How childhood fights and fastbreak creativity helped give Cleveland Cavaliers guard Iman Shumpert 'the best hands in the league

Cleveland Cavaliers

How childhood fights and fastbreak creativity helped give Cleveland Cavaliers guard Iman Shumpert 'the best hands in the league

DALLAS, Texas – If you observe Iman Shumpert strolling into an arena, walking through the corridors, he's not moving in slow motion

That's just his style, his swag. That's the pace at which he gets around. A miniature limp is mixed in with his smooth, slow-footed stride, but don't let the tortoise movement fool you, because he can instantly transform into the hare -- especially when it comes to his hands

Those 10 swift fingers are nightmares for an opponent. He's one of the best in the league at stealing the ball, but how did he develop such lightning quick hands? You'd have to go down memory lane with Shumpert to his upbringing in Oak Park, Ill

Slap boxing is an activity that testosterone-filled boys play to kill time. It also helps cultivate hand-eye coordination. Except, Shumpert didn't participate in that activity growing up

"Slap boxing? I boxed for real," he told cleveland.com. Shumpert said he got into a lot of fights as a youngster. He won some, and lost some. "I lost a lot," he said

It was those conflicts as an adolescent that contributed to him possessing the fastest hands in the NBA

"Sometimes you're going to get knocked out. That's how it goes," he said. "Sometimes you get jumped because you're winning, straight up. But the hands keep going. The hands keep going

The hands kept going while he was at Oak Park-River Forest High School. His coach granted his team offensive freedom only if it picked up full court and caused defensive havoc

"We were a defensive team in high school and I always headed the press," Shumpert said. "We used to chart deflections, so even if I didn't get the steal, it was all about timing. You just have to read eyes, play tendencies

"Getting steals and deflections led to getting out on the break so we could dunk. Because when we got on the break, our coach didn't care what we did. We could do trick dunks, we could throw it off the glass, do something crazy. We could miss it. You could come down and let a three go and he wouldn't care as long as you got a steal

The "best hands in the league" was the compliment the Cavs' Kyrie Irving gave his backcourt mate after the Cavaliers won their eighth straight contest, 110-107 in overtime Tuesday over the Dallas Mavericks

If that ball is anywhere near Shumpert and his eyes catch it for even a split second, chances are he's going to swipe it right out from the grasp of his adversary. Dirk Nowitzki was his latest victim

It was all tied at 95 with 20 seconds remaining in regulation and it was Dallas' ball. Cleveland was forced to switch defensively, and Shumpert found himself matched up on Nowitzki near the free-throw line. Shumpert was giving up 7 inches. Nowitzki held the ball, milking the clock. Shumpert was hounding him

When the clock had six on it, Nowitzki made his move. He took one dribble with his back to Shumpert and then turned his way to get a shot off, but Shumpert slapped the ball out his hands, gathered the ball and threw it up-court to J.R. Smith who immediately got a timeout with 0.9 seconds left on the clock