Ether

Four years into coaching I still don't know how to respond when a player tells me that his mother is a crackhead. I end up saying something like, "I'm sorry to hear that", but I usually come away feeling like something more heartfelt was needed in that moment. Like most listeners I tend to feel like I have to heal a twenty-year wound instantly, as if some clever quote (or hug) can really heal a deep rooted issue that quickly. Experience has taught me that the best way to respond is by simply listening.

During practice, I noticed Lebraun was out of it. His practice was going so poorly that he lost to the slowest guy on the team in a one-on-one suicide competition. Not realizing he was dealing with some heavy stuff, I started to get annoyed and he could sense it. Eventually, Lebraun asked to talk to me about what was weighing on him so heavily.

Lebraun: Coach, I'm not really into this today. Sorry. It's just I got a lot on my mind.
Me: What's wrong?
Lebraun: For Christmas my dad gave me $200 and I decided to buy a necklace for my mom with it even though he told me not to.
Me: Why'd he tell you not to do it?
Lebraun: He was like don't give her no money cuz she gonna buy stuff with it.
Me: So you chose to buy her a necklace instead. What's the problem then?
Lebraun: (his eyes growing red) I found out earlier that she sold the necklace for crack.
Me: Damn. Serious, man?
Lebraun: Yeh. She tried to sell it to my cousin who sells and he told me.
Me: I'm sorry to hear that.
Lebraun: I been tryin to get to know her my whole life but she been heavy into crack.
Me: You didn't grow up with her?
Lebraun: Nah. I grew up wit my dad, but me and him ain't really get along like that.
Me: Why not?
Lebraun: It always felt like he'd choose his girlfriends over me.

The A-Team

Anything is possible! Kevin Garnett infamously exclaimed this phrase after he got the "bully off his back" in 2008 when the Celtics won their 17th NBA title. It was the pinnacle of Garnett's Hall of Fame career. KG solidified himself as one of the all-time great power forwards once the buzzer sounded to end Game 6 and he hoisted the Larry O'Brien trophy for the world to see. Despite having never won a championship as a Head Coach, I've had a couple of these KG moments where I have truly felt like "anything is possible."

One of the most difficult personalities I've ever had to work with is Lanky. Authority doesn't exist in his world. He's stubborn as heck and is one of the cockiest guys I've ever coached. Despite all of this, it's very clear that he comes from solid stock. As a result of this, through the bad times I kept the faith that at some point I could possibly break through to him. Last season, on a team where our leading scorer had a 2.2 GPA, Lanky posted a 1.9 GPA. At one point, he had even told me that school wasn't for him.

When he decided to return for a second season, I had a strong sense that he would emerge as our "leader" this season. With that in mind, I spent a lot of time this past summer talking to him (and other returning players) about the importance of strong leadership. I explained that incoming players are usually followers, and that it was incumbent upon the four second year players to create a winning atmosphere. During one exchange, he expressed strong reservations about taking on the role I was asking of him.

Lanky: The role you're asking me to play ain't easy.
Me: Why's that? It's who you are. You're a fearless guy. Your teammates look up to you.
Lanky: Yeh but that's during games.
Me: If you're a leader during games, you can be a leader in practice and in other ways too. That character trait doesn't just come and go.
Lanky: I hear you, but I'm just not comfortable speaking up to dudes when stuff is going wrong in practice.
Me: Why?
Lanky: They're gonna think i'm a suck up, like I'm kissing the coach's ass.

He finished the semester as our leading scorer and rebounder (18.2 ppg, 9.5 rpg). He also had a 2.85 GPA, the highest in his three semesters with me thus far. His teammates, many of whom came in with sub 2.0 GPAs from high school, fell in line with a cumulative 2.67 as a group.

Le-Naissance

I have witnessed one of the most amazing turnarounds in my coaching career this season. This change has nothing to do with a comeback victory, or our team's record. I got a chance to witness the evolution of a young man I initially deemed to be unfit for our basketball team.

