An Oral History of Boogie Cousins, Pokemon Master
[While the dominance of Sacramento Kings center DeMarcus “Boogie” Cousins on the basketball court is well-known, his Pokemon expertise is less documented. Through exclusive interviews and blackmail schemes, THE SHOCKER now presents the definitive account of Boogie’s history with these strange and captivating creatures.]
A ROCKY START
DeMarcus “Boogie” Cousins: I was stressed in the 2012–13 season. We weren’t winning, Keith Smart spent more time on his stamp collection than drawing up plays for us…So after one loss I was sitting by my locker and Travis Outlaw tries to chill me out. He’s carrying what I thought was a rock and I said, “You got a pet rock, man?” And he said, “Nah, this is Geodude.” And it was a fucking Geodude. The rock had arms and a face that looked mean, like people say mine always does. Travis lit the biggest blunt I’ve seen and said, “Bring Pokemon into your life. You’ll be way less uptight.”
Travis Outlaw (Kings small forward, 2011–14): I specialize in rock-type Pokemon, so that’s what I got Boogie into. During the All-Star break I took him on a trip to Kanto, and the caves of Mt. Moon.
Boogie: Mt. Moon is weird. You got Clefairies dancing around and shit, that’s cute at first but gets old quick, you’re surrounded by Geodudes, some Onix…way too many Zubats. Travis helped me refine my Poke Ball technique, with a good wrist-flick throw, and I caught my own Geodude. Over the next few days, we trained pretty much nonstop and before I knew it, Geodude evolved! Into Graveler.
Keith Smart (Kings head coach, 2012–13): I want to clarify something. I collected Nazi memorabilia, not stamps. I didn’t have the time to “coach the games” or whatever the talk radio said I wasn’t doing. Last month of that season I couldn’t even sit on the sidelines, because Mark Fuhrman had beaten me half to death in a squabble over Martin Bormann’s bejeweled dildo. I later learned that DeMarcus had trained one of his Pokemon to mimic my form. Nobody except Boogie and the front office knew it wasn’t me coaching.
Boogie: That blobby, shape-shifty Pokemon dude Ditto understood the offense we ran — plus we got along really well — but he had no mind for traps or screens or any defensive thing. The one game we won in that final stretch, I finally said, “Ditto, turn into Greivis Vasquez’s girlfriend and thot it up on the sidelines.” Greivis got so distracted he couldn’t shoot or guard anybody. But you can’t rely on that every game, you know, so the end of the season we really sucked. I didn’t think we could be worse without Coach Smart, but we were.
“I’M HERE TO FUCK SHIT UP”
Outlaw: Boogie spent most of the offseason catching and training Pokemon, so his skills got way beyond my capacity to mentor pretty fast.
Boogie: Once I had a good starter team, held down by Graveler, Machop, Growlithe and Kadabra, I began battling the gym leaders in Kanto. They didn’t know what to make of me.
Brock (Gym Leader, Pewter City): We’re not totally cut off from the world — people here know the NBA, they worship MJ and LeBron— but Sacramento Kings games don’t get broadcast much in Kanto, Johto or even Hoenn Island. So people didn’t know Boogie. When he showed up in Cerulean City after beating me, he went to Misty’s gym, bust right in the door saying, “I’m Boogie from Mobile, Alabama and I’m here to fuck shit up,” well, she freaked. Called the cops.
Boogie: Racism is out of control. Figured it’d be different in another country...
Misty (Gym Leader, Cerulean City): Listen. It’s not because he was…you know? Like, some of my best friends…
Brock: The Cerulean police took him in, but I paid his bail, and after calls from Pokemon League headquarters and [then-Deputy NBA] Commissioner Silver, he got released without charge. I wasn’t there for his battle against Misty, but it was a landslide victory, I’ve heard. Supposedly, Misty cried a lot afterward and Boogie punched a hole in the wall.
