The rage inside him: Revisiting Dennis Scott's epic rant to child campers
This Magic Moment, a 30 for 30 documentary eulogizing the mid-1990s Orlando Magic, airs tonight on ESPN. A lot of it will probably center around what might've been if Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls would've just let them be great.
Somewhere in there, I pray that there's mention of the time that Magic small forward Dennis Scott had a vesuvian meltdown and mortified a camp full of bright-eyed kids a year after the core of that Magic team was parted for scrap following Shaquille O'Neal's signing with the Lakers.
In the summer of 1997, Dennis Scott-- who'd been a dutiful role player alongside Horace Grant, Nick Anderson, and Brian Shaw during those three painfully brief years that Shaq and Penny Hardaway were together-- was locked in a dispute with the team over the $3 million he was due to make the following season.
Scott was running his "3D" children's camp in Virginia at the time and was supposed to be coaching fundamentals and spouting glittering "Be All You Can Be" type stuff, but was too stressed about contract negotiations to care about all that. What's more it was hot as all get out.
So at some point, Scott said to hell with it, popped the trunk, and blared some family-friendly tracks from Biggie's Ready To Die album while preaching to this gaggle of 10-year-olds about his trials and tribulations before bonking out to 'meet a friend.'
It was seven different kinds of amazing.
The camp was obviously cancelled and the parents were refunded the $200 fee. Scott was eventually traded to the Dallas Mavericks.
The local reporter rehashing the story should've gotten a solid gold Kewpie doll for keeping it professional while repeating what Dennis Scott said.
"Don't ask me for my autograph, ask me about the rage that's inside of me." My sides.
Though Scott didn't do himself any favors in 1997, clearly the bridges didn't remain burned forever, as the Magic honored Scott with a touching tribute in December 2013.