I've suspended quite a few guys over the years for not meeting my expectations academically. Lebraun, 21, is an example of this. After he took the college placement test and placed into remedial Math and English, I encouraged him to visit the Math Center regularly for help--especially since he had trouble completing a simple algebra problem in my office. He went once. A month into the school year, Lebraun had Fs in all but one class. He didn't have books for his classes either. I gave him a week to make assignments up in order to stay on the team. The assignments weren't completed. As a result, he was suspended for three weeks along with a teammate who was also failing miserably.

When mid-term grades came out, I was surprised to see that Lebraun had pulled his grades up enough to warrant another chance. The other suspended teammate continued to flounder. I still had doubts about Lebron's attitude towards academics despite this turnaround. Lebraun's grades were the first to be released this week. I was floored when I saw his academic report.

Writing B, Reading B+, College Readiness B+, Computer Info Systems C-
Cumulative GPA: 2.85

Seeing this report took me back to something Lebraun said during a bus ride out to an away game in Connecticut.

Lebraun: This is still a shock to me.
Me: What's a shock to you?
Lebraun: All of this. I'm on a team. I always wanted to be on a team, and I'm finally getting a chance.

Take Home Final

This, here, is an excerpt from a take home final that was taken by a Bubblee, Lanky. He was given a week to answer a series of questions related to investments, mortgages, interest rates, bank accounts, and other related material in his course on Personal Finance.

VII. Investments
a) Describe your risk type or risk tolerance in relationship to investments.

Lanky's answer
I don’t  believe in hitting women but I also don’t want them to hit me so I’d rather leave the house so I can cool down and then talking about the situation when everything is calm and ready to be talk bout.


I was horrified when I read that. I thought for sure that he would fail the course since he had a "D" before this awful submission. To my great surprise, he earned a C- for the course.

Business Asspirations

Some people will do anything to make a buck. That's the nature of living in a "dog eat dog" world, especially one that is growing increasingly absent of any conversation about morality. It's absolutely normal to rip people off, or take advantage of them. Used car salesmen sell people "lemons" without thinking about it; just as auto mechanics lie about car parts that don't really need to be replaced. These underlings simply reflect the behaviors of the upper echelon, namely Senators who vote yes or no on measures that destroy individuals and families just to keep their rich corporate friends happy.

Bubblees are not devoid of ambition. As a matter of fact, they often get into trouble because they have too much of it. Your average person accepts the notion of climbing up the proverbial ladder over time. Bubblees want the glory to come about overnight--literally. I'm still figuring out why things have to occur so quickly for them, but that's just the way of life in "the Bubble."

Flash was one of the smartest Bubblees I ever encountered. It actually took a long time for me to place him in "the Bubble" because he could hold a lengthy intelligent conversation with me, and he rarely said anything that sounded ultra delusional. He made sense to me most of the time. I once sent him off to dine with the Dean of Admissions at a major University because I trusted that he could hold his own--and he did! During one of our initial conversations, Flash shared some of his long term goals with me.

Me: So why do you want to major in Economics?
Flash: See. I got this whole plan, right.. I wanna major in Economics to learn how the economy works so that when I become a businessman I could do my thing right.
Me: Economics? Wow. You good at math?
Flash: I've never struggled with it.
(He placed into remedial math.)
Me: What kind of business do you wanna run?
Flash: I don't know if I could tell you all that. I know how you be thinkin.' You gonna get it all twisted.
Me: You told me about your plans to rob Walgreens and I didn't flip so I don't see how this could be any worse than that.
Flash: True. Aiight. How do I put this? There are a lot of beautiful, talented women in the hood who ain't doin nothin',
Me: Yeh.
Flash: I figure why not take advantage of that and open up a chain of strip clubs in the hood. 

Naked Gun

A month ago Lebraun missed practice after he was pulled over by the police. Other than the fact that he was speeding, I'm still not totally clear on what happened for him to miss a two hour practice. In my own experience(s) of being stopped, the whole episode has not lasted for more than twenty minutes. Maybe it's because as a black man, who has followed quite a few cases on police brutality, I know not to reach for my wallet (or anything else for that matter) during a traffice stop. I also know that I should raise my voice an octave so I don't seem like the ordinary black dude. To date, I haven't tasted the pavement yet or gotten a plunger lodged in my asshole so I must be doing something right.