Adam Silver (Commissioner, NBA): Acts of intolerance toward any ambassador of the league, which DeMarcus Cousins functioned as during his time in Kanto, will not be ignored. I had an initiative planned to set up expansion franchises in Kanto and Johto, but pulled the funding for it upon hearing of the discrimination DeMarcus experienced. [Pauses pensively] Just think of the perimeter shooting the average Hitmonchan could give a team…
Boogie: I beat the eight Kanto gym leaders, and no one else treated me weird to my face while I roamed the country that offseason, but I was tired of feeling like I didn’t belong. So when I left just before Kings training camp was gonna start, I told Professor Oak I probably wouldn’t be coming back to go for the Pokemon League championship title.
Professor Oak (celebrated Pokemon researcher): Boogie’s potential as a Pokemon Master was obvious right away. So I was devastated when he said he didn’t want to challenge the Kanto Elite Four, but I understood he had a career in the United States he couldn’t abandon, and the Cerulean incident was ugly.
“PAIN IS INEXHAUSTIBLE, DESTINY IS UNAVOIDABLE”
Boogie: The next season started about where the last one left off. People were trying more under Coach Mike [Malone], but like, aside from me, Isaiah [Thomas] and Rudy [Gay], team just didn’t have the range. Won the first game of the season, then lost the next five. Shit like that.
Isaiah Thomas (Kings point guard, 2011–14): Sactown was fun, kind of a mess though. [Laughs] I was raising Pokemon on the side too. My Charmeleon was near unstoppable against most trainers, but Boogie’s Graveler could whoop any of my Pokemon. He didn’t want to battle as often as I did. Rudy had a Scyther he caught on safari and thought was all that, but he’d do stupid shit like battle it against fire-types. [Laughing again] What a dumbass!
Mike Malone (Kings head coach, fall 2013 — fall 2014): I didn’t understand the whole Porkenman thing, but it cheered Boogie up, and you know how frustrated he can get otherwise. After a while he stopped of his own volition.
Boogie: When I gave up training and battling for a few months, this Misdreavus, a crazy ghost Pokemon, started haunting me. Misdreavus isn’t just like some goofy Gastly, either — this one will shit on your whole life if you don’t tame it.
Quincy Acy (Kings power forward, spring 2014 and 2015–16 season): Every time Boogie fouled somebody cause he was mad or yelled in ancient languages, later on he’d say it wasn’t really him acting up, it was this ghost. I was thinking…is this dude serious? I don’t go saying evil spirits control me every time I miss a shot or drink absinthe and start telling people Geraldo Rivera is my dad. I’m just an asshole.
Thomas: No one except me, Rudy and Coach believed that it was a Misdreavus behind all this. I mean…were people who didn’t understand Pokemon really gonna think a ghost threatened to strangle James Harden with his own beard?
Boogie: I couldn’t prove anything. I was miserable. I went back to my hotel after one game in Houston that I fouled out of, got drunk and left the meanest message on Travis’s answering machine, saying I wish he’d never gotten me into goddamn Pokemon in the first place.
Outlaw: [Massive coughing fit] I felt bad. Knew he didn’t mean it, but it still hurt to hear it.
Boogie: I woke up on the hotel roof, thinking I’d blacked out on Patron. Flying in the air above me was this huge motherfucker of a Pokemon. Over 20 feet tall, green scales with a gold pattern along its body and black eyes, hovering with its wings. I’m not used to anything alive being taller than me.
Steven Stone (Steel-type Pokemon Master/ancient Pokemon expert): Rayquaza, the dragon-type Pokemon god of the skies, only appears in times of great necessity. Evidently, it believed that Boogie’s work as a Pokemon trainer wasn’t over. [Extremely prophetic voice] It was just beginning.
Boogie: Rayquaza told me, “PAIN AND SUFFERING ARE INEXHAUSTIBLE, BUT DESTINY IS UNAVOIDABLE.” It had sent the Misdreavus spirit to test me, just like God sent all those horrors to test the resolve of Job back in the day. I knew then that I had to finish the Pokemon League challenge.
