SACRAMENTO, Calif. – The New Orleans Pelicans’ players are two wins away from winning $500,000 each and a championship in the NBA’s inaugural in-season tournament. To be specific, Pelicans guard Jose Alvarado is two wins away from winning a championship and his three daughters are two wins away from winning $500,000 for their future from their “girl dad.”
“I will not touch the money,” Alvarado told Andscape. “My financial team will act like I never made it. It’s not for me. It’s not in my hands. I’m living my life. They got to live their lives and I don’t want them to struggle at all. This is the first time I’m telling everybody. I just know what I want to do.
“I ain’t struggling now. I’m blessed to be financially good. So why do I need to add that extra load? Let that grow and let them have it. I ain’t going to see it. I promise. I ain’t going to touch it. It’s a great opportunity to do that. A lot of people aren’t that fortunate, but I am. I just want this game to keep me blessed and I don’t want my kids to worry about nothing.”
New Orleans arrived in California on Sunday packed for a long trip, expecting to beat the Sacramento Kings and go to Las Vegas for the in-season tournament semifinals and championship. The Pelicans advanced to the tournament semifinals with a 127-117 victory over the Kings on Monday night before traveling to Las Vegas on Tuesday. The Pelicans play the Los Angeles Lakers on Thursday night in the semifinals. The tournament finals are on Saturday night.
“We’re excited. We don’t know what is going to happen next. We got to get excited again. It’s one of those [unique] feelings, but we have to keep winning,” Alvarado said.
Each player gets $500,000 for winning the title, $200,000 for second place and $100,000 for reaching the semifinals. A $500,000 prize won’t alter the world for Pelicans stars Brandon Ingram, CJ McCollum and Zion Williamson, who will earn more than $30 million each this season. But for Alvarado, it’s a significant financial boost because he makes $1.8 million this season and had earned $3 million total in his NBA career before this season.
“I need all that. I need every penny I can count on,” Alvarado said. “The money is great, that’s why you want to keep winning. We want to keep going higher and higher. So, we big on that. Everybody is big on that. Everybody wants to win the game because we love the game. But that’s a big part at the end of the day.
“Uncle Sam gets me [with taxes]. So just with this, it is a pleasure. Obviously, it’s an opportunity to make more money in a game that I love. This game is bigger than people think it is for a guy like me. We can get extra money that we can count on. I make good money, but I don’t make Zion, B.I. [Ingram], CJ money. Not everybody makes that type of money. But to add to our check is pretty cool.”
On the tournament prize money, Pelicans coach Willie Green said: “It’s important. It changes your ability to be a blessing to yourself and your family. So, you want to go after that and give yourself a chance to win that.”
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Winning the NBA in-season tournament is far from easy, since it began with all 30 teams. And nothing has ever come easy on Alvarado’s road to the NBA.
Alvarado was born on April 12, 1998, in Brooklyn, New York, to Puerto Rican parents Odilia Martinez and Jose Alvarado Sr. The Alvarados raised their family in the Roberto Clemente Plaza Apartments, a five‐building publicly financed low‐and middle‐income housing project in the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn. The New York Times reported on Dec. 21, 1976, that more than 8,000 Hasidic Jews demonstrated at City Hall for two hours to protest the construction of Roberto Clemente Plaza because it was to be occupied by a majority Black and Puerto Rican families in the heart of the Hasidic triangle in Williamsburg.
“We were a low- to middle-class family,” Alvarado, 25, said. “But I’m grateful. My dad, my parents did the best they could for me. I had nice shoes. I had clothes in my back. I had food on my table, so I would never complain about that. And I’m blessed to be in a situation that I never thought I could be in … The beautiful and the challenging of the neighborhood go together. I saw people just trying to make it out of the struggle.
“I got a whole bunch of cousins and families, uncles, aunts that still live out there and we shared the same moments. When we grew up, it wasn’t about the struggle. We had so many memories growing up in that place. I grew up in Roberto Clemente … And I got family members at each floor. So, it was all one household. No complaints. I love the background I have. I love how I grew up and I love all the struggles, all the happy moments, all the bad moments.”
Alvarado was a star basketball player at Christ the King Regional High School in Queens. The 2017 TimesLedger Player of the Year was a three-star recruit who ESPN ranked as the 179th player in the Class of 2017. The 2021 Atlantic Coast Conference Defensive Player of the Year led Georgia Tech to the ACC Tournament championship in 2021. The 6-foot, 179-pound Alvarado averaged 15.5 points and 3.5 assists as a senior during the 2020-21 season.
Despite his early basketball success, the undersized Alvarado said that he fell victim to his naysayers.
“I had a whole bunch of people tell me in my face that I wasn’t going to be good enough or I wasn’t going to be here. And it sucks because I believed them at some point in my life and cried,” Alvarado said. “My dad and my mom were my biggest fans and they kept me in the right situation. And regardless of what people were saying, I believed them. And I’m glad those people said it to me because I think I play better when someone tells me I can’t do nothing.
