Chris Bosh on His Retirement, That Rebound, and Going to Coachella with Michael Beasley

Chris Bosh says there was no flashpoint moment, no single conversation, no epiphany, that was enough on its own to convince him to retire from the NBA. Instead, the process was a slow, torturous burn. It all started with the February 2015 disclosure that he had a life-threatening blood clot in his lung, and then the checkup for calf soreness a year later that revealed another clot in his leg. Bosh had spent six seasons with the Miami Heat, and inked an extension in 2014 that signaled he would be the face of the team for the remainder of his prime. But after the second blood clot incident, Miami quickly moved to extricate itself from Bosh’s contract. He was released in an arrangement that incrementally pays the rest of his salary without it counting against the Heat’s cap space. The risk was simply too great, the Heat argued, for Bosh to play for them again.

But Bosh didn’t exactly spent the last few years enveloped in bubble wrap. At the onset of what should have been his retirement phase, he was “ripped and swole and ready to go”—in the best shape of his life, he says. He was regularly playing pickup, but also participating in the sort of drills and workouts that would keep him sharp enough to return. These workouts also happened to scare the bejeezus out of onlookers, who frequently imparted I must save you from yourself advice that Bosh decided to politely tolerate.

Still, Bosh struggled to fully engage with the game. In fact, he refused to watch the NBA, until he granted himself a reprieve to take in a Celtics-Cavaliers matchup in October 2017. A few minutes in, Bosh saw Gordon Hayward suffer a horrendous broken ankle injury. As Bosh recalls, “I’m watching it with my boy and he’s like, ‘Man, he’s cool, that’s his shoe that came off.’ I said, ‘Bro, that’s not his shoe.’ That moment evoked some emotions out of me that I didn’t even know were there.” Though he may not have totally grasped it in the moment, his reaction was the latest sign that a comeback was increasingly unlikely.

By October of 2018, Bosh, still holding onto a sliver of hope, began to consider the inevitable. It helped that he had discovered a new hobby—producing hip-hop and R&B!—which has since morphed into a full-fledged, full-time passion. He’s known for a few months now that there will be no more NBA dream-chasing, but his official official retirement will coincide with a Miami Heat jersey retirement on March 26. Naturally, the occasion has him in a reflective mood. So over the course of an hour, while sipping on a couple Coronas, he reflects: On his career, on the blood clots, on grabbing the most important rebound in NBA history, on going to Joshua Tree with Michael Beasley, and how he wants to put Texas rap back on the map.

GQ: I’ve noticed professional athletes don’t necessarily enjoy ranking their accomplishments, especially individual ones, because they don’t want to look self-absorbed—

Chris Bosh: I love it now.

Oh, perfect. Where does the jersey retirement rank for you?

It’s really hard to rank, but it’s high up there. It’s an accomplishment, looking up and saying, “I did that.” I can’t wait to go back at night and shoot like we used to and talk crap to everybody, like, “Man, you see that jersey up there? That’s mine!”

But I think it would have to be its own category, because it’s a new phase. It hards to anticipate the emotions from that moment. The championships were more of a determination, more of a will to get things done. This is more of a celebration, a time for reflection about how great of a career I had, the great people that I shared it with, and I just want to share that moment with those people. It’s a new chapter, a new page in my life. I did not expect to be doing this so early, but you make the best out of a situation, and this is a pretty good situation.

In 2014, Zach Lowe asked whether you had anything in your house commemorating The Rebound [the series-saving play Bosh made in the closing seconds of Game 6 of the 2013 Finals that led to a Ray Allen three-pointer], and you said, “I put all that stuff in the vault somewhere, and I’ll look back at it when I’m older.” You’re obviously not old, but with your impending jersey retirement, are you reflecting on moments like The Rebound more often? Or is that something you’re still not interested in thinking about?

