J.J. Redick: In his own words (Week 4)

After breaking the Duke and ACC all-time scoring records, J.J. Redick now has his sights set on the June 28 NBA Draft in New York. In the fourth installment of a regular summer series, Redick catches up with The Chronicle while back in Durham between workouts.

• as told to Gregory Beaton

After working out for Seattle last Wednesday, I flew back to L.A. and stayed there for a few days.

I had the chance Thursday to go to the "Entourage" season premiere in Hollywood. It was pretty cool, I got to see the first two episodes of the season and I went to the after-party after the premiere and chilled with some cool people.

Besides that, though, when I've been in L.A. I've been focusing on my basketball. I've probably left the places I've been staying maybe four times, but when I have been able to get away, I've gotten the chance because I know people and my agent knows people to do some pretty cool stuff like all the things with "Entourage." But my main focus right now is on basketball and not living up the L.A. lifestyle.

After working out last Friday morning, I flew to Houston and I worked out for them Saturday. I thought it went pretty well. We had a pretty intensive interview beforehand just like all the other places. Houston was a little more intense than some of the other places, and during the workout their coaches were very constructive. They gave me constructive criticism on everything. Jeff Van Gundy wasn't there but it was all the assistants.

I got back to Durham late Saturday night and I've been here since then. I actually missed my flight out of Houston, but I got back here and I got to hang out by the pool Sunday and take it easy Monday too.

Originally when I scheduled this week to come back to Duke I wanted to have a chiller week because I had felt like I had gone through the first part of my NBA workouts and I wanted to relax a little bit, work out and stay in shape. It's been busier than I thought, though. A lot of stuff got scheduled and I'm trying to fit things in. I had a memorabilia signing Tuesday and Thursday and Men's Fitness is following me around all day to my workouts and all my meals.

While I'm here, I'm also going to try and spend some time with my sisters, who live in Raleigh. I'm very close with them and I haven't gotten a chance to see them in a while. I saw them at graduation and only once in the last month. Every time I'm here I just try to catch up with people.

The people from Xbox Live were originally supposed to come to my place today to video me playing Halo one-on-one with Adam Morrison, but we had to postpone that until closer to the draft. He's been working out in L.A. and I've seen him twice. He had gotten a new number and I didn't have it for the first week before graduation. But I was at this clothing place in the Valley getting a suit fitted for the draft and we ran into each other and exchanged numbers. That weekend we went to the Ultimate Fighting Championships together and that was a lot of fun.

So far with the teams I've worked out for I've gotten good feedback. I've had the chance to sit down with some of the teams after the workouts. After each one, either Arn Tellem or Bob Myers, my other agent, has talked with the GM or the VP of basketball operations and gotten feedback. It's all been positive. But it's still really early and teams haven't seen everyone yet so it's hard for them to say, "I want to pick this guy." The teams I've worked out for have liked me and I feel like I'll be in the mix at all of those spots.

Everyone wants a promise before the draft and I'd love to get one from someone but a lot of teams don't really do that, especially this early. Maybe something will happen later on, maybe some kids already have them, I don't know. Right now I don't have any and if it does happen it would make my life easier and less stressful.

This weekend I'll head to Orlando for the pre-draft camp. I won't play there but after the camp I have a workout scheduled with Orlando. Sean Dockery is going to play at Orlando. I haven't talked to him since graduation so it should be really exciting down there.