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Remove items from your saved list<\/a> to add more.<\/p>\n AAA<\/p>\n DeMarcus \u201cBoogie\u201d Cousins was known for his fiery demeanour over more than a decade in the NBA and there were few players who fired him up more than Australian centre Andrew Bogut.<\/p>\n The pair would trade elbows, bumps and trash talk during their many battles, and one meeting in 2015 finished with Cousins thrown out of the game against Bogut, Stephen Curry and the Golden State Warriors.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n This week, Cousins is in Bogut\u2019s home city as he appears at the NBA House event in Port Melbourne starting on Thursday, and while it\u2019s not known if Cousins and Bogut, who were later teammates at the Warriors, might meet up, the Alabama native was quick to recall their battles.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was completely unfair because, as talented as Bogut is, he had that [star-studded Golden State] team behind him so they usually went in his favour,\u201d Cousins recalled.<\/p>\n \u201cBut we definitely had some competitive match-ups, some intense ones, a lot of trash talk and a lot of physical play \u2013 y\u2019all know Bogut, he\u2019s crazy as hell, and I\u2019m the same way on the court, so there was some good, intense battles but, nonetheless, very fun at the same time.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve got a lot of respect for Bogut for what he brought to the game, to the league and how he represented Australia. He has my ultimate respect.\u201d<\/p>\n Cousins and Atlanta Hawks centre Jock Landale will headline the NBA House events at the Timber Yard in Port Melbourne from May 14-17, with organisers hoping local fans will make the most of NBA play-off viewing parties, music guests and other activities during daytime and nighttime sessions.<\/p>\n Utah Jazz star Jaren Jackson jnr was going to headline the event with Cousins but withdrew on Wednesday following the death of his long-time teammate Brandon Clarke, age 29.<\/p>\n Jackson and Clarke played together for the Memphis Grizzles. The cause of Clarke\u2019s death is yet to be determined.<\/p>\n The NBA also lost another former player, Jason Collins, 47, from brain cancer.<\/p>\n In 2013, Collins became the first active athlete in any of the US\u2019 four major sporting leagues to come out as gay<\/a> and Cousins paid tribute to both players after arriving in Melbourne on Wednesday.<\/p>\n \u201cComing into the NBA as a young player, I got to play against Collins \u2013 he was definitely a bruiser and he\u2019s one of the guys who welcomed me to the league,\u201d Cousins recalled on Wednesday.<\/p>\n \u201cI spent some time with his [twin] brother Jarron in Golden State as he was one of my coaches there. It\u2019s very unfortunate.<\/p>\n \u201cBrandon Clarke is a younger guy than me. I didn\u2019t have much of a relationship with him, but he\u2019s part of the NBA family and I wish those guys\u2019 families and friends my condolences and am praying for them.\u201d<\/p>\n Cousins was at a similar NBA House event in New Delhi, India last week and impressed the locals and former Australian cricketer and Kolkata KR assistant coach Shane Watson with his cricketing skills.<\/p>\n He also visited the MCG this week and was blown away by the size of the stadium – he hopes to get to an AFL match before he heads home.<\/p>\n \u201cI got to get to a game at that crazy stadium,\u201d Cousins exclaimed on Wednesday<\/p>\n \u201cJust walking out on that empty stadium gave me chills. To hear what a crowd would be like there would be unbelievable.\u201d<\/p>\n Cousins has travelled the world since his NBA career finished in 2022, playing short stints in Taiwan, Puerto Rico and Mongolia, including winning a title with the Taiwan Beer Leopards in 2024.<\/p>\n He had NBL and Euro League clubs chasing him too, but he turned them down.<\/p>\n He could afford to be selective, though. He made around US$94 million (AUD $130m), before tax, during his NBA years.<\/p>\n \u201cOnce I left the NBA, I hit a certain point in my personal life where, a lot of times, it came down to me picking where I played based on my own convenience,\u201d Cousins said.<\/p>\n \u201cThe length of schedule, travel schedule and things of that nature, so a lot of opportunities I turned down because it wasn\u2019t suitable for my personal life.<\/p>\n \u201cBut I\u2019m a huge fan of the league, and I watch from afar. It\u2019s a good soap opera on top of good basketball.\u201d<\/p>\n Cousins played with Bryce Cotton when he was in Puerto Rico, and he\u2019s also friends with former NBL import (and ex-NBA big man) Montrezl Harrell, so those connections resulted in him following the \u201csoap opera\u201d of the NBL via social media.<\/p>\n \u201cIt drew me more into the league,\u201d Cousins said.<\/p>\n \u201cThey will pop up on my social media feed. I\u2019ve got a lot of friends playing over there, and I remember there was a little back and forth between Kendric Davis and Montrezl, there is always something, and I\u2019m like, \u2018Man, this is kind of entertaining\u2019, and, on top of that, it\u2019s really high-level basketball.\u201d<\/p>\n Cousins spoke from India, where he headlined an NBA House event in Delhi, and he admits, since leaving the NBA, he\u2019s been surprised how widespread NBA fans are.<\/p>\n \u201cWe were walking in an airport, I think it was Hong Kong, and a random person walked by and is like \u2018DeMarcus, what are you doing here?\u2019,\u201d Cousins said with a laugh.<\/p>\n \u201cIt put things in perspective for me. I\u2019m known throughout the world in places where you wouldn\u2019t think I would be a thing \u2013 literally everywhere I\u2019ve been, there has been a fan base.\u201d<\/p>\n News, results and expert analysis from the weekend of sport sent every Monday. Sign up for our Sport newsletter<\/a>.<\/p>\n Save<\/p>\n You have reached your maximum number of saved items.<\/p>\n Remove items from your saved list<\/a> to add more.<\/p>\n![\"Andrew](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/b6b1f38391eda3b50fb05bce6e48b4f6a65d5e60.jpeg\")
Andrew Bogut and DeMarcus Cousins tangle in 2015.Getty Images<\/p>\n![\"Sydney](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/b4c7828a21c66403685e1bd0058cf04eded303d9.jpeg\")
Sydney Kings star Kendric Davis and Adelaide 36er Bryce Cotton at the NBL MVP Awards in February.Getty Images<\/p>\n![\"Roy](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/1771772598_238_4b120f01bfcad445ac4e167fbd2673f2c54d0a24.png\")
Roy Ward<\/a> is a sports writer, live blogger and breaking news journalist. He’s been writing for The Age since 2010.Connect via X<\/a> or email<\/a>.From our partners<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Save You have reached your maximum number of saved items. Remove items from your saved list to add…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":668143,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[557],"tags":[64,63,590,85],"class_list":["post-668142","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668142","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=668142"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668142\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/668143"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=668142"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=668142"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=668142"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}