Chapter 4. Players
You don't just quit a life's devotion to sports or most anything without a struggle. Seems most folks try to hang on to whatever we've got for as long as we can. That might explain why plastic surgeons are so rich!
Fact is, I've always felt a little sorry for aging football players but only because there was no good way to continue playing their sport after they had passed through the organized phase. Unlike tennis players, golfers, baseball and basketball players, ex-footballers are relegated to vacant lots and forgotten fields in any city USA. Their preferred battle ground was however their old High School alma mater. That's because it's easier to recall the glory of the caught pass or recovered fumble in the place where it all originally happened. Any former player less than 90 can still remember where his dad and mom sat and his favorite cheerleader cheered from when he did whatever great thing it was he did. But man, after high school, football players have it rough.
On Saturdays you'll see 'em playing with guys they used to play with and with a few other guys that were from somewhere else. Outsiders have always been viewed suspiciously, I mean how many westerns have you seen where the sheriff asks the antagonists, "you guys from around here"? It can be a useful tool in assessing things. So on a sand lot or a field, those outsiders were generally regarded as welcome but worth keeping an eye on.. if not downright dangerous.
Dangerous because they had nothing invested in you and your buddies pasts, they were only interested in theirs. And just what their past was, you had not a clue. I mean, were these guys former players from Burt Reynold's cell block or were they football missionaries from the big church downtown? You just didn't know. And different sides of different tracks view the game of football, lets just say.. uniquely.
To top it all off there were no age brackets, so guys that had played, oh say, a little semi pro ball, could be out there with a guy that might well have been a high school cheerleader trying rectify things. Oh the humanity!
So much psychology. So much blood! For basically 4 reasons. No refs! No rules! and no Pads!! Yeah, no pads! These generally were not your flag football types, that whined if you pulled their flag too hard. These guys mocked flag football players. These guys played with reckless abandon, with no regard for their bodies and even less for yours! These guys played tackle sans pads or helmets, yet hit like they were fully protected. After a few hits the best ones had eyes like sharks and faces like Rocky in the 15th. The weak or the unlucky, through real or feigned injury, simply limped off the field pushing their girlfriends away as they offered comfort or medical care.
As a spectator you had to get there early because the games didn't last too long, 'magine that!
But I said, it was bloody for 4 reasons. The last one is what really made it dangerous. When you break down the players out there individually, you generally wouldn't find too many former starters. Why's that? My guess is, those starters got what they wanted out of the game and didn't have anything left to prove. They didn't, as they say, leave anything on the field. Another thing that kept those guys home on Saturdays, was there was always the danger that the glorious image everyone had of them at their peak, could be compromised. So in reality they had 2 things at risk. Injury and reputation. And no tangible perks like trophies, roaring crowds or adoring cheerleaders So most just hung up their jocks and walked out on top with their reputations, fond memories and teeth intact.
This whole dynamic at work is what made Saturday's sand lot football a particularly risky affair. To fill out the roster, you had former second and third stringers. Then there was a problem group. The guys that didn't make the team at all or for various reasons never tried out. Maybe a guy that was smaller or weaker but after graduation went into full bloom due either to genetics or hours of late night weightroom training.
Or the guys that quit because coach hated them or didn't get enough playing time or both. Or perhaps the kid, whose mom countermanded dad's decision and made him take Latin or violin lessons after school because football was deemed too dangerous. Or perhaps she saw her child as too fragile and sensitive to be associated with such ruffians and at the core, because she just loved him too much to see him get hurt. Impossible to argue with her, except to say that some injuries and scars have nothing to do with bruises and breaks.
All that and a lot more was not so clearly on display in at least a few of the lives out there. A few of the sandlot players were the ones that watched from the stands, elbowing buddies sayin' after a big play, "He aint so good" or "Anybody could have done that". But no matter which past defined them, they all had something in common, they had a score to settle!
As anyone knows that has lived even a little while, vengeance is a powerful motivator but rarely quenched We all have been there. Looking for someone to blame, when the blame is ours alone. But who will accuse us. So sometimes we invent enemies and we tilt at windmills and play sand lot football.
Now don't get me wrong I have great empathy for these guys and anybody with a score to settle but not everyone can make every team or succeed at everything they attempt and man I'll tell you, I've had my share of failures and at many levels. And it's always painful. Yet it's a reality of life and one best accepted early. And most people do, and move on to fight new battles and find success in other ways. But some don't.
Some get locked in the past. So what those Saturday fields can be, is an arena of differing and complex emotions. For a few, it's a patch of green where the clock is set back and standing still. An arena entered in the present, to change the past, that never transfers into the future. Yes, a former rejected player, a guy who dropped the winning pass, or missed the big field goal can raise his battle stature in the eyes of his new friends, in a new time, but the past can never be undone. It was what it was.
Lest you think I am being unnecessarily cruel and fatalistic let me say this. I believe to be happy it's important for people to understand not only that the past can't be changed so they won't waste valuable life pursuing the impossible but more importantly, to discover that the way out is to embrace the past. To the point of being merciful toward ourselves and even finding humor in our seemingly fatal wounds inflicted by others or ourselves. Reliving the past, with the ill-fated intent to change it, only keeps old wounds open and you know what they say about a wounded animal.
So yeah, sand lot Saturday was bloody! A lot of pain out there. External and internal.
Well us basketball players weren't immune from the act of reliving old but good memories and trying to reshape the bad ones. And it would be disingenuous if I said I wasn't responding a little to both when I step on the hardcourt. It is the reason I freely risk the wrath of ex jocks by describing things in such blunt terms and speaking with such unauthorized authority on the matter. Because jocks, both winners and losers, let me stand before you and declare, I am you!!
So much for Mrs. Tallman's english, but it's true. I had a good high school career but my college career was supposed to be, by most accounts, a success but it was basically a dud! Yeah it had high points but it would still be best broadly defined as a firecracker that fizzled. A grape that withered on the vine...well you get the point.. it was a failure! Yeah and it stings a little to say so but that's one of the beautiful things about ascending age, things that burned, now only sting. Things that seem like mountains, impossible to scale, become modest hills we can manage. And more importantly and less artfully, you just don't give a crap what folks think about you anymore 'cause you've pretty much heard it all! You hear that kids! One day you're not going to care so much what they say about you or what you do or look like, so why not get a jump on it all now. You'll be a heck of a lot happier for more years, if you start early.
