second grade. One of her dad was like the temn dad. He came to all of our game. And then the other one had never really had a good relationship with her father. So we all were in different phases with our dads and so rededicated our life to Christ. I found out a couple of weeks after that got introduced to FCA on campus at the University of Tennessee and the rest is history.
Henry Kaestner: It's a great history, a great history. So tell us about basketball. You mentioned your dad played the NBA for while. I think he played with Dr. J. Right. Is there some aspect of your game that you emulated from from Dr. J?
Tamika Catchings: He was a little bit more dynamic than me, right?
Henry Kaestner: It's hard to be more dynamic than Dr. J. Yeah.
Tamika Catchings: I mean, I remember watching and just being able to go to the game then, you know, think even at that point, like, I didn't really understand the magnitude of who Dr. J. Was. My dad played truthfully like my role model and the parts that I wanted to emulate and be like with my dad early on. And then, of course, I got a little bit older. Alonzo Mourning was my favorite player of all time. And so, you know, watching Dr. J was one thing and obviously what he represented in the dunks and the flashiness and just how smooth he was. But my dad to me, that point in time, my dad was like, I watched my dad.
Henry Kaestner: Yeah, of course. That's awesome. So you had your dad, of course, to watch, but you also had an older sister. Right. And so I think that all of us it just it time stamp this little bit were recorded during at a time where there's the covid 19 quarantine. And so we're all at home. I'm a parent of three boys. And there's some amount of sibling rivalry on a basketball court. And so you see that. But you had an older sister you were playing with. How intense were those one on one games?
Tamika Catchings: Yeah. So I have older sister and older brother and I definitely have the more competitive streak in my show. It might be a little bit crazy, but going out in the backyard, you know, whether it was against my brother or whether they get my sister or all three of us playing together, I mean, there was never a dull moment. And my dad used to get so mad because I mean, like me and my Sister, we will go at it. And I'm talking about blood. We're talking about push down on me, like when we'd have those time frames like, hey, we're gonna go play. We also would have to emphasize, okay, we're going to have a friendly game of horse. So we're gonna have a friendly game of one on one, even though they were never friendly games. And I would dare anybody to try to get in between us. But my dad would come out, he'd storm out because I mean, one of us would end up crying. One of us would end up with blood all over us. And my dad would literally come out, take the basketball, my sister would go in the house and play with her dolls. In the meantime, I would just start playing with my imaginary basketball because, you know, I loved the game of basketball that much.
Henry Kaestner: The subtitle of your book, Catch a Star is Shining Through Adversity to Become a Champion. Can you talk to us about what that adversity was for you and how you overcame it?
Tamika Catchings: That's at the age of three. My mom and dad found out that I was born with a hearing disability. And interestingly enough, my older brother was also born with hearing disabilities. They had gone to all the testing and they knew all the signs that came with them. So when they figured out that, you know, just like him, I had a hearing disability early on, like I really didn't understand what that meant. And then I got fitted into my first pair of hearing aids shortly thereafter. And now we were moving around so much so for us. Our family was always so tight-knit anyway that we really, you know, our families were our family and then other NBA families and so forth. So after my dad got finished playing in America, we actually moved to Italy for a year and left when, you know, jelly bean, Kobe's dad, and my dad played in Italy not on the same team, but at the same period of time. So I was in first grade then and then in second grade we moved back to Abilene, Texas, back to America and. That was the first time that I realized that I was different than everybody else. And going through that year, getting made fun of getting teased because of my hearing aid, getting teased because of the way that I spoke. Having to go to a speech therapist made the whole nine yards. And I just remember really struggling during that period of time and trying to make myself as invisible as I could possibly be, like questioning God, like, why did you make me like there to be perfect in every single way? This is not perfection to anything. I really struggle with myself in second grade and ended up on my hearing aids out or even from that point forward, always trying to be invisible and to support that. Really why I started playing a sport because to support it like I can practice and practice and practice that I can get really, really good at something and people could make fun of me. And so whatever sport it was, I mean, soccer was my first four, then softball my second four. And then I started playing basketball loud like the third fourth that I played in an organized fashion. But I think that was like the adversity in the beginning. And I've really been like my whole life. And then some of the adversity through injuries and, you know, just some of the things that you have to deal with. More from my college to my professional years.
