This is not as tired as DeMar DeRozan gets, but it’s close. The Chicago Bulls star forward is quietly decompressing in the third row of a luxury SUV driving through Los Angeles, his hometown and where he lives during the off-season. He has just finished the second of two consecutive two-hour gym sessions.
The real exhaustion will come in August, with its three workouts per day, but late July is no slouch. A few friends are along for the ride, and DeRozan breaks his silence when their conversation turns to the ever-growing Mega Millions lottery prize. Yet another drawing had gone by without a winner, and the potential jackpot was now up to a staggering $1.025 billion.
“If I won that,” DeRozan says, “you would never hear from me again.”
It’s a joke — hence the laughter — but his tone seems more wistful than arch. Perhaps I’m reading too much into it. I’m tired, too. I had to get up at 4 in the morning to watch him work out.
DeRozan credits much of his success to the grueling routine he maintains during these so-called off months. “I hate the summer because it’s the hardest,” he tells me. “But it makes the season easier. It’s like, I just got to play and practice? Perfect. ”
A normal summer day starts pre-predawn, when DeRozan hauls himself out of bed and makes his way across L.A. County for his first scheduled training session at 5. The freeways are empty, but the drive to the little gym by LAX still takes about an hour. It’s dark, and he shuffles through the rear parking lot wearing a pair of ruby Crocs, briefly raising his drowsy gaze when I compliment his choice of footwear.
“Crocs are the shit,” he says. There is no reason to doubt his sincerity on the matter—he claims to own a pair in nearly every color.
With the exception of a few framed jerseys of famous clients hanging on the walls, there’s not much to suggest that Jason Estrada’s gym is an elite training facility. From the outside, one could reasonably expect it to be an auto repair shop or a bathroom tile showroom. “Everything in here is unassuming,” Estrada says with pride. He’s talking about the equipment, or the relative lack thereof, though he might also be referring to the sleepy 6-foot-6 NBA player loosening up on the ground before him.
“I ALWAYS TELL MYSELF THAT WHEN SOMETHING GETS HARDER, YOU PUSH YOURSELF EVEN MORE TO TRY TO GET THROUGH IT. I HATE GETTING UP AT 4 O’CLOCK IN THE MORNING. TRUST ME.”
“I never tell him what we’re going to do each day,” Estrada says. “He just has to show up. It’s easier if it’s a surprise. He doesn’t have to think about it.”
“It still sucks,” DeRozan says from the floor.
What’s going to suck today, specifically, is some extensive work on the Quadmill. Tucked away in the corner, it looks like a bulky treadmill. Estrada has affectionately dubbed it the Scream Machine, and,
