Back in the day, Dave East was a pretty good basketball player. Growing up, he played on AAU teams with future NBA players like Kevin Durant, Michael Beasley, and Ty Lawson. Now, he says that under the right circumstances, he would consider trying out for the NBA.
A TMZ cameraman caught up with East and asked the rapper if he would consider an NBA tryout. With a smile, he answered, “I might. It gotta be the Knicks, I gotta be in New York.”
Beasley said in 2017 of East’s game and on-court demeanor, “Excuse my French, but the motherf*cker could score. Off the court, he’d talk. On the court, he’s one of them guys that’s gonna give you the same facial expression whether we up 20 or we down 20; whether he got 40 or he just missed 20 shots. You don’t know what’s going on in his face. He’s one of them silent killers.”
East also said in 2017 that he’s made peace with not having gone pro in basketball, saying, “I used to love for the whole gym to be [watching] and I hit that shot. Now, I love when the show is sold out and as soon as I come out, they go crazy. If you ask any NBA player, they wanna be rappers. If you ask rappers, they wanna ball. For me to have both, and to be able to almost get to one, but then get to the other one? I don’t got no complaints.”