No, no, I look back at it now. It was the greatest series of all time. Nobody can tell me otherwise. The hall of famers that were involved, and to be able to make plays that were that memorable—like, I remember Jordan’s [1998 NBA Finals-clinching] shot, I remember Hakeem Olajuwon making a turnaround over Shaq, I remember Clyde Drexler and The Dream doing that handshake in the middle of the court. To be immortalized in that way is amazing. Being further removed, you see how lucky you are and how small of a window you have to jump through to even have that chance. To be there, and respond, and make the right play and actually win is unbelievable. I think it’s the greatest play in NBA history, aside from Jordan’s shot.

In your defense, Jordan did push off.

I pushed off too. It was a great move. But it was the biggest rebound in the history of the NBA. I can say that. I’m prideful of that.

If you were on the Heat right now and I was asking you that question, do you think you would be able to reflect on it in the same way?

No, I would be thinking about the next game. I would be mad at people for thinking about that stuff. Now that it’s all said and done, the memories are all I really have. I’m not going to lace up sneakers and put on another NBA uniform and play in a game. So looking back is good. It was a special moment for everybody. I’ll be able to talk shit for the rest of my life.

Even after the second blood clots scare, you were still doing a bunch of drills and playing pickup, right?

Yeah, I was an animal. I was playing.

I don’t know if people realize that.

I was playing, I was working out every day. The season before last I was in the best shape I had been in since the 2011-12 season when we won our first championship. I was motivated. Not being able to play took it out of me. I still kept going until I started seeing some horrific injuries around the league. That’s when it wasn’t the same. The workouts got harder and harder. I know the intensity and effort you have to bring to be able to get out there on that court.

People have referenced Reggie Lewis [the former Boston Celtic who died from a heart defect during a practice in 1993] and other tragedies as a way of saying yeah man, it’s for the best you’re not playing. You could end up in one of those situations. And they may very well have a point. But when you were still considering a comeback, and practicing regularly, did that unsolicited advice annoy you?

It didn’t piss me off, but one thing I noticed is people would say, “You’ve done everything. What else are you going to do?” When you’re pursuing a championship, you’ll do anything. I tore my groin. I tore my abductor muscle off my pelvis. Nobody was saying, “Hey! Don’t do that. Your health! Your future!” I know there’s degrees to the severity of health, but it’s pretty much the same thing.

It was somebody telling me, as I’m ripped and swole and ready to go, that I can’t play. Until somebody goes through that, they can never understand. I had a lot of people telling me what I should and should not do. That’s crazy. You can offer opinions, but I told people, respectfully, that I’m not listening to you. I know what’s in my heart. People tried to be like, think about your family! They’re my family. You don’t read to your kids at night. I do. I know how it feels. You weren’t in the hospital for two weeks laid up with tubes in your chest. I was. I know what’s in front of me and what the consequences are. I’m a grown person.

I guess people felt like they had to protect me from myself. Dudes on the couch were saying that. But that’s not what it’s about. It’s about pursuing your passion and doing that in the correct way. If you want to go for it, you go for it. Eventually, it came to a point where I just had to move on with my life. I was trying to gut it out, but I didn’t want to resent the game.

I read something you said to Bill Simmons about testing for blood clots: “It’s a box you don’t want to open. If you test guys for that, you’d probably find some information you don’t want to find out.” Do you think there are more NBA players with undiagnosed blood clots?

Everyday. Everyday. That’s the reality of the sport. You want to know why I’m not playing anymore? Because I had calf soreness in my calf, and I did the right thing and went to the hospital. I started freaking out, and was like, okay, let me make sure. They told me it was a blood clot.

I mean, this is sort of a philosophy 101 question, but there are tests you can take to see your risks for hereditary diseases—

Yeah, we did those and I don’t have the hereditary markers.

Right. And many people who don’t play professional sports choose not to take those tests because they don’t want to know what they’re at risk of developing. Do you think there’s merit to the idea that guys in the league should not be looking into that stuff? Because it can open Pandora’s Box?

Kind of. But if you’re not going to open it, you need to take precautions, which are minor, to make sure that if you do decide one day to open that box, you have better percentages in your favor. People have passed away from this.

