This is just one of many infamous M.J. restaurant stories
During 2000, when Jamal Crawford was first drafted by the Chicago Bulls, he found himself admiring the city and its biggest athlete of all-time, Michael Jordan. In a profile with The Undefeated, the veteran NBA player shared a revelation about 48-hours that changed his life.
Crawford revealed that he was spending times in the streets with high-profiled millionaires, while he wasn’t anywhere near their tax bracket. While losing money to both His Royal Airness and Ray Allen at times during gambling sessions of his rookie season, Mr. Crossover found himself a serious gambling debt with some people at Jordan’s legendary restaurant in the windy city.
During a two-day span, Crawford lost $100,000 during games of shooting dice, as he was on a rookie contract. Take a look at the story below on how he walked in to the restaurant with $2,000.
The infamous One Sixtyblue restaurant story.
Over what is believed to be a two-day span, he said, he lost in the neighborhood of $100,000. A person with intimate knowledge of the game claims Crawford lost several hundred thousand and Allen lost even more. And that, days after the dice game, a call was placed to Goodwin, Crawford’s agent, to inform him that Crawford had not yet squared his debt with one professional gambler. “OK,” Goodwin said, according to the person with intimate knowledge of the game.
“What does he owe? Jamal is good for it.” “No, you don’t understand,” the go-between said. “If he doesn’t pay now, these guys will kill Jamal.” “Kill Jamal?!! He’s an NBA player. He gets paid as soon as the season starts.
Give me the dude’s number.” The person with knowledge of the game said Goodwin called the man Crawford owed money, set up a payment plan and resolved the issue without incident. Crawford swore he didn’t lose that kind of money, and said he never heard the story about his life being threatened. But he doesn’t deny he got in way over his head.
To help square the debt at the end of the second night, he walked out to his 2001 Mercedes-Benz S Class 430, an immaculate new grey sedan. Before he handed over the keys, he opened the trunk of the car.
And took out his basketball. “It was just this feeling of, man, you think you made it and then you go back to your old ways and do something that completely undermines yourself.”
After 16-years, Jamal is yet to shoot dice again or gamble outside of a casino again.
[Source]