Lessons Propel Payton

Of all the life lessons Al Payton taught his son Gary during a sometimes-stark childhood in East Oakland, Calif., perhaps the most important was not to back down. While some people may never like you, Al Payton told his son, if you don’t believe in yourself, they’ll also never respect you.

“People don’t understand Gary, but when you’re from Oakland you have to be that way,” said Al Payton. “Oakland is a tough town; everybody wants to be the star, to have their way. If you don’t fight back, you’ll get whipped every day. You don’t have to win, but people have to know that you’re always ready to go if that’s what it takes.”

That has been the guiding principle in Gary Payton’s basketball career, from his lippy days at Oregon State when he would dress down hapless defenders while simultaneously breaking them down off the dribble, through most of his six years with the Seattle SuperSonics, where his attitude won him few admirers--even among his teammates and co-workers. Gary Payton has always been ready to go.

Still, somewhere down the line, Payton also has come to accept, if not embrace, another old saw -- the one about discretion being the better part of valor. In the process, he’s become something akin to the NBA’s version of Sally Field on Oscar night. In April, Payton was voted the league’s defensive player of the year; throughout May and into June he earned plaudits for his play during the league playoffs, leading a previously underachieving Seattle team against the Chicago Bulls in the NBA Finals, where he and his teammates acquitted themselves admirably in a six-game defeat.

Since the finals ended, there has been an appearance on the “Tonight Show with Jay Leno” and, on Saturday, came the gold statuette: Payton’s selection to the U.S. men’s Olympic basketball team as a replacement for the injured Glenn Robinson. “You like me! You really like me!”

“The last month has been something -- almost too much of a drastic change,” Payton said earlier this week after a Dream Team practice. “It’s a nice feeling though; I’ve waited a long time to be in this situation, for it to be my time. . . . This is great for me to be here.”

Although some players, such as Michael Jordan and Charles Barkley, lobbied for Shawn Kemp, Payton’s Seattle teammate, to be added to the team after Kemp’s stellar performance in the playoffs, there seemed to be little doubt that Payton was the first choice of the USA Basketball selection committee.

Dream Team Coach Lenny Wilkens says he wants to play a trapping, pressing defense, a natural style for Payton, who averaged 2.85 steals last season. In addition, with John Stockton bothered by nagging injuries and Reggie Miller returning from April eye surgery, it was logical to select a guard.

As one committee member put it, “It’s Lenny’s team, and he made it very clear from the characteristics he said he wanted that the choice was going to be Payton.”

The Atlanta Games are only a part of what should be a rewarding summer for Payton. A free agent, his splendid performance during the playoffs has catapulted him into the upper echelon of players, a group that includes Jordan, Miller, Alonzo Mourning and Juwan Howard. After earning approximately $2.6 million last season, Payton’s representatives expect his salary to double, maybe even triple, before the next one.

That would be more in keeping with a player who has made the last three all-star teams after being selected as the No. 2 player in the 1990 NBA draft. During his first five seasons, no one questioned Seattle’s judgment in using that pick on Payton. Few doubted his talents, but some did wonder when--not if--his mercurial personality would explode.

“He has that confidence and ego--everything is a challenge for him,” said teammate Nate McMillan.

For many years, his relationship with Seattle Coach George Karl was prickly at best, and his attitude sometimes left teammates cold, too. During halftime of a playoff game against the Lakers two years ago, Payton and then-teammate Ricky Pierce got into a heated disagreement, with each threatening bodily harm to the other after the game.

“If something’s bothering him, he’ll let you know; you don’t get that pent-up hostility,” said SuperSonics General Manager Wally Walker.

Asked if he’d ever talked to Payton about his comportment, Walker just laughed, saying he wouldn’t do such a thing -- a very good idea, according to Payton.

“Can’t nobody ask me to change myself or change my game; they’d be wasting their breath,” he said during the playoffs. “I don’t tell them how to run their team -- they run it the way they want to run it. I play the way I play.”

Even so, something happened this season. Payton’s relationship with Karl improved, to the point where the coach said the two have gone from “attacking each other every day to hanging out and talking about how each other’s families are doing.

“There aren’t very many people who can act one way and three of four other people on the team will act the same way just because he’s doing it. Few people have the intelligence, the pizzazz to do that. Gary does; all I’ve said to him was you can lead badly or you can lead the right way, and that’s what he’s done.”

During the playoffs, Payton said, “I’m Gary and I’m gonna be Gary,” but grudgingly admitted that “maybe I’ve calmed myself down.” According to those around him, even at the peak of his trash-talking, there was always another side to Payton.

SuperSonics trainer Frank Furtado, a snarly sort who could give nightmares to military drill instructors, speaks reverently of spending last Thanksgiving with Payton, calling him “a pretty amazing, very generous fellow.” Back in Oakland, Payton has put friends through college or trade schools, provided they stay off drugs and alcohol.

“People say I’ve mellowed, but they’ve only categorized me by what they saw on the court,” Payton said. “They don’t know me. They’re not with me every day. They don’t know what’s going on. . . . My agent (Aaron Goodwin) would talk about me playing in the Olympics, maybe in 2000, but we would never talk about my ‘character.’ Now I’m on the ’96 team and maybe all those people who did talk about my character are saying, ‘Maybe we made a mistake.’ ”