As I've said in earlier posts, Bubblees and drama are like milk and cookies. You can't find one without the other. Lebraun's most recent story typifies this. After the whole episode of being pulled over for two hours, he found himself in another jam. Last night he called to let me know about something that happened before he got to campus yesterday. He wanted to let me know beforehand just in case the "dees" came asking questions about him.

Lebraun: Ay coach, man, I need to let you know somethin..
Me: Is this about your sister again? What happened with her and homeboy, by the way?
Lebraun: Oh yeh. She ain't seein him no mo. She put a restraining order on him. I listened to you. I ain't go after him that day cuz I figure she just gonna go back to him anyway.
Me: Good thinking. What's going on?
Lebraun: Well, I was up by these projects chillin before practice and these girls kept laughin about somethin.
Me: Okay
Lebraun: And so I was like, what are y'all laughin at. Lemme know what's so funny and they wouldn't say nothin, but one of them mentioned a black bag.
Me: Okay.
Lebraun: Yeh so they kept laughin and snickerin then all of a sudden, the dees should up.
Me: I'm following.
Lebraun: So when the dees showed up they went and picked up this black bag and started askin me questions.
Me: Why'd they question you because of a random black bag?
Lebraun: I was thinkin the same thing, but they went through my record and all. They wanted to know if the black bag was mine and I told em no. I told em I was playin ball at QCC so when they ain't find nothin they just lemme go.
Me: What was in the black bag?
Lebraun: A big ass shotgun!!

Cruise Control

Stress subtracts years from an individual's life. I have no scientific evidence to support this, but this is a theory I've heard repeatedly over the years. My thoughtful nature leads me to believe that this is a plausible notion. On the other hand, however, I feel like stress plays an integral part in our lives. A life without challenges would be pretty dull in my estimation. There are days where I feel like overcoming stress is our reason for being.

Consider the story of Jesus Christ, for example. His claim to fame is a thorough beatdown that culminated in a stressful public execution. After being subjected to this painful series of events, he "rose again on the third day" and ascended into heaven to sit at the right hand of the Father. For me, Jesus' story is about the human spirit and the internal mechanism we have to overcome some of the darkest situations we encounter in life. Jesus would still be amazing to us today given all the stories about the miracles he performed, but he probably wouldn't have been immortalized the same way had he not been equipped to overcome His darkest hours. 

Bubblees, on the other hand, don't believe in overcoming challenges. People like Lanky are firmly of the mindset that stress subtracts years from your life. As such, he avoids stress at all costs. He's 20 years old and has no children. Lanky doesn't have a car either. He lives with his mother and is not expected to contribute to rent or utilities. His grade point average, despite his idle time and taking three remedial classes for the second straight semester, is hovering around a 2.0.

Me: Have you ever had a job?
Lanky: Yes
Me: where?
Lanky: I worked with my uncle over the summer doing work as a carpenter.
Me: This was just a summer job, though.
Lanky: Yeh.
Me: What's the longest you've held any other job for?
Lanky: 4 months
Me: Where?
Lanky: TJ Maxx
Me: You're gonna need to work a job for more than 4 months to build your resume.
Lanky: Yeh. I know. I don't need all that stress, though.
Me: What stress?
Lanky: Come on now. How do you expect me to go to school, play ball, and work?

SLAM!!!

The mind is capable of crippling the body. One morning, you might wake up feeling like Superman has NOTHING on you! That newfound bravado could result in your crippled body sprawled on the pavement in front of your house. Reality says you aren't a bird, or a plane. You aren't faster than a speeding bullet either. In this case, your mind would have literally turned you into an invalid or a dead man because you lost sight of your limitations.

Before our third home game this year, I was informed by my Assistant Coach that we picked up a technical foul because a player attempted to dunk the ball during pre-game warm-ups. It's considered taunting to dunk before the game. Initially, I thought a certain hard-headed individual on my team was the violator, but it turned out to be somebody else much to my surprise. Right before tip-off I asked the referee who did it and he pointed to Lebraun. I was furious.

