Stoudemire reflects on time with Nash: 'He made the best out of us'

Pioneer point guard Steve Nash announced his retirement Sunday afternoon, and his two former teams, the Dallas Mavericks and Phoenix Suns, fittingly faced off against each other Sunday night. 

Amar'e Stoudemire, who enjoyed some of his most productive years in the desert with Nash and now plays in Dallas, lavished praise on the Canadian: 

He played the game the way the game should be played. He was a team-first kind of guy. He was the ultimate team player. He was one of maybe the greatest shooters in the game of basketball but he was reluctant to shoot because he wanted his teammates to get a lot of shine and glory. He made the best out of us. All of us thrived and improved because of him.

Mavericks owner Mark Cuban weighed in as well, saying he recently celebrated Nash's 41st birthday with him. 

Cuban reflected on 2004, when the Mavericks allowed Nash to return to Phoenix, refusing to match the Suns' offer for the point guard. The Mavericks were unsure if Nash could sustain his level of play. He'd go on to win back-to-back MVP awards in Phoenix. 

Cuban said:

All I could do is take the best advice that I had going or me. It was at the time when we had the better team and we lost four out of five to Sacramento in the first round. It was a different time, different set of circumstances. If I knew then what I know now, maybe it'd be different. It'd probably be different. All I know was I was being told that we were going to have to cut his minutes.

The Mavericks lost in the NBA finals in 2006, and while they did eventually win a championship in 2011, who knows what could have been had Nash stayed in Dallas?

Nash's career was a remarkable, storybook-like one, and all that was missing was a title.