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“Kris, where you at? Steve Nash just passed me!”
I’m five minutes behind schedule, meeting my trainer to work out at a gym in downtown Brooklyn when I get a call I wasn’t expecting. Steve Nash, the former Brooklyn Nets head coach, just walked out of a juice bar next to my gym.
“He’s wearing a Black hoodie,” my trainer, Ahmad Curry, says. “He just turned up the block.”
”I’m around the corner,” I respond. “Let’s go after him.”
Of course I’m not right around the corner.
In fact, I’m a block-and-a-half away when I get the call and instantly hit a 6.5 mile-an-hour jog when I hang up. It’s 37 degrees outside and 12 hours removed from the first snowstorm, albeit a light one, the city’s seen this winter. I can see my breath with every huff and puff. I’m wearing a bubble jacket and a hoodie with some sweats and some running shoes.
I turn the corner and see my trainer.
“He went that way,” he says.
And off we go — on the hunt for one of the more polarizing figures in New York City sports. And the trail is fresh, though he almost lost us.
A block into the jog, Nash shook us — like a getaway driver hitting an intersection after a bank heist.
A UPS delivery man is loading packages into his trunk. I ask him if he saw Nash walking by.
“I did,” the delivery man responds. He is of little help otherwise. He doesn’t know which way Nash went.
“There he is,” my trainer said. “I see that black hoodie.”
I start running. Something like 8.5 miles an hour on a treadmill. I’m careful not to scare him. I’m on the opposite side of the street catching my breath before I approach.
It’s undeniably him. Nash is wearing a peacoat with a black hoodie under. He’s also wearing sweats and sneakers, like he could go play pickup — basketball or soccer — any moment.
And he’s scarfing down an acai bowl while on the move, the most relatable moment the coach and I — a proud mobile eater — have had since he took the Nets job in 2020.
“Coach, can I get an autograph?” I yell from 10 yards back.
He turns around, and sees me. He’s shocked, and surprised. And he’s not talking on the record.
In truth, he doesn’t need to. Nash misses coaching. He misses the assistants he left after he and the Nets parted ways seven games into the season. He’s living the happy life, caring for his family and his children, who are each into sports.
He’s happy I’ve started working out. The pandemic pounds piled, but they’re noticeably coming off.
And just like that, he’s gone. Into the wind. An encounter with one of the best point guards in NBA history, whose stint as head coach of the Nets may be the only blemish on an otherwise pristine basketball resume.
Nash for sure lost the Nets locker room. The record speaks for itself: Brooklyn started the season 2-5 under him but the team has gone 14-7 since Jacque Vaughn took over.
Could Nash someday return to coaching? Maybe as an assistant? I’m not sure. I didn’t ask, though he sure sounded like he missed coaching and missed the daily challenge of working in basketball.
I’m sure I’ll see him again sometime. Then again, Nash now knows specifically which gym I frequent.
He’s probably had enough of New York City reporters poking around in his business.
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