Beyond the fact that we were giving this very competitive team a point to start the game because a player decided to ignore a widely known rule, I was angry because Lebraun can't even dunk. I couldn't wrap my mind around how a guy who clearly has no hops at 6'4 would do something so stupid before a game. In response to the technical foul, I decided to bench him for the game (not that he would've played anyway).

After the game, a 69-62 loss, he texted me some of his frustrations.

Lebraun: I feel like you don't trust me.
Me: What?
Lebraun: You don't think I could get the job done out there. Gimme a chance, coach.
Me: We need to talk tomorrow about the stupid technical foul you picked up before the game.
Lebraun: I ain't get a tech. What you mean?
Me: The ref told me you were trying to dunk before the game even after he warned you. You can't even dunk!
Lebaun: What? Yeh I can. Just cuz you ain't seen me dunk yet don't mean I can't dunk.
Me: Oh yeh? I'll talk to you tomorrow

I gave Lebraun the ball after practice the next day and told him to show me he could dunk, or he would have to run around the entire campus. He missed all three attempts. As a matter of fact, he wasn't even close. I thought this was an open and shut case.

A month later, while we were working on a last second alley-oop play from out-of-bounds during practice, guess who asked if he could be considered an option to catch a dunk at the rim? Just to prove a point, I decided to experiment with him. Two passes were thrown his way right at the mouth of the rim, and as expected, he caught more of the net than he did the rim.

Big Bang Theory

Size is overrated. Basketball coaches gush over players who are tall, long, and athletic. You could be as dumb as a brick if you have those traits going for you in most basketball circles. Most coaches believe you could teach a lot of things--like how to rebound, score around the basket, shoot, dribble, pass, and everything else that comes with being a skilled basketball player. Size, they contend, cannot be taught.

My first test case was Smokey, a 6'8 300 plus pound monster who got his nickname for obvious reasons. He was obese, but he had basketball skill. When Smokey appeared in the gym out of nowhere, it's almost like I saw gold land on my doorstep. I watched him play a game of pick-up with some friends and he didn't look all that bad. I tried to ignore the fact that Smokey panted through non-strenous pick-up games and only took 20 foot jump shots at his size. In five minutes I determined he would be my first project.

As expected, he didn't pass my conditioning run of ten fullcourt sprints in a minute for big men. He couldn't even do six of them. (Note: A first grader could probably do six fullcourt sprints in a minute.) I let him on the team anyway. At 6'8, I felt like Smokey was a drop-step away from being the league's most dominant big man.

Unfortunately, his foot work was horrible. If he had to run a zig-zag to dodge a shooter's bullets, he'd die within seconds. This wasn't his only drawback as a ball player. Smokey also had the basketball IQ of a grape. He couldn't learn basic play patterns like pass, screen away despite two hours of daily repetition for a straight month.

My excitement about the possibilities lead me to dumb everything down on offense, but he had to at least be able to defend. At 6'8, all he had to do was put his hands up around the basket to be effective. Unfortunately, he couldn't remember to do that ninety percent of the time. He also had an aversion to jumping. Smokey was the first guy I ever coached who was afraid to jump. I'm convinced he thought his knees would shatter or something.

As you might expect, he didn't play much to begin the season. I explained to Smokey that he had a very prolonged learning curve to go through before he could play much, if at all. He told me he understood. I was pleasantly surprised when Smokey approached me to talk about his role on the team.

Smokey: We need to talk.
Me: What's up?
Smokey: (angrily) I don't understand!
Me: What don't you understand?
Smokey: I don't get why I'm not playing!
Me: (shocked) uhh... umm. I thought we talked about this before the season started. I told you not to expect much playing time. 
Smokey: Yeh, but I didn't think it would be this long.
Me: We've played two games.
Smokey: I'm sayin, though! I could ball! Give me a chance!
Me: How?!?!? YOU DON'T KNOW ANY OF THE DAMN PLAYS!