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A little bball history. In December 1891, a Canadian-born fellow named James Naismith, a physical education teacher at the YMCA, took a soccer ball and a peach basket into the gym and invented basketball. In 1893, Naismith replaced the peach basket with iron hoops and a hammock-style basket. Fortunately, that was all before my time because that just doesn't seem all that rewarding to score a basket in a, well, a basket. Kind of like scoring without a net. No swoosh sound. It seems to me it was the net that was the great invention! It kept that ball from rolling down the hill and into whatever trouble was nearby, like a passing car, a pond or down the side of a mountain. In my case it was a snake filled swamp we called our back yard. Of only slightly lesser concern was the overhanging, forehead level, window air conditioner, the concrete barbecue pit and the rear end of a 57 Country Squire.
In my day a basketball net would last until the weather got to it or too many shots went thru it because few could jump high enough to touch it, much less hang on it. Today elementary kids can jam! And without the help of a trampoline, which I always required. Yeah, those peach baskets were replaced by the ubiquitous steel rims you see on the sides of garages and trees that have become a part of the American landscape.
In recent years the sport has gained in popularity worldwide. Girls play it and some very well and when done right, it's reasonably safe and pretty practical for staying in shape and compared to most sports, it's pretty age friendly.
"Take tennis," my friend said. So I did. Man that is a brutal sport! It's played under the sun on black asphalt, unforgiving concrete, dusty clay or steaming grass. The only thing that can bring down the temperature is rain but if you're blessed with rain you have to quit. I frequently prayed for it.
If you and I play tennis, you hit the ball to me. Now my job is to run to where you hit it and hit it back. That's it. Sounds simple enough. But that whole process repeated hundreds of times over several hours, on any of those unforgiving surfaces can be hard on a body. It's all further complicated by the speed of the ball and it's location because your opponents job is to make you put as many miles on your old body as possible! So they try their best to hit it where you aren't! That initial exchange also reveals another inherent problem with tennis.
You and your opponent really need to be at least somewhat similarly adept at that hitting the ball back part. I've been on both sides of the net, so to speak. I've played with guys and girls that could turn that firm yellow ball into a weapon of terror. Getting caught near the net by one of these bloodthirsty macho people can cause a person to ball up into a fetal position in front of a few people or a thousand. It's an autonomic and instantaneous response and no one apologizes for it. In fact, for one not to retreat to that head and genital protective position would not be considered normal or smart. That cute fuzzy little ball, when compressed on one side by tightly wound nylon and a muscular madperson, can travel at speeds well over 100 mph! Fast enough to bring your voice up a few octaves. So it's either go fetal or risk having "Wilson" written permanently emblazoned somewhere on you!
I've also played with guys and girls that would only hit the ball successfully back, you know, like over the net and some modest distance beyond it, perhaps once every fifty or a hundred shots. I'm not sure why I tolerated the newbie guys but I'm certain I restrained my feelings for a lady or two because I had interests in them that had nothing to do with tennis. Guess that doesn't just apply to the ladies of tennis because women are more fun to watch doing, well, anything or even nothing. It's a magical thing.
Strong is the man or woman that remains polite when confronted with a severely talent challenged opponent on a tennis court.
In all honesty, in most of my matches, I was the one that had to be tolerated. That didn't stop me from throwing my racket in anger at a missed shot. It is amusing to observe people like me, that obviously suck out there, lose it when they don't make a shot that they couldn't make if they tried it a hundred times!! Those antics, I have learned, are all a part of the game or at least the modern game. You see, it's not entirely my fault because long before I learned the mechanics of the game, I perfected 'the tantrum' by watching McEnroe! The court decorum of the guys of the 50's and 60's like Rod Laver, Stan Smith and Ken Rosewall is considered corny now. But who knows, even big ties came back in style!
But the mechanics of the swing are almost as important as the whining and considerably more difficult to master because when your opponent hits it, it becomes return time. That's where things get tricky. An environmental and biological 'perfect storm' must occur for the rally to really be a rally. The ball, racket, body and arm have to all be in agreement at a perfectly synchronized moment in time, which in my case rarely happens. Even by accident! Particularly if the ball comes to my ...backhand.
The back hand. Just typing the word makes me freeze up. That demanding shot is the reason people drive down to the local tennis courts just to be entertained. It's an amazing demonstration of physical agility to watch how far people will go to run around that shot. People with otherwise little agility can perform amazing, if not so artful, maneuvers to make sure that ball arrives on the proper side.
The sight of a ball coming to the backhand side can induce great peril because the victim knows if he or she does not immediately make a major body change that rally is as good as over. Advantage opponent!
Generally the first reaction upon recognizing the ball is coming the wrong way is to utter a private 'sh....t' as you take off sprinting. Immediately the muscles you're going to need in a moment tense up, pretty much rendering them non-useable. Waiting on a ball to arrive that's coming to your backhand side, is the football equivalent of a field goal kicker knowing he has to kick the game winning field goal. It's a pressure packed moment and if your opponent discerns that you are particularly frightened and inept at performing it they will hit 99 out of 100 shots to that dysfunctional side or your body.
That might seem mean but it's all part of the game to capitalize on your opponents weaknesses. That's not to say that tennis players aren't mean. In fact tennis players can be the meanest of all the sports and that's including pro wrestling! So much so that it's always amazed me why they have that "love" thing in their score. It's surely there to misdirect to encourage girls to play. I've never explained tennis score keeping to a female that didn't say, ''aww that's so sweet, love'. There were certainly more tennis appropriate terms they could have chosen. Like "whine." You lose a point and you're down 'whine' 15. Maybe "bitch" and "complain" would fit as well. But love? I don't think so but if you do, then just check McEnroe out on You Tube! But send the kids outta the room first!
