Chauncey Billups and Vince Carter are traveling to the Hall of Fame via different paths

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UNCASVILLE, Conn. – Everyone knows how to get to Carnegie Hall (“practice,” as the old joke goes). But not everyone knows how to get to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, which is celebrating its enshrinement weekend in 2024.

Chauncey Billups and Vince Carter, two members of the Class of 2024, found out when they traveled via completely different paths to Springfield, Massachusetts, where the Hall ceremony will be held Sunday at Symphony Hall (NBA TV, 5 p.m. ET).

Both were high lottery picks, both lived up to their potential and secured their place in the basketball shrine alongside 11 other honored players, including former NBA players Michael Cooper and Walter Davis and men’s veteran draftee Dick Barnett. Contributors include: Doug Collins, Herb Simon and the late Jerry West (included as a player in 1980).

However, Billups was a classic example of a late bloomer. He played for four NBA teams in his first four seasons and for five in his first six, an unusual record for the No. 3 pick in the draft. His career eventually took off in Detroit, where he helped the Pistons win the 2004 championship and was named Finals MVP. But he didn’t reach All-Star status until two years later, in his ninth season.

“There were a lot of trials and tribulations early in my career,” Billups told reporters during a news conference Saturday. “Some of these things [‘bust’ criticisms] were once true… But I never believed what people said about me.

“The passion I had for the game, I had lived a clean life, I dedicated everything I had to the game – it just didn’t translate fast enough. [I] stayed focused, stayed humble…I just kept fighting, kept scraping. And it turned around.”

The young Colorado prospect was abandoned by Boston, shipped to and from Toronto and even discarded by his home state’s Nuggets. In Minnesota he got his legs under him and played with his good friend Kevin Garnett, but the Timberwolves had tied up money on veteran point guard Terrell Brandon and said goodbye to the free agent.

With the Pistons, Billups earned the nickname “Mr. “Big Shot” for some of his outstanding performances. He was Detroit’s on-site coach and led the team to six consecutive Eastern Conference Finals and Finals in 2004 and 2005.

There were also shakeups toward the end of his career — at the Nuggets, the Knicks, the Clippers — but by that point, teams were looking for Billups rather than releasing him. The nights he spent worrying about his next job would be over if the NBA had stayed mad. Billups, 48, has been working ever since, after his playing days as a broadcaster, then as an assistant with the Clippers for a year and as coach of the Portland Trail Blazers for the last three seasons.

His arduous journey from disappointment to Hall of Famer prepared him well for his current gig. “One of the gifts” that led him to coaching, Billups said.

“Because I have a lot of different players at different stages of their careers,” he said, “and I can say that I have been every single one of those players at some point.” From the newcomer who is struggling to the man who takes the next step power, from sixth man to best player – I’ve been through it all.

Carter’s bow looks almost like a mirror image. He burst onto the NBA scene out of North Carolina, the No. 5 overall pick in 1998, and almost immediately became the face of the needy Toronto franchise.

He was a clear choice for Rookie of the Year and was even voted MVP in the spring. He became the Raptors’ first All-Star as a second year, the guy who took them to their first postseason appearance and helped them win their first playoff series a year later.

It was Carter’s stirring performance in the 2000 Slam Dunk Contest at All-Star Weekend in Oakland that changed his public profile “overnight.” He began collecting nicknames: “Vinsanity,” “Air Canada,” “Half-Man, Half-Amazing.” In the first-round series against New York in the spring, filmmaker and supporting player Spike Lee finished him off – and sat down as Carter passed that shot to Lee’s beloved Knicks.

Then Carter’s game changed. Even though he was only in his mid-20s, he seemed determined to take his game outside. The bumpy landings that sometimes accompanied his highlights above the rim, no thanks. Carter soon wanted to leave Toronto – and he managed to move to New Jersey in December 2004 at the age of 27.

Carter made three of his eight All-Star appearances with the Nets, but his last appearance came in his ninth season – around the time Billups was just getting going. In June 2009, he was traded to Orlando, the first of six teams he played for after turning 33.

Most people didn’t know that Half-Man, Half-Amazing was only half finished from the time he joined the Magic. He kept ticking and kept playing for more than a decade.

After averaging 23.5 points in his first 11 seasons and slipping below 20 points per game only once, Carter averaged just 9.8 points in his final 11 seasons. The 6-foot-2 winger became a role player, received some sixth-man votes and was then used. He is considered a big reserve and resident “old head” and spent time in Dallas, Memphis, Sacramento and Atlanta in his last seven years.

Graph Carter and Billup’s job security and employment history and you start to cross the line. What they all shared was a determination to move on – one too soon, one too late.

“I played the game because I liked it,” Carter, 47, said Saturday. “It wasn’t about chasing rings. Look at the stops I had, they weren’t championship caliber teams. But I took the opportunity to play. I felt like I could still be a veteran. I could still share it [knowledge].”

The fear of failure that Billups faced early on struck Carter as a refusal to let up. He spoke of his “want”.

“Willingness to do whatever it takes to survive,” he said. “As you get older, you have a list of 10, maybe 12 things you have to do [to stay capable of playing]. At 42, 43 years old, I was ready to stick to the script, which is one of the hardest things.

“Because 12 things become 10 things. Then, when you’ve had enough of it in a few months, it’s eight things. Now you’re cheating the game. Now you’re going to get hurt.”

Every Hall class is full of stories like this, perhaps even more so if the Enshrines aren’t exactly GOAT or Mt. Rushmore candidates. Cooper, for example – the tenacious pest who won five NBA titles with Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and the “Showtime” Lakers – adjusted his game as a teenager when he saw how many coaches were finding minutes for good defenders.

Davis flashed across NBA heaven at Phoenix and later at Denver, like Carter, but as a smooth shooter rather than a rim-rattler. A six-time All-Star, his career was derailed by drug and alcohol problems. His call to the hall comes 32 years after Davis’ last appearance – and 11 months after his death at the age of 69. Posthumously is the worst way to be honored, although Davis’ family values ​​it very much.

Each Hall of Famer who takes the stage at Symphony Hall on Sunday will have achieved their goal on their own schedule, with their specific influencers, and with the necessary talent, drive and patience. They were their own blueprints.

As Billups said, “This is it My Trip. It’s completely different for everyone.

“From the time I was drafted until today, this weekend, it has been a tough journey for me. And to be honest, there wasn’t much traffic on this road. I learned so much about myself. This process has allowed me to get along with everyone, to meet everyone halfway, right?

“It kind of made me who I am.”

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Steve Aschburner has been writing about the NBA since 1980. You can email him here his archive here And Follow him on X.

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