Sixers Press Releases

Donyell Marshall Conference Call Transcript - Walter Reed Army Medical Center

On how it went today visiting the Walter Reed Army Medical Center
It went well; I think it was a very good-eye opener for myself and for my teammates. We complain about playing time or plays and things like that, but to come here and see these guys who have got parts of their lives taken away from them and stuff, I think it’s a very mind-opening experience for us.

On how long they were there and what they did
We were here for about an hour, we went around and visited the soldiers. We got a chance to ask them what their injuries were; a lot of them were really excited and willing to share with us what happened. One guy even explained to us how the vehicle got hit and everything. We met about 10 to 15 different soldiers, females and males, a lot of them were very upbeat. A lot of them knew who we were and that was good, it was a very good experience for them.

On if it is hard to understand how upbeat they are after suffering devastating injuries
Oh definitely, you have to understand that some of these people have been walking around, running, jumping, jogging, working out and now suddenly they can’t walk anymore. They can’t play with their kids the way they want to play with their kids anymore. Some had kids who are two and three years old. Some of them will never be able to go outside and play football with them or baseball.

On the perspective it gives you, going to a place like that, and what people take for granted
A lot of us wake up every morning and complain about our ankle hurting or a knee hurting or a finger hurting, and things like that, or how I have to go to practice today and things like that. When you sit back and look at it, we wouldn’t even be here to do a lot of those things if it weren’t for these people (members of US Armed Forces) sitting here. They go and give their lives up and parts of their bodies up, in order for us to be able to do what we do everyday. When you sit back and look at it, you go in there and appreciate what they do. You look at a guy who just lost his leg for us to be able to go play basketball; those are the things that I think makes you sit back and see the things that you take for granted. Basketball is a privilege, it’s not something that we are supposed to do or we have to do, it’s a privilege we have to play this game.

On after seeing these soldiers, if it helps take away the sting of the loss last night at New Jersey and if it puts the loss in perspective
Oh I think it definitely takes away the sting of last night, I think if you look at the perspective of last night and how we lost that game the way we did. It hurts, it was a big loss, but when you come in here and see what these people lost, you look back at the key word (game) that you said. The “game” last night. It’s a game. Yes we put a lot of emphasis into and the fans put a lot of emphasis into it, but when you come back and come to an eye opener like today’s, you can really put that shot (Devin Harris’ game-winner) out of your head, and go ahead and focus on the next part of the stage which is tomorrow. At least for today we made people happier, that was more important than the people that would have been happy if we had won or lost yesterday.