Dwayne The Rock Johnson is a busy man. But, he still found the time in his stacked schedule to pay a visit to a young Los Angeles Lakers team and give them a few words of wisdom. He was in LA before Lakers game vs. Denver Nuggets.
His visit is part of “Genius Talk” series. During these series, Lakers players are visited by successful people from other branches with a goal of giving them advice on life. The Jumanji: Welcome To The Jungle actor spent time with both the players and team owner Jeanie Buss and president of basketball operations Magic Johnson. The Rock left quite an impression on everyone who had the chance to meet him. His piece of advice for players and everyone listening was: “Find your anchor each morning, and live life like your back is up against the wall. Moving Forward is the only option!”
Big inspiration today from @TheRock!
Find your anchor each morning, and live life like your back is up against the wall. Moving Forward is the only option! #LakersGeniusTalks pic.twitter.com/gKyE0G5ZlO
— Los Angeles Lakers (@Lakers) March 13, 2018
Johnson’s earlier connection to Lakers goes through their strength and conditioning coach Gunnar Peterson who is also a trainer to many celebrities.
Now, after spending some time with Lakers young core of players and their staff, Dwayne Johnson probably made a couple of new friends. Everyone was thrilled meeting him from Lakers coach Luke Walton to their star player Kyle Kuzma. Walton said: “He was great, he really was. It was the first time I met him. Great messaging as far as what he’s done in his career from learning from his disappointments and his life experience and how he approaches different situations.”
Kuzma continued by saying: “I think it’s very cool to see successful people they always have a story to tell. It doesn’t matter whether you play basketball or you’re a wrestler or actor. Track and field star. Dreamworks, whatever. You can always take something from someone’s profession and use it in yours.”
After the game vs. Nuggets, in which Kuzma was the best player on the court and played through ankle injury Walton concluded that Kyle was so good thanks to Dwayne Johnson: “Maybe it was The Rock that motivated him to fight through the injury like that.”
The one that was also happy after the time spent together was Johnson. After his visit was over, he tweeted that he saw a lot of “hungry eyes” in that locker-room.
The practice of having celebrities and successful people from other branches visit Lakers will only continue after Dwayne Johnson. Before him, there were names such as Elon Musk and Kendrick Lamar.
Thank you @TheRock for stopping by and giving our @Lakers players an inspirational message before taking the court tonight. #LakersGeniusTalks pic.twitter.com/bwB9J57hRU
— Earvin Magic Johnson (@MagicJohnson) March 13, 2018