Jeff Teague, the Realest Realist

The best NBA player podcaster is perhaps the least enthusiastic

Right now, there are so many NBA player podcasts. This could have happened a decade ago but for whatever reason it’s a quite recent “all at once” phenomenon. So, in 2023, it’s really hard for a basketball player to differentiate himself in this newly competitive market place. How do you compete with the professional approach and high end guest list of JJ Redick? What if you lack the All-Star status of Paul George, or infamous quirkiness of Gilbert Arenas? How can you seize the public’s attention when Draymond Green is podcasting about the Warriors through deep playoff runs? Speaking of the Warriors, podcasters Andre Iguodala and Andrew Bogut both have podcasts that feature stories from those legendary title seasons.

I did not expect Jeff Teague, now age 35, to stand out in this space. The waterbug point guard out of Wake Forest had a solid 12 year career to be sure, but it was mostly spent on teams outside the national spotlight. His most prominent years were with an overachieving Atlanta Hawks roster, and while that team once won 60 games, there isn’t an enduring public fascination with a squad doomed by lack of talent come playoff time. So naturally, prior to this podcasting endeavor, Teague didn’t have a national profile as a personality. He was just a guy you might remember and only if you’re an NBA fan.

And yet, he keeps going viral with his stories. His Club 520 podcast is a modest success on Youtube, but its individual clips get massive play on social media, usually with a caption stating some variation of “Jeff Teague is hilarious” or “Jeff Teague is a great storyteller.”

That’s all true, but there’s something else going on: Jeff Teague in retirement offers people the real, cynical NBA.

Players are conditioned to yearn for a championship, at least publicly. Jeff Teague is upfront about preferring a max contract. Players know they should present the image of high competitive drive. Jeff Teague says he stopped playing defense after Steph Curry scored 44 points against his best efforts. Players know they should, of course, root for their own teams. Jeff Teague talks about his outward lack of belief in a Bucks title team that benched him.

What’s funny about Teague is, in making these claims, he embodies a detachment some fans hate about the NBA. So many guys now are, outwardly, more about themselves than about their teams. By owning this sentiment completely, though, Teague turns disenchantment into amusement. He’s bringing us in on the joke, and it’s one that often comes at his own expense.

Not only is Teague unusual as an athlete who puts out self myth busting content, but he’s all the more uncommon for doing so at his size. Teague measures at 6' 0.25' without shoes, above average height for a human, but quite tiny for the NBA. By (often true) stereotype, such smaller players are usually incredibly driven, in stark contrast to many seven footers who play professional basketball because it was simply the most lucrative path offered to them.

Teague, in podcast form, doesn’t appear all that driven. Does he love basketball? I’d have to assume so, based on his ability to compete at that level, but his stories betray little passion for a sport that made him $100 million. And that’s all fine because he also presents as someone with little ego, as though a fan just happened to land in all these situations. My impression that successful small NBA players almost necessarily have delusional self confidence gets busted when Teague tells a story about wanting nothing to do with the biggest shot he ever hit.

It’s a perfect story, not because anything incredible or surprising happened. The shock is how Teague felt about his own high point, and how open he is with sharing his past diffidence. It’s tales like this that make him the perfect fan avatar, despite a cynicism for the sport that fans don’t share. Teague sometimes feels the terror and shame of how we just might, if dropped into NBA scenarios. He, a normal-sized man, conveys a sense of imposter syndrome as he gets disrespected by the likes of Tracy McGrady and Kevin Garnett.

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The Invulnerable Player Media Era

Back in 2014, the Player’s Tribune launched as part of this broader effort for athletes to own their own stories. The publication, founded by Derek Jeter, was pitched with not a small amount of resentment for the sports writers who’d previously owned narrative production. The Player’s Tribune had some hits here and there, but never really caught on. The reason for that, I believe, was that it was too sanitized and guarded, much like Jeter himself. The athletes disliked sports writers in part because such people exposed their secrets and weaknesses. That’s an understandable gripe, but there is no closeness without vulnerability.

While a Yankees legend could thrive while giving little away, it’s a suboptimal model for storytelling. There’s no way that a Jeff Teague could rise above everyone else while presenting as a man who looks down on us from great heights. Instead, by conscious choice or accident, Teague comes down to our level. Even better than that, he takes us behind the curtain, exposing the sorts of trade secrets the other guys reflexively commit to hiding within guild.

That combination has made Teague potentially powerful, similar to how Pat McAfee was able to build a massive brand off being an NFL punter, orthogonal to the gladiator culture in his midst. Jeff Teague might not be just like us, but he feels just like us, only with way better stories. That’s a winning formula for a guy who seems, in retrospect, sort of apathetic about winning.