BOOGIE COMES TO INDIGO
Oak: I heard that Boogie would visit Indigo Plateau to battle the Pokemon League’s Elite Four of the Kanto branch in August 2014, after his stint with Team USA at the FIBA World Cup tournament. It was wonderful news.
Boogie: At FIBA, people saw me as more than “dude with all the technicals,” which was good, because having uptight sportswriters and white people in general mad at you all the time is upsetting as hell. Except for the Lithuania game and that lunky fuck Valanciunas [spits on floor], everything was gravy. But I’d taken Rayquaza’s advice and was ready to fight the Elite Four.
Thomas: Because Boogie was busy with FIBA training and then the games themselves, he didn’t know that I’d spent the summer in qualifying battles to become an Elite Four member. My Charmeleon had become Charizard and I got these other fire-types, Arcanine, Slugma, Magmar and Torkoal, to round out my team.
Boogie: People thought during that least season Isaiah was with Sacramento that I had beef with him. I didn’t, we got along fine — it was a purely Pokemon-based rivalry.
Thomas: I’d say Boogie was surprised to see me as his first Elite Four challenge, but he got over it quick. [Shakes head] Honestly, I was no match. His determination and poise were impeccable. Once his Graveler hit my Pokemon with that rollout attack, it was a wrap. For the best, though. After I got traded to Boston from Phoenix at next season’s trade deadline, I had no more time for Pokemon anyway.
Stone: When I’m not studying ancient Pokemon or defeating criminal organizations on Hoenn Island or Fargo, North Dakota, you can usually find me hanging out at Indigo, watching the Pokemon League matches. Boogie’s battling style is truly a thing of beauty. What a bond he has with his Pokemon! After every victory, him and his Graveler always dap, and somehow those rock fists never hurt Boogie’s hands. He tore through the Elite Four like they were fucking nothing.
Boogie: The only real challenge of the Elite Four was Lance, the dragon-type trainer. Graveler was only really equipped to fight his hybrid Flying/Dragon Pokemon using Rock Slide — the others wouldn’t go down so easily. Fortunately though, I had found a Lapras in the oceans en route to Indigo, so I had Ice Beams on deck for those dragon asses.
FEAR, TREMBLING AND TRIUMPH
Lance (Dragon-type Pokemon Master/Elite Four, Kanto branch): I wanted to give Boogie the Pokemon League Championship right away. But rules are rules. If a current champion is available and wants to defend his or her title, that champion has the right to do so. If he or she remains unchallenged for a year, the tournament opens again for someone new.
Boogie: They told me the current champion had to be defeated for me to enter the League Hall of Fame. I opened the door to the final arena, and I couldn’t believe my eyes.
Thomas: I was watching the other battles and felt bad, and even worse considering who the current champion was.
Boogie: Mike fucking Dunleavy.
Thomas: Mike fuckin’ Dunleavy.
Oak: Mike fucking Dunleavy. I felt bad for Boogie — having to battle for the championship against a man he hated in his professional life.
Mike Dunleavy (Cavaliers power forward, “scrappy perimeter shooter,” noted dirty player): Every time someone finds out I’m into Pokemon, they’re so surprised. It’s great! [Laughs maniacally] Helps me learn new elbowing techniques on the court.
Boogie: That motherfucker Dunleavy used a bunch of different Pokemon types, like me. Him being who he was, made sense that he had a goddamn Sneasel.
Stone: Sneasel is a powerful hybrid dark/ice-type Pokemon, vicious and without scruples. Makes sense that fucking Dunleavy would have one.
Boogie: I beat Dunleavy’s Blastoise, Golbat, his other fuckboy Pokemon without much struggle. That Sneasel though…man. Ruthless. It got me down to just Graveler, and Sneasel had the type advantage there. I didn’t know what to do.
Stone: And then…something indescribable happened.