Sorry, I got side tracked... What I was pursuing up there, was in tennis, you have to chase down every ball no matter where it is, even if you can't reach it tennis etiquette requires you to give it all you've got. And if at some point you feel that you've satisfied the crowd with your effort to get to it you can either dive for it or do what I do, throw your racket at it. Thank heaven for metal rackets! All that of course is wasted energy and brutal. Now in basketball it aint like that.
Heck no, if the urge to take it easy hits you at any ol' time, you can simply stop and stand there. Yep. You can rest until the burn in your lungs subsides or until you can get your heart rate under control or started. Or take a moment to put a knee back in it's socket or tie a shoe or sign an autograph. All while the other 9 are busy doing other things. It's true. Just ask Kareem or Shaq.
So to me, tennis, at least in it's 'singles' format, is not inherently very age friendly. So to compete with shuffleboard and draw in the geriatric crowd, they modified things a bit. They said it's ok to bring more people out there with you. They called it 'doubles' and it completely changed everything. Instead of having to run, like in 'singles', in doubles you can stay in one place for the duration of the match. No need to bring extra shirts or sweatbands because sweating just does not occur.
It's even permissible to bring your favorite recliner out there, as long as it's not a grass court. Yeah, adding people to the tennis court changed everything. So where does an aging but not yet couch potatoed, sports person take his or her business. Perhaps the golf course?
Golf, so their brochure says, is considered by many to be very age friendly but I am here to challenge that propaganda. Golf, in fact might just be the most brutal of them all! Drudging up, over and down hills, wading thru snake and gator occupied lakes and creeks. All the while dodging misfired missiles on a battlefield 100 feet wide and 5 miles long. It's 4 hours of ever lurking danger and injury. Sounds like a day in the life of a marine in battle doesn't it? But it's all true. So much so, that it's my considered opinion that golf was invented long ago in Scotland by a struggling sports medicine doctor.
And the golf cart, which has not seen an advance in shock absorber technology since the horse and buggy days, I am certain it's design is endorsed by struggling Chiropractors everywhere.
If your back survives the cart ride, you can always get taken out just swinging that iron on a stick. Think about it. From a cold, very still position, the masochist must twist every piece of cartilage and sinew they've got, in one direction. Then at the appropriate moment, which for me is the point at which the pain has become unbearable, release all that coiled tissue at a speed which you now have no control over, toward the other direction. At that point the only thing that can prematurely interrupt the accelerating forces, is the ground, which can actually move upward during the downswing. Another thing that can stop a swing in motion is a concealed rock disguised by the course architect as soft soil. A tree trunk that moved when the ground moved is the most bone jarring of all swing stoppers. The last and most tolerable is a bikinied blond selling beer. That swing stopper is the only one I have not encountered. Figures!
Some would describe the game in more friendly terms but for me, I was as kind as I can be without turning this into fiction. Now your mileage may vary on how often you repeat that violent twist and scream but in my case it's about 120 times a round! All that, along with the green fees, equipment prices, golf lessons, bets lost, sports medicine, chiropractic pays and co-pays, all serves to surely make pro wrestling the better financial alternative. One speedo. What's that 10 bucks?!
Something I was just thinking about. You know those little paved roads that meander artfully through the golf course? Many believe they are there only for the golf carts. Yes, that is one function but they are also there to provide quick and unencumbered passage for emergency medical vehicles!! That's because of the dangers described above but also because golfers aren't...well, let me approach it like this...Do we all agree that golf isn't considered a 'real sport' by some folks?...oh ok, apparently we don't agree but I did say some folks, not me! But in some respects I can see their point.
Not that you don't have to have exceptional athletic skills or be mentally tough and you surely must practice as much, if not more than most sports. But there is a side of golf that the ambassadors of the sport don't like to talk about. A golfers body is.. how can I say this...is not the body we think of when we think 'Athenian athletic image'? How's that, delicate but true? Now like any rule there are exceptions, Tiger being one but the Craig Stadler's reflect the general population of hackers a whole lot better than Tiger or Couples or Seve.
Another thing that really puts the nail in the coffin, so to speak, is that it's a game that can be played about as well with or without a cigarette or an alcoholic beverage in your hand. And statistics have shown, mine at least, that beers consumed is inversely proportional to strokes, golf strokes that is! It is perhaps the most attractive aspect of the game. It seems to loosen the sinew a bit or deaden the pain. I don't really know what's going on metabolically but it does have the cumulative effect of making high scores, broke clubs, lightning and snake strikes and lost bets a little easier to handle.
That's easy to prove too. Just ask most any golfer, male or female, what their favorite hole is and if they are not in the company of their children or pastor they will tell you.. the 19th!
I guess all sports like Macs and PC's have their own unique followers. It's a beautiful thing too, in that we all come in so many shapes and sizes and possess such varied gifts and skills to apply them. And surely we all deserve a place where we can do our thing without wise guys like me making fun of them. But of course there will always be wise guys and if not me, there will be others. So let's just keep doing our thing and ignore the heclers in the cheap seats! Forget the women only spas or feeling like you have to get in shape before you join one. Or wearing a towel around your lower unit because it's not bikini or speedo ready. Do your silly looking stretches or jumping jacks proudly in the middle of the field or any darn place you want to. Join that team and take that jumper. Just get in the game. Nobody cares what you look like or gives a crap what you're doing, so...just do it!
Now compared to aging footballers, basketballers have it pretty good. We could retire on one level and move right into another level of organized ball. Heck, they've got leagues for guys in their 90's and that's just the youth league. Yeah and they all come with rules! and refs!
Well, because of my lack of conditioning and my concern for my guitar fingers I tried to make the transition wisely, so I had a couple of expectations for the league I would join. One was to pick one that afforded me the least opportunity to get hurt! And the other was the same as the first!! Ok, I know you golfers are jumpin' on that and I don't blame you but really people, that was important because I figured I had been so lucky to survive all these years of basketball and football with no broken nothins. That's from birth! Sure plenty of sprains, jams, cuts, contusions, abrasions, blisters, bruises but no breaks! And I aimed to keep it that way! Besides, in the past I was playing for a school, a cause, cheerleaders! but now I was playing for...health!! So it seemed consistent that limb protection would fall under the umbrella of my health concerns!
