Before the league adapted the one-and-done rule, some of the best young talents in the NBA were coming straight out of high school. One of the all-time greats that took this exact same path is none other than Hall of Famer Tracy McGrady.

McGrady recently took a quick stroll down memory lane, as he shared the very reason why he opted to go straight to the NBA instead of spending a year or two in college.

“Time goes by, I'm playing my season, my name's getting stronger, I'm sitting in my coach's office. He's like, ‘I know you want to go to Kentucky, I know you want to go to college but after I tell you this you're going to forget all about it,'” he recalled on a recent guesting on the “All the Smoke” podcast with Stephen Jackson and Matt Barnes, via Chris Fisher of 247Sports. “He's like, ‘I got a $12 million deal for you.' I said, ‘from who?' He said, ‘from Adidas. They want to offer you six years, $12 million.' My college dream went out the window and that was it.”

Unsurprisingly, the almighty dollar played a huge role in Tracy McGrady's decision. At the end of the day, this was/is pretty much the exact same reason 90% — if not more — of young players decide to skip college and join the NBA straight away.

Most of these youngsters also come from a life of poverty, so it is completely understandable why they would jump at the opportunity to sign a deal for an amount of money they never could have imagined in their wildest dreams. As McGrady said above, everything else goes out the window.