Antoine Walker

Antoine Walker was one of those unforgettable NBA players of the late 90s and early last decade. Now he is mostly remembered for his lightness when it came to taking any possible shot, one of those players who "never felt that a shot was difficult enough not to take it" and one who, when asked why he took so many three-pointers, replied: "because there is no four-point line". But beyond that, Walker (number 6 pick in the 1996 draft) was three-time All Star, champion in 2006 with the Miami Heat and a member of the best Celtics seen between the golden 80s and the arrival of Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen. In 2002, he played the Eastern Conference Finals alongside Paul Pierce: he averaged 22.1 points, while the small forward averaged 26.1 points and continued with the Celtics until becoming a champion in 2008.

Only in his NBA contracts (he ended up between the Timberwolves and the Grizzlies in 2007 and 2008), he earned over $108 million... and less than two years after leaving the NBA, in May 2010, he declared bankruptcy with assets of $4.3 million and debts of $12.7 million. In the summer of 2013, and after having to sell even his championship ring, he declared that he had left all his debts behind and was moving forward, something that many other American athletes do not achieve after having earned a good amount of millions.

Now Walker speaks openly about how a player who earns over $100 million reaches that situation: "I thought I had everything figured out. It's a sad story and many others go through it: you work hard and then lose everything in two or three years. You develop a prohibitive, unsustainable lifestyle," says a former player who was arrested for signing fake checks to pay off, in Las Vegas, gambling debts that amounted to over $800,000: "I couldn't say no to my family or my childhood friends. I gave them everything they asked for. During my career, I was like an ATM for them."

So now he tries to prevent others from going through what he has gone through: "I give two fundamental pieces of advice. Learn to say no to your family and close friends, and say it many times. And live life to the fullest but never stop thinking about the future."