Here's more on the McCants/UNC/prison blowup. After
you read through it, you can understand his argument
about being taken out of context a bit better, but as Roy
Williams pointed out, it's too late: the quote will live for
years.
Part of the problem, though, isn't simply the comment,
but who made it.
If a bon vivant like Julius Hodge or Chris Carrawell had
said it, the reporters would have laughed about it and not
taken it seriously. Part of the problem for McCants is that
he has developed a reputation as a guy who is somewhat
erratic and moody, and fair or not, he's probably not
given the benefit of the doubt in a situation like this. And
juxtapose that with his new tattoos (Born To Be Hated on
one arm, and Dying To Be Loved on the other), and a lot
of people are going to take the attitude of boo-hoo,
Rashad opened his mouth and got burned. And to an
extent that's inevitable. When a guy is so removed that
even his teammates say (or used to say) they didn't
understand him, how can he expect anyone else to?
Fame is a two-way street, and not everyone is well-suited
to it, and you can't blame a guy who seems naturally
reserved for being reticent when he's not sure who he
can trust. But having said that, he's clearly not a
dummy, and comparing UNC to prison, even in passing,
was an exceptionally dumb thing to do. There's no way
for a guy like McCants to somehow morph into a guy like
Carrawell overnight, but the basic principle still applies:
lighten up, kid. You have a lot more friends than you realize.