With my special demands, I thought it best I bypass AAU ball where competition was keen and broken limbs were injuries you played through. So I decided to join a... ok golfers have at me'... church league!! Yeah, same to ya!.. Easy Mike, never insult your audience!.. Yeah but did you hear what they ..I don't care get back to your story.
..Ahh sweet church league. Just the mention of it sets the mind to hearing violins and choirs of angelic voices emanating from the bleachers. Playing with and against God loving, Bible believing competition, it would be a breath of fresh air from the rough and tumble college ball I was retiring from. I had everything I needed. Good shoes, a good attitude, a beer gut, only problem was I didn't have what all the other church leagues guys had.. a church!
Now that posed a problem because at that time I wasn't a Christian and was quite uncomfortable in holy places, where the sun shined thru beautiful stained glass and the people in the pews knew when to sit, stand and bow without prompt. Where even the children knew all the songs and recitations by heart. Yes I did recall a few verses of " Jesus loves me" from mom singing to me in the cradle but really, I had to follow others to even get through that one.
So I began my church search and as I did I soon realized that I was looking for a church in a whole different way and for different reasons than others might. Normal people might be interested in asking the pastor whether their church believes that Christ is the son of God, or do they speak in tongues or believe in the rapture? But a non Christian basketball player has different concerns. Like how big is your gym? Do you have locker rooms, do players get a cut of the Sunday offering!? And the deal breaker for me.. does your team practice? I did not want to practice!! I wanted to play. I didn't really care all that much if we won even. I just wanted to play and laugh and listen to the angelic music and reconnect with the game that I used to love.
Well I picked my team or better put, I was drafted. Word had gotten out that a former college player was looking for a team and they started recruiting me. It was great. Got trips and cars and girls...ok I didn't get nothin' but a few phone calls but I still felt honored. It's funny but thinking back as I write this you'd have thought out of all the stuff they asked about my scoring and assist stats that maybe one recruiter would have asked if I was a Christian.. That turned out to be a very, very important point, for as you may recall, I specifically stated that I was joining to play with and against Christians!
Well apparently I was not the only one that didn't have to declare anything about being a Christian. Because it didn't take long before I was wishing that I was playing with the Saturday concussion gang! At least in football you know when the hit's coming, so you can do a little preparation, like sliding or juking. What's jukin you ask? Well, it's an old timey football term where you kinda wiggle your hips and the opponent is distracted by you wiggling your hips on a football field and you adroitly take advantage of the momentary seduction and zip around him, thereby, avoiding direct and intimate contact with him. Which I suppose is a good thing if he was bedazzled by your wiggling hips in the first place!
Where was I?.. oh yeah, first game. First of all, don't fool yourself, the word church in 'church league' is only relevant because that's where the games are played. Other than that, you would never associate 'Church' with anything that was happening on the hardwood and in front of preachers and women and children. Why? Because some of those guys on those teams were just plain sinners!! I tell you they were evil. They were the living and breathing reason why each church league player should have to sign a document that says they have given their life to Christ and because of that, will not bite, hold , stomp, butt, elbow, poke faces, eyes, noses or any open orifice! Now I ask you, is any of that behavior biblical!!?
Not that winning isn't biblical, I mean God doesn't advocate losing but the Lord is big on the rules of engagement and it was obvious that some of these guys were not into the 'love thy neighbor' or 'do unto others' message of all churches. Heck, even wiccans believed in those basics!! I would go further to suggest that their preferred philosophies were centered more around some deviant marriage between the martial arts and rugby!!
Now let me say here, because as you probably know by now I am a Christian and of course want to be fair when describing that time as accurately as possible, even though I didn't demonstrate the same generosity to golfers!! The truth is, that most of those guys were great, great, people but like in anything, as time goes by, you tend to recall the extremes of the past. Extremes defined as the beautiful and the horrible. For the moment I am describing the horrible but in a bit I'll give the beautiful some equal time...
So on with the horrible. Golfers, this is where you exact your revenge. There was one team that had plays. Not basketball plays like the rest of the free throw world, rather they had a variation on teamwork that was both corrupt and brilliant because at the proper time one guy would yell a code word, something like, Satan! And instead of doing something that had anything to do with the basketball and advancing it toward the basket, two or more players would slowly slide together and pin a predetermined victim, that we'll call, me!, between them under the basket. Now most of these guys were much older and with that, fatter. And I being skinny but for my thermometer looking gut, was no match for their heavy, jello-like bodies. Because of the anatomy differences, for a moment, I virtually disappeared from the sight of anyone on the court or stands but most importantly, the refs! Yes, I completely disappeared into the folds of aged and hairy fat and did not reappear for what seemed like minutes. And when the ordeal had passed I felt like Bill Murray, I'd been slimed! It was pure intimidation and had nothing to do with basketball. Evil I say!
There were no boos from the crowd because they surely must have thought I had stepped off the court, I mean, where else could I have been? All that aggression of course truly meriting a whistle but there was silence. My theory at the time was that the refs were paid off by the bishops but with the advantage of time I now believe it's because they were afraid of these guys. At some point a refs got to walk to his car in the night and surely must have feared a parking lot re-enactment of the slime play.
Well, I've had a little fun at the expense of church league bball of the past but I must say, just a few years ago I joined a team up in Tennessee that was that breath of fresh air I was looking for in my 20's. Yeah, no slime plays, guys would say nice shot, if it was. Even help you up when you fell but in my case they were rarely responsible for the fall for I could do that on my own for any number of reasons. But you can read more about that in 'the Butterfly story' if you aren't worn out by now or perhaps grossed out by the 'aged hairy fat' thing! Hey, sometimes you gotta throw a little imagery in there that makes a reader think 'ewweew'.
It was 30 years after my first church league experience that I played for that team in Tennessee. At the end of the games, when the two teams might shake hands at midcourt,...these guys knelt, held hands and prayed together. The beautiful side of ' church league'!!