Justin Forman: Tamika, that's great. Thank you for sharing that. When you look back at your career, which we're gonna talk more about in more detail here in a few minutes. But if you could go back to Abilene in the summer and talk to the girl that's playing basketball in our driveway with that imaginary ball. What advice would you speak into? What truth would you tell her that you learned through that experience?
Tamika Catchings: I think what I try to live by to this day, it's really about, you know, just keep believing and keep practicing and keep working. And, you know, one day our dreams will come true. And even at that age, like, I didn't really have a dream or a goal that wasn't until seventh grade that I dreamed about being in the NBA because the WNBA wasn't here. But I think at that point in time, just, you know, keep believing, keep striving, keep going, and one day, whatever. You know, I don't even know what I was dreaming about at that point in time, but it will come true.
Justin Forman: Speaking of dreams, you've played on four Olympic teams, won four gold medals, which again, to point out that's probably twice as many gold medals as Michael Jordan. No big deal there. We'll just glance right past that. But talk to us about those teams. What made that experience in those teams special for you?
Tamika Catchings: Wow. You know, everybody always asked, like out of those four, which one was your favorite or which one? And I'm like, you know, it's hard because all of them mean something else. And they all came a different period in my life. When you're talking about a four year span between each one and you got 2004, well I started playing on the 2002 world championship team, 2004 Olympic 2006 world championship 2008, you know, Olympics. And then I didn't play 2010, 2012. So keep going on and on. But I think the thing that made it so special was for all four of those mean we would come from our WNBA team. So we're the best players on our WNBA team. We come in the middle of the NBA season and the Olympic team gathers together. So you forget about everything else that's going out. And by the way, you just gave me a cheap shot in the game that we just played you a couple of nights ago, and now we're teammates.
But I think the most important thing when we got together and represented our country is that we represent the USA as a whole. And so when we all got there, I mean, we bought in to what we were there for. And we were committed to win a gold and nothing less. And so our practices were really, really unchanged. You know how we carried ourself off the court, how we carried ourselves on the court. I mean, I think we're just really, really blue collar, you know, really like we got out there. We got to work. And even though we were the best of the best, we played for each other. We played for our nation.
Justin Forman: So we'll put you on the spot a little bit. Hopefully you'll you'll go with me on this. But if you had to look at those four teams, you have to put together for other people to start alongside you in the best of that span. Who's your starting lineup?
Tamika Catchings: Wow. I would have to say I'm going to play myself at the three position that gives me a good group of four and a five.
So I'm going to go with Lisa Leslie at my five. I'm gonna go with Candace Parker, my 4. I play that story and I will go with. Birdie.
Justin Forman: Now, I don't want any U-Conn. like Tennessee bias to get into this. This has got to there's got to be objective here, so I'm going to go with it.
Tamika Catchings: Yeah, I know that I'm a go at Dawn Staley at my worn. I'm a go at Diane at my two. Okay. I'm going back and forth. Can I have six? Cause I got to have somebody come off the bench. So you know, we're gonna have a six man rotation. I might not, but I'm okay with not starting up. I don't have to but I'm a pushover food seller.
Justin Forman: Well there you go. That's a great five, an incredibly impressive group. Speaking of impressive groups and more on that topic, you recently inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame, as Henry mentioned, it might be the first time we've had somebody with that great honor. You joined an elite group, somebody that was a part of that group that obviously wasn't able to be a part of that induction with Kobe. And it sounds like your dad and his dad crossed some passes, the team's cross pass there. What does that honor like for you to be a part of that Hall of Fame? And how did that feel to be inducted along those giants of the game?
