"I wasn't always perfect, nor was the situation, but I became the brunt of the blame there," Jackson said. "Everything bad that happened, I was the scapegoat. I'm taking all this blame, and I'm wondering: 'How am I supposed to change it all here, make an impact, in eight minutes a game?' Everybody is jumping down my neck, and it gets annoying when I'm supposed to have this great impact playing so little this season.
"All of a sudden, I'm the bad locker room guy. I'm the problem…"
Jackson was talking through the tears now, trying to make you understand why he felt so liberated, why he was so thrilled to climb aboard that flight to Detroit on Friday morning.
"The whole time, I was honest," he said. "I wanted to start. And then, I became the problem in the locker room to people who have never been in our locker room. …I mean, come on.
"Coming here, this is such a weight off my shoulders, a new beginning. To come play with a new group of guys, to start to change this perception of me, I can't wait to get to the arena tonight and meet them all."
And then, the tears started again, and Reggie Jackson apologized and hoped you understood why he had been moved to such emotion. This is important to him, his life's work, and he's beyond grateful to Van Gundy for the belief in his character, his talents, his tomorrow.
"It wasn't easy this year, to go to bed at night and think about how you're considered the problem and each and every day, people testing your character. …I couldn't walk last year, couldn't go to sleep without taking pills for my back and I gave them everything I had there.
"And then, to have people tarnish your name … it just means so much to have someone finally believe in you. I'm Stan's point guard now, and I want that responsibility. He can cuss me out in the film room, do whatever he needs to do for this team and me, because at least now I have control on the court. That's all I ever wanted."
"This is my shot now," he said on Friday afternoon, on his way out of the hotel and on to the Palace of Auburn Hills. The tears wouldn't stop coming. Finally, he had a basketball team, had a franchise to call his own, and this was everything Reggie Jackson has wanted in the NBA