You don't just quit a life's devotion to sports or most anything without a struggle. Seems most folks try to hang on to whatever we've got for as long as we can. That might explain why plastic surgeons are so rich!
Fact is, I've always felt a little sorry for aging football players but only because there was no good way to continue playing their sport after they had passed through the organized phase. Unlike tennis players, golfers, baseball and basketball players, ex-footballers are relegated to vacant lots and forgotten fields in any city USA. Their preferred battle ground was however their old High School alma mater. That's because it's easier to recall the glory of the caught pass or recovered fumble in the place where it all originally happened. Any former player less than 90 can still remember where his dad and mom sat and his favorite cheerleader cheered from when he did whatever great thing it was he did. But man, after high school, football players have it rough.
On Saturdays you'll see 'em playing with guys they used to play with and with a few other guys that were from somewhere else. Outsiders have always been viewed suspiciously, I mean how many westerns have you seen where the sheriff asks the antagonists, "you guys from around here"? It can be a useful tool in assessing things. So on a sand lot or a field, those outsiders were generally regarded as welcome but worth keeping an eye on.. if not downright dangerous.
Dangerous because they had nothing invested in you and your buddies pasts, they were only interested in theirs. And just what their past was, you had not a clue. I mean, were these guys former players from Burt Reynold's cell block or were they football missionaries from the big church downtown? You just didn't know. And different sides of different tracks view the game of football, lets just say.. uniquely.
To top it all off there were no age brackets, so guys that had played, oh say, a little semi pro ball, could be out there with a guy that might well have been a high school cheerleader trying rectify things. Oh the humanity!
So much psychology. So much blood! For basically 4 reasons. No refs! No rules! and no Pads!! Yeah, no pads! These generally were not your flag football types, that whined if you pulled their flag too hard. These guys mocked flag football players. These guys played with reckless abandon, with no regard for their bodies and even less for yours! These guys played tackle sans pads or helmets, yet hit like they were fully protected. After a few hits the best ones had eyes like sharks and faces like Rocky in the 15th. The weak or the unlucky, through real or feigned injury, simply limped off the field pushing their girlfriends away as they offered comfort or medical care.
As a spectator you had to get there early because the games didn't last too long, 'magine that!
But I said, it was bloody for 4 reasons. The last one is what really made it dangerous. When you break down the players out there individually, you generally wouldn't find too many former starters. Why's that? My guess is, those starters got what they wanted out of the game and didn't have anything left to prove. They didn't, as they say, leave anything on the field. Another thing that kept those guys home on Saturdays, was there was always the danger that the glorious image everyone had of them at their peak, could be compromised. So in reality they had 2 things at risk. Injury and reputation. And no tangible perks like trophies, roaring crowds or adoring cheerleaders So most just hung up their jocks and walked out on top with their reputations, fond memories and teeth intact.
This whole dynamic at work is what made Saturday's sand lot football a particularly risky affair. To fill out the roster, you had former second and third stringers. Then there was a problem group. The guys that didn't make the team at all or for various reasons never tried out. Maybe a guy that was smaller or weaker but after graduation went into full bloom due either to genetics or hours of late night weightroom training.
Or the guys that quit because coach hated them or didn't get enough playing time or both. Or perhaps the kid, whose mom countermanded dad's decision and made him take Latin or violin lessons after school because football was deemed too dangerous. Or perhaps she saw her child as too fragile and sensitive to be associated with such ruffians and at the core, because she just loved him too much to see him get hurt. Impossible to argue with her, except to say that some injuries and scars have nothing to do with bruises and breaks.
All that and a lot more was not so clearly on display in at least a few of the lives out there. A few of the sandlot players were the ones that watched from the stands, elbowing buddies sayin' after a big play, "He aint so good" or "Anybody could have done that". But no matter which past defined them, they all had something in common, they had a score to settle!
As anyone knows that has lived even a little while, vengeance is a powerful motivator but rarely quenched We all have been there. Looking for someone to blame, when the blame is ours alone. But who will accuse us. So sometimes we invent enemies and we tilt at windmills and play sand lot football.
Now don't get me wrong I have great empathy for these guys and anybody with a score to settle but not everyone can make every team or succeed at everything they attempt and man I'll tell you, I've had my share of failures and at many levels. And it's always painful. Yet it's a reality of life and one best accepted early. And most people do, and move on to fight new battles and find success in other ways. But some don't.
Some get locked in the past. So what those Saturday fields can be, is an arena of differing and complex emotions. For a few, it's a patch of green where the clock is set back and standing still. An arena entered in the present, to change the past, that never transfers into the future. Yes, a former rejected player, a guy who dropped the winning pass, or missed the big field goal can raise his battle stature in the eyes of his new friends, in a new time, but the past can never be undone. It was what it was.
Lest you think I am being unnecessarily cruel and fatalistic let me say this. I believe to be happy it's important for people to understand not only that the past can't be changed so they won't waste valuable life pursuing the impossible but more importantly, to discover that the way out is to embrace the past. To the point of being merciful toward ourselves and even finding humor in our seemingly fatal wounds inflicted by others or ourselves. Reliving the past, with the ill-fated intent to change it, only keeps old wounds open and you know what they say about a wounded animal.
So yeah, sand lot Saturday was bloody! A lot of pain out there. External and internal.
Well us basketball players weren't immune from the act of reliving old but good memories and trying to reshape the bad ones. And it would be disingenuous if I said I wasn't responding a little to both when I step on the hardcourt. It is the reason I freely risk the wrath of ex jocks by describing things in such blunt terms and speaking with such unauthorized authority on the matter. Because jocks, both winners and losers, let me stand before you and declare, I am you!!
So much for Mrs. Tallman's english, but it's true. I had a good high school career but my college career was supposed to be, by most accounts, a success but it was basically a dud! Yeah it had high points but it would still be best broadly defined as a firecracker that fizzled. A grape that withered on the vine...well you get the point.. it was a failure! Yeah and it stings a little to say so but that's one of the beautiful things about ascending age, things that burned, now only sting. Things that seem like mountains, impossible to scale, become modest hills we can manage. And more importantly and less artfully, you just don't give a crap what folks think about you anymore 'cause you've pretty much heard it all! You hear that kids! One day you're not going to care so much what they say about you or what you do or look like, so why not get a jump on it all now. You'll be a heck of a lot happier for more years, if you start early.