“It is a gift and a curse because when they tell me I can’t do nothing, it either is going to get me in trouble or it’s going to make them look at me like, ‘Oh, he got it in him.’ So just keep going, keep your head up high and excuse my language, f— those people. Just be you at all times.”
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The 2021 NBA draft took place at Barclays Center in Brooklyn on July 29, 2021, not far from where Alvarado grew up. Since Alvarado doubted he would be drafted, he had a big party at home with family and friends instead. His instinct was correct as he went undrafted but felt like he was after the Pelicans agreed in principle to sign him to a two-way contract.
“I remember everybody that got picked in front of me,” Alvarado said. “I remember me worrying about what’s going to happen, but my name didn’t get called. But when I got a phone call and they said I would be on a two-way, I celebrated like I was the No. 1 player selected.”
The Pelicans officially signed Alvarado to a two-way contract on Aug. 18, 2021. New Orleans quickly went from expecting him to spend most of his rookie season with G League Birmingham Squadron to instead making him a deserved fixture on the Pelicans’ roster.
Alvarado’s defense, energy and hustle quickly made him a Pelicans fan favorite, created the nickname “Grand Theft Alvarado” and drew the ire of NBA stars Joel Embiid and Chris Paul during games. Alvarado averaged 6.1 points, 1.8 rebounds, 2.7 assists and 1.3 steals in 15.3 minutes per contest during the 2021-21 season. He also led all rookies that season in assist/turnover ratio (3.88), steal/turnover ratio (1.79), and plus/minus (+163) while ranking second among all rookies with 1.3 steals per game.
On March 28, 2022, Alvarado’s two-way deal was converted into a standard four-year, $6.5 million contract.
“He has an incredible story,” Green said. “We signed him to a two-way and the plan was for him to be in Birmingham playing for our G League team most of the season. Maybe play a few games with us. But immediately his leadership, his energy, his impact on our team was felt. [Pelicans president] David Griffin and I were talking about how we make this guy a part of our team going forward. To [Alvarado’s] credit, he has done all the work.
“These are the stories we love hearing about. A guy who makes it over all the odds and is doing it the right way. After the first couple of games, you can feel his impact right away. He just gives you 110% of what he has.”
Alvarado showed the Pelicans he could be more than just a defensive player when he scored 38 points against the Denver Nuggets on Dec. 4, 2022. On Feb. 28, the Pelicans announced that the 2023 Rising Stars Challenge MVP had a stress reaction in his right tibia that ultimately would end his 2022-23 season prematurely. After missing the start of this season, Alvarado has averaged 7.3 points and 2.0 assists in eight games. He had 9 points, 3 rebounds, 2 steals and 2 blocks in the quarterfinal win that punched the ticket to Las Vegas.
While Alvarado has proved he belongs in the NBA, he isn’t letting his guard down.
“I’m still fighting to this day,” Alvarado said. “Obviously, I have had some great moments. I’m blessed and I am comfortable, and I should be here. But I have to keep fighting. I had a tough injury. Everybody thinks it’s all sweet, but when you get injured, you step back for a while and you got to reset. So, I’m still fighting. I got a lot to prove and I’m excited. Everybody always caught me that out.
“I don’t feel like I’m replaceable, but because I feel like me, Jose is just one-of-a-kind human being. But man, there are a lot of a great basketball players out here. I got to stay locked in. I can’t relax. I ain’t growing no more. I ain’t getting more athletic. So, I just got to keep doing what I do best and keep on showing that I belong here.”
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Alvarado has two young daughters with his partner Flor Castillo in Nazanin, 3, and Brooklyn, 1, and a stepdaughter, Aliyah Mecord, 14. The $500,000 prize money would account for about 36.6% of what Jose Alvarado makes this season. Alvarado said he still recalls staring at his first NBA check and sending a picture of it to his mother. He says he has received financial advice from McCollum’s financial team.
Whether it’s $100,000, $200,000 or the grand total of $500,000, Alvarado plans to put his tournament check into a savings account for his daughters.
“We got $100K. Let’s get the $500K,” Alvarado said. “It’s fun how we play. We came in here and we had fun. That is the most important thing. We just have to keep winning and if we do my girls will be a half a mil up.”
Late NBA legend Kobe Bryant was the father of four girls and no boys. ESPN SportsCenter anchor Elle Duncan has famously said Bryant once told her that he loved being a “girl dad.” Like Bryant, Alvarado says he is a girl dad, too.
“Being a girl dad is amazing,” Alvarado said. “It is a fun that I really can’t explain it. It’s crazy because when they was born you don’t even know the person and then you fall in love and you do anything for that person. And now they’re growing and I’m learning them, they’re just amazing and they keep me going. Without them, I’m not who I am today.”
