Here is an article I just read on Stephen Strasburg, the “the best amateur pitcher I’ve [MLB super-agent Scott Boras] seen” on ESPN.com. And here’s Sports Illustrated’s 1995 cover piece on a 19 year-old coming straight from high school named Kevin Garnett.
It is interesting to me how the piece on Strasburg discusses his fastball, how much money his super-agent will be able to fetch him in contract negotiations, and how teams with no chance of acquiring him are sending scouts to watch him anyway, because of what a treat it is just to see the kid perform. How the crux of the column is how much guaranteed money the young pitcher will receive from the team that drafts him, and how negotiation will set a new standard for top-flight draftees.
While the Garnett piece (also this, this, this, and this), paradoxically, discusses how overwhelming the whole situation may be for the young basketball player, how the money he is set to receive is “like… Monopoly money” to him, and how there is a strong possibility (along with past cases as evidence) that he might fail.
I know this issue has been talked about ad nauseum over the years, and fired up again last yer when Brandon Jennings ditched the NCAA for Europe and this year when Jeremy Tyler passed up his senior year of high school for the pros overseas. It’s just crazy that Lebron James and Kevin Garnett’s initial NBA contracts were worth less than $25 million COMBINED (note: the NBA installed a rookie pay scale in 1998; LBJ’s rookie year was 2003-04; and KG’s yearly salaries can be seen here), and Strasburg’s agent has MLB general managers talking in the $50 million range and there is nary a word of how overwhelming that may be for Strasburg or how he may have to worry about keeping childhood friends from pulling him in all directions or how he very well may fail, or how his example of being super-talented sets a bad precedent for less-gifted amateurs who may attempt following in his footsteps.
Just interesting to me.
Posted 1 year, 3 months ago at 10:21 PM. Add a comment
DALLAS — The coach of a Texas high school basketball team that beat another team 100-0 was fired Sunday, the same day he sent an e-mail to a newspaper saying he will not apologize “for a wide-margin victory when my girls played with honor and integrity.”
The head of Covenant School of Dallas, along with its board chair, regretted the outcome, deeming it “shameful and an embarrassment.” Their statement also added that the outcome was not “Christlike” or an “honorable approach to competition.”
Situations like this are why I at times don’t understand why some folks even engage in competition. In the words of Herm Edwards, “YOU PLAY TO WIN THE GAME!!! HELLO?!?!?”
The team on the losing end of said basketball game, Dallas Academy, had 8 players on its roster and hasn’t won a game in four seasons. There was a parent who was there who said “spectators and an assistant coach were cheering wildly as their team edged closer to 100 points.” Who gives a damn what the spectators were doing? Should they have been crying for the terrible performance of the Academy? At least according to ESPN, there has not been a statement released by Dallas Academy.
So these muthafuckas (Academy) haven’t won a game in 4 years, and now there’s a problem with them being beat by 100 points? Why the hell do they even suit up??? And the administration of the WINNING team brings heat on their coach for winning by too much??? This is what I call “Reverse Bitch-Ass-Ness.” I mean, if the opponent you’re facing is not even fit to compete, what do you do? Roll over and hold your team back from performing at the level they have been taught to perform at?
I’m 100% behind the fired coach on this one. The administrators from Covenant cited Christian principles in their reasoning for the coach firing. I’m not an expert on Christianity, but when there is a game being played– a competitive one– you perform at your highest level, and may the best (wo)man win. Right? When a boxer steps into the ring, he is coming to knock the other guy out, not to be just a little bit better than an unprepared opponent.
I’m not surprised that there has been a lot of support for the Academy team for not giving up while being beaten down so badly. And this situation may very well be the last chapter in competitive sports for many of those young women, who would rather not play then suffer this embarrassment again. But dammit, if you’re on a basketball team that loses 100-0, and adults are mad at how badly the other team beat you, maybe you should hang up the high tops. Leave the real competition to the competitors.
Posted 1 year, 7 months ago at 8:53 AM. Add a comment
No, you haven’t missed my book’s release date. The following, along with Part 1 before it and the excerpts that will follow in the future, will be included in my as-yet-untitled book that I do not yet have a publisher or contract for. But it’s coming. Trust me, it’s coming.
This time we’ll take it back to ’98. Dam, 1998 was 10 years ago?!?!
*************
(* names have been changed to protect the innocent)
Basketball tryouts at George Washington Carver High School of Engineering & Science (or E&S for short) were always a huge event. Being that we were an under-funded Philadelphia public school that offered no junior varsity program, combined with the school offering a fresh mix of every ‘hood in the city, dam near every heterosexual male in the school dusted off their gym shoes to try out for the squad. (note: if you grew up in any city in the North part of the USA, you know: in high school, EVERY dude thinks they can play ball. )
Being that this was my junior year, this tryout was pivotal for me: even though I knew I probably wouldn’t be much of a contributor to the team, a year of practicing and going to the games would prepare me, physically and mentally (which I really needed) for a breakout senior year. And even though I had been unceremoniously cut on the first day of tryouts in 9th & 10th grade (I think I made a total of one basket in both tryouts combined), I still had a golden nugget of knowledge: Michael JORDAN didn’t even make his HS varsity until he was a junior. So as of 3PM that day, I was still on course to be the next MJ, just as I’d planned.
Guess I should’ve told everyone else to go along with it.
I was ready and knew what to expect for tryouts: we’d play a randomly-selected 5 on 5, Coach would sit and watch quietly, and a list of the best 20 or so guys would be the talk of the school the next morning. I was in great shape for a 16-year-old, so I could run all day; and, with a strong running start, I could DUNK. Oh, it’s on!!!
