Basketball may have been easy for Lamar Odom, but life sure hasn't been.
He
was 12, growing up in a rough neighborhood in the New York City borough
of Queens, when his mother, Cathy, died of colon cancer. His dad wasn't
around much, and his grandmother Mildred Mercer, who raised him as a
teenager, died in 2003 when he was in his mid-20s.
Three
years after that, his 6-month-old son, Jayden, died in his crib of
sudden infant death syndrome. A grief-stricken Odom cradled Jayden's
tiny body in the hospital for hours, refusing to let go.
In
the later years of his NBA career, before he took the court, Odom wrote
a tribute to each of his departed loved ones on his sneakers. Three
names. Every game. The arena lights shone and the fans cheered and
Odom's star-studded Los Angeles Lakers won two NBA titles and Hollywood
beckoned, but heartache was never far away.
"I
sometimes have to stop and remind myself how much this guy has been
through and how much he's lost," then-teammate Derek Fisher told Sports
Illustrated in 2009. "I'm sure there is anger and disappointment inside
of him, but to have his spirit, to have his approach to everyday life, I
don't know how he does it."
Now, as Odom, 35, lies clinging to life in a Las Vegas hospital
after being found unconscious in a brothel in the Nevada desert, the
world is taking a closer look at the talented athlete with the ready
smile, the humble nature, the reality-show lifestyle and the famous
in-laws.
Some of us think we know him
through his 14 years in the NBA, where he charmed fans and teammates
with his athletic grace and unselfish play. Some of us think we know him
from his marriage to Khloe Kardashian, which ushered cameras into every
corner of his personal life and brought him a new, intensified level of
celebrity for which he may not have been prepared.
But few of us know the whole story.
"Death always seems to be around me," Odom told the Los Angeles Times in 2011 after a young cousin was killed in New York. "I've been burying people for a long time."
From Queens to Hollywood
Despite
a turbulent childhood spent in one of New York's rougher neighborhoods,
Odom was always quick with a smile and a kind word.
"He
grew up as a happy-go-lucky kid," his paternal grandmother, Florence
Odom, 89, said this week. "We taught him how to love instead of hating
stuff going on. He gives you everything you ask for. He never talks
(badly) about people."
After the death
of his mom, Odom found refuge in basketball. By the time he hit puberty,
he was wowing older hoops players on his neighborhood playgrounds in
Queens' working-class Ozone Park.
When
he was a high school sophomore, he grew 6 inches. At 15, he was
6-foot-8, rail-thin but strong on both ends of the court: He controlled
rebounds and rejected ill-advised shots by opponents but ran the floor
like a guard, flinging nifty passes and hitting three-pointers.
He
was already being noticed by colleges when he scored 36 points to lead
his high school, Christ the King, to the New York Catholic League
championship.
Suddenly, everyone in basketball knew who Lamar Odom was.
But
his studies proved more difficult. With NBA scouts hovering, Odom got
poor grades and switched high schools twice as a senior. Before he could
play hoops for the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Odom had to take
summer classes.
But Odom, at 6-foot-10
and one of the top high school prospects in the nation, never suited up
for the Rebels. A Sports Illustrated article expressed suspicion about a
rise in his score on standardized admission tests, and then Odom was arrested for soliciting a prostitute. After he refused to cooperate with an NCAA investigation into his test scores, UNLV rescinded its offer. Odom was devastated.
He
ended up at the University of Rhode Island, where -- after taking
courses to become academically eligible to play -- he led the Rams to
the 1999 NCAA Tournament. Three months later, the Los Angeles Clippers
selected him fourth overall in the NBA Draft. He was 19 years old. For
his jersey, he chose the number 7, his grandmother Mildred's "lucky"
number.
Odom scored 30 points in his
NBA debut and was named to the league's all-rookie team. Off the court,
however, things were going less smoothly. He was suspended twice by the
league in 2001 for violating its anti-drug program before confessing
tearfully to reporters that he was using marijuana.
"I fell into things I wasn't supposed to be doing, hanging out, partying," he told the New York Times.
The
native New Yorker would go on to spend all but two of his NBA seasons
in Los Angeles with the Clippers, Lakers and finally Clippers again,
winning back-to-back championships with the Lakers in 2009 and 2010.
Although
he was never an All-Star, Odom was a versatile complementary player
with a panache to his game. It wasn't unusual to see him grab a rebound,
dribble up the court and throw a behind-the-back pass to a teammate for
an easy basket. In 2011, he won the NBA's Sixth Man of the Year award,
given to the league's top reserve player.