The new wave in technology is to see if you have hereditary markers for cancer and Alzheimer’s and all these different things. That’s good to know, I guess. But is it? I think we’re all figuring that out right now. One thing guys can do is wear the compression socks below their knees, even if you don’t think anything is wrong with you. Just do it. Why not? Take a baby Aspirin. Do your research yourself. That’s what I would implore guys to do.

You entered the league a year or two before the dress code was instituted—

Yeah, it seemed like some kind of punishment. It was pretty much like the principal instituting a new rule. I didn’t have a stylist or direction, but I was trying to have fun with it. The term that I hate to this day is “dress jeans.” They’d say, “You can wear dress jeans.” What’s dress jeans, bro? But we made the best of it.

Who has the best fashion sense in the NBA right now?

I like DeAndre Jordan. He’s trying to be stylish as a tall guy, and that’s a hard thing to pull off. The guards, they always got it. They can shop off the rack and show up in new fly shit. He really tries to push the envelope, but doesn’t go too far. Being seven feet is enough. If you’re a big billboard, you don’t need bright colors all the time. [Puts his face closer to the recorder]: DeAndre, you owe me for that one, bro.

I’ll keep that in there, don’t worry.

Wait, sorry, I have to take that back. Not DeAndre. Tyson Chandler. Tyson really lives it. I met Tyson in 2006, and he had all these clothes. My gear was wack as hell at the time. I didn’t know where he got pants that fit. He put me onto it. The way he puts things together is very interesting. I wouldn’t wear it, but then you see him in it, and you’re like damn, let me get one of those. Tyson, he really cares passionately about fashion. That’s my man.

I was digging through your YouTube channel and saw you once mentioned going to Coachella with Michael Beasley. What is Coachella with Michael Beasley like?

Amazing. Amazing. That’s why he’s my brother for life. We had a great time. That was before Coachella got super cool. We were in the desert hanging out. It was an impromptu trip. When we were playing in the playoffs—it was our back-to-back year—OutKast came back together at Coachella, and I was so upset I couldn’t go. I remember we were in Milwaukee and I’m just watching it on YouTube. A couple years later, we did the whole trip, went down to Coachella, then went down to Joshua Tree and hung out.

You weren’t in a tent, were you?

No, no, no. We did it right. We stayed in Palm Springs and went to Coachella every night. Then we went down to Joshua Tree and were just hanging out in the desert looking at the trees and walking in the state park. We did a hike and everything. Beas, he’s a legend, man. One of the best to ever do it. People don’t even know that. Making it, where he made it from, he’s a special guy. Him and Josh McRoberts. That was our crew. We got pictures.

You once said you felt like you lost a sense of purpose when your playing days concluded. Have you regained that sense of purpose of late?

People ask me, “How are you going to replace basketball?” You don’t. I think a lot of people get in trouble trying to replace it. I’m not trying to replace basketball. I had to search inside myself. That was one of the questions—what are the things that I love to do? I had never answered that question beyond basketball. Then I picked up a guitar. Then I thought, okay, I need a computer. I need to make some beats. I’m going to record myself. I start messing around in there, and learned I really liked this stuff. Then I started making different friends, and really went down the rabbit hole as far as software and musical compositions, studying the greats. Next thing you know, I’m feeling that excitement, I’m hanging out with some of the best artists and producers in the world. I got a chance to be in the Dreamville sessions before J.Cole released “Middle Child.” I listened to that about 200 times, because they’re mixing, and I can’t tell the difference anymore. But just being in that world, it gave me that fire and that want to really pursue something.

Is there anything imminent on the music front?

Something’s always imminent. The thing about music is if you’re not ready, you’re not ready. I’ve got my laptop with me—if somebody says, “Hey, let’s make some music,” or, “Let’s play some music,” I can do both. I’m very, very confident. But that confidence comes from work and repetition. I’ve had thousands of hours put into this thing. It is an artform, and there’s a difference between artform and business. Just trying to figure out how those marry is the challenge. I’m working with a couple artists right now, and I think they’re very dope. We’re going to put Texas back on the map. So yeah, something is always imminent.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.