My right foot’s been bugging me for a couple weeks now. For some reason, since the end of September, the nerves in the front part of my foot have just been kinda painful. I don’t know what’s wrong with it. I still have my usual range of motion and I don’t think anything is seriously wrong, but trying to run or jump off the balls of my foot sends jolts of pain coursing up my leg. I guess I’m just hoping the pain will go away by itself.
Last week, I tried to go easy on my foot so I could play ball on Saturday (10/03/09). It seemed to work. I was okay to play. Once I got the adrenaline coursing through my veins I was able to run around almost like normal. I was probably at about 85% percent.
So I got to the Lowell courts around 11AM. Surprisingly, the Fob Academy was not there. There was a group of Asians playing a halfcourt game there, but I don’t think they were the Fob Academy. Other than those guys, there were a handful of others just shooting around at the other baskets. After I shot around for a few minutes, Harry (note to self: he needs a nickname) and Alex the Man eventually arrived. We shot around some more to get warmed up. Also, there wasn’t anyone else to play with because those other Asians didn’t want the taint of outsiders to ruin their game, and there weren’t enough other guys at the other courts who were interested in playing a game.
For some reason, the Lowell JROTC drill team was practicing. Broad daylight and no shame, baby. They weren’t in their uniforms or anything, but they were marching in weird patterns all over the basketball courts. You know that game Snake? That’s how those kids were marching, except they didn’t end up eating themselves. They kept walking on our court, too, even though three men were clearly using the space. I guess they must have been super proud or just blind or something.
After a while, Harry, Alex the Man, and I decided to play hunch. I emerged triumphant in glorious fashion, of course, because someone (not me, honest) had the great idea to place no limits on free throws after a made basket. We were playing up to eleven, and once I scored my first point, I drained ten straight free throws to ice the victory. I didn’t even sweat. I’m not making this up. Ask Harry or Alex the Man. They were both witnesses.
Yeah, I think I can shoot free throws better than Andris Biedrins. I don’t care if he’s got 18,000 people screaming at him. I’m pretty sure what I accomplished that day proves I can shoot better than him.
After a few more minutes of shooting around and bemusedly watching the JROTC marching around, a few more other players from the other courts decided it was time to get a game going now that we had enough to play full. I’m writing about this day more than a week after it happened, so I can’t remember every single detail, but this is the gist of it. Harry was on my team and Alex the Man was on the other team. My team won the first game and I had a respectable performance.
I remember this because it almost never happens, but I was 4-for-4 from the field and I had at least two assists, a couple rebounds, and a steal. Not too bad, other than the fact that it’s dorky to keep track of your own stats in a street ball game… and then remember those stats over a week later, as though trying to vainly reclaim some bygone glory.
The second game we played, my team just got beat bad. I don’t remember the score or anything, but even though it might have been close, I knew the other team was in control. It was one of those games where I didn’t really like my teammates (other than Harry, of course) so I essentially quit on the team. The other guys on the team were talking too much, or just ballhogging, or just generally taking stupid shots. That’s all fine and dandy when those bad shots go in and we win the game, but not when we’re down big. Like, this one guy kept taking pop-up threes. He made like one the entire time but it was enough to make him believe he was on fire. And this other guy kept trying to drive to the hoop, only the defense constantly collapsed on him resulting in one of two bad decisions: either the dude would force up a bad shot, or he’d just try to keep the ball and end up turning it over. The third guy just kept talking trash to an opposing player, calling for the ball, and then trying to take his man one on one.
(You ever think about what “team chemistry” really is? Analysts and writers love to bring it up, but isn’t “good” team chemistry present on every team that wins and “bad” team chemistry present on every losing team? Has there ever been a really good dominant team in the NBA with “bad” chemistry? Isn’t chemistry really just the result of winning? The more you win, the happier everyone is and the better team chemistry is. Vice versa when you’re losing. Why do people treat team chemistry like it’s a potion that can be mixed in a laboratory? The closest example to a good team with “bad” chemistry I can think of is the Lakers that last year they had Shaq… and they didn’t win the championship.)
I didn’t stop playing in the middle of the game or anything, but I was just going through the motions. Once I saw how the flow of the game was going, I stopped passing and tried to shoot the ball no matter what. Also, they had one tall guy on their team, and even though he wasn’t my man, I had to guard him a few times. I had to use my wiles to try to contain him, and he did tell me I had good d after the game, so I took some pride in that. I was still pissed I lost, but I blame the guys on my team for that one. (Except for Harry.)
__________
Balling at the church retreat was good times as well. That was pretty much all I did all afternoon… on Saturday and Sunday.
The court at the retreat site wasn’t anything special. It was smaller than normal. They had those double rims that always irritated me, and I think the hoops might’ve been a few inches lower than usual. (Not that I could touch the rim or anything – I can’t jump.) To top it all off, the ground wasn’t perfectly smooth. But when you’re desperate, it don’t really matter, I suppose. It’s like that Al Harrington shoe commercial: “You don’t need money to play this game. You need shoes. Protégé. Only at Kmart.”