Tamika Catchings: Yeah, awesome. Total blessing. You know, and I did think back to, well, the late November, early December when the announcement came out and were just like, oh, you know, like first ballot players that will be able to be on the first ballot for the Naismith Hall of Fame and my name and K.G. and Kobe. Then I was just like, oh, you know, I guess kind of cool. I first time like now you can actually be on a ballot and you never know what's going to happen with that. And so, like, I just remember being excited about it and I started kind of thinking through and I'm like, man, the crazy part about this is Kobe and I just going back to the beginning and my father thought they like they played together in Philly for a little bit and that's how our family knew each other. And then kind of fast forward, you know, they go their different ways and end up both of them in Italy and all of our family, both of our family just kind of hanging out. But you don't really think about like everybody like, oh, what was what was it like when you guys were young? And like, we were worried about pointing back, but we were playing soccer. That's what people in Italy did and that's what we were into.
But you fast forward to the announcement. And for me, I was kind of like, man, that's it. Cool. It's like the book had being close, like the grand finale of the last chapter. This book is over. And now we're both like starting a new book and a new chapter of our lives. And gosh, what a blessing. You know, like what a blessing to be able to experience that. And that's what I thought in November. And then, of course, you know, past Kobe and G.G. and, you know, then the family, when that happened in January like that weekend was crazy. That whole week, I think I'm still like disbelief. And it's more so because of the impact that he had. You know, the impact that he had on the floor is one thing. But I think when you start looking at the thing that he was starting to do, post basketball, that the thing that for me, gosh, our lives, our journey, the path that we've been on have been so intertwined with always being able to make an impact on others. And so for us to be able to go into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame together and to be able to share that moment and stay for a bit. Like, it's so real, to be honest, but it's a blessing. It's just a blessing.
Justin Forman: Is there a point in your career when all the sudden that conversation of even being in the Hall of Fame becomes real? Was there a part where on a way to gold medals and NCAA titles and WNBA? And we will point, does it say that could be a career milestone or goal to strive for the Hall of Fame?
Tamika Catchings: I would be honored, but it never was a dream or a goal. You know, my first dream and goal was to be an NBA and then eighth grade with the first time I saw Pat Summitt, first time I saw women on national TV playing. And I at that point were like, oh, my gosh, if I could ever get good enough to play for this lady, I would love to have that opportunity. And then freshman year and ninety six before freshman 96 Olympic team. And watching Cheryl and Donna and Lisa, I was like, oh, my gosh, if I could ever get a chance to represent my country and be just like them, like they became my first real female role models outside of my mom and passed.
And so that happened. Ninety six. The WNBA starts right after that. And then. The WNBA became my goal. Like it shifted from the NBA to the WNBA my freshman year in college, and so like I just look back and I'm just super thankful for the journey that I've been on. And just being able to have gold and to be able to reach the gold and kind of see the vision along the way.
Henry Kaestner: So, Tamika, you've been a player, a coach, an analyst and a business owner and now a general manager. I mentioned and business owner because we also have the Faith Driven Entrepreneur and the Faith Driven investor podcast. But not a lot of people probably know about business owner. And actually, before I go to my question. Tell us about the business owner. I bet a lot of people don't know about that.
Tamika Catchings: Yeah. Interestingly enough, when I first got to Indiana, I was talking to somebody. And one of the ways that my mom would keep us all together, we would have tea like we would actually have like a little Tea Party. My sister would have big Tea Party with all her doll and so got here. They told me about their amazing tea place around the corner from Bankers Life. I'm like, oh, I'll go check it out one day and ended up becoming like my spot. And I will go there. And the thing that I love is nobody in there knew about basketball. So, like, I could go in there and say I was a fly on the wall.
