I knew his dad played ball at Kentucky but I didn't know that his mom did too. Seeing his parents on video makes his demeanor make perfect sense now. These are people of deep faith too. I'm beginning to wonder if Reed might low key have a very intense understanding of the game that he's just very modest about. I think he is going to grow into himself, but he has a super humble mentality while being incredibly gifted at the same time. He will likely be an NBA or NCAA coach after his NBA career.
His mom is a legend @RB713 We are lucky to have her son, Rockets Legend™ & Rockets Franchise Player™ Isaiah Reed Sheppard. Spoiler https://www.on3.com/teams/kentucky-...ppard-stacey-jeff-legacy-kentucky-basketball/ “Everyone from home is like, you play like your mom,” Reed Sheppard said. “She played the same way. And then some people that don’t really know mom, they just fall onto I play like my dad because that’s all they know.” The difference is in the hands, which John Calipari has said multiple times may be the best he’s ever coached in his 32-year career. “His hands, his feel, he plays exactly like his mom Stacey,” Calipari said after Reed’s standout performance vs. Miami. “Just like her. The way he gets hands on the ball, steals, and feel and all that stuff. Jeff could score. Didn’t have the body that this kid has.” Footage of Stacey during her time at Kentucky is scarce and the pictures are all in black and white, which, she ruefully points out, is a sharp contrast to the many color pictures of Jeff, whose career started just a few years after hers. However, you don’t have to look far to imagine what it was it was like to see her play. “What was it like watching her?” Jeff Sheppard said. “Watching a 5’7” Reed Sheppard out there is what it was like.” … It didn’t take long for Stacey and Jeff to realize Reed had something that a lot of other kids his age just didn’t. “He kind of always had some natural tendencies athletically, even as a little bitty fella,” Jeff said. “He always showed incredible hand-eye coordination. You just throw him a ball and he’d catch it. So there was just phenomenal, God-given ability, because of his mama, that was inside of him.” “I knew that early on he was very gifted naturally,” Stacey said. “And so I didn’t want to coddle him. Going back to, you do it the right way or don’t do it at all.” Like her father, Stacey refused to take it easy on Reed and Madison, even when they were throwing the ball around the backyard. “She never babied me in anything,” Reed said. “We would go out and throw football and she would throw it like she would throw it to me today…If it hit me in the face, it would hit me in the face. That was very important just because growing up, I had to get used to that.” “She doesn’t try to pump your tires,” Lola said of her daughter. “With Reed, from any time that he’s played, she’s never allowed excuses. Whatever happened, it happened. ‘Son, you just have to put your big boy britches on and go on.’” When Reed was four, Jeff started a travel team for him and his friends called The Sharks. Knowing that Reed had some natural gifts, Jeff purposefully scheduled games against older opponents to challenge him. “My dad would put them in tournaments with people at least one or two years older than them so they never won,” Madison said. “Like, they just got beat to death. And he did it intentionally because he’s said, ‘You’re never gonna get better if you don’t play against anybody better than you.’” “You just could tell he had it,” Jeff said of Reed. “He had something special.” … “I’m like my dad,” Stacey said. “I would never let Reed win. If you’re going to score, you’re going to score because you scored on your own. Don’t bring that crap in here. You’ve got to handle the ball.” “Anytime that we would play anything, whether it was me or mom or me and dad, I didn’t win,” Reed said. “I never won in a game until like seventh grade or eighth grade. That was finally when I could start beating them.” “When we got to the point that he could beat us, we just quit playing,” Stacey said. As Reed’s skills developed, you could see how much they resembled his parents’, specifically Stacey’s. Sharon Fanning got to see Reed play in person for the first time at an AAU Tournament in Birmingham in the summer of 2022. For her, it was like going back in time. “When I watched him, the first thing that I thought was he looks a little more like Stacey playing than his dad. If you saw her run — you’d have to see her run. You’d have to know that bounce, that step. He did remind me a lot of some of the mannerisms of Stacey.” “Reed is very good with his hands,” Stacey said. “And I was always very good with my hands. Just get your hands on balls.” Hand-eye coordination is one thing, but the most important thing Stacey may have passed on to her son was instinct. “Both of them play the game one play ahead and some of the things that a player has a knack for like that, you don’t teach,” Fanning said. “You either have it or you don’t have it. But I think he has the ‘It.’ The ‘it.’ Something that’s just inbred; it’s just a reaction. He plays the game one play ahead. He knows where the pass is before it happens. He anticipates, transitions right as it’s taking place.” “In my mind, I was always going one or two plays ahead of where we were, like visualizing where somebody should be or what they should do, or how the defense was playing,” Stacey said. “Just always processing the game ahead of time. And Reed plays a lot like that.” “A lot of people are trying their best to compare Reed to me,” Jeff said. “And they’re struggling because I wasn’t that good. And so they’re like, ‘Hey, he looks like him and he can dunk but we don’t remember him doing that. And we don’t remember him doing that either. And he’s actually good on defense, Jeff, you really weren’t good on defense. And he makes all his free throws.’ “And I said, Yeah, I know because you’re looking at the wrong parent. You gotta go over to Stacey to make the comparison.” Dunks and threes may trick the untrained eye, but the real similarities in Stacey and Reed’s games show up on defense. “Reed, his instincts and his feistiness – Shep was a laid-back but silent killer but Reed’s skill package is more like his mom’s,” Sean Woods said. “He’s more of a point guard and a straight two. Jeff was not a great break-you-down type of guy off the bounce, but she was. So he gets that from her. The point guard skills he gets from her.” “They really are alike in a lot of ways,” Jeff said. “She was incredible with her hands on defense. She did it all. She rebounded, she passed the ball, she got steals, she tried to block shots at 5’7”. And you know what? That, if that sounds familiar, that’s why, because they’re a lot more alike on and off the basketball court and then Reed and I are.” “I really do think I can see a combination of his parents,” Fanning said. “That should make him an even better player than both of them if he has both qualities.” “Growing up, I’ve always heard that I’ve played like my mom,” Reed said. “And it’s really cool for me because it’s my mom. I’m a mama’s boy.” … “People would always say, ‘He’s the best.’ And I’m like, ‘No, he’s not.’ When we go play these tournaments, he’s good and he stands out, but he’s not the best. And so, taking him away to bigger tournaments and events, he was able to see it for himself and what he needed to do. And that drove him to want to be better.” “He is a lot like her in the way that he’s just determined,” Madison said. “There have been many games where he didn’t necessarily love the way he performed. And so it’s 10 o’clock when we return home, and he’s going to the gym because he didn’t shoot well.” “Her big thing was, just be yourself,” Reed said of his mother’s advice. “Never let anyone outwork you and never let anyone be tougher than you on the court.” “She hated if you went out and didn’t try or didn’t play hard or pouted while you’re on the court. You’ve got to go out and no matter what, you’ve got to play as hard as you can. She didn’t care about missing shots or making shots. It was the way you competed.” … If you’re starting to think that Reed Sheppard is too good to be true, you’re not alone; Madison — always the protector — wouldn’t share any of Reed’s faults but joked about her brother’s taste in fashion (which he also inherited from his mother). “He’s 19 years old. He’s a goofball. He wears camo Crocs after basketball games. And you’ve got all these teammates walking out with their chains and their fancy sweat suits, and he’s in his Crocs, and he doesn’t care. Like that’s who he is. And I’m so proud of him for that. Because I can imagine it’s really easy to give into a culture shift. And just your surroundings like to be influenced by that.” “Reed doesn’t like the spotlight,” Stacey said. “Reed would prefer to be in the background. He’s not about the glitz and the glamour. He’s very quiet, very witty.” “We like that Reed is just Reed,” Lola added. “He never thought that he is better than he is. He just realizes where his abilities have come from. He knows that he’s had to work hard to get to where he is. He has natural abilities, but he’s just worked to fine-tune all of them.” There may be no better representation of Reed sticking to his roots than his haircut, the upside-down chili bowl that every boy has rocked at some point in his life. Reed fever is so intense in the Big Blue Nation right now that young fans are requesting the style at barber shops across the state. “He’s just as he says, ‘I’m just a country boy from Eastern Kentucky,'” Lola said. “And he is.” … “Reed’s gonna mess up, he’s gonna do stupid stuff, he’s gonna do great stuff and that’s part of the game,” Stacey said. “But just to watch him, and just to know it’s a confirmation for him and for us, what we’ve known the whole time, that he’s a special player.”
commander shepard should ease into coaching at 25. be a full time coach at 27, have have like a 40 year career coaching the nba.
Ime having dinner with his mom and her saying she taught him to not be soft is a running gag in the threads. Recently watched a youtubes about a month ago from his hometown news channel, where he held his draft viewing 'party' at the local church. I was like I don't remember this from espn's coverage.
With all the Watson crap, KPJ antics, etc. it's kind of surreal to have a humble, wholesome kid to root for. Bringing me back to my Mayberry R.F.D, and The Andy Griffith Show days... https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0053479/
Have a perception since early in his rookie year, that when Reed played with the starters, lots of times Reed was always prioritizing his teammates (too unselfish). He never inserted himself aggressively to score. (Recall the way he played in NBA early games (timid, looking for others) vs in g-league, pre season games (aggressively leading and trying to score) Now I think he's more confident and balance in his judgement when to facilitate others vs to find his own shot. From the video clips stories by his parents, pastoor, I think Reed is a religiously humble guys with his basic nature to serve and prioritize / facilitate others than to seek his own glory. now that he is maturing and more balance in his judgement (facilitate others vs insert himself) reed is leading his team to a more optimal team output. Reed will become a very good PG when the time comes.
maybe. I would say many if not most guys in the NBA have a deep faith background. Amen is another example.
A choirboy? Anyone that has sat court side long enough knows that Reed is on his way to being an elite trash talker. He drops variations of f**k as well as he can shoot 3’s.