You don’t even need a court to play this game as long as you have shoes. And maybe a ball. And some baskets. Al Harrington said so. And he’s a genius. He graduated from high school and went straight to the NBA, which proves he’s smart.
Saturday, we had enough players to play some four-on-four, full court. We had some decent games. Pastor Kim was on the other team. At one point, I swatted one of his shots. I was about to boast, maybe say something like, “Aw, yeah! Put THAT in your next sermon!” but then he picked up the ball and laid it in while I was mentally formulating trash talk. Sometimes I wish I were quicker on my wits. Maybe I should have just done the Dikembe Finger Wag. Oh, well. Next time I swat a pastor, I guess I’ll have to be prepared.
Not much else to say about Saturday’s games other than they were good exercise and I realized I could no longer take anyone off the dribble with my whacked out foot. It’s not like I was ever the quickest dude or anything, but I feel like a slow white guy now. It’s like if Eric Snow woke up one day and found himself in Jud Buechler’s body. I might still have that explosive first step, but it’s the second step that I’ve temporarily lost. Also, Galen’s Shane Battier-esque defense frustrated me and I had some nasty turnovers. On the plus side, I can honestly say that I didn’t cuss a single time that day. Even though Mike Singletary doesn’t like moral victories, I am willing to take whatever I can get. But I think I won those games anyway, ‘cause Pastor Alton was on my team.
Sunday, I warmed up by playing some dodgeball with the fellas. That was amusing. At one point, while dodging, I must have planted wrong and really hurt my right foot again. Waves of pain just blasted my foot. I wanted to quit but I think there were girls watching so I didn’t say anything and just acted like nothing happened even though I lost my agility and couldn’t really run effectively.
The first game we played was five-on-five and each team had a girl. I think they played pretty well. Tiffany and Denise knew what they were doing and made some shots. At one point, Denise stuffed Pastor Alton’s shot and he immediately clutched his shoulder so we had a little injury timeout. He’s a Pastor, so I assume he actually has some past injury with his shoulder, and he wasn’t just pretending to be hurt ‘cause a girl blocked his shot. Although that would be pretty funny if true. I don’t know. If Tiffany had blocked one of my shots or something, I probably would have just pretended to have a sprained elbow or something. If she’d given me the Dikembe Finger Wag I would have pretended to have a concussion. Fortunately, that didn’t happen.
The girls only played like one or two games with us, and then I guess they had enough. I don’t remember the games too well ‘cause I played so many of them and had a bunch of different teammates.
The fun thing was just playing with fellow brothers and sisters in Jesus. It’s a different feeling than playing against the Fob Academy all day long because I don’t really get as pissed off if my team is behind. Also, I feel like I can kind of trust the other Christians not to call fouls every single possession. I can lower my guard and enjoy the game. I wasn’t as obsessed with having to win the games so I tried some things I normally wouldn’t go for if I were playing to win. Even with my hurt foot, I tried penetrating, but that usually ended up in me forcing up a stupid bad shot. If we were playing the Fob Academy, my stupid bad shot tendency would decrease dramatically, I promise you that.
Towards the end of Sunday afternoon, this one large white dude joined us. I don’t know who he was, but his body type reminded me of Oliver Miller. Dude was a big dude, but he kept trying to play like he was A.I. or someone! Can’t believe he kept trying to do crossovers when he couldn’t even dribble without taking his eyes off the ball. I thought those were some pretty bad moves. He played better when I told him to post up can catch a lob down low. He was able to score then. But every time he tried to take someone off the dribble, he’d lose the ball. Either his defender would just pick him clean or he would just completely lose the handle. I even saw him try to split a double team while his head was totally pointed straight down ‘cause he had to look at the ball while he was dribbling. I felt embarrassed.
I lost the last couple games that day. Each time, Pastor Alton hit a game-winning jumper over me. I guess that’s a sign from God that I must study my Bible much more.
After basketball, we played some football. I have been obsessed with football the last few years but I rarely get a chance to play even touch football, so it was a blessing to be able to have a few guys. Alex the Man has a rocket arm like Alex Smith. Brian Chang was playing like Brian Dawkins. He had five INTs and I think he would have had a few TAINTS if he didn’t keep trying to toss laterals. (TAINT stands for Touchdown After Interception. It’s one of my favorite sports acronyms of all time, baby! I can say it all day long. TAINT, TAINT, TAINT. There’s just something about this acronym that makes me laugh. Pretty lowbrow, but whatever.)
Gilbert “Brown” Kwan was playing like Randy Moss, too. He burned his man on a streak and caught a bomb in stride after playing a really laid-back game up to that point. In the post-game interview, he quoted Moss when he said, “I play when I wanna play.”
No comments:
Post a Comment