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A little bball history. In December 1891, a Canadian-born fellow named James Naismith, a physical education teacher at the YMCA, took a soccer ball and a peach basket into the gym and invented basketball. In 1893, Naismith replaced the peach basket with iron hoops and a hammock-style basket. Fortunately, that was all before my time because that just doesn't seem all that rewarding to score a basket in a, well, a basket. Kind of like scoring without a net. No swoosh sound. It seems to me it was the net that was the great invention! It kept that ball from rolling down the hill and into whatever trouble was nearby, like a passing car, a pond or down the side of a mountain. In my case it was a snake filled swamp we called our back yard. Of only slightly lesser concern was the overhanging, forehead level, window air conditioner, the concrete barbecue pit and the rear end of a 57 Country Squire.
In my day a basketball net would last until the weather got to it or too many shots went thru it because few could jump high enough to touch it, much less hang on it. Today elementary kids can jam! And without the help of a trampoline, which I always required. Yeah, those peach baskets were replaced by the ubiquitous steel rims you see on the sides of garages and trees that have become a part of the American landscape.
In recent years the sport has gained in popularity worldwide. Girls play it and some very well and when done right, it's reasonably safe and pretty practical for staying in shape and compared to most sports, it's pretty age friendly.
"Take tennis," my friend said. So I did. Man that is a brutal sport! It's played under the sun on black asphalt, unforgiving concrete, dusty clay or steaming grass. The only thing that can bring down the temperature is rain but if you're blessed with rain you have to quit. I frequently prayed for it.
If you and I play tennis, you hit the ball to me. Now my job is to run to where you hit it and hit it back. That's it. Sounds simple enough. But that whole process repeated hundreds of times over several hours, on any of those unforgiving surfaces can be hard on a body. It's all further complicated by the speed of the ball and it's location because your opponents job is to make you put as many miles on your old body as possible! So they try their best to hit it where you aren't! That initial exchange also reveals another inherent problem with tennis.
You and your opponent really need to be at least somewhat similarly adept at that hitting the ball back part. I've been on both sides of the net, so to speak. I've played with guys and girls that could turn that firm yellow ball into a weapon of terror. Getting caught near the net by one of these bloodthirsty macho people can cause a person to ball up into a fetal position in front of a few people or a thousand. It's an autonomic and instantaneous response and no one apologizes for it. In fact, for one not to retreat to that head and genital protective position would not be considered normal or smart. That cute fuzzy little ball, when compressed on one side by tightly wound nylon and a muscular madperson, can travel at speeds well over 100 mph! Fast enough to bring your voice up a few octaves. So it's either go fetal or risk having "Wilson" written permanently emblazoned somewhere on you!
I've also played with guys and girls that would only hit the ball successfully back, you know, like over the net and some modest distance beyond it, perhaps once every fifty or a hundred shots. I'm not sure why I tolerated the newbie guys but I'm certain I restrained my feelings for a lady or two because I had interests in them that had nothing to do with tennis. Guess that doesn't just apply to the ladies of tennis because women are more fun to watch doing, well, anything or even nothing. It's a magical thing.
Strong is the man or woman that remains polite when confronted with a severely talent challenged opponent on a tennis court.
In all honesty, in most of my matches, I was the one that had to be tolerated. That didn't stop me from throwing my racket in anger at a missed shot. It is amusing to observe people like me, that obviously suck out there, lose it when they don't make a shot that they couldn't make if they tried it a hundred times!! Those antics, I have learned, are all a part of the game or at least the modern game. You see, it's not entirely my fault because long before I learned the mechanics of the game, I perfected 'the tantrum' by watching McEnroe! The court decorum of the guys of the 50's and 60's like Rod Laver, Stan Smith and Ken Rosewall is considered corny now. But who knows, even big ties came back in style!
But the mechanics of the swing are almost as important as the whining and considerably more difficult to master because when your opponent hits it, it becomes return time. That's where things get tricky. An environmental and biological 'perfect storm' must occur for the rally to really be a rally. The ball, racket, body and arm have to all be in agreement at a perfectly synchronized moment in time, which in my case rarely happens. Even by accident! Particularly if the ball comes to my ...backhand.
The back hand. Just typing the word makes me freeze up. That demanding shot is the reason people drive down to the local tennis courts just to be entertained. It's an amazing demonstration of physical agility to watch how far people will go to run around that shot. People with otherwise little agility can perform amazing, if not so artful, maneuvers to make sure that ball arrives on the proper side.
The sight of a ball coming to the backhand side can induce great peril because the victim knows if he or she does not immediately make a major body change that rally is as good as over. Advantage opponent!
Generally the first reaction upon recognizing the ball is coming the wrong way is to utter a private 'sh....t' as you take off sprinting. Immediately the muscles you're going to need in a moment tense up, pretty much rendering them non-useable. Waiting on a ball to arrive that's coming to your backhand side, is the football equivalent of a field goal kicker knowing he has to kick the game winning field goal. It's a pressure packed moment and if your opponent discerns that you are particularly frightened and inept at performing it they will hit 99 out of 100 shots to that dysfunctional side or your body.
That might seem mean but it's all part of the game to capitalize on your opponents weaknesses. That's not to say that tennis players aren't mean. In fact tennis players can be the meanest of all the sports and that's including pro wrestling! So much so that it's always amazed me why they have that "love" thing in their score. It's surely there to misdirect to encourage girls to play. I've never explained tennis score keeping to a female that didn't say, ''aww that's so sweet, love'. There were certainly more tennis appropriate terms they could have chosen. Like "whine." You lose a point and you're down 'whine' 15. Maybe "bitch" and "complain" would fit as well. But love? I don't think so but if you do, then just check McEnroe out on You Tube! But send the kids outta the room first!
