He stands at midcourt, waiting for me to come up to him. Dribbling the basketball between his legs and doing some of his “trademark” tricks, I keep my eyes on the ball at all times and remain undaunted as I approach him.
“Quit playing, and let’s go already!” his teammate yells at him.
The scattered spectators along the court have already begun to leave. The coach sits on the sidelines and tosses his clipboard down onto the side, crossing his arms, yawning. On the sidelines for two hours already, he is bored out of his mind, but the current commotions on the court draw his attention back into the game. Seeing his star point guard unsuccessfully harassing me, he picks up the clipboard and scrambles to find my name and picture.
Unwavering from his task, the guard picks up his speed of his dribbles and he prepares to attack. He jogs up to me and crosses over, and that’s when I make my move.
My fingers nip the smooth surface of the ball as it passes by me. It hangs in the air for a split second, but by then he has already moved away too far to maintain his handle. He lets out a silent gasp, and I grab the ball and sprint down the other end of the court, all alone for a wide open layup.
I gently tap the ball against the glass, banking it. It whirls around the rim, and to my disappointment and everyone else’s surprise, it rolls out. The coach chuckles to himself and puts down his clipboard again. The game continues but it doesn’t really have any impact on him whatsoever. I vow to myself never to play basketball again.
***
“Dude, come on, it‘ll be fun!”
“Yeah, man, what do you got to lose?”
“Imagine how cool you would be if you got on. ‘Hi, I’m Simon Man. I’m on the bowling team!’”
I had to find another sport. I want to be one of those athletic guys who make the headlines in the school newspaper every other week for their life-defining accomplishments, not because they missed an open layup at the JUNIOR varsity basketball tryouts. With my friends badgering me about the upcoming tryouts in two weeks, I play around with the idea. I know I’m going to go. It was just the matter of the reason of why I would go. Should I try out just for the fun of it? Or should I really brush up and prepare for some intense competition at the tryouts?
“Oh, by the way, we’re heading to the alley this weekend. There’s a tournament for $500. $1 buy-in. How about it? You can brush up on your skills.”
Now I know what I’m going to do.
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