Oak: What happened next? Indescribable.
Thomas: I have no words for that.
Boogie: The champion battle was in this enclosed-dome arena, and the top of it burst open. After the rubble dropped and people in the audience were safe, Rayquaza descended through the hole in the ceiling. It said, “I WILL BE YOUR CHAMPION, BOOGIE. FEAR NOT — THIS COWARD DUNLEAVY IS UNWORTHY AND CANNOT WITHSTAND MY POWER.”
Stone: Dunleavy shouts in response, “The other guy had dragons, what makes you so tough?” No respect. Rayquaza answered, “ARE YOU SERIOUS? I JUST BLEW UP THE ROOF WITH A FUCKING HYPER BEAM.” Then it descended into the arena, and before Dunleavy’s Sneasel could attack, Rayquaza used Outrage. If the Outrage technique doesn’t knock out its target in two or three hits, it can be bad for the Pokemon using it. But this is Rayquaza. Dunleavy didn’t have a chance.
Boogie: And then it was over. I was the champion by default.
Oak: There’s no specific provision in the League rules for what happened. But…this intervention was facilitated by a Pokemon that’s one-of-a-kind and viewed as a god by the Pokemon-habitat nation of Hoenn. It may be a god, for all we know. Who are we to challenge that?
Dunleavy: It sucked not being the champion anymore, but now I’m on an NBA team with LeBron, so every life problem of mine is solved. Except the non-gonococcal urethritis.
A WARRIOR OF TWO WORLDS
Boogie: In the years after winning the Pokemon League Championship, I would defend my title against challengers, meet rare Pokemon and weird people — including this annoying-ass teenager walking around with a stupid Pikachu, he was the worst — and become one of the NBA’s leading scorers. In all that time, people still misunderstood me. They’d call me “knucklehead” or “thug.” It hurts my feelings.
George Karl (Kings head coach, spring 2015-spring 2016): Pokemon. Christ. [Shotguns tall can of Tecate beer] Those things cost me more wins than the defense I completely refused to coach. DeMarcus went running back to them every time the team had a little adversity. Could’ve been worse. Imagine if JaVale had gotten into Pokemon when I was still with Denver. [Shotguns another beer]
Boogie: During the last season I barely even took any trips to Kanto, let alone the places I’ve only been briefly, like Sinnoh. Coach Karl was so full of shit.
Acy: Yeah…like I said, I really didn’t like the Pokemon thing, but Coach hated it. Boogie couldn’t so much as run to the vending machine for a Gatorade without Coach talking shit about Boogie’s Pokemon career. “Saw your exhibition battle against Pryce, DeMarcus. Pitiful.” Stuff like that.
Karl: I taunted him a bit! So what? It worked on Gary Payton. [Falls drunkenly from chair]
Rajon Rondo (Kings point guard, 2015–16): I never had the patience for Pokemon training. If I sent out a fire-type Pokemon with Flamethrower and it didn’t work how I wanted, I’d run in the Pokemon arena and try shooting flames out of my mouth. But I could relate to feeling misunderstood, so me and Boogie got close. [Pause] Chicago’s gonna suck.
Oak: Last season the Kings were so close to that eighth seed you couldn’t blame them for trying. The West was so top-heavy! I knew Boogie was too busy with work to train or battle that often. But I’m grateful to have seen his championship match. [Deep sigh] I hope he doesn’t end up in L.A. in two years. Those Buss children will ruin him!
Boogie: Pokemon aren’t the part of my life they once were. But I’ve still got some, including Graveler. He chills on the bench a lot, plays cards with Seth [Curry]. Always cheers and waves a towel whenever I hit a shot. And the day I won gold at the Olympics, I held up my medal and shouted praise to Rayquaza. Everyone looked at me funny, but so what. I saw a flash across the sky and heard off in the distance, “FUCK SERBIA, GO TEAM USA!” And I knew something powerful still believed in me.
