Well let me be honest, I was never cut out to be a true basketball player. Yes I was mainly 6'2, 6'3 and had a firm muscular frame and Dennis Rodman-type caliber player, during most of high school but mentally I was out of it.
Basketball in high school for me was firmly about being accepted in a social circle. My first crush played on the girl's team, I wanted to be invited to parties, I wanted my brother (who was a D1 athlete) and dad to be proud of me, I wanted something to go back and relate to when I talk to other nigglets and my dad's brothers when we were just sitting around. And none of those things panned out how I wanted too because I honestly didn't want or need them to pan out in that way. I honestly had given up my dog so I could go hangout with people I don't even have as Facebook friends anymore.
But some of the more miraculous things happened from this sport. For years and years I recorded stats on every basketball player I could stuff in my little Jonny brain and would update them on my basketball video games on player's attributes and accolades. Surely enough, basketball was not the one thing my brother and dad wanted me to talk about all the time (of course we still gotta' talk our stuff). I met some of my favorite players like Ben Wallace, George Gervin, and Jeff Capel. I found my voice as a leader being the defensive anchor on my teams.
This seemingly simple-minded sport became a storybook to me, full of tales and heroes and villains. All of my jerseys, action figures, trading cards, ProAm games; missed dunks, completed dunks, game winners, broken ankles, broken bones, size-ups; long nights, long days, long weekends, long practices, long car rides...it is just a game. Nothing more, nothing less.
You may be born at a Level 98 Wizard basketball player or work hours and hours off and remain at a Level 2 Peasant basketball player. And if you are a Level 2 Peasant in basketball, you may easily enough re-imagine yourself as a Level 98 Wizard on an entire simulation made by other Level 2 Peasant basketball players that are Level 98 Wizard game developers.
Whatever happened on a basketball court for me was so impersonal and I didn't feel it on a spiritual or emotional plane at all. If I was getting after it on the offensive glass and pushing and shoving all of these massive players, getting dunked on by people 5, 6 inches taller than me, talking into their ear about their mommas', I turned that off instantly as soon as I put my slides back on. But you can imagine the culture that this game built that gives everyone dreams, hopes, stability, and a form of escapism. The passion that burns in their eyes, it may not burn in my mines.There was a passion of just trying hard and giving almost everything I had. If I gave everything I had to the game, what would I leftover for everything else?
Regardless, I will dunk on you.
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| "Basketball Jones" by various artists on Space Jam reminds me of the hoop dreams I never had, |
Dope read !!!!!
ReplyDeleteBet you can't dunk on me tho
ReplyDelete