Joe Harris
I've been No. 12 my entire career. My cousin Nikki Haerling was a good basketball player, she wore No. 12 in high school and college, and my dad, he was No. 12 as well. I actually just started wearing it when I got to high school my freshman year.Collection: Dad
I feel like I take a lot of pride in the patience that I play with.Collection: Patience
A lot of Washington state is beautiful. You have just tons of mountains, beautiful bodies of water, you have a lot of rolling hills in eastern Washington. I'm biased, obviously, but there's not a lot of places in the world that are like where I grew up.
My hometown, first and foremost, it's one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. A beautiful lake town. It's one of those communities where, winter rolls around, it's exactly the same as any other small town in America. Sort of a lower socio-economic area. There isn't anything high-end necessarily anywhere around there.
Preparation is such a big thing and you should never take that for granted.
Kyrie, he's got a big personality. He's one of these guys that's misunderstood. The way that he's construed in the media is probably going to paint him in a light that is not necessarily true. I'd say you could ask a lot of people that played with him and they'd all say that he's a great teammate and a good guy to be around.
None of us are perfect all the time.
I have off days all the time too, but nobody really cares when I have an off day. People care when Kyrie does.
We're all going to have ups and downs throughout the course of the season.
I think going to Virginia and playing in that program, you definitely take a lot of ownership in the fact of possessions and understanding the value of each possession. And that goes on both ends. Trying to be as efficient as possible on the offensive end, and not turn the ball over. But then defensively, making everything tough.
Some nights, depending on who you're going up against, some guys are just capable of hitting tough shots.
Sometimes you've got to be able to finish at the rim.
Yeah, I had a good relationship with Coach Blatt. I enjoyed playing for him. But the NBA is, first and foremost, a business, and as much as you may have liked the situation you were at, sometimes it just doesn't work out your way.
There's not a lot of guys in the NBA who stick with one team for very long.
I've kind of given up trying to evaluate college guys, especially guys from Virginia, just because of my bias.
I like this book by Angela Duckworth called 'Grit.'
My grandparents owned an apple orchard when I was growing up - a lot of apples, cherries... now, actually, a lot of grapes, too, to be honest.
Obviously playing on a team like the Cavs in 2014, they were championship contenders, not allowing a ton of young guys to come in and play through mistakes. If you weren't helping the team have success you weren't really afforded a lot of different opportunities.
I grew up in the Northwest, so I was always a really big Sonics fan. I loved Gary Payton, Shawn Kemp, a lot of those players who were really good through the '90s.
I was lucky in my rookie year to play in the NBA Finals, to have that experience, to see what it was like to get to that stage.
Some rookies build bad habits and it's not until year three, four, five that they get to be part of a winning-type organization and culture.
Everybody's always asking me: 'What's it like playing with LeBron?' It's really hard to describe. I'm pretty fortunate that I got him my first year. He's an awesome guy, a great leader. You're witnessing such greatness all the time and you try not to take it for granted because you see it so often, in practice or wherever.
I played football growing up so I used to lift quite a bit when I was in high school. And then I got to Virginia I was lucky, good strength and conditioning program and coach there.
Obviously my role is shooter, trying to take my numbers to another level from that perspective.
Some games you're going to be able to get rolling, you're going to get in a good rhythm, you're going to be able to get open looks. Other games, sometimes the rhythm's not there and you've got to get off it a little bit.
The shots, all that stuff, kind of comes and goes. You're not going to be hitting every single game. You wish that you could. But there's a lot of other areas to impact the game where I focus more on.
When you're going through a game and you miss your first couple, you definitely put a little bit of added pressure on yourself. And there is that sense of frustration. You got to block it out and realize that the whole goal of what I'm trying to do is just get open shots.
When you look across the board at the count of NBA quality players that are on various international teams in Europe, Latin America, the Middle East and Asia, there are good players all over the world now. It's just not in the NBA where America has the most talent.
Whenever you play with better competition or play against better players, it raises your level of play on both ends of the court.
Some games you're gonna have seven shots, some games you're gonna have 15, it just ebbs and flows with the game.
You can play basketball - if you're lucky - for about 10 years. So, you're going to have to have something to fall back on.
I loved going to a place like Virginia, making a connection and meeting the people that are outside of the whole basketball realm, and earning my degree from there.
It was really important for me to get a degree that carried some weight, something that I really wanted to do.
The decision of where I wanted to go to school was very important to me.
I come from a town in Washington state that might not be too familiar to Clevelanders called Chelan. It's really beautiful. It's about two-and-a-half hours east of Seattle and two-and-a-half hours west of Spokane. It's right in the middle of the state.
I grew up in kind of a resort community. I lived on a big lake. It was really cool growing up there. But a lot of people come there in the summertime, especially Seahawks guys.
Coach Blatt is very, very knowledgeable about the game. And it just goes to show you that no matter where you're at, he knows as much about basketball as anyone. You learn a lot from him. And he's a very charming guy, very personable. He's pretty funny, too.
I feel like I play with good poise and I know when to take my shot - and when I do, I have a lot of confidence.
The way I play - I'm the guy moving, coming off screens, getting up and down the floor. I should be one of the better-conditioned athletes out there.
The conditioning aspect of things is really important, obviously in basketball, and then specifically for players like me.
Coming into my rookie year, I could kind of eat whatever I wanted - you're really not too concerned about it. But you don't realize that a pound here and there is really not a good thing. It's just basic physics: it's harder to move faster and jump higher when you weigh more.
There's only so much you can do as far as individual skill work and conditioning on a bike. But you can't simulate playing in an actual game. And it can't satisfy the competitive itch you feel as a player.
They have great restaurants, good nightlife. Everything is here in Brooklyn that you can possibly want.
I don't really get recognized a whole lot. I blend in pretty well.
I kind of look like I work in a Brooklyn coffee shop.
I just love basketball.
Everybody has a different path to making it in this league. I was fortunate to get an opportunity here in Brooklyn.
The NBA is a difficult thing because the head coaches, they definitely have one of the more difficult jobs and one of the jobs with, I guess, little amount of security as possible. There's so much turnover all the time.
You don't really coach high school basketball because it's a good paycheck. You do it because you love it, care about the kids and you're just passionate about the game.
Yeah, I think any time you're comfortable playing within a system you're going to play more aggressive. You're going to play with more confidence.