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Amid the farewell letter from former Golden State Warriors center Kevon Looney, the 10-year veteran shared the most memorable moment of his tenure and sent a special tribute to the games played at Oracle Arena. Before moving to the Chase Center in San Francisco, the Warriors’ former arena, Oracle Arena, was home to four of Golden State’s previous five championships (1975, 2015, 2017, 2018).
Looney says it was a place where he grew from a 19-year-old rookie to an NBA champion, per The Players’ Tribune.
“How do you say goodbye to a place that practically raised you in a lot of ways? A place that saw you go from a boy to a man? A place where you’ve made so many lifelong friends and experienced some of the best times imaginable? I have so much to be grateful and appreciative for over the past 10 years,” Looney penned. “This place, it’s truly changed my life forever.
“In some ways, I feel like I’ve been in the Bay so long that lots of people kinda forget that back when I got drafted by the Warriors, I was barely out of high school. Still just a kid, 19 years old.”
Looking back, Looney says he was the luckiest kid in the world. He was a teenager joining the Warriors dynasty while playing in an unforgettable environment.
“And look, Joe, don’t get me wrong. I love Chase Center. It’s great. Beautiful. I loved playing there. First-class everything. Don’t @ me. But Oracle? All those memories? Oakland? Those crowds? That NOISE? Oracle’s undefeated with me, for sure. It’s a shrine,” Looney adds. “Definitely the best arena I ever played in as far as a crowd goes, an energy. Playing there … it sounds weird to say it, but it was almost like that place was actually alive.
“Like it had a heartbeat. A personality. Like it was a living, breathing thing.”
Kevon Looney reflects with Warriors fans
After former Warriors center Kevon Looney signed a two-year deal with the Pelicans, he couldn’t believe young NBA players would never get to experience the Warriors’ old arena in his tribute to Oracle Arena.
“It was like nothing I’d ever experienced before. Beyond loud. And then everyone would hit that WAAAAAARRIOOOOOORS!!! chant and, I mean … I’d get goosebumps,” Looney said. “At some points, it was so live that I honestly remember kinda wishing I could’ve been in the stands, like up in the nosebleeds screaming my head off with the rest of the die-hards up there.”
Looney agreed to a two-year, $16 million contract with the Pelicans.
