I was as popular as you can be - All-NBA, Olympian. You couldn't get any higher than where I was.
People think I'm soft and bailed out on basketball. But it was five knee surgeries.
A lot of the kids gave a lot of positive feedback about if I ever became a coach, they would love to play in our program. And I was very confident that we would be able to get the top-tier players to come in.
I want the opportunity to play pain-free.
With Shaq, you have to let him know that he's the man. You have to do that with him.
Injuries made people lose confidence in me, but I never lost confidence in myself.
I can scream and yell that I can still play, but unless I prove it, people will say, 'Yeah, Penny, whatever.'
I can pass on a lot of information. I'm just never going to be the 21-year-old Penny Hardaway again.
I felt pain every night. After games, it took me a long time to walk to my car, and the driving home, it took me a couple of minutes even to get out of my car and extend my legs and just walk.
I don't know who Rick Barnes thinks I am, but I'm not a dude that likes to just mess around about anything.
I just call it like I see it.
I keep myself in shape. I love the game of basketball, and I really feel like it doesn't matter about your age.
For sure, I definitely feel like there's a target on my back.
I'm getting used to this as a coach because it's a little jealousy from a lot of these coaches around the country. I do understand that, because we are NBA players trying to come back, and we didn't have any experience as college coaches. So we didn't, quote, unquote, 'Pay our dues.'
I feel like I've paid attention to all the great coaches who have coached me.
There's going to be situations that you get into that you're going to need help, for sure. But for the most part, I think coaching is just understanding who you have and your team, understanding yourself, and understanding the situation.
I'm not the kind of coach who feels like they know everything and 'Don't say anything to me.'
I like to speed teams up. I don't like them to get in their rhythm.
I like to keep teams off balance.
Someone takes the challenge with me, I'm going to take it right back.