Sorry, I got side tracked... What I was pursuing up there, was in tennis, you have to chase down every ball no matter where it is, even if you can't reach it tennis etiquette requires you to give it all you've got. And if at some point you feel that you've satisfied the crowd with your effort to get to it you can either dive for it or do what I do, throw your racket at it. Thank heaven for metal rackets! All that of course is wasted energy and brutal. Now in basketball it aint like that.
Heck no, if the urge to take it easy hits you at any ol' time, you can simply stop and stand there. Yep. You can rest until the burn in your lungs subsides or until you can get your heart rate under control or started. Or take a moment to put a knee back in it's socket or tie a shoe or sign an autograph. All while the other 9 are busy doing other things. It's true. Just ask Kareem or Shaq.
So to me, tennis, at least in it's 'singles' format, is not inherently very age friendly. So to compete with shuffleboard and draw in the geriatric crowd, they modified things a bit. They said it's ok to bring more people out there with you. They called it 'doubles' and it completely changed everything. Instead of having to run, like in 'singles', in doubles you can stay in one place for the duration of the match. No need to bring extra shirts or sweatbands because sweating just does not occur.
It's even permissible to bring your favorite recliner out there, as long as it's not a grass court. Yeah, adding people to the tennis court changed everything. So where does an aging but not yet couch potatoed, sports person take his or her business. Perhaps the golf course?
Golf, so their brochure says, is considered by many to be very age friendly but I am here to challenge that propaganda. Golf, in fact might just be the most brutal of them all! Drudging up, over and down hills, wading thru snake and gator occupied lakes and creeks. All the while dodging misfired missiles on a battlefield 100 feet wide and 5 miles long. It's 4 hours of ever lurking danger and injury. Sounds like a day in the life of a marine in battle doesn't it? But it's all true. So much so, that it's my considered opinion that golf was invented long ago in Scotland by a struggling sports medicine doctor.
And the golf cart, which has not seen an advance in shock absorber technology since the horse and buggy days, I am certain it's design is endorsed by struggling Chiropractors everywhere.
If your back survives the cart ride, you can always get taken out just swinging that iron on a stick. Think about it. From a cold, very still position, the masochist must twist every piece of cartilage and sinew they've got, in one direction. Then at the appropriate moment, which for me is the point at which the pain has become unbearable, release all that coiled tissue at a speed which you now have no control over, toward the other direction. At that point the only thing that can prematurely interrupt the accelerating forces, is the ground, which can actually move upward during the downswing. Another thing that can stop a swing in motion is a concealed rock disguised by the course architect as soft soil. A tree trunk that moved when the ground moved is the most bone jarring of all swing stoppers. The last and most tolerable is a bikinied blond selling beer. That swing stopper is the only one I have not encountered. Figures!
Some would describe the game in more friendly terms but for me, I was as kind as I can be without turning this into fiction. Now your mileage may vary on how often you repeat that violent twist and scream but in my case it's about 120 times a round! All that, along with the green fees, equipment prices, golf lessons, bets lost, sports medicine, chiropractic pays and co-pays, all serves to surely make pro wrestling the better financial alternative. One speedo. What's that 10 bucks?!
Something I was just thinking about. You know those little paved roads that meander artfully through the golf course? Many believe they are there only for the golf carts. Yes, that is one function but they are also there to provide quick and unencumbered passage for emergency medical vehicles!! That's because of the dangers described above but also because golfers aren't...well, let me approach it like this...Do we all agree that golf isn't considered a 'real sport' by some folks?...oh ok, apparently we don't agree but I did say some folks, not me! But in some respects I can see their point.
Not that you don't have to have exceptional athletic skills or be mentally tough and you surely must practice as much, if not more than most sports. But there is a side of golf that the ambassadors of the sport don't like to talk about. A golfers body is.. how can I say this...is not the body we think of when we think 'Athenian athletic image'? How's that, delicate but true? Now like any rule there are exceptions, Tiger being one but the Craig Stadler's reflect the general population of hackers a whole lot better than Tiger or Couples or Seve.
Another thing that really puts the nail in the coffin, so to speak, is that it's a game that can be played about as well with or without a cigarette or an alcoholic beverage in your hand. And statistics have shown, mine at least, that beers consumed is inversely proportional to strokes, golf strokes that is! It is perhaps the most attractive aspect of the game. It seems to loosen the sinew a bit or deaden the pain. I don't really know what's going on metabolically but it does have the cumulative effect of making high scores, broke clubs, lightning and snake strikes and lost bets a little easier to handle.
That's easy to prove too. Just ask most any golfer, male or female, what their favorite hole is and if they are not in the company of their children or pastor they will tell you.. the 19th!
I guess all sports like Macs and PC's have their own unique followers. It's a beautiful thing too, in that we all come in so many shapes and sizes and possess such varied gifts and skills to apply them. And surely we all deserve a place where we can do our thing without wise guys like me making fun of them. But of course there will always be wise guys and if not me, there will be others. So let's just keep doing our thing and ignore the heclers in the cheap seats! Forget the women only spas or feeling like you have to get in shape before you join one. Or wearing a towel around your lower unit because it's not bikini or speedo ready. Do your silly looking stretches or jumping jacks proudly in the middle of the field or any darn place you want to. Join that team and take that jumper. Just get in the game. Nobody cares what you look like or gives a crap what you're doing, so...just do it!
Now compared to aging footballers, basketballers have it pretty good. We could retire on one level and move right into another level of organized ball. Heck, they've got leagues for guys in their 90's and that's just the youth league. Yeah and they all come with rules! and refs!
Well, because of my lack of conditioning and my concern for my guitar fingers I tried to make the transition wisely, so I had a couple of expectations for the league I would join. One was to pick one that afforded me the least opportunity to get hurt! And the other was the same as the first!! Ok, I know you golfers are jumpin' on that and I don't blame you but really people, that was important because I figured I had been so lucky to survive all these years of basketball and football with no broken nothins. That's from birth! Sure plenty of sprains, jams, cuts, contusions, abrasions, blisters, bruises but no breaks! And I aimed to keep it that way! Besides, in the past I was playing for a school, a cause, cheerleaders! but now I was playing for...health!! So it seemed consistent that limb protection would fall under the umbrella of my health concerns!
