Toronto Raptors Assistant Coach and former Seattle SuperSonics guard Earl Watson recently made an appearance on SLiC Sports’ Point Guard with Baron Davis podcast. During the episode, Watson talked about his first experience of clashing against Utah Jazz legend John Stockton and how Gary Payton prepped him before the match-up. At that time, the Sonics Guard was a 22-year-old rookie and Stockton was around 40. But Payton knew that the rookie wasn’t dealing with just another point guard, ‘Mr. Stockton’ was the real deal.
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Watson prefaced his story by revealing that Payton never said anything ‘good’ about point guards. However, he broke his habit when he talked about the all-time assists leader.
While talking about Stockton, Watson recounted, The Glove had expressed utmost admiration and respect. “Hey, this boy right here[Stockton], cold white boy. You[Watson] don’t take this for granted. You hear me. This is a blessing for you. When you face him, it’s Mr. Stockton,” the 44-year-old quoted Payton.
After mentioning Payton’s thoughts, Watson went into his intriguing experience against the veteran guard. He picked Stockton from full-court in hopes of containing his offense. However, the Jazz star managed to find his way through the court anyway. Watson admitted that it was very hard to lock down Stockton because he would always change directions with his crafty handles and make sure to take the play to the foul line. The former backup guard further revealed how Stock would draw fouls effortlessly which made guarding him even more difficult.
However, Watson decided to not let the Jazz’s floor general dictate terms and bumped him repeatedly. This infuriated the experienced PG and he taught the rook a lesson.
“And when I stand him[Stockton] up, we bounce each other off, the ball go right past my face, I duck. I think it’s a backdoor, no one’s behind me. He threw the ball in my face. I look back at him, he said back the fu** up,” added Watson. This little ‘Welcome to the NBA’ moment added the icing in the cake of Watson’s ‘John Stockton’ story.
Utah Jazz was a dominant force in the West during the era of Stockton and Karl Malone. Gary Payton knew very well how hard it was to guard the Hall-of-Famer guard. Stockton averaged 14.0 points, 10.1 assists and 2.8 rebounds in 49 games against The Glove.
Gary Payton admires John Stockton
The Glove and Stock clashed 70 times(postseason included) in their careers, and the Jazz guard emerged victorious in 38 instances, which includes an 11-10 playoffs edge. This is one of the reasons why GP has immense respect for Stockton. His on-court experiences taught him that Stock is one of the hardest players to guard. His ability to pass from multiple angles and change directions at will was indeed a nightmare. So much so that once GP called him tougher to guard than the perpetual match-up nightmare Michael Jordan.
“I gotta guard him [Stockton] 94 feet. I gotta think about coming off of picks. He throwing passes, he coming back, trying to steal basketball. He always moving, he’s taking charges on me. He doing a lot of things. I have to always focus on him,” recalled The Glove on Vlad TV.
Payton also touched upon how he hated to play in Utah because of Stockton’s presence. GP was an incredible two-way guard who was a Defensive Player of the Year in 1996. Therefore, this praise coming from him is a big deal.