And I would just go in and take my computer and post up in a corner and just like hang out all day. And when I finished playing 2016, I remember I had a meeting there and gathered with I tell him my comment. It's like I just love coming here every time I come here. Like, I just feel like I'm at home. And he was like, well, you better come as much as you can because this place is going out of business. I'm like, can't go out of business. Long story short, I found out the owner and his wife are moving. And I told him, I said, look, we can't let this place closed down. So here to do. Give us a week. Let me go. Let me think let me try to find somebody that will come and take over, like obviously got to find someone that can financially, come and take over the business. Right. So every single day that we came up in my dream, whether I would drive and by whether somebody in my dream talked about to me what I would drink and some tea from TV. I mean, it came up to some capacity. So I came back the next week and I'm like, OK, did you find anybody you like? No. All right, one more week. At the same time, like it came up over and over and over my dreams. And I remember sitting down with my husband. I said, look, I was like, what about me? And he was like, what about you? Like, what about me?
Like, what about me? Can't I? Can I run the tea shop? Can we buy the tea shop and can I run? And he was like, why not? Like everything that you are passionate about. You can tell I'm super passionate about it. Like everything you're passionate about, it just work. And you put the work in. You know, you do all the right things, but you do business the right way. And so went in February, twenty seventeen took over, Teas Me Cafe Indy and I absolutely love it.
Oh that's awesome. It's super cool. What's it been like being a business owner? And how's that surprise you? Because, you know, a lot of people would say that they took over business and also they've got all these invoices and they're complaining customers and all that. But that doesn't seem to be part of your story.
Tamika Catchings: You get complainign customer. But I think the few complaints that we have, I really appreciate, you know, because I want us to be the best. And I mean, it's like playing basketball, right. So the way we operate the business is the way that we operate on the Fevers side, on Pacers sports and entertainment and all like you have our own assignments. You have our president, you have a team everything, I mean we have a CEO? Oh, we have our GM. We have the coaches. We have the players. So like I operate our restaurant cafe the same way that I would if I had a team. And, you know, if I'm the owner. I have a GM and we have our managers who operate as our coaches. And then we have our team. And those are, you know, the other people that are in there that help make the team flow. So it's been good. But I love the complaint. The few complaints now and everybody start complaining. But it helps us get better. You know, like when they say sometimes you have to lose game to be able to know what you need to work on. I mean, it's almost the same thing that the complaints are like our game that we've lost that we're able to kind of say, OK. Like, how do we do this better next time? So that that doesn't happen again.
Henry Kaestner: That's fascinating. OK. So you joined the WNBA when it's just five years old. So you played for 15 years. Now you serve as a general manager of the Indiana fever. It's almost as if there never was a WNBA without Tamika Catchings.
Tamika Catchings: And I was an intern before that.
Were you really? So, in the very, very beginning. What was the WNBA like when you first started playing it and how have you seen it evolve over the years? And what do you envision the future for for the league to be?
Tamika Catchings: Yeah, I mean, in the beginning, I mean, Sheryl Swoops, Dawn, and Lisa Leslie, like those three. And then, of course, Tina Thompson and Katie Smith, like those were the players that I looked up to when I was younger. And so having the opportunity to get into the WNBA and even like as an intern, I was an intern in between my junior and senior year of college. My sister actually got drafted to the Phenix Mercury. And so I went out there with her and ended up becoming an intern with the mercury. Even though she got cut, she moved back to like we lived in Phenix and were around the whole experience.
Henry Kaestner: She got cut you stayed on?
Tamika Catchings: Well, I was an intern. I had already gotten a job as an intern. So even though she got cut, it was like, OK, now what am I going to do? Like, I can't quit my job. Yeah. Oh, she got picked up by Miami. So at that point it got cut from there. So and she ended up moving to Phenix. And, you know, we just lived in Phenix for the summer.