With my special demands, I thought it best I bypass AAU ball where competition was keen and broken limbs were injuries you played through. So I decided to join a... ok golfers have at me'... church league!! Yeah, same to ya!.. Easy Mike, never insult your audience!.. Yeah but did you hear what they ..I don't care get back to your story.
..Ahh sweet church league. Just the mention of it sets the mind to hearing violins and choirs of angelic voices emanating from the bleachers. Playing with and against God loving, Bible believing competition, it would be a breath of fresh air from the rough and tumble college ball I was retiring from. I had everything I needed. Good shoes, a good attitude, a beer gut, only problem was I didn't have what all the other church leagues guys had.. a church!
Now that posed a problem because at that time I wasn't a Christian and was quite uncomfortable in holy places, where the sun shined thru beautiful stained glass and the people in the pews knew when to sit, stand and bow without prompt. Where even the children knew all the songs and recitations by heart. Yes I did recall a few verses of " Jesus loves me" from mom singing to me in the cradle but really, I had to follow others to even get through that one.
So I began my church search and as I did I soon realized that I was looking for a church in a whole different way and for different reasons than others might. Normal people might be interested in asking the pastor whether their church believes that Christ is the son of God, or do they speak in tongues or believe in the rapture? But a non Christian basketball player has different concerns. Like how big is your gym? Do you have locker rooms, do players get a cut of the Sunday offering!? And the deal breaker for me.. does your team practice? I did not want to practice!! I wanted to play. I didn't really care all that much if we won even. I just wanted to play and laugh and listen to the angelic music and reconnect with the game that I used to love.
Well I picked my team or better put, I was drafted. Word had gotten out that a former college player was looking for a team and they started recruiting me. It was great. Got trips and cars and girls...ok I didn't get nothin' but a few phone calls but I still felt honored. It's funny but thinking back as I write this you'd have thought out of all the stuff they asked about my scoring and assist stats that maybe one recruiter would have asked if I was a Christian.. That turned out to be a very, very important point, for as you may recall, I specifically stated that I was joining to play with and against Christians!
Well apparently I was not the only one that didn't have to declare anything about being a Christian. Because it didn't take long before I was wishing that I was playing with the Saturday concussion gang! At least in football you know when the hit's coming, so you can do a little preparation, like sliding or juking. What's jukin you ask? Well, it's an old timey football term where you kinda wiggle your hips and the opponent is distracted by you wiggling your hips on a football field and you adroitly take advantage of the momentary seduction and zip around him, thereby, avoiding direct and intimate contact with him. Which I suppose is a good thing if he was bedazzled by your wiggling hips in the first place!
Where was I?.. oh yeah, first game. First of all, don't fool yourself, the word church in 'church league' is only relevant because that's where the games are played. Other than that, you would never associate 'Church' with anything that was happening on the hardwood and in front of preachers and women and children. Why? Because some of those guys on those teams were just plain sinners!! I tell you they were evil. They were the living and breathing reason why each church league player should have to sign a document that says they have given their life to Christ and because of that, will not bite, hold , stomp, butt, elbow, poke faces, eyes, noses or any open orifice! Now I ask you, is any of that behavior biblical!!?
Not that winning isn't biblical, I mean God doesn't advocate losing but the Lord is big on the rules of engagement and it was obvious that some of these guys were not into the 'love thy neighbor' or 'do unto others' message of all churches. Heck, even wiccans believed in those basics!! I would go further to suggest that their preferred philosophies were centered more around some deviant marriage between the martial arts and rugby!!
Now let me say here, because as you probably know by now I am a Christian and of course want to be fair when describing that time as accurately as possible, even though I didn't demonstrate the same generosity to golfers!! The truth is, that most of those guys were great, great, people but like in anything, as time goes by, you tend to recall the extremes of the past. Extremes defined as the beautiful and the horrible. For the moment I am describing the horrible but in a bit I'll give the beautiful some equal time...
So on with the horrible. Golfers, this is where you exact your revenge. There was one team that had plays. Not basketball plays like the rest of the free throw world, rather they had a variation on teamwork that was both corrupt and brilliant because at the proper time one guy would yell a code word, something like, Satan! And instead of doing something that had anything to do with the basketball and advancing it toward the basket, two or more players would slowly slide together and pin a predetermined victim, that we'll call, me!, between them under the basket. Now most of these guys were much older and with that, fatter. And I being skinny but for my thermometer looking gut, was no match for their heavy, jello-like bodies. Because of the anatomy differences, for a moment, I virtually disappeared from the sight of anyone on the court or stands but most importantly, the refs! Yes, I completely disappeared into the folds of aged and hairy fat and did not reappear for what seemed like minutes. And when the ordeal had passed I felt like Bill Murray, I'd been slimed! It was pure intimidation and had nothing to do with basketball. Evil I say!
There were no boos from the crowd because they surely must have thought I had stepped off the court, I mean, where else could I have been? All that aggression of course truly meriting a whistle but there was silence. My theory at the time was that the refs were paid off by the bishops but with the advantage of time I now believe it's because they were afraid of these guys. At some point a refs got to walk to his car in the night and surely must have feared a parking lot re-enactment of the slime play.
Well, I've had a little fun at the expense of church league bball of the past but I must say, just a few years ago I joined a team up in Tennessee that was that breath of fresh air I was looking for in my 20's. Yeah, no slime plays, guys would say nice shot, if it was. Even help you up when you fell but in my case they were rarely responsible for the fall for I could do that on my own for any number of reasons. But you can read more about that in 'the Butterfly story' if you aren't worn out by now or perhaps grossed out by the 'aged hairy fat' thing! Hey, sometimes you gotta throw a little imagery in there that makes a reader think 'ewweew'.
It was 30 years after my first church league experience that I played for that team in Tennessee. At the end of the games, when the two teams might shake hands at midcourt,...these guys knelt, held hands and prayed together. The beautiful side of ' church league'!!