Steve Francis not sorry about refusal to play in Vancouver

Steve Francis has had some eclectic post-NBA playing days, including having a chain snatched off his neck at a Houston concert in 2015.

The three-time All-Star, however, opened up in a recent essay for The Players' Tribune, sharing stories from his troubled youth in the D.C. suburbs through a nine-year NBA career.

One thing he's not necessarily sorry about is his refusal to play for the team that drafted him second overall in 1999 - the Vancouver Grizzlies - a choice that forced his trade to the Houston Rockets soon after.

"I damn near cried when I got taken by the Grizzlies at No. 2," Francis wrote. "I was not about to go up to freezing-ass Canada, so far away from my family, when they were about to move the franchise anyway. I'm sorry but, actually, I’m really not even sorry. Everybody sees the business of basketball now. That team was gone. The only thing I'm sorry about is that I went up there and gave probably the rudest press conference in NBA history before they traded me."

The Grizzlies didn't move to Memphis for another two years following an ownership change. Many observers still blame then-Grizzlies GM Stu Jackson for botching the situation, drafting Francis when he had already made it clear he didn't want to play in Canada.

"Come on, man. Canada?" Francis wrote. "Me? Up there? It just wouldn't have worked," Francis added.

Francis last played in the NBA for the Rockets in 2008.