“Story Time With Jalen Rose: The Mansion” is not about Jalen using his NBA paychecks to buy a dream home for himself and his family. “Story Time With Jalen Rose: The Mansion” is about Jalen using his NBA paychecks to buy a gaudy, diamond-studded bracelet that had roughly the same price tag as a mansion. Like the rest of us, Jalen was a bystander to the ’90s jewelry arms race, watching music videos and flipping through pages of magazines merely marveling at the hip-hopulence before him … until he got drafted and started making NBA money.
Today, Jalen Rose is the responsible, measured, charter-school-founding role model you enjoy on Grantland and ESPN. “Story Time With Jalen Rose: The Mansion” is not about the Jalen Rose of today. “Story Time with Jalen Rose: The Mansion” is about a child wishing he had the finer things in life, a young man purchasing all of them, and then an adult realizing that they can’t be bought.
(Special thanks to Jalen’s Three Tier Entertainment, Smash5 animation, and the Grantland Channel staff.)