Henry Kaestner: So what do you see as the future for the WNBA? Because you're in a position of influence. And you always had influence because you've been around since beginning. But now you're a member of the Hall of Fame. You've got more sway than maybe you had and maybe more of a potential to be not only a part of the vision that you see you'd hope for, but to actually make it happen. What are your hopes and your dreams for the league?
Tamika Catchings: Yeah, I have high hopes and dreams for our league. You know, and to go back to your question, you said, you know, like, where have we seen the advancement of the players? Well, I think the great thing now is, I mean, when we were growing up, we didn't have the W to look to and be like, oh, I want to play in the WNBA like someone. So. And now these young players, they have that.
So from the age of zero, all the way to the age of, you know, twenty to twenty one, twenty two, you have something to emulate. You have something to aspire to be like and someone to aspire to be like. And I think that's been the beauty. And even during this time and you know, you see our ladies in the WNBA getting more active on social media. That being something that our younger generation is really drawn to. That's off the court. But I think on the court you have more young girls that have somebody to look up to and somebody to be like. And so I think when you look at the WNBA and you look at the future, you know, you really I think it's bright. You know, you have more young lady that. I look at right now and the players that are playing the ones, you know, we just had our WNBA draft and so the player that we've drafted and just like when they come to our team.
What they're able to bring and, you know, the history that they have. That college graduate you got overseas players ever come in. You got these young ladies that have done so many great things in their collegiate careers coming to the WNBA, some from a fan perspective, being able to have a band that are following those young ladies throughout their careers and being able to watch. But I think from the game aspect on the floor, you have one hundred and forty four young ladies that are the best of the best.
Justin Forman: So I want to pivot here as we move towards the end of our time here to make. And when you think about just your career and the different steps of the earlier, you said the idea that you made basketball your God, it sounds like that's something you learned early on at your time at Tennessee. In what ways have you prevented that from becoming an idol and worshiping kind of the game, your work at the expense of other things in your life?
Tamika Catchings: I mean, being more focused and being more in tune to God, to Bible, to worship, to having the right group of people around me had the same Bible study groups in 2005. So, you know, like even during that period of time of being a lockdown, being more intentional, being focused on having our Bible study group, having prayer time, making sure, you know, devotionals, all of that. And then, you know, I think one thing that my pastor always talks about is that people around you, you got to see what they're in your life for. And the ones that don't draw you closer to God or those the ones that you really want in your life want around you. And so I think for me personally, as I look at my life as an athlete and, you know, learning how to put my focus on learning how to focus on like I'm playing the game because God had given me the ability and the skill to be able to do that. Now, on the other side of the court and a different position, being able to show our players how they can walk the walk and talk the talk and have their faith be kind of the light for them to follow. And I you know, I feel like every single day my job when I get up, my purpose in life is obviously what God has given me the ability to do, but really to be a bright spot in that light for those that I'm around.
Justin Forman: When you think about the league, when you think about young players and leaders that are coming up on people that are integrating their faith and intentionally looking for ways to do that, who are the players out there that give you encouragement and hope to know that there are people out there trying to integrate their faith and their work in the WNBA?
Tamika Catchings: Well, I would say every team has a variety have a good number of them. You know, one thing for the WNBA and the NBA is that we have chapel before the game. And so you see some people like, wait. So both teams come in the same room, like right before they're going to go out on battle. And then I'm lik yeah, it is unique. I know, but it works. You know, you're sitting in that room and I know that I'm I'll go out there and try to give you 50. But in this room right now, we're focusing on God, right? Audience of one.
So I think the encouragement really is that on each team you have player, then you have chaplains that are so dedicated and so focused to feeding the players the right type of food, quote unquote, then that the God food and the Bible and the truth, then you know why we're doing what we're doing at all these young people that are coming to the game and watching us and aspiring to be like, you want to be that example, you want to be that faith, that Christ like example on and off the court. And this is what I get to see you in your class. And so I think the beauty of the WNBA and the beauty of the player that we have in our league is that you have players that are spot on and that are trying to do whatever it takes to live their life as Christlike as possible.
