From one of the top-ranked 2K players to joining the company as a community forum moderator to becoming the literal face of NBA 2K, Ronnie Singh, known to the world as “Ronnie 2K,” has carved out one of the most improbable careers in sports. It’s a path that sounds like something ripped straight out of the game’s MyCAREER mode. But this isn’t a storyline designed by developers. Ronnie is a real person who, about 20 years ago, was just another gamer with a handle. Today, he’s one of the most prominent figures in the entire basketball community.

“I really struggled before 2K in figuring out what I wanted to do,” Ronnie says. “And I always tell people, it’s probably because that thing didn’t exist.”

As a first-generation Indian kid, Ronnie carried the weight of expectations—Become a doctor! Become a lawyer!—the traditional and steady paths often laid out for children of immigrants. But he drew his own line: he wanted to work in sports, and he wanted a life far removed from the one he knew growing up. He says his family circumstances were so lean that even a copy of NBA 2K was out of reach. His first experience with the game that would ultimately change and then define his life was on a modded copy, back in the Dreamcast days.

Before Ronnie knew working with 2K was a possibility, he treated the game like his real job. He’d get home from his day job around midnight and play 2K for hours. Every night. Rinse and repeat. And soon enough, it became clear that he wanted to make a career out of 2K. So it goes, he earned an opportunity and he made the most of it.

But nobody, not even Ronnie, ever expected it would turn into this. 

“What’s funny is, I never had a content background; I had no interest in being on camera,” he says. “But as we were growing our social media, it became clear that we needed to do storytelling around the growth of this brand. It was never the intention to become ‘Ronnie 2K,’ at least not on the scale that it is now,” he continues. “But it was necessary, because our game was growing so fast.”

NBA 2K is still growing at a blinding speed, and so is Ronnie’s cachet within basketball culture. But it’s beyond just the game…he’s connected to all the ancillary touchpoints, including music and fashion. He’s cultivated 2K partnerships with some of the most respected streetwear brands, like Jerry Lorenzo’s Fear of God, and some of the world’s biggest artists, like Jay-Z and Pharrell. But more importantly, he’s made a concerted effort to feature underground brands and artists and give them a shining moment. The same goes for the artists on the soundtrack. “It’s our responsibility to break the next generation,” he says. “2K has become a platform that people look to, to storytell. And that’s one of the things I’m most proud of.”

But be clear: he doesn’t develop the game! (Visual Concepts does.) Ronnie doesn’t create the ratings, he’s “just the person that the NBA guys get to discuss their ratings with.” That’s probably the most obvious misconception about his role as the face of 2K. The other misconception: thinking Ronnie’s job is all play. Straight up, the guy puts the work in. It’s the first thing he’d tell a kid trying to carve out a similar lane. But it’s deeper than mere hard work.

“It needs to be the only thing you think about, a lot of the time, for years on end,” he says. “It’s not just hard work, it’s a lifestyle.”