A massive gold watch gleams on Chris Paul’s wrist as he points to his right hand.
“I’ve had five hand surgeries. Fifteen screws in this hand.”
He reverses position and points to his left hand.
“Sixteen screws in this one.”
The man famously known as the “Point God” is able to recount each procedure. One he underwent days after his daughter was born, the result of an injury suffered during the 2012 Olympics gold medal game. Another came about after a Pistons game during Paul’s time with the Warriors. The scars and crooked bone left behind are as much evidence of a storied NBA career as his many All-Star selections.
He’s seated smack in the middle of a long table between a dozen reporters at a lavish event space in the Meatpacking district of Manhattan; the event is hosted by Thorne, the health and wellness company whose products are quite popular in the sports sphere. Each seat is marked with wedding-like placards and a stylized menu detailing the main event: a three-course Michelin-grade breakfast, prepared by chef Julien Castillo, that featured several Thorne products such as pre-workout and creatine. An athlete’s breakfast, in other words. The end product was, predictably, phenomenal (the skirt steak with scrambled eggs and a salsa macha made for the biggest hit of the morning). Nobody was more enamored with the spread than Paul himself, showering Chef Castillo with praise several times between casual table banter.
As the murmur of conversation clashes against the clinking of silverware on fine china, Paul continues to chat about his basketball career. These are not war stories shared fondly, though. They’re tales of a previous life—one long past at this point. The future Hall of Famer snorts with laughter when someone lightly asked if a midseason NBA return was on the table this year: “Hell, no.”
This is Paul’s life, now. Instead of furiously preparing his body for the rigors of an 82-game NBA regular season plus playoffs, he’s enjoying the benefits of endorsing his preferred products in a field he’s passionate about. And Paul is finding it’s not a bad life at all.
“How does retirement suit Chris Paul…” he repeats in a quiet, considering tone as he leans forward in his chair; you can see the wheels turning in his head as he mulls how to approach the question like a complicated pick-and-roll coverage. With breakfast over, we’ve separated from the group for a private interview, shielded by hanging curtains and a foggy glass wall.
“What's funny is, I guess, I retired from basketball, right? But I feel like I've always been so much more than just a basketball player,” Paul responds after a few moments. “So it’s interesting to walk into these different rooms now, and people be like, ‘Oh, you're retired.’ Yeah, from professional basketball, but I'm enjoying the other things now that I'm getting time to put energy into.”
One of those things is the reason we gathered that day: taking care of your body. Paul is a longtime user of Thorne products dating back 15 years, when he was traded to the Clippers after spending the first six years of his career in New Orleans. He points to that moment as the turning point for his attitude towards the science of health and the importance of paying very close attention to what he was putting into his body. Thorne products helped Paul achieve his overarching goal of keeping his body at peak shape with high-quality ingredients that were all above board when it came to the NBA’s stringent drug testing policies.
What might have started as a professional requirement turned into a passion for a man who, among many other qualities, considers himself to be deeply curious; Thorne proved a perfect partner in his pursuit of learning as much as he could about this field of science.
“Man, I know I wouldn't have been able to play for 21 years without paying attention to the different things that I put into my body on a daily basis,” he explains. “And I think what I always have tried to do over my career is all the little nuggets and gems that I found out, I wanted to pass them on to my friends and family. I consider myself a lifelong learner. I continue to learn anything that I can to help with longevity and health, which is priceless. I want to know.
“(In retirement), there’s definitely still a focus. Obviously, I don't have four or five hours every day that's geared to just training, right? So, it's an adjustment (health-wise). You have to try to evolve and change and whatnot. I think I’m learning about myself and the things I’m into, what I would like to do, but health is always going to be at the forefront. That’s what gives you the ability to enjoy the things that you want to enjoy.”
That last point is key. Like most recently-retired athletes, Paul doesn’t know exactly what the coming years have in store. It’s an odd and even frightening feeling for some athletes whose lives have been entirely dictated by the sport they played for literally their entire lives. Fear of the unknown lives even in the greatest players of a generation. In Paul’s case, figuring out what comes next is just another challenge to disassemble and solve. He already has a sense of direction, too—and, above all, a determination to enjoy it.
“That aspect of figuring out what you want life to look like, it's fun and a little scary,” the longtime NBA star says. “I mean, most athletes tell you it is definitely scary, and you want to make sure that you have people to talk to about different things.
“The next chapter is going to be about a lot of things. A whole lot of things. It's gonna be about my family, the different businesses that I'm into. I have a show that we're launching where I'll be, breaking down the game and teaching all the details of different things that I see throughout the game. And experiences, you know, that's the thing that I'm looking most forward to. (For example), my dad just turned 66. Because I’ve been in training camp and stuff for all those seasons, I haven't spent time with my dad on his birthday in the last 20-some years. I think about Thanksgiving and some of these holidays where I haven't been with my family. I’m the assistant coach at my son's high school. I'm so grateful for the 21 years that I did get. And I try to just focus on what was so positive about my career and what I get a chance to do now.”
Athletes cannot afford to spend much time looking back on what they’ve accomplished. It’s always about the next steps. It’s clear Paul carried that mindset into retirement after his career came to a sudden end last December, when the Clippers sent him home from the team before releasing him. He has no interest in discussing how that exit went down, nor what’s occurred since (“None,” he states with a steely-eyed stare when asked for his reaction to L.A.’s cap circumvention scandal. “I ain’t playing no more. That don’t got nothing to do with me.”). There’s a clear appreciation for the decades he dedicated to the NBA… but no nostalgia.
As we speak, 30 teams and hundreds of players are beginning the new NBA season. For most of his life, Paul was one of them. Now that he’s not, he doesn’t miss it.
“I’ll always love the game, love basketball, and all that stuff,” he allows. “But I don't miss that aspect of it, though. No, I don't miss it. I miss the camaraderie. You know what I mean? Like, being with teammates, and I miss the competition and the game. But what I learned is that I enjoy the moments with my family more than I miss that.”
In other words: Retirement suits Chris Paul just fine, thank you very much.
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