Justin Forman: Earlier you mentioned that there are sliding doors in moments that God might not reveal to us in the moment when he does something. But later it becomes clear. You talked about the idea of I guess I would be remiss not to ask why do you think God brought coach summit in your life?
Tamika Catchings: I think he brought her into my life a and young as an example, you know. And I think for me, watching Pat, you know, you always with people and sometimes you're watching people even when you're not really watching them. Right. And I feel like for me, I was always watching Pat. The year before I got there. And then, of course, when I got to the University of Tennessee my freshman year, the year that she sat me down and got me back into one where my hearing aid. And I remember sitting in that I like I can see myself sitting in the train like I see her and in our train at the time, Jenny Mozeliak, like standing in front of me and talking to me about, you know, getting back into wearing my hearing aid. And Pat said one day your story will reach thousands, maybe millions of people. As far as like, why am I hearing aids and getting back into speech therapy? And I remember sitting there in front of her and in my head, I would think, and this lady has no idea who I am. Because I didn't talk to people, public speaker would never had been something that I would have done.
And so for me, I had put like my own little blinders on and I put myself in my own little box of what I was capable of doing. But then when you look on the Bible, you think about Jacob and you think about all the things that Moses and you go through and you have people that had different things in our life that in their mind should have stopped them.
But God pushed them through. Pat was kind of that for me. She was the one that kind of opened the door like God had given her the vision or given her the word to speak. And for me, I didn't have my. My vision wasn't bright enough to see where I could be and what type of platform God would put me on. And if I hadn't had gotten back on to where my hearing. Then the story wouldn't have came out my freshman year in college. I don't know where I'd be. Like, I don't know. I mean, I'm sure at some point I would have gotten back into it. And who would have been that person? I don't know.
But to have somebody of her stature cares so much about me and care so much about me getting back into one of my hearing aids and getting back into speech therapy and doing things that would help me. I'm a person for my future and the future of so many other young people that one day will be in this seat and be able to do that. I think it's really cool.
Justin Forman: Yeah. Powerful, powerful stuff to see how Pat saw that spoke, that truth. And many years later, you find many that are looking up to you in this time in the season and throughout your career, especially as you have such a great honor with the Hall of Fame. If you could make the most out of this opportunity here and speak the truth of where God has you in this season. Maybe there's a passage, a piece of scripture that's come alive recently that that you would share with our listeners.
Tamika Catchings: That's interesting. I was talking about this earlier with a friend and during this time in particular. Of having to be at home and having to like get a new normal. The last couple of years of my career, I have a running joke of one of the players that I played against. And because I moved around so much on the court, she'd always say just be still just be, you know, like we would start laughing. Still, we still. We still. And then after I got finished, same thing. I like people like guys like you're always moving. Everywhere you're doing this, you're doing that. And you're just like you're doing a lot of great things, but you're everywhere.
And so in that moment, the thing that I think of the most, is be still and having to take a moment to appreciate the people that are around me, having to take a moment, I move my office outside on the patio and I have a little space heater because it does get cold. But I'm looking and we have a little hill and we have trees. And I've seen pretty much every single type of bird you can imagine. I feel like I've seen just fly through and we've had deer just dart through the yard. And in this moment, like, I really feel like God had put me in a place of contentment, extreme focus. And just like being still and being in this moment that I'm in right now. And I can tell you, like I know there's a lot of people that, you know, like, oh, my gosh, like what's going to happen when we get back? And you can't live in faith and fear at the same time.
And I really have faith that when we get out of there, we as a nation and not just the USA, but like the global like as a world, we will be in such a better place as far as what our new normal will look like. And we will be OK. We will be fine. It will take a little bit and there will be some trials and tribulations that will get us through. But I really think like being still being content and then being ready when God said go like being ready to make that next move.