Reeves Nelson does not look so good these days. The former UCLA men's basketball player was one of the virtual villains in George Dohrman's recent Sports Illustrated story "Not the UCLA Way." Now, Reeves is trying to clear his name. During an interview on ESPN Los Angeles, Reeves claimed Dohrman took one his quotes out of context to make him look worse and that he never tried to hurt teammate James Keefe (via Sports Radio Interviews). He also disputes the story about him urinating on another teammate's clothes, although that defense seems a little lacking:
"What’s true about that is the fact that he was a suitemate of mine. Me and him lived in rooms five feet apart. He’s my friend. I’ve known him since I was 16 years old. … I was just messing with him and I flipped over his bed, put some baby powder and Jolly Ranchers or something. … At no point did I ever remove clothes from his closet and purposely urinate on them and the bed."
Saying he didn't "purposely urinate" on Tyler Honeycutt's clothes seems like an odd way to phrase that. But, to Reeves's credit, he is willing to paint himself in a less than flattering light. He also seemed to be understanding of why he was dismissed from the team. Maybe the urinating incident was really a misunderstanding.
For more on the UCLA basketball scandal, be sure to check out Bruins Nation.