"He was a great teammate, full of joy, a guy you want to have in your locker room," Pau Gasol, his former Laker teammate, told the Los Angeles Times. "He's very unselfish, an incredible guy. I had a lot of memorable moments with him."
Trying to keep up with the Kardashians
For most of his NBA career, Odom was with longtime girlfriend Liza Morales, his high school sweetheart.
"I
met Lamar in the ninth grade ... and was completely taken in by his
wit, charm, and that devastating smile he so easily flashed at anyone he
met," Morales told The Daily Beast in 2013.
"We dated from the 11th grade on and shared a tight bond due to a lot
of things, including the fact that we both were products of broken
homes."
The couple had three children
-- Lamar Jr., Destiny and Jayden -- although they never married. Odom
told her that NBA marriages never lasted, suggesting that they wait
until after he was retired from the league, she said. But by 2009, the
relationship was over after Morales said she learned Odom was having an affair.
As a Lakers star and an eligible bachelor, Odom was seen around town in early 2009 with a number of women, including actress Taraji P. Henson.
Then
came Khloe Kardashian. The Kardashians were not the massive
conglomerate that they are today when Odom met the youngest of the three
TV-friendly sisters at a party in 2009. A month later, they were
married on "Keeping Up With the Kardashians."
Morales said she learned of the wedding via a text message.
"I
don't think I'll forget the tight knot I felt in the pit of my stomach
the morning I received the text message with three simple words on the
screen. It read 'I'm getting married' and it was from the man I'd spent
more than 10 years of my life with," she told The Daily Beast.
To
viewers watching their relationship blossom on TV, Odom and Kardashian
seemed very much in love. But he struggled at first with the constant
spotlight -- especially on their spinoff E! reality show, "Khloe and
Lamar," which ran for two seasons in 2011 and 2012.
"By
the third or fourth day (of filming 'Khloe & Lamar'), I realized
how tough and demanding it was going to be. I was like, 'I don't think I
could do this,' " Odom told the Los Angeles Times in 2011. "But we worked through it."
Their
fishbowl marriage proved to be more difficult to work through.
Kardashian filed for divorce in 2013 and accused Odom of infidelity in a
2014 episode of "Keeping Up With the Kardashians."
The estranged couple, whose divorce has not been finalized, have always been open about their continued attachment. Kardashian recently told Complex magazine that she talks to Odom -- whom she calls "genuinely one of the best people I've ever met" -- as often as she can.
"I
like looking back and holding on to that stuff," she said. "I
definitely miss it, and there's times I'll get so sentimental and so
sad, but this had to happen for some reason."
For his part, Odom told In Touch magazine in August that Kardashian is his "soulmate" and that he will always care for her.
"I
can't control it. We'll never part," In Touch quoted him as saying. "I
would never consider myself serious with another woman."
A downward spiral?
It's
impossible to say exactly what led Odom to Dennis Hof's Love Ranch in
Crystal, Nevada, where employees said he was using cocaine and other
drugs. But in recent years, his life seemed increasingly troubled.
Odom's
NBA career ended in 2013 and he has been out of basketball since a
brief 2014 stint in a Spanish pro league and an attempted comeback with
the Knicks. His departure deprived him of the stability and support that
comes with being an active professional athlete.
Since leaving the NBA he has seen his marriage crumble and pleaded no contest to a DUI stemming from an August 2013 arrest. There have been numerous reports in recent years about his struggle with drugs.
Friends said Odom was distraught after the June death of Jamie Sangouthai, a close childhood friend from Queens. Several business ventures, including his Rich Soil clothing line, never caught fire.
And
the constant prying by tabloid bloggers and paparazzi seemed to have
taken a toll. In August, a visibly agitated Odom berated a photographer
who followed him down the street.
"Y'all have discredited me, beat me down, took my confidence, took everything away from me," he said, in a video posted on TMZ Sports. "I've been taking this s--- for two years straight."
Friends, former teammates and others believe Odom needs help.
"I
think what's happened with Lamar, like it happened to me, is that you
become broken inside," former baseball star and recovering addict Darryl Strawberry told CNN's Chris Cuomo. "And when you're broken inside you never heal your issues."
"He
was a good, good person that had demons. He has demons -- everybody
knows that," said New Orleans Pelicans Coach Alvin Gentry, who coached
Odom for two seasons with the Clippers.
Gentry told the Los Angeles Times that Odom's kindness sometimes worked against him because people took advantage of him.
"But
I just think if you take into account his whole background and how he
grew up and what was there," Gentry said, "it's not that hard to see
where the demons came from."
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