Exclusive | Knicks guard Jose Alvarados dad reveals what his son gave him after team won first title in 53 years
After the Knicks clinched their first NBA title in 53 years, guard Jose Alvarado Jr.invited his dad to the locker room, where an epic merch drop took place.“He gave me his whole uniform, his jersey, shorts, sneakers, headband, the champion shirt.
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.He said, ‘Pa, hold this.
It’s wet, but put it on,'” Alvarado Sr., 49, recalled.The proud dad, a Brooklyn electrician who raised his son in the Roberto Clemente projects on Wythe and Division Avenues in Williamsburg, said he “cried like a baby” after the historic win.“He’s from New York and to win in New York with his team, it was just amazing,” he said.Alvarado Sr., a Crown Heights native, was only 19 when his son was born.He wisely packed his child’s schedule with sports to keep him out of trouble.“Williamsburg now, it’s not the same, but when I was growing up, it was drug-infested, gang-infested, a lot of killing.
So I was trying to keep him out of the streets,” said Jose Sr.Junior’s early sport of choice was football, and there were no tackle football leagues for kids in Brooklyn, so his dad would take him two and a half hours by train and bus to a pee-wee league on Staten Island.“I came out of work at 1:30 p.m., got home at 3, got on the bus to the R train, and then back on a bus to go over the bridge, and then walk from Hylan Boulevard,” said Alvarado, a union electrician with Local 3.When Jose Jr.was 8, the family moved to Flushing, Queens.
Young Jose played basketball at P.S./M.S.200 and was on six streetball teams — ultimately getting noticed by Nick Sanchez, the assistant coach of the storied Christ the King High School team.
He invited him to their basketball camp.“I said, ‘Yeah, how much is it?'” Jose Sr.recalled.
“He goes, ‘It’s about $225 a week.I said, ‘Alright, I’ll take a week.’“When I went to pick him up for the last day, Coach Joe Arbatello came to me and was like, ‘Can we keep him here for another two weeks?’ I said, ‘As long as it�...