M. Night Shyamalan says JJ Redick plays like he's ‘at war' with himself

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After pouring in 26 points during the Sixers’ 118-112 OT win over the Minnesota Timberwolves to close out a three-game road trip, JJ Redick took a brief break to drop off his latest podcast.

This edition’s guest was Timberwolves star center Karl-Anthony Towns. The two touched on a myriad of topics, perhaps the most interesting of which was a look at the inner workings of the mind of an NBA player.

Towns explained the origin of “Karlito,” an imaginary friend he developed at Kentucky that he talks to on the court for encouragement, to vent frustrations, calm nerves, etc.

That’s when Redick shared a story of one famous Sixers fan dissecting his own demeanor on the court.

“We have these breakfast meetings with the Sixers and this past week the movie director M. Night Shyamalan, who did Signs and Unbreakable [and] a bunch of other movies, he came and spoke to our team for about an hour,” Redick said.

“This is a guy who reads emotions. That’s what he does for a living. He tries to get actors to portray something and have it show up on screen and then sort of elicit an emotion. So he’s going through a few guys on our team, he’s a season-ticket holder of the Sixers [and] he sits courtside, so he’s going through and he’s talking about JoJo (Joel Embiid) and he’s talking about Ben (Simmons) and different things and he gets to me and he says to me, ‘When I watch you play, you’re at war with yourself.’ And I thought to myself that’s really (bleeped) up that he would say that in front of the team, but the other part of me was like maybe there’s some truth to that.”

Apparently it’s far from the first time someone told Redick he was inside his own head on the floor. The veteran sharpshooter said his father noticed those tendencies early on in his playing days.

“My dad knows me really well,” Redick said. “He knows how messed up I am in the head. He used to make me write head case on my shoes in high school. Some of my actual career highs in the NBA, as I’m setting career highs 27, 29, 31 [points], whenever I get to that level, I would always miss free throws. He would text me after the game and be like I know all you’re thinking about are the missed free throws. And I would be like, you hit it.”

Redick and Towns went on to discuss NBA unicorns, playing for Tom Thibodeau, the big man’s OCD tendencies and much more. Check out the entire podcast right here.

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