Quotes from Trevor Ariza

My favorite player of all time is Deion Sanders, so football is my first love. When I was little, I focused more on football, definitely.

I get the job of guarding the 'tough guy' every night so I just try to bring the same energy every night with whoever it is that I'm facing.

I started to get a whole lot of attention in the 10th grade. That's when I kind of came out of a little bit of a shell, or whatever, as far as basketball was concerned. I stopped being so goofy. For a high school kid, my game matured a little faster. It got better from the ninth to tenth grade.

I think pressure is a frame of mind.

I looked at basketball as something that I love and escape from the real world, and in order to continue to escape the real world, you got to work hard at it.

There's going to be times where things don't go the right way, but for the most part, if we continue to communicate, we'll figure it out quicker.

People get confused because we all make a lot of money and it seems crazy to the general public, but this is something that we all love to do. We play this game because we love it and if we didn't get paid for it, most of us probably would still be playing.

It was extremely tough to leave Washington. Especially with the chemistry that we built, players getting better over there. My family and the players, our families became really close. That was tough, I ain't going to lie.

I don't like ghosts.

The good thing for me is I have a lot of experience going through NBA seasons.

When the team wins, everybody wins, so I can score two points, one point, get three rebounds, if our team wins, that's all that matters to me.

Like I've been saying the whole time I've been in the NBA: anything the coach asks me to do that I can do, I'm going to try to do. Whether it's to score the ball or guard the center, I'll do it.

I work hard, extremely hard worker.

The way I do things is I take it one day at a time. Don't try to put too much pressure or stress on myself figuring out what somebody else is going to do. Just worry about what I got to do.

The person I used to watch growing up was Tony Bland. I just loved the way he played. He was a big guard, and I watched him a lot. He scored, he shared, he did a little bit of everything. I wanted to be a point guard, though it didn't work out that way.

When you have players who are hungry to win, you don't have to tell them much.

I don't think you ever really get over losing a sibling, especially when you are with that person every day.

I wasn't going to play in New York. By trading me to Orlando, I got a chance to play.

Kobe was like a brother to me, for sure.

I didn't really want to play for the Lakers, I wanted to play for the Clippers.

That's when you start messing up, when you put too much pressure on yourself. Just come into the game clear and just try to play hard.

The doctors told me I had a bone deficiency, so I had to get my vitamin D up. I've been drinking a lot more milk. Still don't like it though.

I always imagined myself going up against Reggie Miller, Michael Jordan, guys like that, and I had to make the shot to win the game.

Nene is an unbelievable talent. He's a nightmare for the opposing team.