In August 2010, when the Hornets traded for Trevor Ariza and became his fifth team in seven NBA seasons, Mike Malone, then a New Orleans assistant, called Ariza to say how excited he was to reconnect. Malone was a Knicks assistant when New York drafted Ariza in 2004, a relationship that ended 18 months later after New York's coach, Larry Brown, labeled Ariza "delusional."
Malone had spent much of the summer before Ariza's rookie season inside the gym at Westchester High School in Los Angeles, where Ariza was a local legend, teaching a raw and gangly teenager the basics of NBA basketball: defensive slides, ball-handling drills, holding his follow-through.