By KL Chouinard
"Yeah, I'm never going to retire," Jeff Teague said via phone from Indianapolis.
With that said, the basketball world might never know when Teague will officially call it a wrap as an NBA player, but if he is indeed done, he went out on top. In April of last season, he signed as a free agent with Milwaukee and went on to appear in 21 regular-season games and 16 more in the playoffs. When the Bucks vanquished the Suns in Game 6 to win the NBA Finals, Teague had the ultimate mic-drop. "I just got an 'A' on the group project," he said in a self-effacing moment as he bolted to the locker room. "I feel great. I feel phenomenal."
[[{"fid":"135684","view_mode":"square_box","fields":{"format":"square_box","alignment":"left"},"link_text":null,"type":"media","field_deltas":{"2":{"class":"media-element file-square-box media-wysiwyg-align-center","data-delta":"2","format":"square_box","alignment":"left"},"4":{"format":"square_box","alignment":"left"}},"attributes":{"class":"media-element file-square-box media-wysiwyg-align-left","data-delta":"4"}}]]If he won his NBA title at the end of his career in a supporting role, Teague still had the kind of pro career that could have easily seen him win a title in his prime. Before he got a ring with the Bucks, the 6-foot-3 point guard made nine consecutive postseasons at the start of his career with the Hawks, Pacers and Timberwolves, respectively, before coming back to the Hawks once again. He ranks fifth on Atlanta’s all-time assists list (2,771), seventh in steals (632) and 11th in three-point field goals made (430). He also earned a spot on the Eastern Conference All-Star Team during the Hawks' 60-win season of 2014-15.
I once asked the three point guards from that team if they wanted to be NBA head coaches someday. Shelvin Mack said that he did. He is currently a college basketball analyst with CBS Sports. Dennis Schröder said that he would rather opt for the business side of things, and while he is still plying his trade for the Houston Rockets, he also bought a German pro basketball team in his hometown in May 2020.
When asked that same question seven years ago, Teague toed a line that hinted that he loved basketball too much to leave it, even if he preferred a role behind the scenes. "I'll be a coach, but I don't want to be a head coach."
As it turns out, Jeff Teague is back for a third stint with the franchise that drafted him. You heard that right: Jeff Teague is now a scout for the Atlanta Hawks.
"I've been all around the world watching basketball," he said, "so I've got a pretty good eye for who I think can play at a certain level."
Teague planted the seed for the idea the second time the Hawks acquired him via trade in January 2020.
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"When I was there for my second tenure with the Hawks, I told Travis (Schlenk) that I wanted to look into working in the front office," Teague said. "(I asked if) once I got done playing if he would be open to trying to help me out. And he told me when I first got there that first day that when I was done playing, if he was still there that he would look out for me. So I just reached out and he kept his word."
Teague's championship run took him all the way into late July and he had to make a tough decision in a short offseason. And he knew that, all other factors being equal, he would really prefer to be back home in Indiana.
"I was debating if I was going to continue playing or not. I had an injury that I wasn't really sure if I had to have surgery or not. I didn't want to go through with the surgery, so I was like, 'I don't think I'm going to try to play this year.' And I just started looking at different things."
To be clear, the NBA has scouts for a number of purposes. Some scout NBA games of future opponents to help with game planning. Others scout NCAA games to help their teams prepare for the NBA Draft. Teague falls squarely in the latter group, in large part, because he wants to stay close to home.
"(The Hawks) gave me an opportunity to get my feet wet in it and do it regionally."
Teague's region has a lot of basketball. He has the Big Ten at his doorstep in Indiana and Purdue. He can ride down the street to see Butler and the Big East. A tank of gas can get him to a lot of places.
"I go everywhere. I go to Kentucky. I go to Louisville. All over the Midwest really. Being based out of Indianapolis, there are a lot of colleges in the surrounding areas in a two-hour window that you can get to to see a lot of college games from different conferences. It's a good location for scouting."
One trip that he didn't make was the one to get his championship ring. He got his in Indy. The limelight was never his thing.
"They had some people come up and handed it to me to take some pictures and stuff. I'm pretty much out of the way. I never really wanted the highlights and stuff. I just wanted to do my job and stay out of the way."
Looking back now on his group project quip, Teague somehow laughed as anxiously as his low-key demeanor could muster.
"I got a lot of love for that and I got some criticism. Some people said I wasn't happy or whatever, and I was like, 'I was very happy. I just thought it was very fitting.'"
What is also fitting is that Jeff Teague is a Hawk once more. He is a man with two homes.