Back then people weren't so PC obviously. But if this guy was my teammate every nickname he would get would be derived from his chinky eyes. I am big nosed and always had long muttonchops in high school so pretentious kids I didn't like called me toucan Sam. But my teammates and the local cholos and blacks called me Elvis because of the elvish sideburns. I totally didn't mind. I rolled with it and would do Elvis sounds after making a jumper. This guy probably had a great grandfather who was a hun.
You played basketball? GTFOOH .... If so, I was a badminton champion. [Sets this one on a tee, backs away quickly]
I played baseball because I am technically a cripple and was told no sports but if John kruk was allowed to play I was gonna try. Baseball in the 80 s was an all day thing. And you don't get tired. Lots and lots of breaks. You go outside find the couple baseball nerds playing catch in the street and you get a stick and say let's go to the empty field, I pitch and one of you hits and the other fields then we take turns. Eventually more kids join and you play all day. Until it gets ruined by the kids with all the equipment. Right before the 90s I moved from Whittier to Azusa. The park was teeming with black kids playing basketball. The gang stuff wasn't like in Whittier here it was brown vs black and it was way more real. There wasn't black kids in Whittier. I found kids in Jr high to play baseball with but it wasn't the same. I had ruined my arm trying to be Fernando when that guy was not human and not made to emulate. I couldn't play baseball in school. The coach said I needed glasses. So i tried football and the coach said I could train with the backs but I got my chest used as a dummy by some dude who thought he was Ronnie Lott but on offense. Everytime I tried to stop him he would basically punch me in the chest somehow. I became an expert at the ankle tackle out of fear of that dude and some big fullback that would kick his knees up high as he ran and knee you in the body repeatedly if you went in for a tackle and you didn't like up perfect. I got so good at it that I broke his ankle and ruined his career. He had a deal to go to a legit school but ended up at MtSac after the rehab. He was never the same. It affected our friend group. He was also a church friend. So after I burned that bridge I went to the blacks smoking weed and drinking 40s on the other side of town and after a few brawls to settle the new vibe where Mexicans also went to that park me and the blacks got along like princes of Egypt. I even found a black guy that liked heavy metal. And one that liked the cranberries. Oh yeah basketball. Growing up how I grew up I have one god given power above all. Unlimited second ones. So I used to play basketball all day without using any drugs. Just using my own adrenaline as a drug. That I could tap into at will once I was running on empty. Which is how i usually run. And a lesser gift was that I can hang. I don't go high I go long. I used to do triple and long jump training for fun. To help a friend in track. Same when I had a friend in cross country, and in everything else. I become the best training partner, sparrer, dummy. Because the best friend you can have is a good coach. And thats what I am everywhere I go. Except disguised as the waterboy or test dummy. It took me years to develop a decent enough jumper. I would shoot like divac, barely leaving the floor and just stretching as high as possible and shooting soft shots with my wrists. I
I was best at scoring on mid range drives going up under and around much more athletic defenders due to my extensive English pedigree. I have big hands and palming was natural as was passing. My favorite players were magic, rambis, green, divac, and Nick Van Exel and Eddie Jones later on. My game evolved as I emulated those guys. By the time I was penetrating like Nick I had developed a game that would now be what the Ball brothers play today in the NBA. And I would play against the proto Curry types and the proto unicorns. In fact chino hills had two 7 foot eastern europeans in the starting lineup that could run and jump and shoot and pass. I can say that I invented the baller style of play that is gonna be the prevalent style going forward because I was not athletic enough to Be Like Mike. So I had to figure out ways to make him bite his tongue. I used to make fun of guys with proto black mamba mentalities with my white llama hustle and flow. While those guys could make a shot from anywhere they couldn't do shit if I didn't let the ball be passed to them until after they got tired trying to get open and on offense they couldn't cheat off me because I was always setting screens or running to corners or to the basket to give the playmakers an extra option, an easy out to pass to in their line of site it they got ganged up. And if I had the ball in my hands they didn't know where I would begin my layup. I started layups near the 3 point line sometimes and then would do some crazy scoop or half hook after what appeared as a pass designed to be more real than a fake out because who would ever try to take such a weird angled shot. It's not even a layup or a shot or a hook. It's a crook. And it dont matter how it looks. Ugly still scores. I would shoot bricks at the backboard unexpectedly then sprint like mad knowing where the carom would go and get the rebound for an easy layup. People would mock me for how I played and It caused problems. The high school coach flat out yelled at me first day at camp and I never went back. Besides practice was gonna be at 630 am and I worked till 2 am. I took my old dodgers mentality to basketball. And it worked great. Now inland empire park basketball is keeping the NBA afloat during the final days of the fall of the lebron empire of kangs with spray painted on beards.
i played w guys like that and if you don't know a guy w that type of game it can be mystifying until you figure it out then its over pretty quick like my ping pong game against TB i'd be fly swatting that weak shit all over the place at 60 also that's the most impressive bunch of bs i've read in a long time amigo but if that's how you remember it carry on!