Only this year, Coach decided that he could get a better read on players if we played half-court, 3 on 3. No problem, I told myself. I can do more than dunk. “Let’s do this,” I thought as I was called out as part of the first 3 on 3 group.
The player I was assigned to guard- let’s call this guy Jim- was a senior and had been on the team the year before. He was about an inch taller than me but I knew I was more athletic. But 1998 was before I had ever been into a weight room- Jim was at least 3x stronger than I was. I’d watched Jim play before and knew he wasn’t a scorer- he was a strong, scrappy hustle guy whose major contribution was rebounding and tough defense. Outside of a layup, guarding Jim would be no problem for me. I knew his limitations.
Well, Jim knew his limitations too, and he knew of my (literal) weakness.
The first play the ball goes into Jim, posting me up (which for those of you not into bball, means he was standing very close to the basket, and I was too weak to move him from that spot. Remember Jim & I were roughly the same height, though). He makes a short turnaround shot over me. Sensing his advantage, his other two teammates forget about showing off their own abilities for Coach and feed Jim the ball, and he keeps making shots. Over me. Again. And again. And again.
Being that my mentality of how I would make this team had gone into crash-and-burn mode at this point, details are foggy. Ill say that Jim scored between 5-8 points in a row on me, without a miss, as the murmurs from the sideline grew louder and I was embarrassed off the gym floor. I do remember, however, a female saying after maybe Jim point #5, “he should just go home.” (oh yeah, I didn’t mention- anybody who was somebody at E&S came to see tryouts- either watching or trying out. Needless to say, I didn’t get asked on many dates after this.)
The legend of this story grew in proportion over the following weeks; Jim’s point total ballooned to 13 at one point. Even dudes in my neighborhood who DIDN’T EVEN GO TO MY SCHOOL heard about it through the grapevine. One day later that school year, I was a spectator at a lunchtime basketball game that Jim happened to be playing in. Noticing me, Jim scored a basket, looked at me and said, loud enough for everyone to hear: “remember that, Andrae?” (this was before I legally changed my first name to “Dre.”). I couldn’t even muster a response.
After not touching a basketball for a few weeks after that fateful day, I eventually picked up the pieces of my ego and basketball career. I joined a neighborhood league for the year. I finally made the varsity on my 4th and final try in my senior year, averaging an astonishing 2 points per game (really!). Somewhere between then & now, the planets aligned, I lifted a few weights, got better at basketball, and became the man that stands (writes?) before you today.
And if anyone ever sees Jim* out there somewhere: tell him if he ever makes the pros, we’ve a score (or 
to settle. I don’t forget anything.
Posted 2 years, 6 months ago at 8:50 AM. 7 comments
during my senior year of high school, i received a one-day suspension for downloading some profanity- laced music on some computers in the computer lab. the day i returned to school, i was required to have all my teachers sign off on my absence. approaching one teacher who shall remain unnamed, she gave me a look of disgust and said, in her best old- lady- to- young- man voice,
“you should be ashamed of yourself.”
“you don’t even know what happened.”
“excuse me? that was despicable what you did!”
the response that ensued is neither here nor there; I’m sharing this story because i am watching first hand how mike Vick has been condemned by the public before he has had a chance to tell his side of things or defend himself publicly. yea, i know Vick has been to court, and yes, i know that he plead guilty to the charges which will now presumably land him in jail.
but we should all realize that a guilty verdict or plea does not necessarily mean someone “did it,” just as o.j. Simpson’s acquittal on murder charges doesn’t necessarily mean he didn’t do it.
when i got suspended in high school, i never actually confessed to the crime. of course there was plenty of evidence stacked against me- there were witnesses in the classroom that saw and heard my actions (i was actually pretty brash and proud of it), and the teacher in charge was pretty sure id done it. the fact of the matter was, i was better off just taking the suspension and moving on than sitting in the assistant Principal’s denying everything to no avail.
in case you’re wondering, and i know you are, i was guilty as charged. mike Vick has not come forward and admitted to doing anything. he made a vague, PR- conscious apology for the whole situation, but never said, “i am guilty of the charges against me.” Vick’s co- defendants all plead guilty and agreed to work with authorities against mike Vick had he decided to take his case to trial. with Vick being the biggest name on the defensive side, he stood to lose the most, and the prosecutor stood to make the most of her career by taking Vick down, rather than some no-names running a dogfighting ring.
the dogfighting was discovered because one of Vick’s co-ds had been busted for drugs. when asked for his home address, he gave the address at which the dead dogs were found, the house is registered to mike Vick, and BOOM! that’s how the case came about. so other defendants in this case have bigger fish to fry than dogfighting. I’m not hypothesizing whether or not mike is guilty of his charges, but he had next to nothing to gain from fighting what was in front of him. once it was made public that mike Vick’s lawyers were advising him to plead guilty it was pretty much a done deal.
as stephon marbury said, famous people are built up to be broken down by the general public. I feel it’s my duty to NOT pile on a man down before he has had a chance to speak in his own defense. i have heard very few people speak up in mike Vick’s defense to this point, even though he has yet to admit guilt. i just find it interesting how people are so quick to jump on the popular bandwagon when it comes to poo-pooing a person (apparently) caught on the wrong side of do-goodness.
now, i know some of you have read to this point and feel that I’m wrong for defending a man who has been found guilty in the court of law. so some closing questions for those people:
are you 100% sure OJ is Innocent?
were the officers in the Rodney king case really innocent, as the jury found them?
is r. Kelly innocent of having sex with underage females?
the point is not for you to argue the details of the above’s innocence or guilt, just for you to know that being found “guilty” or “innocent” in the court of public opinion, or in real court, doesn’t necessarily mean that you are. Judge Not, Lest Ye Be Judged.
Posted 3 years ago at 11:12 AM. Add a comment
