Walker played for the Minnesota T-Wolves in his last NBA tour-of-duty in 2008
For the nth time, another former NBA All-Star dropped out of his once lofty status in the planet’s greatest basketball league.
His name is Antoine Walker.
A vital piece in the Miami Heat’s NBA championship conquest in the 2006 season, the 6′8″ Walker, who has earned more than US$110 million in over 11 years of playing in the NBA, is now neck-deep in debt.
According to Yahoo! Sports’ latest news sport, Walker has over US$12 million in debt — product of his mishandling of his assets and for his gambling woes during his years as an NBA player.
If you’re not an NBA junkie, Walker used to be the 1-2 scoring punch of the Boston Celtics about 10 years ago, where he was Paul Pierce’s partner. In 2002, they nearly brought the Celtics to the 2002 Finals, but their efforts went short after losing to the New Jersey Nets in seven games in their Eastern Conference Finals series.
Walker is now playing for the Idaho Stampede in the NBA Development League, where he hopes to resuscitate his sagging basketball career and be able to earn a spot back in the NBA.
“It’s unfortunate that that’s (gambling and legal woes) the reason I’m not in the league,” Walker said. “We all go through trials and tribulations in life. I haven’t killed anybody. I haven’t committed a crime, so I don’t feel bad about it. It’s just a terrible decision I made,” said Walker.
Who we are today is a product of the decisions we made yesterday.
Hopefully, we can learn a lesson from Walker’s basketball life. Left to our own devises, life would be devoid of meaning. But in Christ, as He promised in John 10:10, He has come that may have life, and have it to the full.