Gary Payton thinks NBA could learn from the NFL’s eligibility rules

Gary Payton spent four accolade-filled seasons at Oregon State before being drafted second overall in the 1990 draft. And despite his growth through a full college career, he still wasn’t ready for superstardom in the NBA, averaging just 7.2 and 9.4 points per game in his first two seasons, respectively.

It takes a “special person,” Payton said, to be ready after just one year in college, which is why Hall of Famer believes the NBA should take that choice out of the teenagers’ hands.

“My first two years in the NBA, I wasn’t ready; I had a miserable two years,” Payton said on 710 ESPN Seattle’s “Justin and Gee.” “… I think that staying in school and learning how to become a man, how to learn how to balance a check book, learn how to wash your clothes, learn how to be your own man is good. I think basketball should go to the football rule, where you’ve got to stay in college for three years.”

Payton, the Supersonics legend known as the “The Glove” for his lock-down defensive prowess, is considered one of the best all-around point guards in NBA history despite a slow start to his 17-year career. Like many stars from the 90s, Payton sees good individual athletes in today’s game, but not fully stocked rosters of true NBA players.

“You know how it is, the money and the temptation is a lot now,” said Payton, 47. “A lot of these guys need to go out and help their families and stuff like that. That’s just the way it is. Football you can’t. Football you have to stay there – you’re going to have help your family in three years. I just think that, me, I had a better opportunity after I got out of four years to work it and stay in the NBA for 17 years because I learned more from doing that, and learning how to grow up and manage myself when I got to the next level.”

The NCAA has tinkered with how it handles eligibility into the NBA over the years since disallowing high schoolers to enter the league in 2006. NBA stars including LeBron James, Kobe Bryant and Kevin Garnett all famously jumped from the preps to the pros, and the last 15 No. 1 overall picks have been freshmen, sophomores or teenagers from overseas.

Payton was a legendary trash-talker and is known to speak without a filter, something he said he learned in his hometown of Oakland. He said the culture shock that came with transitioning from the Big City streets to a college town in Oregon made him the man he is today. It’s a process he believes all young men should receive.

“It’s off nowhere,” said Payton, whose son, Gary Payton II, is a senior point guard at Oregon State. “You drive down a road like you are going to any kind of farm place and then all of the sudden, bam, it’s Corvallis. But you know what, it was big for me because it changed my life. It changed me to know how to really adjust to anything. I adjusted to this different city from a big time city and now I’m adjusted to how I’ve got to change my life and slow down and do another culture. And that’s what I did.”