Carlos Boozer recalls when Tim Duncan talked trash to him: “You are good, but you need to get better son” originally appeared on Basketball Network.
San Antonio Spurs great Tim Duncan couldn’t care any less for the frivolities of the NBA game. He was all about doing whatever he could to ensure that his team emerged victorious every night.
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However, underneath that stoic exterior lay a fierce competitor, which, at times, would manifest itself in some brief trash talk.
One player who found himself on the receiving end of Duncan’s trash talk was Carlos Boozer. The former Utah Jazz power forward recalls a memorable encounter with The Big Fundamental during his time in the league.
Booz got a few more words than usual
While Boozer and Duncan eventually became close friends after playing together on Team USA in the 2004 Athens Olympics, their first brush with each other came early in the former’s first season in the league. While Carlos was no pushover, especially after a stellar collegiate career at Duke, he soon learned that playing against Tim — who had already won an MVP award and an NBA title at that point — was a different beast.
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“I don’t know if it was the exact first game — but one of my first games against Timmy, he gave me like 28, 17, and I don’t know, six or seven blocks,” Boozer stated.
As memorable as it was to be schooled like that by a bona fide superstar, Boozer said that wasn’t the part that stood out the most from that encounter.
“At the end of the game, he goes, ‘Booz, you’re good, but you got to get better, son,’” he recalled.
While some blue-chippers may have taken offense to being criticized like that, Boozer disclosed he appreciated Duncan’s candor and honesty and used the assessment to improve his game.
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“That was one of those moments. But it was an honest moment, and it was coming from the great Timmy — Timmy D. And I’m like, ‘You know what? I’m gonna get in the lab, and I’m gonna get better,’” Booz added. “I got a little bit more than the one-word humble brag. But he was great. I mean, he really was super fundamental, but that’s what made him so terrific. And he was a winner.”
KG was a different beast
Boozer’s heyday in the league came during a time when there were numerous dominant big men. Aside from Duncan, another player that Booz had to contend with plenty of times was Kevin Garnett.
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Unlike Tim, who let his game do all the talking, KG was all about crushing opponents with both his hoop skills and mental warfare.
“Garnett’s a whole different monster,” Boozer revealed. “KG was very, very talkative, very demonstrative, very passionate — and he let that passion show.”
One story Carlos shared came from his rookie year. At that time, he was still coming off the bench, playing behind Chris Mihm, a 7-footer from Milwaukee who was the seventh pick in the 2000 NBA draft. In that game, Garnett wasn’t his usual productive self and was beside himself at the free-throw line.
“He gets fouled. That’s the first thing. He walks up to the ball under the basket, grabs the ball, and kind of does one of these — head banging — with the ball. Then, as he walks back toward the free-throw line, getting ready to shoot his free throws, he starts talking,” Booz remembered.
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“He’s like, ‘Come on, Ticket. He can’t stay with you.’ But he’s not talking to me. He’s talking to himself in third person, loud enough for everybody in the gym to hear,” he continued. “And sure enough, he ended up having like 35 and 20 by the end of the game.”
Booz had a solid NBA career, averaging a near-double-double of 16.2 points and 9.5 rebounds per game in 861 appearances. As stellar as his production was, some of his career’s most treasured moments involved going up against two of the greatest power forwards to play the game: Duncan and Garnett.
This story was originally reported by Basketball Network on Jun 20, 2025, where it first appeared.
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