CHRIS BOSH

I don't jump as high and I'm not as fast as Dwyane Wade and LeBron James. I don't have many highlight plays, but I can play this game.

I'm at a space in my life where I see gifts I've been given, and if it ends, it's been a helluva ride. I did more than I'd ever think I'd do.

Don't get me wrong - it's amazing playing basketball. But being 19 years old, playing and interacting with grown men with families wasn't fun all the time, especially during a grueling 82-game season. That, mixed with Toronto's freezing winter climate, made me miss my buddies back at Tech even more.

For me, I kind of just follow my passions and follow what I love to do and use my free time to kind of answer those questions and go through my bad moods and maybe a little light case of depression.

I'm used to practicing. I'm used to the schedule. That's kind of what I was born to do. That's what I've been doing my whole life.

People used to ask me, 'What else do you want to do?' For me, the answer was, 'Nothing.' I loved basketball. It's all I wanted.

When I was a kid, I used to cry every time I lost a game, up until, like, the 8th grade. I used to go ballistic. I used to go crazy. If I cried, it'd be like, 'Ah, Chris is crying again... damn it... come on, get in the car.' All that over one game. I hated to lose.

The game has gotten a lot faster. I was anticipating changes as far back as when I first came into the league, when the spacing was changing, and big guys were playing in different spaces on the floor. But when that change actually happens, and it happens so quickly, it's just amazing.

If somebody attacks me with words, I'm always like, 'Do you know me? Do you know me that well? Let's have a beer and talk about it.'

If they need me to score 30, I can go do it. If they need me to just rebound and defend, I can do that. I can play this game, just in case people forgot. You just carry that chip on your shoulder, and you go out there and do what I was put on this Earth to do.

CB4 is never coming back. A few years later, I think I'm a much better player. It's funny, even all the way over here in Africa, people are telling me, 'We need CB4 back.' I can't be that. That's impossible.

I'm still learning more about myself and my situation and really, off the court, how to function there, because I'm kind of getting the taste of retirement now.

I remember in high school, I ate some nachos probably like an hour, half-hour before the game, and it's kind of gross, but a little of it came up while I was running - you know you get that burp - and I literally coughed at the same time, and it got caught in my nose, and it was during the game.

I felt like I was chosen to play basketball when I was younger.

My favorite was always smothered pork chops. Smothered pork chops. That would be my request if I ever had one, and it was pretty consistent.

I gave everything I had. All your feelings, all your energy, you put everything out there. And you come up short.

The way I look at it, competing at a high level, whether that's business, art or film, athletics, anything you do, there's a certain way to go about it.

I don't do anything without measuring 10 times and cutting once.

I would really want to teach someone how to function without having to have plays called for you.

My dad used to play every other weekend with me when I was young. I started getting better, but he could always beat me. Then one day, he realized the jig was up. And he stopped playing me just before I could beat him.

To be honest, I'm looking at today's game, and I put myself in that position and how I would benefit from the faster basketball, more threes, catch-and-go opportunities, attacking the paint with more space, that's what kind of gets me juiced up and riled up when I watch today's game.

Everybody says they want to win. But when you start talking about sacrifice and doing what's right for the team, it's like, 'Wait a minute, I didn't mean that. I want to win, but...' There's always a conjunction with that. It's never what you think it is. And it's always, like, your weakest point where you got to do it.

Once I close the doors, it's closed. I don't open it back up. That's kind of me as a human being. That's just one of the things about me... But yeah, for me, I don't close anything until I'm officially done.

The NBA is the best league in the world. It's no way you're going to be able to fill the void that the energy of performing before 20,000 people every night gives you. That's just impossible. So, I just try and move on from that and let it be a moment in time and leave it alone.

You're playing games every two or three nights, so there's no real time off.