Appears in SLAM Issue 237. Published on April 8, 2022 at slamonline.com
It wasn’t until Russ Smith found himself surrounded by cherry trees, waterfalls and miles of bright-green foliage among the Fujian province in China that he began to truly appreciate the little things.
Maybe it was the 62 points he averaged in China’s National Basketball League, or the 81 he dropped with Luoyang in 2017. But mostly, as Russ tells us over Zoom, it was the time he spent alone that allowed him the needed headspace to fall in love with a new craft, bourbon.
“It allowed me to really take in what I was doing and just be happy again. My first three years as a pro, yeah, I was getting paid pretty well, but I was unhappy,” he says. “I want to be respected for my craft. And I think that means more to me, my craft being appreciated, my creativity being appreciated.”
After captivating the college basketball world at Louisville, the 47th overall pick in the 2014 NBA Draft bounced around from the Pelicans and Grizzlies to the G League—and even a short stint in Turkey—before reinventing himself once again in China’s NBL.
The 32-game season over the summer was coupled with an immense amount of downtime, in which Russ thought to himself, When I get home, what am I gonna work on?
As someone who meticulously mastered each craft he fell in love with, the 6-0 guard’s passion for creating, innovating and acquiring new skills blossomed into Mr. and Mrs. Bourbon, founded, owned and operated by Mr. Russdiculous himself. (READ THE FULL STORY HERE.)