Playing Pro Basketball, Attending NBA Training Camp & Pro Workouts, and Breaking Stereotypes with Benji Kil

The Asian American Athlete

On this episode, host Justin Hong interviews former pro basketball player Benji Kil about his athletic journey and basketball career.
During this episode, Benji talks about his family’s background, growing up in Michigan, and playing a bunch of sports in his childhood (2:09), finding basketball when he was living in Los Angeles pursuing child acting, and the early days of his basketball career (6:27).
Benji discusses his high school basketball career (11:03), his experiences with college basketball recruiting, and his pursuit of a college basketball career (21:09) before walking away from the game to focus on bodybuilding (28:48).
He discusses when he started thinking about getting back into basketball again (31:45), a workout that he participated in for the Cleveland Cavaliers’ Developmental League (now known as the NBA G-League) team that built buzz for him (37:15), his pro basketball experiences, including playing overseas in multiple countries and also attending training camp with the Orlando Magic (42:13), what he’s up to now with basketball training and running his own AAU team (51:14), and much more.

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